Brookings Institution...It took four years of sifting through government records and doing rigorous analysis to come up with the bottom line: $5.5 trillion dollars. If future cleanup, stockpiling and dismantlement is included, that rises to $5.8 trillion. Even with the Cold War over, the United States is spending $35 billion a year—14 percent of the defense budget, or $96 million a day—on nuclear efforts of which about $25 billion goes for operation and maintenance of the nuclear arsenal. The rest is spent on cleanup, arms control verification, and ballistic missile defense research. http://www.brookings.edu/projects/archive/nucweapons/silverberg.aspx
