Latest news with #McAleeseDefenseProgramsConference
Yahoo
26-03-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
In the wake of Hegseth's software memo, experts eye further change
In the two weeks since Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth issued a directive requiring the use of rapid procurement methods and contracting tools for all software acquisition, military officials and industry executives have expressed a mix of optimism and angst about the mandate, while also calling for more sweeping reforms to how the Pentagon develops, tests and funds software-heavy programs. The March 6 memo directs all Defense Department components to use DOD's Software Acquisition Pathway, along with other authorities designed to speed up the buying process and better leverage commercial providers. The tools singled out in Hegseth's order have existed for years, but a relatively small number of programs actually use them. 'The Department of Defense has been slow to recognize that software-defined warfare is not a future construct, but the reality we find ourselves operating in today,' Hegseth said in the memo. 'When it comes to software acquisition, we are overdue in pivoting to a performance-based outcome and, as such, it is the warfighter who pays the price.' Officials have attributed the Pentagon's slow adoption of these processes to several causes but have primarily pointed to cultural inertia and risk aversion, both from DOD leaders and within military program offices. In interviews with Defense News and at events around the Washington, D.C., region in recent weeks, industry and Pentagon leaders said they were hopeful that Hegseth's mandate could lead to change — if it's enforced. They also said they view the acquisition guidance as a first step toward broader reforms to how software is funded, tested and priced, as well as how acquisition officers and program managers are trained to manage software-heavy development efforts. Steve Morani, the Pentagon's acting acquisition executive, said Hegseth's order sends a clear mandate for rapid transformation. 'That's Secretary Hegseth's way of, just six weeks into his tenure, introducing some change,' Morani said last week at the annual McAleese Defense Programs Conference. 'It's a sign that he's determined to drive the system to operate differently. I think we're all on notice that, again, we're not going to do things business as usual.' In the immediate aftermath of Hegseth's mandate, Morani said his phone was 'blowing up,' as many in the defense acquisition world were concerned about how this new way of buying software could impact their programs. 'I think there was a lot angst up front,' Morani said. That angst is indicative of the culture change that will be required to implement Hegseth's direction, as well as the sense that there are more changes still to come, he added. 'This is not the exception,' Morani said of the software memo. 'This is going to be the standard way of doing things.' The Software Acquisition Pathway, created in 2020, has been regarded by the department as the recommended approach for buying software. The pathway offers a tailored acquisition mechanism, recognizing that software can't, and shouldn't, be procured under the same process as an aircraft or ship. Today, around 82 programs representing each of the military services are using the pathway to buy a range of capabilities — from command-and-control systems to cyber. The problem, according to one official who recently spoke to reporters on the condition of anonymity, is that the pathway hasn't been combined with other authorities designed to attract and take advantage of commercial capabilities. Those authorities include an approach championed by the Defense Innovation Unit called a Commercial Solutions Opening, a type of solicitation that allows startups and non-traditional defense companies to sell products and services to DOD without navigating arduous requirements documents. DIU also leverages a contracting tool called Other Transaction awards, which isn't subject to the same regulations as a standard contract. When combined, these authorities allow DOD to award software contracts much faster than in the past. Hegseth mandates streamlined software acquisition approach in new memo Justin Fanelli, the Navy's chief technology officer, said this shift may be jarring for some acquisition officers who are used to dealing with a rigorous source selection process that can include thousands of pages of meticulous requirements. For example, the need statement for a Commercial Solutions Opening, or CSO, can sometimes be as succinct as a paragraph. 'As you can image, not everyone's comfortable with that, even inside the building,' Fanelli said March 19 during an Emerging Technology Demo Day in Reston, Virginia. 'We're saying, 'Here are three sentences that are user-sponsored,' and those serve as what we used to know as 3,000 pages of requirements.' Speaking with Defense News after his presentation, Fanelli said the Navy is working to break down some of those barriers by offering examples of programs that have successfully used these tools and reaped the benefits. 'We are, right now, just using this opportunity to stockpile big success stories so that we can get more adoption and change our focus from risk avoidance when it comes to procurement to a focus on impact and outcomes and value-per-dollar,' he said. Kori McNabb, a senior procurement analyst for the Air Force, told Defense News at the same event that while the shift to commercial-like buying is uncomfortable for some of the acquisition officials she works with, she's noticed there's been a greater sense of urgency to learn how to use these tools since Hegseth issued his directive. McNabb highlighted the Air Force's CSO Center of Excellence, which offers training opportunities for program officers who may have less experience with the source selection tool. In recent weeks, use of the center's app has increased from around 200 users at a given time to close to 3,000, she said, adding that her team has upped its training webinar offerings since the memo's release. 'We just slowly grab them and pull them along with us,' she said. 'We're like, 'You have to come along because we're all moving to this.'' A new report from the Atlantic Council's Software-Defined Warfare Commission identified workforce expertise — and the training required to achieve it — as a top need for DOD as it looks to better leverage software. The report, released Wednesday, proposes DOD develop an 'extensive, connected, layered and modular software-centric training program' that both raises awareness about the importance of software and establishes a foundational understanding of commercial best practices. 