Since the Iran war began in late February, the United States has burned through around 1,100 of its long-range stealth cruise missiles built for a war with China, close to the total number remaining in the U.S. stockpile. The military has fired off more than 1,000 Tomahawk cruise missiles, roughly 10 times the number it currently buys each year.
The Pentagon used more than 1,200 Patriot interceptor missiles in the war, at more than $4 million a pop, and more than 1,000 Precision Strike and ATACMS ground-based missiles, leaving inventories worrisomely low, according to internal Defense Department estimates and congressional officials.
The Iran war has significantly drained much of the U.S. military’s global supply of munitions, and forced the Pentagon to rush bombs, missiles and other hardware to the Middle East from commands in Asia and Europe. The drawdowns have left these regional commands less ready to confront potential adversaries like Russia and China, and it has forced the United States to find ways to scale up production to address the depletions, Trump administration and congressional officials say.
The conflict has also underscored the Pentagon’s overreliance on excessively expensive missiles and munitions, especially air-defense interceptors, as well as concerns about whether the defense industry can develop cheaper arms, especially attack drones, far more quickly.
The Defense Department has not disclosed how many munitions it used in 38 days of war before a cease-fire took effect two weeks ago. The Pentagon says it hit more than 13,000 targets, but officials say that figure masks the vast number of bombs and missiles it used because warplanes, attack planes and artillery typically strike large targets multiple times.
White House officials have refused to estimate the cost of the conflict so far, but two independent groups say the expense is staggering: between $28 billion and $35 billion, or just under $1 billion a day.