Benjamin Giltner
The war in Iran has exposed both the strengths and limits of the forces involved. Most notably, Iran has shown it can strain—and sometimes penetrate—Israel’s vaunted missile defenses, underscoring how difficult it is to build a reliable shield against modern threats. That should give Washington pause. The Trump administration’s proposed “Golden Dome,” modeled on Israel’s Iron Dome and air and missile defense (AMD), rests on a system now showing clear vulnerabilities. If Israel’s shield can be tested this way, the lesson for the United States is clear: a similar effort risks wasting vast time, money, and resources on a promise that may not hold.
In this war, Iran broke through Israel’s AMD system by launching large numbers of missiles at it. This is a sure way of overcoming missile defense systems. By launching multiple missiles or loading multiple warheads or bombs onto a single missile, attacking forces can break through missile defense systems. Most recently, it used cluster munitions attached to ballistic missiles to overcome Israel’s AMD system. Essentially, Iran is flooding the zone.
It is easily conceivable that China and Russia could overwhelm America’s Golden Dome system, especially when the Golden Dome’s missile interceptors would need to cover 400 times the square miles compared to Israel’s geography. Russia and China possess larger and more advanced missile capabilities compared to Iran, including intercontinental ballistic missiles, which are extremely difficult to intercept.
The financial costs of homeland missile defense systems compared to attacking missiles should cast further doubt on the feasibility of the Golden Dome. Regarding the war in Iran, Tehran’s attacks cost less money and resources than Israeli and American missile defense munitions do. A single THAAD interceptor, for instance, costs an estimated $12.7 million, and an Iranian ballistic missile costs $1 to $2 million.
If Iran, a country with a negligible economic power, gives Israel’s AMD system a run for its money, countries with much larger economies will have a good chance at breaking through America’s Golden Dome, which is estimated to cost US taxpayers $844 billion to $1.1 trillion.
When considering defense investments, the Pentagon and policymakers must determine whether a military weapon or system is in the United States’ interest and aligns with its defense strategy. The Golden Dome fails this litmus test. Its problem is one of opportunity cost. Why should the United States spend billions, if not trillions, of dollars on a missile defense apparatus that is more than likely to fail? The federal government could put this money to far better use than to waste it on a defense system with minimal strategic benefit for the United States.
With the war in Iran already costing over $30 billion, and the Pentagon’s 2027 budget slated to be $1.5 trillion, the last thing Americans need is their tax dollars going towards another wasteful defense project.