'While the DoD has taken steps to upskill its existing workforce for the digital age, a widely acknowledged software proficiency shortfall remains,' the commission found. 'While the United States is the world leader in software talent and solutions, the DoD lacks the expertise to effectively acquire, integrate, and use software tools that are central to mission success.' As acquisition officials prepare their workforces to implement the secretary's software guidance, others in the defense community are looking ahead to further reforms — hoping that Hegseth's initial memo is just the beginning of more sweeping changes. Jason Brown, general manager of defense programs at software firm Applied Intuition, said he's hopeful DOD is serious about enforcing the software directive, calling it a 'long overdue' policy. But more reform is needed, he told Defense News in an interview. Brown pointed to software pricing, workforce expertise and testing processes as areas that need further attention if the department wants to make progress in this area. 'Test and evaluation needs to be completely reworked,' he said. 'It's not feasible for the current, very bureaucratic, slow, cumbersome test and evaluation methodologies to also be applied to software. I think everybody recognizes that — even the test and evaluation community — the question is, what are they going to do about it and how do we get there?' The Atlantic Council's report offered a similar assessment of the software testing enterprise, pointing to lagging simulation capabilities and digital infrastructure. Pentagon's commercial tech arm to ramp up role in military innovation Authored by a group of former U.S. military officials and defense experts, the report recommends the Pentagon empower and provide funding to the Test Resource Management Center to improve its digital testing capabilities. Speaking with reporters Wednesday at a Defense Writers Group event in Washington, D.C., former acting Deputy Defense Secretary Christine Fox identified testing infrastructure as a key, near-term focus area for the department. 'The thing that the department has to grapple with is, in addition to buying the software, they need to provide the infrastructure to, particularly, the operating forces,' she said. Along with those investments, the report suggests the department explore letting more mature software vendors self-certify some capabilities as a way to speed up software fielding and reduce bottlenecks in the testing enterprise. The commission also recommends the Defense Department take a commercial-first approach to development and procurement, arguing that DOD too often chooses to develop software on its own when private-sector solutions already exist. 'When the DoD decides to develop custom software, this often results in higher costs, longer schedules, and increased risks,' the report states. 'Commercial software is often updated continuously across a broad customer base, of which the DoD could take advantage. Instead, updating software to address threats and bugs or add functionality takes considerable time and funding.'
CNN
22-03-2025
- Politics
- CNN
Trump wants a ‘Golden Dome' capable of defending the entire US: ‘Strategically, it doesn't make any sense'
CNN — US military officials are scrambling to develop a 'Golden Dome' defense system that can protect the country from long-range missile strikes and have been told by the White House that no expense will be spared in order to fulfill one of President Donald Trump's top Pentagon priorities, according to multiple sources familiar with the matter. 'Golden Dome' is the Trump administration's attempt to rebrand vague plans for developing a missile defense system akin to Israel's Iron Dome. At a time the Pentagon is looking to cut budgets, the Trump administration has ordered military officials to ensure future funding for 'Golden Dome' is reflected in new budget estimates for 2026 to 2030 – but the system itself remains undefined beyond a name, the sources said. 'Right now, Golden Dome is, it's really an idea,' one source familiar with internal discussions about the project said, adding there may be technology in the pipeline that, if ever scaled up, could apply to it, but as of now discussions are purely conceptual. That makes projecting future costs nearly impossible, the source added, though it would likely cost billions of dollars to construct and maintain. Trump has repeatedly insisted the US needs a missile defense program similar to Israel's Iron Dome, but the systems are orders of magnitude apart. In practical terms, the comparison is less apples to oranges, and more apples to aircraft carriers. Israel's Iron Dome missile defense system selectively protects populated areas from short-range threats in a country the size of New Jersey; Trump wants a space-based missile defense system capable of defending the entire United States from advanced ballistic and hypersonic missiles. For one thing, 'Israel is tiny,' the source familiar with ongoing internal discussions about the Golden Dome project said. 'So, it is 100% feasible to blanket Israel in things like radars and a combination of mobile and fixed interceptors.' 'How are you going to do that in the United States? You can't do it just at the borders and the shoreline, because intercontinental ballistic missiles, they can re-enter the atmosphere over Kansas.' Still, Trump issued an executive order during his first week in office ordering Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to submit a plan for developing and implementing the next-generation missile defense shield by March 28. And a senior Pentagon official insisted earlier this week that work is underway. 'Consistent with protecting the homeland and per President Trump's [executive order], we're working with the industrial base and [through] supply chain challenges associated with standing up the Golden Dome,' Steven J. Morani, currently performing the duties of undersecretary of defense for acquisition and sustainment said this week at the McAleese Defense Programs Conference in Washington. At the same time, Pentagon officials have been realigning the Defense Department's 2026 budget proposal to meet Hegseth's priorities, which were outlined in a memo delivered to senior leaders last week and represents a major overhaul of the military's strategic goals, according to a copy obtained by CNN. The memo specifically directs Pentagon leadership to focus on strengthening missile defense of the US homeland through Trump's 'Golden Dome.' 