Iran Retaliation Left US missile stockpile in alarming gap

The Wall Street Journal has warned of an “alarming gap” in the US missile arsenal, noting the stockpile fell significantly short during Washington’s recent support operations aimed at protecting the Israeli regime against a large-scale Iranian retaliation.

The US daily published the remarks in a Thursday report detailing the United States' unprecedented support operations for the Israeli regime during Iran’s retaliation for Tel Aviv’s 12-day war in June.

The US deployed two of its most advanced Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) systems, nearly a third of its global stock, to support Israel, yet Iranian projectiles still managed to break through.

The shortcoming came, although former Pentagon official Dan Shapiro has called the US deployment “an extraordinary commitment of US technology and personnel to Israel’s security,” it said.

With five of America’s seven THAAD units already deployed abroad, the paper said, US commanders were now concerned about “dwell” issues, namely lack of downtime for crucial maintenance and training.

Observers have also pointed out that the multi-billion-dollar American defense apparatus failed to perform as expected, even as Washington scrambled its Patriot missile systems in a bid to shield the Israeli regime.

According to the Journal, the Iranian missile barrage was so overwhelming that American planners even considered redirecting the interceptors that had been ordered by Saudi Arabia towards the occupied Palestinian territories.

“Achieving successful lethal object kills in dense raid environments becomes significantly more complicated,” noted Tri Freed of Johns Hopkins.

The paper, meanwhile, broke down the steep cost of the support.

It said over 150 Thaad interceptors had been launched, almost 25% of all ever acquired by the Pentagon.

Replenishing just the Thaads used will cost up to $2 billion and take more than a year, the daily wrote, adding Lockheed Martin, the US defense giant behind the system, can only produce around 100 interceptors annually.

The paper also exposed that, aside from the American missiles, Israeli missile stockpiles also drained quickly, saying by the end, the regime was nearing depletion of its Arrow, David’s Sling, and Iron Dome systems.

A US official admitted, “Had Iran fired a few more large volleys of missiles,” Tel Aviv would have exhausted its Arrow 3 reserves.

The US Navy also unleashed 80 of its Standard Missile-3 interceptors, priced between $8–25 million each.

Meanwhile, American destroyers, unable to reload missiles at sea, were forced back to port mid-war, something experts have called an alarming weakness with far-reaching implications.

Top-notch American experts went on to further underline the gross underprepared status of the country’s missile architecture in the face of high-volume threats.

“We are at long last waking up to the need for massive defensive munitions procurement,” said Tom Karako of Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies, which works closely with US officials.

Vice Adm. Brad Cooper, soon to take the helm of the US Central Command, also warned Congress about the “munitions and magazine depth” problem.

Karako offered another admission, stating, “The other worry is that the Iranians are going to do this again. And we can’t afford to do it again.”