U.S. Puts Sentinel Intercontinental Ballistic Missile Back on Track for 2027 Launch.

The U.S. Air Force said February 17, 2026, that the LGM-35A Sentinel ICBM program is back on track, aiming to regain Milestone B approval by year's end and conduct its first missile pad launch in 2027. The update signals renewed discipline after a 2024 Nunn-McCurdy breach and reinforces the land-based leg of the U.S. nuclear triad for the early 2030s.

The U.S. Air Force on February 17, 2026, signaled it has put the LGM-35A Sentinel intercontinental ballistic missile program back on a disciplined path to complete its ongoing restructure in 2026, regain a Milestone B decision by year's end, and preserve an initial operational capability target in the early 2030s. The service framed Sentinel as a pace-setting modernization effort for the land-based leg of the U.S. nuclear triad and pointed to the next visible leap as a first missile pad launch planned for 2027, a key precursor to an eventual flight test campaign from Vandenberg.
Follow Army Recognition on Google News at this link

LGM-35A Sentinel is a next-generation, three-stage solid-fuel U.S. ICBM replacing Minuteman III, designed for prompt intercontinental nuclear strike from hardened silos with upgraded command-and-control and a more resilient, upgradeable architecture (Picture source: U.S. Air Force).

That confidence matters because Sentinel is not simply a new missile body. In July 2024, the Department of Defense certified the program to continue after a critical Nunn-McCurdy breach, rescinded Sentinel’s earlier Milestone B approval, and directed a full restructuring to address the sources of cost growth. DoD concluded that the largest driver sat in the command-and-launch segment, the expensive, manpower-heavy ecosystem of launch facilities, launch centers, and the conversion process required to transition from Minuteman III to a new architecture. The 2026 Air Force update now positions that corrective work as largely maturing into an acquisition plan designed to reduce decision latency and tighten enterprise alignment.

Sentinel remains a three-stage, solid-propellant ICBM, but the Air Force is careful to emphasize test evidence and integration steps rather than hard performance numbers that remain sensitive. The service released imagery of a Sentinel test booster assembled with stages one, two, and three and both interstage mechanisms, with the booster intended to be integrated with the missile’s forward section to create a fully assembled ground-test missile used for transportation, emplacement, and other pathfinder activities. In parallel, the propulsion stack is being de-risked through full-scale qualification of the stage-two solid rocket motor in July 202,5 following a stage-one qualification in March 2025, plus earlier developmental work on the stage-two motor. This is the kind of engineering cadence that matters for a weapon expected to sit on alert for decades, where reliability and predictable maintenance cycles are strategic effects in their own right.

Payload and reentry integration are equally central to Sentinel’s operational credibility. The Air Force Nuclear Weapons Center notes the program is replacing the aging Minuteman III force across the three existing missile fields at F.E. Warren, Malmstrom, and Minot, with the number of land-based missiles on alert intended to remain the same. Sentinel is planned to deploy initially with the W87-0 warhead now associated with Minuteman III, while the National Nuclear Security Administration develops the W87-1 modernization, which is slated for deployment in the FY2031 to FY2032 window. NNSA has already verified completion of the first production unit plutonium pit for W87-1 and is rebuilding pit manufacturing capacity, underscoring that Sentinel’s schedule is inseparable from the broader nuclear enterprise’s production throughput.

The Air Force pitch is about decision advantage and resilience more than raw throw-weight. Sentinel is described as a full-scale replacement of missile, launch systems, and command-and-control infrastructure with adaptability for the digital era, an overt nod to cyber hardening, modular upgrades, and tighter integration with modern nuclear command, control, and communications. U.S. Strategic Command leadership has repeatedly argued that a modern, reliable ICBM force complicates adversary decision-making and preserves credible presidential options. In practical terms, that translates into hundreds of hardened aimpoints across the northern tier of the United States, continuous alert posture, and prompt global reach, even as the U.S. emphasizes submarines and bombers for survivability and signaling flexibility.

Where Sentinel becomes most tactical in a day-to-day military sense is in the infrastructure and the way it is operated. The restructure leans into a crawl, walk, run approach for flight test campaigning, while investing early in the plumbing that makes a missile wing function: wing command centers, launch support systems, and secure corridors. The Air Force says it is building new silos rather than excavating and retrofitting 450 unique Minuteman-era structures, citing cost unpredictability and safety hazards. It also confirms that Air Force Global Strike Command took the first Minuteman III silo offline last fall as a sequenced step in transition planning, managed through Site Activation Task Force detachments at the three missile wings and at Vandenberg Space Force Base.

The near-term development roadmap is now clearer than it has been in months. In February 2026, teams are set to break ground on a prototype launch silo at Northrop Grumman’s Promontory, Utah, site, to validate modern construction techniques before full field work accelerates. This summer, prototyping at F.E. Warren is intended to validate utility corridor construction methods designed to streamline the installation of thousands of miles of secure infrastructure. The Air Force also highlights a critical design review for the Sentinel Launch Support System completed in September, and states that the first of three new wing command centers is taking shape at F.E. Warren while test facilities rise at Vandenberg to support the future launch campaign, culminating in a first missile pad launch planned for 2027.

Sentinel is being built into a world where other nuclear powers are modernizing in ways that stress missile defense and compress warning timelines. Russia’s RS-24 Yars is a three-stage solid-fuel ICBM deployed in both mobile and silo variants and assessed to carry multiple reentry vehicles plus penetration aids out to roughly 10,500 km. Moscow is also pursuing the heavy, liquid-fueled RS-28 Sarmat, which is silo-based with a payload on the order of 10,000 kg and a range band up to 18,000 km, marketed for multiple independently targetable reentry vehicles or glide vehicles. China’s DF-41 is designed around mobility and scale, with a reported 12,000 to 15,000 km range and the ability to carry multiple warheads, while North Korea’s solid-fueled Hwasong-18 reflects a different kind of threat: a cold-launched, road-mobile ICBM concept intended to reduce pre-launch signatures and shorten decision time for defenders.

Allies, by contrast, generally anchor deterrence at sea rather than on land. The United Kingdom’s future Dreadnought-class ballistic missile submarines are designed to launch Trident II D5 missiles, and London continues to participate in the U.S. Trident life-extension effort that could keep the missile viable into the early 2060s. France is modernizing the oceanic leg as well, with the M51.3 version of its submarine-launched ballistic missile entering operational service after a decade of development. This broader NATO reality means America’s land-based leg remains a unique contribution that underwrites extended deterrence even for allies whose national forces do not field ICBMs.

The propulsion milestones and ground-test assembly work suggest the air vehicle is moving, but the 2024 Nunn-McCurdy findings are a warning flare that the hardest part is concrete, cabling, staffing, and command-and-control modernization at scale. The schedule hinge points now sit in three places: the reconstituted Milestone B decision at the end of 2026, the 2027 pad launch as a proof of integrated readiness, and the nuclear enterprise’s ability to deliver W87-1 components on time. If those align, Sentinel will not just replace Minuteman III, it will reassert the logic of a dispersed, always-ready land deterrent in an era defined by mobile missiles, multi-warhead buses, and shrinking strategic warning.