'There is a rigorous analytic process underway taking a relook at [the budget],' Morani added. 'This is standard practice for any new administration that takes office.' But it remains unclear how much money the Pentagon will request for Trump's Golden Dome in its budget proposal or how officials will determine the amount of funding is required. Retired Rear Adm. Mark Montgomery believes creating a ballistic missile defense system may be possible in 7-10 years, but even then, it will have severe limitations, potentially capable of protecting only critical federal buildings and major cities. 'The more you want it closer to 100%, the more expensive it's going to get,' said Montgomery, the senior director of the Center On Cyber and Technology Innovation at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. A comprehensive system will require different sets of satellites for communication, sensing incoming missiles, and launching interceptors, Montgomery told CNN. Those types of systems are long-term projects, he said, requiring existing defenses to fill the gap in the meantime. 'You've gotta be responsible here,' Montgomery said. 'You're not going to be able to defend everything with these ground-based missiles. They defend a circle around them, but it's not large.' Potential pay day for arms companies US arms manufacturers are already seeing dollar signs. The Missile Defense Agency held an Industry Day in mid-February to solicit bids from companies interested in helping to plan and build Golden Dome. The agency received more than 360 secret and unclassified abstracts about ideas for how to plan and execute the system. Lockheed Martin has taken it a step further, creating a polished website for Golden Dome claiming the world's largest defense contractor has the 'proven, mission-tested capabilities and track record of integration to bring this effort to life.' In the 1980s, President Ronald Reagan announced the Strategic Defense Initiative to create a space-based defense against ballistic nuclear missiles. The system was derisively nicknamed 'Star Wars,' and consumed tens of billions of dollars before it was ultimately cancelled, facing insurmountable technical and economic hurdles. Laura Grego, a Senior Research Director of the Global Security Program at the Union for Concerned Scientists, says the same challenges remain and have been known for years. 'It has been long understood that defending against a sophisticated nuclear arsenal is technically and economically unfeasible,' Grego told CNN. America's current ballistic missile defense is designed to thwart a small number of missiles from a rogue state such as North Korea or Iran. The system relies on the Ground-based Midcourse Defense (GMD), which has failed nearly half of its tests, according to the Arms Control Association, rendering it incapable of stopping a major attack from Russia or China. But in his executive order, Trump called for a far more complex and robust system - space-based interceptors capable of downing a target moments after it launches. Such a system would require thousands of interceptors in low-earth orbit to intercept even a single North Korean missile launch, according to the American Physical Society (APS), which has studied the feasibility of ballistic missile defenses for years. A single interceptor in orbit is almost never at the right place and time to rapidly intercept a ballistic missile launch, so you need exponentially more to ensure adequate coverage. 'We estimate that a constellation of about 16,000 interceptors would be needed to attempt to counter a rapid salvo of ten solid-propellant ICBMs like the [North Korean] Hwasong-18,' the APS wrote in a study earlier this month. Even then, Grego says a space-based missile defense system is vulnerable to enemy anti-satellite attacks from far less expensive ground-based systems. 'The most critical weakness of a system like this is its brittleness, its vulnerability to attack,' Grego added. In the Red Sea, the US has fired scores of multi-million dollar interceptor missiles at Houthi drones and missiles that cost a fraction of the price. The fiscal imbalance gets far worse when the system is in space, according to John Tierney, a former Democratic congressman who held years of hearings on ballistic missile defense. 'It's a joke. It's basically a scam,' Tierney said bluntly. Now the executive director for the Center for Arms Control & Non-Proliferation, Tierney ripped Trump for being 'willing to throw billions and billions and billions of dollars at something that won't work.' Adversaries likely to react As the US pours money into research and developing the Golden Dome, current and former officials say America's adversaries will likely expand their own arsenal of ballistic missiles in an effort to stay ahead. But since the offensive ballistic missiles are far less expensive than the interceptors needed to stop them, Tierney says the system quickly becomes financially unfeasible. US military officials are also assessing how Golden Dome could disrupt the current stability provided by nuclear deterrence, according to the source familiar with internal planning discussions related to the project. Today, the main US deterrent against another country launching a preemptive nuclear attack is its survivable second strike, or ability to retaliate even after enduring an initial nuclear attack, the source said. 'If you implement something that your nuclear armed adversaries believe is a reliable countermeasure that just nullifies their nuclear arsenal, now you've done away with deterrent stability, because you've improved the ease of the United States sending a nuclear attack to them with impunity,' the source added. 'And then you have to ask yourself, well, how much do we trust the US not to do that?' 'If I'm China, if I'm Russia, my confidence is lower and lower, that that the US won't strike us with a nuclear missile in in a crisis,' according to the same source. 'Strategically, it doesn't make any sense. Technically, it doesn't make any sense. Economically it doesn't make any sense,' Tierney added. CORRECTION: An earlier version of this story incorrectly attributed a quote about the comprehensive system necessary to provide the kind of protection President Donald Trump has asked for. Retired Rear Adm. Mark Montgomery said, 'You've gotta be responsible here. You're not going to be able to defend everything with these ground-based missiles. They defend a circle around them, but it's not large.'
