Resolved: The USFG should eliminate its nuclear armed ICBM force

THOERY: Con should defend a single and consistent advocacy. Con has advocated a counterplan (CP), so he should be bound to defend that counterplan throughout this debate because:a) It’s unfair to allow Con to shift his advocacy. If Con can change his CP he can just shift the goalposts in resonse to all my arguments.b) Pro has to defend a single position- the Resolution. It’s only fair the Con do the samec) Con has last speech. If he is allowed to shift his advocacy he could do so in the final round and I have no way of responding.d) Multiple positions is a time skew. I’m going to spend this whole round attacking his CP; if he shifts his advocacy he will invalidate my entire R2 without doing any work.e) Allowing Con to to defend multiple contradictory advocacies promotes lazy and intellectually dishonest debating. In choosing to advocate a CP, Con has forfeited his right to defend the status quo. Perm the CP: Do both - the CP is not mutually exclusive to the Rez. We can eliminate ICBM and forego LSR-B research while maintaining sufficient nuclear deterence with subs and our existing bomber force. The CP therefore does not prove we shouldn’t do the Resolution. DA1: Conventional Military Power The primary function of the heavy bombers the LRS-B will replace is conventional warfare. B-52s etc play are crucial to deterring military aggression- they have historically been deployed to Asia in response to crises. Bombers serve a key role in conventional warfare, as they did in Iraq and Afghaistan Conventional military power is more crucial to deterring conflict and upholding security agreements such as with NATO. Conventional power is what we actually use when we flex our muscles and engage in hard diplomacy. We must prioritize our conventional arsenal over our nuclear arsenal. Experts question the reliability of our existing bomber fleet- much of which is over 50 years old. Without the LRS-B, the US will rely on a decaying bomber fleet with no plan for replacement. Given the recent shift in US strategy to a focus on the Asia Pacific and the aggressive modernization efforts of Russia and China, foregoing upgrading our bomber fleet seriously jeopardizes US security. The impact is regional and global conflict and the collapse of the global economy: “...navigation and access to the South China Sea is...vital to the economy of every nation in North America and East Asia. More than half of the world’s shipping passes through the South China Sea .. Any attempt to restrict universal access to this maritime common could impact the security, political stability, and economic prosperity of the United States... Long-range bombers, conducting maritime reconnaissance and capable of anti-shipping operations, could actively and passively maintain situational awareness of the vast Asia-Pacific maritime region. “ [11] http://fas.org... It’s taken years to get the ball rolling on planning for the LRS-B and it will take decades until it is operational. If we wait until our bomber force falls apart, we will go decades militarily crippled. DA2: Politics Extend my [4] that nuclear modernization was key to getting domestic support for the New Start treaty. By foregoing LRS-B, Con reneges on the promise of modernization, crippling future efforts at arms agreements as right-wing hawks will remember this betrayal. C1) ICBM Solvencya) Pro misrepresents my source by excluding follow-on missile programs, the cost of replacement ICBM shown in Figure 10, and the ICBM contribution to the $350 billion NNSA cost. Even so, if ICBM only accounted for a one-fourth cost reduction the savings are still massive. ICBM will cost hundreds of billions we don’t have over the next 30 years.b) Con claims we can exclude the cost of the follow-on missile program, but the program is the planned replacement of our ICBM. The government is committed to the program so the cost is real- its money the government WILL try to spend. Without the follow on program all ICBM go offline in 2030 with no replacement missiles. This is exactly the “unplanned disarmament” I talk about in my C1.c) Con’ CBO source notes that the follow-on program is a real cost that the study hasnt accounted for; modernization is a real cost of the ICBM program: “For this study, CBO assumed that DoD would develop a new silo-based missile... Design of that missile would need to begin around 2018 to ensure that the new missile was available by 2030” d. Con’s CBO source [2], by its own admission, underestimates savings: “ the potential savings in life-cycle costs from eliminating a leg of the triad (and the associated military personnel) would probably be higher than the costs shown in this report, because the 10-year period examined here does not capture the full cost of modernizing nuclear forces.” CP Solvency:a) Con doesn’t specify what “substantially” means, so I will assume he