Nuclear Warhead Dismantlement Well Ahead of Schedule, U.S. Energy Department Says

The United States over the last eight months has dismantled 50 percent more nuclear warheads then it took apart in the preceding year, the Associated Press reported today (see GSN, May 4, 2006).

Thomas D’Agostino, head of the Energy Department’s nuclear weapons program, said his goal had been to increase the pace of dismantlement by 50 percent in this fiscal year.  The department met that mark “about four months early,” he said.

“It’s good news from a global nuclear safety standpoint,” he said.  “There will be fewer nuclear weapons in the world.”

D’Agostino said he expects the nuclear of warheads taken apart by the end of fiscal 2007 to double the number dismantled last year.  The actual number of warheads involved, however, remains classified.

The National Nuclear Security Administration, a semiautonomous arm of the Energy Department, is believed to be dismantling thousands of warheads.

The United States is believed to have roughly 6,000 deployed nuclear warheads with a significant reserve stockpile bringing the total to the neighborhood of 10,000 nuclear weapons.

The United States is required by a 2002 pact with Russia to reduce the number of deployed weapons to no more than 2,200 in 2012.

A NNSA statement to be released today reads:  “As a result of the increased dismantlements and reductions, today’s stockpile is one-quarter of its size than at the end of the Cold War,” according to AP.

The United States will have disassembled all of it excess Cold War-era weapons by 2023, nine years ahead of the original target date, D’Agostino said.  Dismantling a weapon can taken between hours and months, depending on the design (Josef Herbert, Associated Press/Yahoo!News, June 7)

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