CNN
22-03-2025
- Politics
- CNN
‘How are you going to do that?' Pentagon scrambles to make Trump's ‘Golden Dome' missile defense system a reality
US military officials are scrambling to develop a 'Golden Dome' defense system that can protect the country from long-range missile strikes and have been told by the White House that no expense will be spared in order to fulfill one of President Donald Trump's top Pentagon priorities, according to multiple sources familiar with the matter. 'Golden Dome' is the Trump administration's attempt to rebrand vague plans for developing a missile defense system akin to Israel's Iron Dome. At a time the Pentagon is looking to cut budgets, the Trump administration has ordered military officials to ensure future funding for 'Golden Dome' is reflected in new budget estimates for 2026 to 2030 – but the system itself remains undefined beyond a name, the sources said. 'Right now, Golden Dome is, it's really an idea,' one source familiar with internal discussions about the project said, adding there may be technology in the pipeline that, if ever scaled up, could apply to it, but as of now discussions are purely conceptual. That makes projecting future costs nearly impossible, the source added, though it would likely cost billions of dollars to construct and maintain. Trump has repeatedly insisted the US needs a missile defense program similar to Israel's Iron Dome, but the systems are orders of magnitude apart. In practical terms, the comparison is less apples to oranges, and more apples to aircraft carriers. Israel's Iron Dome missile defense system selectively protects populated areas from short-range threats in a country the size of New Jersey; Trump wants a space-based missile defense system capable of defending the entire United States from advanced ballistic and hypersonic missiles. For one thing, 'Israel is tiny,' the source familiar with ongoing internal discussions about the Golden Dome project said. 'So, it is 100% feasible to blanket Israel in things like radars and a combination of mobile and fixed interceptors.' 'How are you going to do that in the United States? You can't do it just at the borders and the shoreline, because intercontinental ballistic missiles, they can re-enter the atmosphere over Kansas.' Still, Trump issued an executive order during his first week in office ordering Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to submit a plan for developing and implementing the next-generation missile defense shield by March 28. And a senior Pentagon official insisted earlier this week that work is underway. 'Consistent with protecting the homeland and per President Trump's [executive order], we're working with the industrial base and [through] supply chain challenges associated with standing up the Golden Dome,' Steven J. Morani, currently performing the duties of undersecretary of defense for acquisition and sustainment said this week at the McAleese Defense Programs Conference in Washington. At the same time, Pentagon officials have been realigning the Defense Department's 2026 budget proposal to meet Hegseth's priorities, which were outlined in a memo delivered to senior leaders last week and represents a major overhaul of the military's strategic goals, according to a copy obtained by CNN. The memo specifically directs Pentagon leadership to focus on strengthening missile defense of the US homeland through Trump's 'Golden Dome.' 'There is a rigorous analytic process underway taking a relook at [the budget],' Morani added. 'This is standard practice for any new administration that takes office.' But it remains unclear how much money the Pentagon will request for Trump's Golden Dome in its budget proposal or how officials will determine the amount of funding is required. Retired Rear Adm. Mark Montgomery believes creating a ballistic missile defense system may be possible in 7-10 years, but even then, it will have severe limitations, potentially capable of protecting only critical federal buildings and major cities. 'The more you want it closer to 100%, the more expensive it's going to get,' said Montgomery, the senior director of the Center On Cyber and Technology Innovation at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. A comprehensive system will require different sets of satellites for communication, sensing incoming missiles, and launching interceptors, Montgomery told CNN. Those types of systems are long-term projects, he said, requiring existing defenses to fill the gap in the meantime. 'You've gotta be responsible here,' Montgomery said. 