US scrambles to rebuild missile interceptor stockpile – report

The Pentagon is rushing to restock its inventory of interceptor missiles, amid reports that the US has already used most of its arsenal.

By World Israel News Staff

The Pentagon has ordered US defense manufacturers to rapidly increase weapons production and deliveries as months of fighting with Iran sharply deplete stocks of some of the military’s most important missiles and air-defense interceptors.

Deputy Defense Secretary Steve Feinberg sent defense industry leaders a memo Wednesday giving them no more than 21 days to produce plans for substantially faster delivery schedules and expanded production of critical weapons, according to reporting by the Washington Post that was subsequently confirmed by the Pentagon.

“Years-long development cycles are not acceptable,” Feinberg wrote. “We must dramatically accelerate our program schedules and expand our production capacity now.”

The directive underscores the mounting pressure the war with Iran has placed on a US weapons industrial base built largely around peacetime production rates.

Although the Pentagon says the effort forms part of a broader campaign to modernize military procurement, the urgency comes as some high-end missile inventories have fallen sharply since fighting began.

The scale of US weapons use has been enormous. During the first month of the war alone, American forces fired more than 850 Tomahawk cruise missiles and more than 1,000 Patriot and THAAD air-defense interceptors, according to previous Washington Post reporting.

US forces also expended more than 1,300 Army tactical ballistic missiles during the opening weeks of the conflict.

The strain is particularly severe for the Patriot and Terminal High Altitude Area Defense systems, which are among the United States’ principal defenses against ballistic missiles.

An analysis by the Center for Strategic and International Studies estimated that the US possessed about 2,330 Patriot interceptors before the Iran war. That fell to approximately 1,030 by the April ceasefire and, following subsequent fighting, is now estimated at between 759 and 827 — a decline of at least 65%.

THAAD inventories have also been significantly depleted. CSIS estimated a prewar stockpile of 452 interceptors, falling to between 232 and 262 by the April ceasefire. Some production has since replaced expended missiles, leaving an estimated 234 to 278 available — still at least 38% below the prewar level.

CSIS warned that the reduced inventories could force US forces and regional allies to become more selective about which incoming Iranian missiles they attempt to intercept, increasing the risks associated with another sustained round of fighting. The think tank noted that there are few substitutes for Patriot and THAAD when defending against ballistic missiles.

The Pentagon is now trying to expand production on several fronts.

On July 29, the US Army awarded Lockheed Martin a multiyear Patriot PAC-3 Missile Segment Enhancement deal worth as much as $58.62 billion. The agreement is intended to help triple the company’s PAC-3 production capacity by the end of 2030, with Lockheed previously setting a target of eventually producing 2,000 interceptors annually.

Lockheed said it plans to invest between $8 billion and $9 billion through 2030 to modernize more than 20 US facilities and expand munitions manufacturing. The company also plans to increase employment at its Camden, Arkansas, PAC-3 plant from about 1,200 workers to roughly 1,850.

The Pentagon followed that move on August 3 with framework agreements involving Northrop Grumman and Lockheed Martin aimed at expanding production of key PAC-3 and THAAD components. The arrangements are intended to provide additional suppliers for PAC-3 rocket motors and other components while quadrupling production capacity for several major THAAD interceptor parts.

Michael Duffey, the Pentagon’s undersecretary for acquisition and sustainment, said the agreements were intended to accelerate the “tripling of PAC-3 and quadrupling of THAAD interceptor production.”

The government is also looking beyond the traditional defense giants.

In May, the Pentagon announced agreements with Anduril, CoAspire, Leidos and Zone 5 to pursue more than 10,000 relatively inexpensive containerized cruise missiles over three years.

A separate arrangement with defense startup Castelion seeks to develop large-scale production of lower-cost hypersonic missiles, with the Pentagon envisioning purchases of at least 500 annually once testing requirements are met.

Those programs are intended in part to address one of the central lessons of the Iran war: expensive, highly sophisticated weapons can be consumed much faster during sustained combat than existing factories can replace them.

But expanding factory capacity does not necessarily mean missiles will immediately begin rolling off production lines in dramatically greater numbers.

Some of the Pentagon’s agreements are framework deals that signal expected future demand rather than fully funded procurement contracts.

Defense executives have warned that companies cannot make all the necessary long-term investments in factories, workers and suppliers until Congress provides the money.

That creates an additional political problem for the administration. A major defense spending package remains stalled in Congress amid disputes over President Donald Trump’s Iran policy and the White House push to increase annual Pentagon spending to as much as $1.5 trillion.

The Pentagon’s push also comes amid public disagreement over how serious the shortages are.

Trump rejected reports that US stocks were becoming dangerously low, writing Thursday that the country possessed “massive amounts” of munitions and that additional weapons were being produced and sent to the military as needed. He also threatened legal consequences for officials leaking information about classified weapons inventories.

The administration’s public assurances contrast with increasingly urgent moves inside the Pentagon to rebuild the arsenal.

Reuters reported last week that the US has used virtually all of some categories of long-range precision missiles available for the Iran campaign, while the rapid consumption of Patriots, THAADs, Tomahawks and Army strike weapons has raised broader questions about US preparedness for another major conflict.

Those concerns extend beyond Iran. Washington must simultaneously maintain forces capable of deterring China in the Indo-Pacific, continue supplying weapons to allies and preserve sufficient reserves for future emergencies.

The heavy use of sophisticated missiles in the Middle East has therefore turned what began as an Iran-war logistics problem into a wider test of the capacity of the US defense industry to sustain prolonged, high-intensity warfare.