Cruise control

TWENTY-FIVE years ago, television viewers around the world were introduced to America’s cruise-missile technology. As journalists stood filing their reports from the roof of the Al Rashid hotel in Baghdad, Tomahawk missiles were caught on camera sweeping through the city’s streets on their way to targets struck with uncanny accuracy. Designed at the height of the cold war as a nuclear missile, subsequently armed with a conventional warhead, the Tomahawk has been in the vanguard of most American air campaigns since the first Gulf war. Yet plans to develop a successor, the long-range stand-off missile (LRSO), before the old ones are retired in 2030—part of the Obama administration’s plan to overhaul America’s nuclear deterrent over the next 30 years at a cost of $1 trillion—are now under attack.

William Perry (defence secretary from 1994 to 1997, in charge of developing the air-launched cruise missile at the Pentagon during the late 1970s) and Andy Weber (the assistant secretary of defence responsible for nuclear programmes for five years, to 2014) caused a stir in October by calling for the cancellation of plans to build a fleet of 1,000 air-launched, nuclear-armed missiles. This would save $25 billion.