'You're not going to be able to defend everything with these ground-based missiles. They defend a circle around them, but it's not large.' US arms manufacturers are already seeing dollar signs. The Missile Defense Agency held an Industry Day in mid-February to solicit bids from companies interested in helping to plan and build Golden Dome. The agency received more than 360 secret and unclassified abstracts about ideas for how to plan and execute the system. Lockheed Martin has taken it a step further, creating a polished website for Golden Dome claiming the world's largest defense contractor has the 'proven, mission-tested capabilities and track record of integration to bring this effort to life.' In the 1980s, President Ronald Reagan announced the Strategic Defense Initiative to create a space-based defense against ballistic nuclear missiles. The system was derisively nicknamed 'Star Wars,' and consumed tens of billions of dollars before it was ultimately cancelled, facing insurmountable technical and economic hurdles. Laura Grego, a Senior Research Director of the Global Security Program at the Union for Concerned Scientists, says the same challenges remain and have been known for years. 'It has been long understood that defending against a sophisticated nuclear arsenal is technically and economically unfeasible,' Grego told CNN. America's current ballistic missile defense is designed to thwart a small number of missiles from a rogue state such as North Korea or Iran. The system relies on the Ground-based Midcourse Defense (GMD), which has failed nearly half of its tests, according to the Arms Control Association, rendering it incapable of stopping a major attack from Russia or China. But in his executive order, Trump called for a far more complex and robust system - space-based interceptors capable of downing a target moments after it launches. Such a system would require thousands of interceptors in low-earth orbit to intercept even a single North Korean missile launch, according to the American Physical Society (APS), which has studied the feasibility of ballistic missile defenses for years. A single interceptor in orbit is almost never at the right place and time to rapidly intercept a ballistic missile launch, so you need exponentially more to ensure adequate coverage. 'We estimate that a constellation of about 16,000 interceptors would be needed to attempt to counter a rapid salvo of ten solid-propellant ICBMs like the [North Korean] Hwasong-18,' the APS wrote in a study earlier this month. Even then, Grego says a space-based missile defense system is vulnerable to enemy anti-satellite attacks from far less expensive ground-based systems. 'The most critical weakness of a system like this is its brittleness, its vulnerability to attack,' Grego added. In the Red Sea, the US has fired scores of multi-million dollar interceptor missiles at Houthi drones and missiles that cost a fraction of the price. The fiscal imbalance gets far worse when the system is in space, according to John Tierney, a former Democratic congressman who held years of hearings on ballistic missile defense. 'It's a joke. It's basically a scam,' Tierney said bluntly. Now the executive director for the Center for Arms Control & Non-Proliferation, Tierney ripped Trump for being 'willing to throw billions and billions and billions of dollars at something that won't work.' As the US pours money into research and developing the Golden Dome, current and former officials say America's adversaries will likely expand their own arsenal of ballistic missiles in an effort to stay ahead. But since the offensive ballistic missiles are far less expensive than the interceptors needed to stop them, Tierney says the system quickly becomes financially unfeasible. US military officials are also assessing how Golden Dome could disrupt the current stability provided by nuclear deterrence, according to the source familiar with internal planning discussions related to the project. Today, the main US deterrent against another country launching a preemptive nuclear attack is its survivable second strike, or ability to retaliate even after enduring an initial nuclear attack, the source said. 'If you implement something that your nuclear armed adversaries believe is a reliable countermeasure that just nullifies their nuclear arsenal, now you've done away with deterrent stability, because you've improved the ease of the United States sending a nuclear attack to them with impunity,' the source added. 'And then you have to ask yourself, well, how much do we trust the US not to do that?' 'If I'm China, if I'm Russia, my confidence is lower and lower, that that the US won't strike us with a nuclear missile in in a crisis,' according to the same source. 'Strategically, it doesn't make any sense. Technically, it doesn't make any sense. Economically it doesn't make any sense,' Tierney added. CORRECTION: An earlier version of this story incorrectly attributed a quote about the comprehensive system necessary to provide the kind of protection President Donald Trump has asked for. Retired Rear Adm. Mark Montgomery said, 'You've gotta be responsible here. You're not going to be able to defend everything with these ground-based missiles. They defend a circle around them, but it's not large.'
