The intriguing longer-term question is whether to combine this weapons modernisation with the fundamental rethinking of the armed forces' task that the Clinton administration hesitated to carry out in the 1990s.The cost of the new weapons is immense.
But the biggest reform was a ten-year weapons-modernisation programme launched in 2010, at a cost of $720 billion.
That is because supercomputers can figure out problems even with proven designs that had testers puzzled.Mr Bush now wants to ask Congress for more money to carry on a proposed weapons-modernisation plan.
The nuclear non-proliferation treaty conference, meeting in Vienna in the first half of this month, also gave strong indications of the concern of much of the international community about the modernisation of nuclear weapons systems and the failure to make progress towards nuclear disarmament, as required by the treaty.
The committee duly blessed the treaty in September by a solid bipartisan majority of 14-4 and sent it to the full Senate for ratification.John Kyl, the minority whip, expressed a few reservations about the administration's modernisation programme for nuclear weapons.
On Sunday, New York senator Charles Schumer called for legislation to make building a gun with a 3D printer illegal, and said he and the New York congressman Steve Israel would introduce the Undetectable Firearms Modernisation Act, which would ban weapons like Wilson's.
And the labs have other ways to extend the life of existing weapons.Keen to avoid the impression that their modernisation plans could spark a new arms race, administration officials point out that Russia, China, Britain and France all have their own modernisation efforts planned or under way.
Instead China put its efforts into affordable "asymmetric" weapons.Special report Brushwood and gall The fourth modernisation Less biding and hiding In the balance Friends, or else Strategic reassurance Sources & acknowledgmentsReprintsThis unorthodox strategy has made the PLA's progress harder to measure.
Meanwhile, the weapons Britain does keep, as before, will need periodic modernisation to improve safety and reliability.
A worry for Western observers of Russia's military modernisation is the frequent reference to nuclear weapons by Russian officials.
