-
- Ten years after the
fall of the Berlin Wall, maintaining
the U.S. nuclear arsenal of over
10,000 strategic warheads (of which 7,200
are operational) remains an
enormously expensive proposition. Movement
towards deep reductions or
elimination of the U.S. nuclear stockpile could
save tens of billions
of dollars annually. Even modest steps like stopping
procurement of
Trident II submarine-launched ballistic missiles could save
taxpayers
hundreds of millions of dollars annually.
-
- Below are a few examples of the
costs of our current
nuclear arsenal:
-
- 1)
Costs Since 1940 (to build,
deploy, maintain, cleanup) $5.6 trillion
(<#11)
-
- 2) Current Annual Costs,
total U.S.
nuclear arsenal $35 billion (<#22)
-
- 3)
Annual Costs of Stockpile
Stewardship Program (a Department of Energy
program to maintain the existing
nuclear stockpile and develop new
nuclear warheads) $4.5 billion (<#33)
-
- 4)
Cost of additional Trident
II submarine-launched ballistic missiles
(in FY 2000 budget, produced
by Lockheed Martin) $535 million
(<#44)
-
- 5) Cost of maintaining 550
land-based
intercontinental ballistic missiles (1997-2012, contract to
TRW, Inc.)
$3.4 billion (<#55)
-
- 6) Estimated costs of
environmental
cleanup of nuclear weapons research, testing, and
production sites $227-410
billion (<#66)
-
- 1.
Consequences of U.S.
Nuclear Weapons Since 1940 (Washington, DC:
Brookings Institution, 1998),
p. 4 ($5.5 trillion for 1940-1996, plus
$35 billion per year for 1997-1999).
2.
Schwartz, Atomic Audit, op. cit., p. 1; includes $25 billion
for
directly maintaining the arsenal plus $10 billion for associated costs
of clean-up, missile defense, and victim compensation.
3. Greg Mello, Andrew Lichterman, and William Weida, "The
Stockpile Stewardship Charade," Issues in Science and Technology,
Spring 1999, available at www.nap.edu/issues/15.3/mello.ht
m.
4. Conference report on the F.Y. 2000
Department of Defense budget.
Data supplied by the Center on Strategic
and Budgetary Assessments.
5. Robert S. Norris
and William M. Arkin, Natural Resources Defense
Council "U.S. Strategic Nuclear Forces, End of 1998," Bulletin
of the Atomic Scientists,
January/February 1999.
6. Atomic Audit, op cit.,
Chapter 6, p. 355 (extrapolated from
Dept. of Energy
estimates).
-
-
- William D. Hartung
- World Policy Institute
- 65
Fifth Ave. Suite 413
- New York, NY
10003
- (212)-229-5808, ext. 106
- (212)-229-5579 (fax)
- <mailto:hartung@newschool.edu
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