Air Force Removes Officer Overseeing Nuclear Missile Replacement Program

The U.S. Department of Defense wants to replace the Minuteman 3 Intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM), here in training launch tube at Minot Air Force Base, N.D., in 2014, with the LGM-35 Sentinel. Charlie Riedel / AP

The U.S. Air Force has removed the officer leading the development of the newest land-based U.S. intercontinental ballistic missile, known as the LGM-35 Sentinel.

Air Force Col. Charles Clegg assumed leadership of the Sentinel Systems Directorate in July of 2022, the program to replace the LGM-30 Minuteman III intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM).

“The Air Force Nuclear Weapons Center Commander [Maj. Gen. John Newberry] removed the Sentinel Systems Director [Col. Clegg] from his position on June 24th due to a loss of confidence in his ability to lead the directorate,” Air Force spokeswoman Ann Stefanek confirmed in an emailed statement to The Epoch Times on June 26.

Ms. Stefanek said Col. Clegg was removed “because he did not follow organizational procedures.”

She did not provide additional details about the colonel’s ouster but said he will be reassigned and the Air Force is still working through the details of his next assignment.

The Sentinel missile has been in development for years but has be subject to delays and cost overruns.

A program review undertaken under the Nunn–McCurdy provision of the 1982 National Defense Authorization Act concluded in January that the Sentinel program costs had grown to more than $125 billion, overshooting previous program cost estimates by about 37 percent.

The program office also pushed back its estimated completion for its first Sentinel warhead from fiscal year 2025 to fiscal year 2027; a delay which a Government Accountability Office review concluded would likely conflict with plans to begin fielding these new ICBMs by 2030.

Ms. Stefanek said the decision to remove Col. Clegg from the Sentinel program was “not directly related to the Nunn-McCurdy review.”

“In no way does this removal impact our operational Minuteman III ICBM force. It remains our nation’s safe, secure, and effective nuclear deterrent, just as it has been without interruption for the past six decades,” the spokeswoman said.

The Minuteman III fleet consists of around 400 missiles currently in service, according to an Air Force fact sheet. The Minuteman I missiles first entered service in the 1960s and have seen periodic modernization efforts, with the third iteration in the ICBM series entering service in 1970, with production for the Minuteman IIIs ending in 1978.

The U.S. military is also working to modernize its nuclear bomber aircraft with the development of new B-21 Raider stealth bombers, and Columbia-class ballistic missile submarines. These efforts, combined with the Sentinel program, seek to modernize the land, sea, and air components of the U.S. nuclear triad at the same time.