You don’t think of the nuclear warheads on top of Minuteman-3 intercontinental ballistic missiles as going bad. But in fact, the weapons, located in hardened silos through the American West, do have an expiration date: 2091.

In a 2006 report to Congress, an independent scientific advisory group estimated that’s about when the plutonium in the core, or “pit,” of hydrogen bombs will degrade enough to cause problems. Most of us will not be alive by then, but that doesn’t mean some people aren’t worried about it.

Worrier-in-chief is Air Force Gen. C. Robert Kehler, who heads the U.S. Strategic Command. In an interview with the Washington Times last week, Gen. Kehler said he was concerned that forthcoming Pentagon budget cuts would threaten ongoing weapons modernization efforts. “Getting full funding is definitely critical,” the general said.

Every flag officer worth his or her stars is making the same claim. The military-industrial-congressional complex is at DEFCON 1 over the possibility that, as a result of the congressional “supercommittee’s” failure to reach a deficit-cutting deal, defense spending will be reduced by more than $500 billion over the next 10 years. That’s on top of $500 billion in defense cuts agreed to last summer in negotiations between the White House and congressional leaders.

Defense Secretary Leon Panetta has said that a trillion dollars in cuts would leave the United States with “the smallest ground force since 1940, the smallest number of ships since 1915 and the smallest Air Force in history.”

Such cuts might, however, solve the problem of those aging Minuteman-3 nukes. Mr. Panetta said the United States might have to eliminate its ground-based nuclear arsenal altogether. There would be enough nukes aboard submarines, surface ships and aircraft to destroy the world several times over, but the silos would be emptied and closed.

Faced with another half-trillion in budget cuts, are Pentagon planners furiously drawing up contingency plans to minimize the damage? No. The New York Times reports that Pentagon officials worry that contingency plans would leak, making it appear that the cuts, however painful, were manageable.

Instead, defense officials and contractors are counting on relationships with key members of Congress to find a way around the mandated cuts. It’s a practice that has worked in the past.

But this time around, the defense hawks might lose out to deficit hawks. Said Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, “The House will forge ahead with the commitments we have made to reducing government spending.”

But when members hear from constituents worried about military base closings or job losses at defense plants, they might change their minds.

Some independent analysts think the apocalyptic fears are overblown. Lawrence Korb, who was an assistant Defense Secretary in the Reagan administration, noted that the Pentagon budget had increased for 13 straight years and is now, in constant dollars, 50 percent higher than it was in 2001.

“The Pentagon will have to make some tough choices,” Mr. Korb told The Financial Times, “but the truth is the military got a bit spoilt.”

This debate will play out next year as the presidential and congressional races heat up. Choices will be stark: the deficit, defense or deeper cuts in entitlements and non-defense discretionary spending.

Even if Republicans give in to tax and revenue increases, it’s clear that America can no longer have it all.

— St. Louis Post-Dispatch