William D. Hartung
AT A GLANCE
The Pentagon and the Department of Energy are ramping up a three-decades-long plan to build a new generation of nuclear-armed bombers, submarines and missiles, along with new warheads to go with them.1 The price tag for operating existing weapons and building new ones could reach a staggering $2 trillion.2 The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) has estimated that, in the next decade alone, the cost of nuclear weapons deployment, development, and procurement could reach $634 billion.3 The major beneficiaries of these expenditures will be the prime contractors for new nuclear delivery vehicles and the operators of the National Nuclear Security Administration’s (NNSA) nuclear weapons complex.
The nuclear weapons budget has already begun to climb over the past few years, from $37.2 billion in FY2020 to $43 billion in the Biden administration’s proposed budget for FY2022. The figure for FY2022 includes $27.7 billion for nuclear activities at the Department of Defense and $15.5 billion at the NNSA.4 This figure will grow dramatically as the nuclear weapons modernization plan ramps up over the next decade and beyond. For example, the CBO estimates that the major elements of the Pentagon’s nuclear modernization plan will cost tens of billions each over the next decade, including $145 billion for ballistic missile submarines, $82 billion for the new Intercontinental Ballistic Missile (ICBM), and $53 billion for the new nuclear-armed bomber.5 And the costs will not end there. For example, the estimated lifetime cost of building and operating the new ICBM is $264 billion
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