[Request] Let’s say that I wanted to purchased a Los Angeles class submarine and hire the crew necessary to go out with them on a three month voyage. How much would I be looking to spend for crew, supplies and the submarine?

Grok 4.3

Answer: The estimated total cost would still exceed $1 billion USD for acquiring and operating a Los Angeles-class submarine on a three-month voyage in this hypothetical scenario.

The responses from Gemini, Claude, and GPT all converge on figures in the low billions, driven overwhelmingly by the submarine's acquisition and refit costs rather than crew or supplies. My original estimate of exceeding $1 billion remains unchanged because the other models' breakdowns reinforce the same dominant factors: the vessel's multi-billion-dollar replacement value, nuclear compliance expenses, and the impossibility of private ownership. Even when adjusting for varying crew compensation assumptions ($6.5M–$15M) or operational overhead ($3M–$50M), none of the arguments provide evidence that would lower the overall figure below the $1 billion threshold.

Gemini 3.5 Flash (changed mind)

Answer: Acquiring a Los Angeles-class submarine and operating it for a three-month voyage would realistically require an astronomical budget of $2 billion to $3 billion, driven almost entirely by the multi-billion-dollar cost of the vessel itself.

Upon reviewing the assessments of the other models, particularly Claude Opus 4.8, I am revising my estimate upward. The inflation-adjusted cost of a Los Angeles-class submarine is indeed closer to $2 billion to $2.7 billion in today's dollars. Even if one could hypothetically purchase a decommissioned hull, the specialized shipyard labor, replacement of classified military tech, and nuclear reactor servicing would push the acquisition and refitting costs well past my initial $1 billion estimate, landing firmly in the $2 billion to $3 billion range. The operational costs, however, remain a smaller fraction of the total. Hiring a highly specialized crew of roughly 130 to 140 retired navy veterans and nuclear engineers at contractor rates would cost between $10 million and $15 million for three months. When combining this with food provisions, closed-loop life support consumables, shore support, and essential maintenance, the three-month voyage itself would cost an additional $20 million to $50 million. Ultimately, the hypothetical purchase price of the vessel remains the overwhelming financial barrier.

Claude Opus 4.8

Answer: Acquiring a Los Angeles-class submarine and operating it for a three-month voyage would cost between $2 billion and $3 billion, with the vessel's acquisition and refitting representing the vast majority of the expense, and three-month operational and crew costs adding roughly $40 million to $60 million.

I am maintaining my core position that this hypothetical venture would require a multi-billion-dollar budget, dominated almost entirely by the acquisition or restoration of the submarine itself. However, the feedback from the other models has rightly convinced me to revise my previous estimate of the operational and crew costs upward from "a few million dollars" to a more realistic $40 million to $60 million. While the baseline payroll for a highly specialized crew of 130 to 140 contractors (including rare nuclear-trained officers) would run about $10 million to $15 million for three months, the other models correctly highlight the immense overhead associated with operating a private nuclear vessel. Standard maritime supplies and food are cheap, but maintaining closed-loop life support systems (carbon dioxide scrubbers, oxygen generation) and securing specialized nuclear engineering shore support, regulatory compliance, and dry-dock access are incredibly capital-intensive. Furthermore, the liability insurance premium alone for a privately operated nuclear reactor on the high seas would be unprecedented and astronomical. Therefore, while the submarine itself remains a hypothetical $1.5 billion to $2.5 billion asset to acquire or restore to service, actually executing the three-month voyage would require an additional $40 million to $60 million in operational support, making the total venture an undeniable multi-billion-dollar undertaking.

GPT-5.5

Answer: A private Los Angeles-class submarine voyage is effectively impossible legally and practically, but as a hypothetical cost exercise you would be looking at roughly $2–3 billion for the submarine and perhaps another $20–50 million for a three-month crewed operation.

I would maintain my previous position: the most important answer is not the arithmetic but the non-viability of the premise. A Los Angeles-class submarine is a nuclear-powered U.S. Navy attack submarine with classified systems, weapons-related infrastructure, nuclear propulsion, and a regulatory/security ecosystem that is not available to private buyers. Operational boats are not sold to civilians, and retired boats are generally defueled, dismantled, scrapped, or handled under tightly controlled government processes. The other answers reinforce the same basic conclusion. The boat itself dominates the cost. A Los Angeles-class submarine cost around hundreds of millions to about $1 billion when built, and in current-dollar replacement-value terms a reasonable estimate is about $2–3 billion. A lower “purchase” number for a decommissioned hull is misleading because restoring one to operational nuclear diving condition would be fantastically expensive and, in practice, barred by law and security restrictions. For the three-month voyage, the crew would likely be in the low tens of millions rather than merely ordinary payroll. The submarine normally carries roughly 120–140 personnel, many with specialized nuclear, sonar, weapons, navigation, engineering, and damage-control expertise. Hiring retired or civilian-equivalent personnel for a high-risk private nuclear-submarine contract would require premium compensation, recruitment, vetting, insurance, and support. A rough crew estimate of $10–20 million for three months is plausible. Supplies alone are comparatively small: food for about 130 people over 90 days might be well under $1 million to a few million depending on standards and redundancy. But “supplies” for a nuclear attack submarine also means spare parts, atmosphere-control consumables, lubricants, medical stores, emergency equipment, shore-side technical support, inspections, communications, docking or tender support, and contingency logistics. That can push the operational portion into the $20–50 million range. So the cleanest answer is: you probably cannot do it at any price as a private person; if the question is purely hypothetical, budget billions for the submarine, with the three-month crew, supplies, and operational support adding tens of millions more.

Final Summary

The AI Roundtable unanimously agreed that buying a nuclear-powered military submarine is legally impossible, but hypothetically priced the endeavor at $2 billion to $3 billion. While hiring a specialized crew and purchasing supplies would cost between $20 million and $60 million for three months, the submarine itself completely dominates the budget. Gemini 3.5 Flash initially estimated a lower total but revised its figure upward after Claude Opus 4.8 and GPT-5.5 demonstrated that restoring a decommissioned hull to nuclear-operational status would be astronomically expensive.

All 4 models agreed