Yahoo
22-03-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Trump wants a ‘Golden Dome' capable of defending the entire US: ‘Strategically, it doesn't make any sense'
US military officials are scrambling to develop a 'Golden Dome' defense system that can protect the country from long-range missile strikes and have been told by the White House that no expense will be spared in order to fulfill one of President Donald Trump's top Pentagon priorities, according to multiple sources familiar with the matter. 'Golden Dome' is the Trump administration's attempt to rebrand vague plans for developing a missile defense system akin to Israel's Iron Dome. At a time the Pentagon is looking to cut budgets, the Trump administration has ordered military officials to ensure future funding for 'Golden Dome' is reflected in new budget estimates for 2026 to 2030 – but the system itself remains undefined beyond a name, the sources said. 'Right now, Golden Dome is, it's really an idea,' one source familiar with internal discussions about the project said, adding there may be technology in the pipeline that, if ever scaled up, could apply to it, but as of now discussions are purely conceptual. That makes projecting future costs nearly impossible, the source added, though it would likely cost billions of dollars to construct and maintain. Trump has repeatedly insisted the US needs a missile defense program similar to Israel's Iron Dome, but the systems are orders of magnitude apart. In practical terms, the comparison is less apples to oranges, and more apples to aircraft carriers. Israel's Iron Dome missile defense system selectively protects populated areas from short-range threats in a country the size of New Jersey; Trump wants a space-based missile defense system capable of defending the entire United States from advanced ballistic and hypersonic missiles. For one thing, 'Israel is tiny,' the source familiar with ongoing internal discussions about the Golden Dome project said. 'So, it is 100% feasible to blanket Israel in things like radars and a combination of mobile and fixed interceptors.' 'How are you going to do that in the United States? You can't do it just at the borders and the shoreline, because intercontinental ballistic missiles, they can re-enter the atmosphere over Kansas.' Still, Trump issued an executive order during his first week in office ordering Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to submit a plan for developing and implementing the next-generation missile defense shield by March 28. And a senior Pentagon official insisted earlier this week that work is underway. 'Consistent with protecting the homeland and per President Trump's [executive order], we're working with the industrial base and [through] supply chain challenges associated with standing up the Golden Dome,' Steven J. Morani, currently performing the duties of undersecretary of defense for acquisition and sustainment said this week at the McAleese Defense Programs Conference in Washington. At the same time, Pentagon officials have been realigning the Defense Department's 2026 budget proposal to meet Hegseth's priorities, which were outlined in a memo delivered to senior leaders last week and represents a major overhaul of the military's strategic goals, according to a copy obtained by CNN. The memo specifically directs Pentagon leadership to focus on strengthening missile defense of the US homeland through Trump's 'Golden Dome.' 'There is a rigorous analytic process underway taking a relook at [the budget],' Morani added. 'This is standard practice for any new administration that takes office.' But it remains unclear how much money the Pentagon will request for Trump's Golden Dome in its budget proposal or how officials will determine the amount of funding is required. Retired Rear Adm. Mark Montgomery believes creating a ballistic missile defense system may be possible in 7-10 years, but even then, it will have severe limitations, potentially capable of protecting only critical federal buildings and major cities. 'The more you want it closer to 100%, the more expensive it's going to get,' said Montgomery, the senior director of the Center On Cyber and Technology Innovation at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. A comprehensive system will require different sets of satellites for communication, sensing incoming missiles, and launching interceptors, John Tierney, a former Democratic congressman who held years of hearings on ballistic missile defense, told CNN. Those types of systems are long-term projects, he said, requiring existing defenses to fill the gap in the meantime. 'You've gotta be responsible here,' Tierney said. 'You're not going to be able to defend everything with these ground-based missiles. They defend a circle around them, but it's not large.' US arms manufacturers are already seeing dollar signs. The Missile Defense Agency held an Industry Day in mid-February to solicit bids from companies interested in helping to plan and build Golden Dome. The agency received more than 360 secret and unclassified abstracts about ideas for how to plan and execute the system. Lockheed Martin has taken it a step further, creating a polished website for Golden Dome claiming the world's largest defense contractor has the 'proven, mission-tested capabilities and track record of integration to bring this effort to life.' In the 1980s, President Ronald Reagan announced the Strategic Defense Initiative to create a space-based defense against ballistic nuclear missiles. The system was derisively nicknamed 'Star Wars,' and consumed tens of billions of dollars before it was ultimately cancelled, facing insurmountable technical and economic hurdles. Laura Grego, a Senior Research Director of the Global Security Program at the Union for Concerned Scientists, says the same challenges remain and have been known for years. 