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Total quantities cover years 1945 to 1961. Total quantities 1945-1948 were already unclassified. Total quantities of the stockpile after 1961 remain classified since there were weapon systems introduced in 1962 and later that are still in the current stockpile.
Builds numbers reported below are total annual quantities for fully retired weapon systems. This represents a subset of United States nuclear weapon production. The annual production of nuclear weapons still in the stockpile remain classified.
Retirement rates from 1984 to 1989 are adjusted from the stockpile memorandum retirement numbers to better reflect the number of weapons truly retired. Retirement numbers reported below reflect weapons retired for conversions, modifications, or disassemblies for disposal. Retirement numbers depend critically on how the term retirement is defined.
Disassemblies reported below reflect only the number of weapons dismantled for actual disposal. It should be noted that raw disassembly numbers published elsewhere by the Department are typically larger reflecting the number of times a weapon is disassembled but not necessarily disassembled for disposal or dismantlement purposes. An example of this would be for repair, a weapon might be disassembled to replace a part and then returned to the stockpile. Records prior to 1980 on disassemblies for disposal are not immediately available but will be provided in the future if possible.
YEAR TOTAL MEGATONNAGE BUILDS RETIREMENTS DISASSEMBLIES
1945 2 0.04 2 0
1946 9 0.18 7 0
1947 13 0.26 4 0
1948 50 1.25 43 6
1949 170 4.19 123 3
1950 299 9.53 264 135
1951 438 35.25 284 145
1952 841 49.95 644 241
1953 1169 72.80 345 17
1954 1703 339.01 535 1
1955 2422 2879.99 806 87
1956 3692 9188.65 1379 109
1957 5543 17545.86 2232 381
1958 7345 17303.54 2619 817
1959 12298 19054.62 7088 2135
1960 18638 20491.17 7178 838
1961 22229 10947.71 5162 1571
1962 12825.02 4529 766
1963 15977.17 3185 830
1964 16943.97 3493 2534
1965 15152.50 3519 1936
1966 14037.46 2429 2357
1967 12786.17 1693 1649
1968 11837.65 536 2194
1969 11714.44 684 3045
1970 9695.20 219 1936
1971 8584.40 1073 1347
1972 8531.51 1546 1541
1973 8452.00 1171 544
1974 8325.22 959 807
1975 7368.38 748 2240
1976 5935.51 427 2181
1977 5845.0 221 998
1978 5721.16 50 1148
1979 5696.34 170 730
1980 5618.86 0 904 732
1981 5382.91 30 1887 1577
1982 5358.89 338 1537 1535
1983 5232.47 217 749 1120
1984 5192.20 187 1143 994
1985 5217.48 195 1322 1075
1986 5414.54 140 1224 1015
1987 4882.14 0 958 1189
1988 4789.77 0 1023 581
1989 4743.34 0 1794 1208
1990 4518.91 0 1154
1991 3795.94 0 1595
1992 3167.88 0 1856
1993 2647.31 0 1556
1994 2375.30 0 926 as of April
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Last Updated: April 24, 2008