The Trump administration’s Golden Dome missile defense system could cost taxpayers as much as $3.6 trillion over the next 20 years — far exceeding the White House’s $175 billion estimate — and still fail to deliver on its central promise to protect the United States from nuclear threats.
In a new report, Taxpayers for Common Sense, a nonpartisan fiscal watchdog organization, argues that some of the technological challenges for the project are likely “insurmountable.”
“If Golden Dome could guarantee our security for nuclear weapons, one could argue that these astronomical costs would be worth it, but from all these viability problems and the history of failed attempts, it’s very clear that it won’t,” Gabe Murphy, a policy analyst at Taxpayers for Common Sense, told Federal News Network.
Decades of investment in missile defense have yet to produce a system capable of reliably intercepting an intercontinental ballistic missile — the United States has spent more than $450 billion pursuing that goal and yet no system has demonstrated the ability to stop even a single ICBM.
Nuclear warheads are relatively small targets — about three meters long — and they can reach speeds of up to 15,000 miles per hour. Defending the entire country could require hundreds or even thousands of interceptors for each missile launched by an adversary.
“That creates a cost effectiveness problem right out of the gate,” Murphy said.
Adversaries can further undermine missile defense systems through various countermeasures, including radar jamming, decoys that mimic the appearance of warheads, or balloon-like objects that conceal warheads. “Those are really complex problems to overcome,” Murphy said.
Adding to the technical hurdles is the potential of a nuclear detonation in space that would make detection and interception of additional incoming missiles practically impossible.
“As a budget watchdog, one of our guiding principles at Taxpayers for Common Sense is, “if it doesn’t work, don’t fund it.” The evidence presented in this report strongly suggests that Golden Dome will not work,” the report says.
Plus, the initiative could accelerate the nuclear arms race and complicate efforts to secure arms control agreements that reduce the nuclear threat.
“People in the national security community are already deeply concerned about the cost of this program, about the insurmountable viability issues facing it, about the strategic risks of pursuing it, let alone deploying it,” Murphy said.
Golden Dome costs
In May, President Donald Trump said the Golden Dome would be nearly 100 percent effective, completed in about three years, and cost approximately $175 billion.
Pentagon officials have since described the program as a “top priority for the nation.”
But it is unclear where the $175 billion figure came from or what exactly it included.
“I think the initial figure was likely just pulled out of thin air. $175 billion was supposed to be presumably for acquisition costs for the program, the initial cost of buying the systems and deploying them,” Murphy said.
An analysis by the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative think tank, estimated that a robust Golden Dome architecture could cost about $3.6 trillion over 20 years. That figure includes operations, maintenance and replenishment costs.
AEI also found a system based on $175 billion acquisition cost would, at best, be capable of intercepting only a handful of incoming missiles.
“It doesn’t get you anywhere near to just the theoretical capability to be able to cover an area the size of the United States. I think the $175 billion number is not realistic for a program that is designed to counter nuclear weapons,” Murphy said.
Congress allocated a $23 billion down payment for the Golden Dome initiative through the budget reconciliation bill enacted last summer, but Congressional appropriators say the Pentagon has yet to explain how it plans to spend that money — lawmakers are still waiting for the Pentagon to provide “complete budgetary details and justification of the $23,000,000,000 in mandatory funding.”
“The fact that they’re already throwing money at it without having seen a plan is pretty wild to me, and the cost of this thing is potentially astronomical,” Murphy said.
“There’s nothing unusual about Congress asking for information. There is something unusual about throwing $25 billion at a program before you have any sense of how that program is supposed to be constructed and built, and what programs are going to fall under it. I do think it’s indicative of the fact that Congress, at least until recently, if they have received this architecture — it’s not entirely clear — does not have a clear sense of how this program is envisioned. It’s a very serious problem, and the sort of “fun first, ask questions later” approach is a really cavalier way to budget for national security,” he added.
Conflicts of interest
The Missile Defense Agency has already tapped more than 2,000 companies to support the Golden Dome initiative — these pre-approved vendors are now eligible to compete for future task orders.
But some of the bigger companies seeking work on Golden Dome that have emerged since the announcement of the initiative include SpaceX, led by Elon Musk, who has served as a close adviser to the president and the head of DOGE.
“That’s an obvious potential conflict of interest that Congress has already been raising questions about, and should continue to,” Murphy said.
Palantir Technologies — run by Peter Thiel and Alex Karp, both major contributors to Trump’s campaigns — is also seeking a role in Golden Dome.
1789 Capital, a venture capital firm Donald Trump Jr. joined right after Trump began his second term, holds significant investments in SpaceX and Anduril Industries, which are both competing for Golden Dome contracts.
“Conflicts of interest aren’t a new problem in Pentagon acquisition. In fact, they’re pervasive. Congress should be looking at systemic solutions to address that problem, but in the meantime, it should also dig into the potential conflicts of interest for a program this large,” Murphy said.
If you would like to contact this reporter about recent changes in the federal government, please email anastasia.obis@federalnewsnetwork.com or reach out on Signal at (301) 830-2747.
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