'It has been long understood that defending against a sophisticated nuclear arsenal is technically and economically unfeasible,' Grego told CNN. America's current ballistic missile defense is designed to thwart a small number of missiles from a rogue state such as North Korea or Iran. The system relies on the Ground-based Midcourse Defense (GMD), which has failed nearly half of its tests, according to the Arms Control Association, rendering it incapable of stopping a major attack from Russia or China. But in his executive order, Trump called for a far more complex and robust system - space-based interceptors capable of downing a target moments after it launches. Such a system would require thousands of interceptors in low-earth orbit to intercept even a single North Korean missile launch, according to the American Physical Society (APS), which has studied the feasibility of ballistic missile defenses for years. A single interceptor in orbit is almost never at the right place and time to rapidly intercept a ballistic missile launch, so you need exponentially more to ensure adequate coverage. 'We estimate that a constellation of about 16,000 interceptors would be needed to attempt to counter a rapid salvo of ten solid-propellant ICBMs like the [North Korean] Hwasong-18,' the APS wrote in a study earlier this month. Even then, Grego says a space-based missile defense system is vulnerable to enemy anti-satellite attacks from far less expensive ground-based systems. 'The most critical weakness of a system like this is its brittleness, its vulnerability to attack,' Grego added. In the Red Sea, the US has fired scores of multi-million dollar interceptor missiles at Houthi drones and missiles that cost a fraction of the price. The fiscal imbalance gets far worse when the system is in space, according to Tierney. 'It's a joke. It's basically a scam,' Tierney said bluntly. Now the executive director for the Center for Arms Control & Non-Proliferation, Tierney ripped Trump for being 'willing to throw billions and billions and billions of dollars at something that won't work.' As the US pours money into research and developing the Golden Dome, current and former officials say America's adversaries will likely expand their own arsenal of ballistic missiles in an effort to stay ahead. But since the offensive ballistic missiles are far less expensive than the interceptors needed to stop them, Tierney says the system quickly becomes financially unfeasible. US military officials are also assessing how Golden Dome could disrupt the current stability provided by nuclear deterrence, according to the source familiar with internal planning discussions related to the project. Today, the main US deterrent against another country launching a preemptive nuclear attack is its survivable second strike, or ability to retaliate even after enduring an initial nuclear attack, the source said. 'If you implement something that your nuclear armed adversaries believe is a reliable countermeasure that just nullifies their nuclear arsenal, now you've done away with deterrent stability, because you've improved the ease of the United States sending a nuclear attack to them with impunity,' the source added. 'And then you have to ask yourself, well, how much do we trust the US not to do that?' 'If I'm China, if I'm Russia, my confidence is lower and lower, that that the US won't strike us with a nuclear missile in in a crisis,' according to the same source. 'Strategically, it doesn't make any sense. Technically, it doesn't make any sense. Economically it doesn't make any sense,' Tierney added.
CNN
22-03-2025
- Politics
- CNN
‘How are you going to do that?' Pentagon scrambles to make Trump's ‘Golden Dome' missile defense system a reality
US military officials are scrambling to develop a 'Golden Dome' defense system that can protect the country from long-range missile strikes and have been told by the White House that no expense will be spared in order to fulfill one of President Donald Trump's top Pentagon priorities, according to multiple sources familiar with the matter. 'Golden Dome' is the Trump administration's attempt to rebrand vague plans for developing a missile defense system akin to Israel's Iron Dome. At a time the Pentagon is looking to cut budgets, the Trump administration has ordered military officials to ensure future funding for 'Golden Dome' is reflected in new budget estimates for 2026 to 2030 – but the system itself remains undefined beyond a name, the sources said. 'Right now, Golden Dome is, it's really an idea,' one source familiar with internal discussions about the project said, adding there may be technology in the pipeline that, if ever scaled up, could apply to it, but as of now discussions are purely conceptual. That makes projecting future costs nearly impossible, the source added, though it would likely cost billions of dollars to construct and maintain. Trump has repeatedly insisted the US needs a missile defense program similar to Israel's Iron Dome, but the systems are orders of magnitude apart. In practical terms, the comparison is less apples to oranges, and more apples to aircraft carriers. Israel's Iron Dome missile defense system selectively protects populated areas from short-range threats in a country the size of New Jersey; Trump wants a space-based missile defense system capable of defending the entire United States from advanced ballistic and hypersonic missiles. For one thing, 'Israel is tiny,' the source familiar with ongoing internal discussions about the Golden Dome project said. 'So, it is 100% feasible to blanket Israel in things like radars and a combination of mobile and fixed interceptors.' 'How are you going to do that in the United States? You can't do it just at the borders and the shoreline, because intercontinental ballistic missiles, they can re-enter the atmosphere over Kansas.' Still, Trump issued an executive order during his first week in office ordering Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to submit a plan for developing and implementing the next-generation missile defense shield by March 28. And a senior Pentagon official insisted earlier this week that work is underway. 'Consistent with protecting the homeland and per President Trump's [executive order], we're working with the industrial base and [through] supply chain challenges associated with standing up the Golden Dome,' Steven J. Morani, currently performing the duties of undersecretary of defense for acquisition and sustainment said this week at the McAleese Defense Programs Conference in Washington. At the same time, Pentagon officials have been realigning the Defense Department's 2026 budget proposal to meet Hegseth's priorities, which were outlined in a memo delivered to senior leaders last week and represents a major overhaul of the military's strategic goals, according to a copy obtained by CNN. The memo specifically directs Pentagon leadership to focus on strengthening missile defense of the US homeland through Trump's 'Golden Dome.' 