Renovation of the nuclear weapon arsenal of the United States

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The renovation of the nuclear weapon arsenal of the United States is the modernization, refurbishment and rebuilding of the nuclear arsenal of the United States of America.

Facilities for maintenance and refurbishment of U.S. nuclear weapons allegedly became dilapidated after the end of the Cold War with the Soviet Union.^[1] The United States planned to spend about a trillion dollars over thirty years to rectify this shortfall, which some saw as a reversal from President Barack Obama's 2009 Prague speech that laid out his agenda for further nuclear disarmament, for which he won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2009.^[2] In 2015, the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists set its Doomsday Clock closer to midnight to highlight this development.^[3]

Budget projection

Analysts at the

• 350 for the National Nuclear Security Administration which runs the facilities which research, develop and produce nuclear weapons
• 240 to 270 for maintenance of the existing triad of bombers, land-based missiles and submarine-launched missiles
• 120 for command, control and communications
• 20 to 120 for a successor to the Minuteman missile.
• 77 to 102 for Ohio-class submarines to carry missiles
• 55 to 100 for a
  B2
• 10 to 20 for a
  Long Range Stand Off Weapon LRSO standoff missile^[5]

making a total of $872 billion to $1.082 trillion. $348 billion have already been committed for the first ten years of the program.[6]

In 2017, the Congressional Budget Office produced a report analysing the planned expenditure and its estimate of the total cost over 30 years was $1.2 trillion. This was before any additional capacity which might result from the Nuclear Posture Review of the Trump administration, which was expected to be completed in early 2018.^[7][8]

Facilities

The main facilities of the National Nuclear Security Administration are:^[9]

1. The administrative headquarters known as the
   Albuquerque
   Complex
2. Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California which researches plutonium and houses the National Ignition Facility
3. Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico which researches and runs computer simulations
4. The
   National Security Campus
   at Kansas City, which produces non-nuclear components of the weapons
5. Nevada National Security Site
   where nuclear weapons are tested
6. The
   Pantex Plant
   in Texas which assembles and disassembles nuclear weapons
7. stress-tests
   nuclear weapons
8. The
   waste and produces tritium
9. The
   enriched
   and processed

The Sandia National Laboratories tests nuclear weapons to ensure they can withstand extreme physical stress such as missile launch and re-entry. Their testing equipment includes centrifuges, a rocket sled, six-inch cannon and wind tunnel. A major overhaul of these was completed in 2014, at a cost of about $100 million.^[11]

Doomsday clock

In January 2015, the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists set their Doomsday Clock at three minutes to midnight.^[3] Their executive director, Kennette Benedict, announced that the world was closer to catastrophe as "unchecked climate change and a nuclear arms race resulting from modernization of huge arsenals pose extraordinary and undeniable threats to the continued existence of humanity."^[12]

See also

• Prompt Global Strike
  — the US capability to make a conventional attack anywhere in the world within an hour.
• Reliable Replacement Warhead — a family of new nuclear weapons which started development at the NNSA in 2004 but which was cancelled in 2009.
• Stockpile stewardship

References