By Ashley Brasfield, Reporter Daily Caller News Foundation | May 22, 2025
The Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration (DOE/NNSA) announced the completion of the first B61-13 gravity bomb Monday.
The keynote address took place at the Pantex Plant in Texas during an event led by Secretary of Energy Chris Wright.
“Modernizing America’s nuclear stockpile is essential to delivering President Trump’s peace through strength agenda,” Secretary of Energy Chris Wright said in a Department of Energy press release.
“The remarkable speed of the B61-13’s production is a testament to the ingenuity of our scientists and engineers and the urgency we face to fortify deterrence in a volatile new age,” his statement continued.
In coordination with the U.S. Air Force, the Nuclear Security Enterprise delivered the first unit nearly a year ahead of schedule and under two years after the program began, making it one of the fastest-developed weapons since the Cold War, according to DOE/NNSA.
The B61 — a key component of the U.S. nuclear Triad — is the nation’s longest-serving and most adaptable nuclear weapon, the press release noted.
Unlike earlier versions, the B61-13 will be deployed exclusively by strategic bombers from bases within the continental U.S. It builds on capabilities from the recently completed B61-12 and features the same safety, security and precision upgrades, but includes a yield tailored for harder and larger military targets, according to DOE/NNSA.
“Accelerating production of the B61-13 while maintaining the highest standards of safety and security, and without disrupting our other six modernization programs, is a remarkable achievement,” David Hoagland, Acting Deputy Administrator for Defense Programs, said in the press release. “I’m confident many of these practices can be applied to future weapon modernization efforts, with promising implications for their delivery timelines.”
The B61-13 is part of DOE/NNSA’s broader effort to modernize and maintain the reliability of the nuclear arsenal through seven active programs.
By streamlining or merging key design reviews, engineers accelerated the development timeline, enabling hardware “test builds” for the B61-13 to begin just three months after receiving congressional approval and funding, the press release stated.
The B61-13 offers the President more nuclear options for tough and wide-area military targets, while the Department of Defense (DOD) and DOE/NNSA work together on a strategy to address “hard and deeply buried targets,” according to the press release.
Ashley Brasfield is a reporter at the Daily Caller News Foundation
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