'There is a rigorous analytic process underway taking a relook at [the budget],' Morani added. 'This is standard practice for any new administration that takes office.' But it remains unclear how much money the Pentagon will request for Trump's Golden Dome in its budget proposal or how officials will determine the amount of funding is required. Retired Rear Adm. Mark Montgomery believes creating a ballistic missile defense system may be possible in 7-10 years, but even then, it will have severe limitations, potentially capable of protecting only critical federal buildings and major cities. 'The more you want it closer to 100%, the more expensive it's going to get,' said Montgomery, the senior director of the Center On Cyber and Technology Innovation at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. A comprehensive system will require different sets of satellites for communication, sensing incoming missiles, and launching interceptors, John Tierney, a former Democratic congressman who held years of hearings on ballistic missile defense, told CNN. Those types of systems are long-term projects, he said, requiring existing defenses to fill the gap in the meantime. 'You've gotta be responsible here,' Tierney said. 'You're not going to be able to defend everything with these ground-based missiles. They defend a circle around them, but it's not large.' US arms manufacturers are already seeing dollar signs. The Missile Defense Agency held an Industry Day in mid-February to solicit bids from companies interested in helping to plan and build Golden Dome. The agency received more than 360 secret and unclassified abstracts about ideas for how to plan and execute the system. Lockheed Martin has taken it a step further, creating a polished website for Golden Dome claiming the world's largest defense contractor has the 'proven, mission-tested capabilities and track record of integration to bring this effort to life.' In the 1980s, President Ronald Reagan announced the Strategic Defense Initiative to create a space-based defense against ballistic nuclear missiles. The system was derisively nicknamed 'Star Wars,' and consumed tens of billions of dollars before it was ultimately cancelled, facing insurmountable technical and economic hurdles. Laura Grego, a Senior Research Director of the Global Security Program at the Union for Concerned Scientists, says the same challenges remain and have been known for years. 'It has been long understood that defending against a sophisticated nuclear arsenal is technically and economically unfeasible,' Grego told CNN. America's current ballistic missile defense is designed to thwart a small number of missiles from a rogue state such as North Korea or Iran. The system relies on the Ground-based Midcourse Defense (GMD), which has failed nearly half of its tests, according to the Arms Control Association, rendering it incapable of stopping a major attack from Russia or China. But in his executive order, Trump called for a far more complex and robust system - space-based interceptors capable of downing a target moments after it launches. Such a system would require thousands of interceptors in low-earth orbit to intercept even a single North Korean missile launch, according to the American Physical Society (APS), which has studied the feasibility of ballistic missile defenses for years. A single interceptor in orbit is almost never at the right place and time to rapidly intercept a ballistic missile launch, so you need exponentially more to ensure adequate coverage. 'We estimate that a constellation of about 16,000 interceptors would be needed to attempt to counter a rapid salvo of ten solid-propellant ICBMs like the [North Korean] Hwasong-18,' the APS wrote in a study earlier this month. Even then, Grego says a space-based missile defense system is vulnerable to enemy anti-satellite attacks from far less expensive ground-based systems. 'The most critical weakness of a system like this is its brittleness, its vulnerability to attack,' Grego added. In the Red Sea, the US has fired scores of multi-million dollar interceptor missiles at Houthi drones and missiles that cost a fraction of the price. The fiscal imbalance gets far worse when the system is in space, according to Tierney. 'It's a joke. It's basically a scam,' Tierney said bluntly. Now the executive director for the Center for Arms Control & Non-Proliferation, Tierney ripped Trump for being 'willing to throw billions and billions and billions of dollars at something that won't work.' As the US pours money into research and developing the Golden Dome, current and former officials say America's adversaries will likely expand their own arsenal of ballistic missiles in an effort to stay ahead. But since the offensive ballistic missiles are far less expensive than the interceptors needed to stop them, Tierney says the system quickly becomes financially unfeasible. US military officials are also assessing how Golden Dome could disrupt the current stability provided by nuclear deterrence, according to the source familiar with internal planning discussions related to the project. Today, the main US deterrent against another country launching a preemptive nuclear attack is its survivable second strike, or ability to retaliate even after enduring an initial nuclear attack, the source said. 'If you implement something that your nuclear armed adversaries believe is a reliable countermeasure that just nullifies their nuclear arsenal, now you've done away with deterrent stability, because you've improved the ease of the United States sending a nuclear attack to them with impunity,' the source added. 'And then you have to ask yourself, well, how much do we trust the US not to do that?' 'If I'm China, if I'm Russia, my confidence is lower and lower, that that the US won't strike us with a nuclear missile in in a crisis,' according to the same source. 'Strategically, it doesn't make any sense. Technically, it doesn't make any sense. Economically it doesn't make any sense,' Tierney added.
