Advocates of nuclear abolition spend far too much time wringing their hands about the cost of modernizing the United States’ nuclear triad. These detractors are loathe to put the cost of nuclear weapons into any real context because doing so only weakens the false narrative they seek to create.

After giving the disarmament community three decades to convince Russia, then China, and now North Korea that America would lead them to the promised land of a world free of nuclear weapons, their failure is evident in the complete modernization of the Russian nuclear arsenal and the more recent dramatic increase in both the Chinese and North Korean nuclear arsenals.

The United States, however, allowed its nuclear force to atrophy in place, keeping intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBM) in silos for more than five decades, well beyond their intended ten-year lifespan. If the nation’s B-52 bomber fleet were human, they would be Social Security-eligible, while the Ohio-class nuclear submarines are quickly approaching or well past their intended thirty-year service lives.

Unlike China, Russia, and North Korea, which recognize that nuclear weapons serve as both a fundamental guarantee of sovereignty and a means to compel adversaries into submission, the United States chose to lead by example and allowed its nuclear arsenal to age into obsolescence, hoping that autocratic nations would follow suit.

This flight of idealistic fancy gave the American people the most tumultuous world since 1939, when then, like now, the United States was unprepared for a world where autocrats sought to fundamentally reshape the world order. It took a world war, 407,316 Americans dead, and the deaths of untold millions around the world to restore peace and bring about unprecedented economic prosperity in the United States and around the world, both during and after the Cold War. Today, however, America’s enemies have nuclear weapons that are both more numerous and far more modern than our own.  

China, North Korea, and Russia desperately seek to coerce the United States into giving them a free hand to pursue their interests through the coercive use of nuclear weapons and, if necessary, use them on the battlefield to defeat the United States. The war in Ukraine proves that these three autocratic regimes are now joined in a common cause to collectively ensure the United States cannot defeat them in a conventional conflict or coerce them with American nuclear weapons.

In a recent article, nuclear minimalist Ivan Eland writes, “The United States is implementing a three-decade-long, $1.7 trillion program to modernize and increase its already sizeable arsenal of nuclear weapons.” Instead, Eland recommends the United States scrap ICBM and bomber modernization and pursue a minimum nuclear deterrent. He proffers this alternative with a serendipitously conceived example that if there are 500 major targets in Russia and China, with two warheads needed to destroy each target, then only 1,000 nuclear weapons are needed to ensure deterrence. Like too many commentators free of military experience, he assumes every warhead will strike its target. Unlike conventional conflict, which required the U.S. military to expend over 250,000 rounds of small arms munitions for each enemy kill, nuclear weapons will miraculously hit every target every time. Thus, the United States needs no extra weapons.

Eland suggests that about 1,000 nuclear warheads should be placed on twelve “invulnerable” Columbia-class ballistic missile submarines (SSBN) to serve as the single leg of the nuclear force. While allocating 1,000 nuclear warheads to the SSBN fleet is feasible, not all submarines are deployed at sea simultaneously, and thus, only a portion of the 1,000 nuclear warheads would be available for retaliation at any time.

This leaves the remaining submarine fleet in port and extremely vulnerable to a first strike. Such a nuclear force is hardly sufficient for a superpower needing to deter a collective of nuclear-armed adversaries.

Unfortunately, Eland quoted a recent New York Times article, which recycled a Federation of American Scientists (FAS) estimate suggesting the nation’s nuclear modernization effort will cost $1.7 trillion. The FAS report described American efforts as “a wide-ranging nuclear modernization program that will ultimately see every nuclear delivery system replaced with newer versions over the coming decades.” The report added, “The total cost of this modernization could reach over $1.7 trillion.”

It may seem trivial to note that the number is likely closer to $1.6 trillion than the larger figure, but $100 billion matters when the federal government is borrowing $1.6 trillion per year and already spending more on debt repayment than defense. Additionally, since the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) released the original $1.242 trillion modernization estimate in 2017, Americans saw a cumulative inflation rate of 28.6 percent by 2024—accounting for much of the cost increase.

In his article, Eland omits that about 30 percent of the $1.7 trillion cost includes the operations and maintenance of the existing arsenal. This brings the real price of modernization down to about $1.1 trillion over three decades, which amounts to less than 5 percent of the Department of Defense’s budget. Lest readers forget, the nation is now spending less on defense, as a percentage of gross domestic product, than it has since before World War II—3.4 percent versus an average of 5 percent.

Eland’s desire to have meaningful cost-cutting through fielding a minimum deterrent force is a unicorn. Such a force would limit the ability of the United States to retaliate if attacked and allow China, North Korea, and Russia to focus their efforts on fielding conventional capabilities that can destroy America’s two submarine bases, while hunting at-sea ballistic missile submarines with conventional capabilities. This is a recipe for coercion of the United States and attacks on American interests.

It would also necessitate a counter-value nuclear targeting strategy that focuses American attacks on civilian infrastructure and population centers. American leaders have long shunned such a strategy as unethical. Thus, “countervalue nuclear threats are no longer credible for American deterrence.”

According to the Congressional Budget Office’s 2017 modernization report, even with fewer deployed weapons, the 30-year cost would likely stay around $1 trillion due to high fixed infrastructure costs for nuclear forces and laboratories. Although the Congressional Budget Office did not provide a cost estimate for Eland’s specific proposal, analysis of CBO’s options with similar force structures indicates that fielding a submarine-only force will likely save about $6.5 billion per year, out of the $57 billion Americans will spend for a completely modernized triad.

Americans deserve peace and stability. America’s nuclear arsenal has provided that for eight decades.

Claims that nuclear modernization is too expensive are simply false, as are claims that the United States can still effectively deter China, Russia, and North Korea with a minimally equipped nuclear arsenal that is increasingly susceptible to adversary countermeasures. The Biden administration, hardly a proponent for a large nuclear arsenal, recently hinted at the need for more nuclear weapons, and a recent strategy by the National Institute for Deterrence Studies called for nuclear parity with America’s combined nuclear adversaries.

As to cost, former Secretary of Defense Gen. (ret.) James Mattis once said, “Cutting defense will not close the deficit.” He also poignantly noted, “America can afford survival.” National security comes with a cost, and that cost must be properly prioritized over other items.

Keep in mind that American taxpayers spend more than $100 billion every year on waste, fraud, and abuse in the Medicare and Medicaid programs alone—and do not even know it. That is twice the annual cost of nuclear modernization.

At an average of $57 billion annually over the next three decades, Americans are asked to pay $165 per year to ensure the United States remains free from attack on the homeland and free from coercion abroad. For the return on investment, how can we not afford to modernize the nuclear arsenal?

About the Authors: 

Col. Curtis McGiffin (US Air Force, Ret.) is Vice President for Education at the National Institute for Deterrence Studies, co-host of the weekly podcast The NIDS View, and faculty at Missouri State University’s School of Defense and Strategic Studies. He has thirty years of Air Force service in uniform and in the civil service. The opinions expressed are solely his own and do not necessarily represent those of any organization with which he is currently or was formerly associated. He can be contacted at [email protected].

Adam Lowther, PhD, is the Vice President for Research at the National Institute for Deterrence Studies, co-host of the weekly podcast The NIDS View, and host of the Nuclecast podcast. The opinions expressed are solely his own and do not necessarily represent those of any organization with which he is currently or was formerly associated. He can be contacted at [email protected].

Together, they have over four decades of experience in the Department of Defense nuclear enterprise.