How do backers defend their support for spending more a trillion dollars over the next three decades to recapitalize all three legs (and shorter appendages) of the U.S. nuclear triad? By invoking the awesome power of nuclear weapons and the uses they presumably serve. Foremost among them is deterrence of a nuclear attack. As long as nuclear weapons exist and are held by competitors and adversaries, investment on these grounds is entirely justifiable, since the costs of being attacked by nuclear weapons could easily dwarf the costs of recapitalization.

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