Air Force Seeks New Land-Based and Air-Launched Nukes … Advancing what could become a near-total rebuild of the U.S. nuclear weapons arsenal, the Air Force … solicited industry proposals to build a new fleet of land-based nuclear missiles as well as replacements for its air-launched nuclear cruise missile force.  The two projects are part of a broader modernization of the nuclear arsenal expected to cost hundreds of billions of dollars over 30 years. –AP/ABC

At the same time as the Pentagon's ability to audit its spending, HERE, is still in shambles, the US military-industrial complex seeks a cool trillion dollars to modernize virtually America's  entire nuclear force.

This ABC article, above, calls the upgrade one that could cost "hundreds of billions." But other estimates put the estimates far higher than that. A lot can happen in 30 years, after all.

The Pentagon may be purposefully downplaying costs, in our view. It's probably under pressure from the larger military-industrial complex to get the funds moving.

Apparently, Congress is not going to stand in the way. And why should it? There's plenty of cash to go around.

But somebody should ask some tough questions before the US commits to spending another trillion or two on $400,000 helmets, HERE, and complex, next-generation, nuclear weapons.

We've been running a series of articles questioning aspects of the Pentagon's nuclear program and of nuclear weapons in general. We don't want to deny that nuclear weapons exist, (or that man went to the moon) because we would like to preserve some level of viability for the civil society we grew up with. But we're not alone in voicing doubts about the narrative. A growing number of Youtube videos bear witness to a necessary, ongoing and growing skepticism.

We recently discovered videos HERE and HERE that described Operation Sailor Hat. This test was apparently comprised of  a series of three 500-ton conventional TNT explosions near Hawaii in mid-1965. It was designed to test the blast resistance of Navy ships in the advent of a tactical nuclear strike. This is similar to the Baker test off Bikini Atoll in 1946 that we wrote about yesterday, HERE.

Interestingly, if you use enough conventional explosives, you can create something that looks a lot like a mushroom cloud upon detonation.

Depending on how big the explosion is, you can get significant A-bomb shaped results. See some videos of large conventional TNT or dynamite explosions HERE and HERE.

Did some of the Pentagon's nuclear tests involve massive amounts of conventional explosives rather than "atoms"? Sorry to admit we're generally suspicious of the Pentagon's nuclear test films. We've yet to find a single Youtube video that looks completely legit. HERE is a skeptical video about these tests, and HERE.

Apparently, a secret animation division housed in San Fernando's Lookout Mountain, HERE, supervised the film production for the Pentagon's nuke blasts. We recently interviewed a water technologist Anders Björkman, HERE, who believes that nukes are a sham from beginning to end and has a website HERE explaining why.

Nonetheless, the plans put forward by the US military-industrial complex are ambitious and wide-scale, indeed. To keep citizens safe, a comprehensive upgrade is demanded. The upgrade involves all three nuclear "legs" –  submarines, long-range bombers and land-based missiles

The Air Force has moved the most quickly, asking its contractors to present proposals to upgrade bombers and the Minuteman 3 intercontinental ballistic missiles, or ICBMs.

The idea is to replace all 450 deployed Minuteman 3 ICBMs, beginning in 2027 for an estimated cost is $62.3 billion. The Air Force also wants a new-generation nuclear cruise missile so it can remove its AGM-86B cruise missile deployed early in the 1980s.

The Navy wants brand-new nuclear-missile submarines at a cost that will probably match or exceed anything the Air Force desires.

Daryl Kimball, executive director of the Arms Control Association, is quoted by the ABC article as saying the Pentagon's requests are financially unsustainable.

"The Air Force could save billions by refurbishing and extending the life of the existing Minuteman 3 well beyond 2030 rather than building a completely new and more deadly missile … The Air Force does not need a costly new and more capable nuclear-armed cruise missile, especially if the new long-range penetrating bomber is truly penetrating. We are seeing a return to the days of nuclear excess and overkill."

He's probably right about that. Even a trillion will be far too low for such a massive rebuild.

But based about what we can tell regarding such programs, it's about time top mainstream reporters asked some hard questions.

They can begin with Hiroshima and the missing squadron we've identified that might have been secretly guided to Hiroshima to bomb the city, HERE.

And then they can ask about Crawford Sams who ran the Atomic Bomb Casualty Commission in Japan and claimed that the Pentagon drastically exaggerated the destruction to Hiroshima and Nagasaki. (Transcript HERE.)

They should also ask about the Bikini Island tests and why some of the filming looks unconvincing (in our view). They should ask about other Pentagon nuke-tests films (see skeptics above) that seem to show elements of military fakery when it comes to A-bomb testing.

There has been surprisingly little Fourth Estate investigation into nuclear weapons. From the very beginning, the Pentagon set the rules for how its nuclear program should be covered and even who would write about it.

For years, it utilized a single reporter, William Laurence, HERE, to write up the "news" it wanted to present to the public. Eventually, Laurence was secretly put on the Pentagon's payroll.

In some sense, the situation doesn't seem much better today. The mainstream media simply seems to accept what the Pentagon tells them about nukes. This includes the way they work, their necessity and importantly, their cost.

There are "narrative" difficulties with nuclear weapons as the traditional, approved, history portrays them. Interestingly, the same difficulties seem to afflict the tale of some of NASA's incredible achievements.