means the planned reduction from 94 to 60 bombers under new START. These savings are already accounted for in my [1]; his only savings come from eliminating the LRS-B.b) Con’s savings will be far less than Pro’s because he retains the majority of the bomber program. As his own CBO source [2] says: “Because of fixed costs for infrastructure and other factors, a partial reduction in the size of the force from cuts to any of the current systems that make up the nuclear triad would be likely to result in cost savings that were proportionally less than the relative reduction in the force.” c) Con’s plan results in less than half the savings of Pro, assuming he saves $100 billion from the LRS-B and I save 25% of $1 trillion. C2a. While other organizations have “bad apples” the Air Force has a systemic problem: “Unlike the Air Force, which continues to make headlines for cheating scandals related to the network of nuclear intercontinental ballistic missiles, Navy cheating on this scale has been rare and isolated to ongoing qualifications underway” [12] http://news.usni.org... b. The ICBM force faces unique morale problems. Officers have lost faith in their leaders, internal studies showed that many officers wished they could transfer to other Air Force divisions, and many believe Air Force leadership intentionally de-emphasized training for the ICBM program. Cross apply my argument that these problems exist at all levels at leadership; this isnt just a few bad apples. My evidence is all unique to ICBM. [13] http://www.military.com... c. Pro says it is nearly impossible for a terrorist to break into a silo- but cross apply my evidence that a GANG LEADER had access to ICBM silos. A man trafficking in drugs and sex rings could allow unsavory characters access to secure areas. d. Con is sticking his head in the sand. The litany of disciplinary problems in the ICBM program are exactly the sort of warning signs we can’t ignore. These problems show a deterioration of the force, making the past 70 years irrelevant. e. The Air Force doesn’t want nuclear certification for the LRS-B because it's expensive, this proves lack of commitment to the nuclear mission. This doesn’t at all prove that the unique security deficiencies of ICBM also exist for our bomber force. f. This entire argument cross-applies to my C3. The deficiencies in the ICBM force also undermine its effectiveness- it doesn’t matter how many missiles we have if they are chronically mismanaged. C3 1. Extend my analysis that the primary goal of our nuclear force is deterring nuclear war. This is accomplished by any credible second-strike ability; if the enemy believes we have the ability to retaliate MAD will prevent a first strike.2. Con’s arguments about a post-nuclear war world are absurd. We shouldn’t base our national security decisions on the outside chance that the US isn’t completely annihilated in a nuclear war. Our overwhelming priority is the prevention of nuclear and conventional war.3. All we can do is make wild guesses about the outcome of all out nuclear war. These predictions aren’t credible enough to weigh against immediate considerations like the balance of power between the US and Russia.4. Extend my R3 analysis that SLBM give adequate nuclear response capability.5. Con’s scenerios all end with a new arms race- we can re-think ICBM then. Con’s Case: R1 a) Con’s own analysis shows SLBM are an adequate deterrent- by his math even in the worst case scenario of 5 submarines getting hit at port, we would have almost 900 nukes available for retaliation. This is in addition to any surviving bomber force. These numbers demonstrate that subs have high survivability. b) Existing and new bombers also offer a hedge against anti-sub warfare- a two legged nuclear force is adequate. R2 ICBM acting as a buffer is a ridiculous argument. a) Any attack on the US would include both silos and sub ports and air-bases. The High Value targets Con discusses will be attacked first no matter what. b) ICBM ensure that any nuclear war will require a huge number of nuclear weapons, increasing the environmental impact of war. The carpet bombing required to attack 450 missile silos would create devastating destruction to the US even if the bombs don’t hit cities. This means that the a nuclear war in a world with ICBM is much worse than in a world without. [14] http://www.theguardian.com... R3 a) Turn: ICBM as post-war reserves is a security risk. If society collapses, the LAST thing we want is unsecured nuclear weapons. The geographic distribution and large number of ICBM means they will be difficult to secure in a post-war environment, making them vulnerable to theft or hijacking by terrorist. b) The post-war scenario is unrealistic. First, nukes make no sense as a weapon against an occupying power. Second, there is no reason to believe a crippled nuclear weapons stockpile would not swing the balance of power back to the US.