[Poohbah]

And the billions we are currently dumping into storage, maintanance, and research is what? Chicken feed?

Considering that we're not dumping "billions" into it at this time--it's actually a bit less than a billion--yes.

Can you afford it?

The entire infrastructure? No.

Can I afford a nuclear bomb?

Yes.

Particularly if I only intend to own it long enough to get it to its DGZ (designated ground zero) and detonate it.

[Dead Corpse]

Are you so delusional to think that would really happen? Now assume there were private US citizens with nukes as well who could think of nothing better than to airmail them to Iraq.

It'd make for a REAL short war. If we had had that kind of a policy from the beginning... we would probably still have two really tall office towers standing in New York.