During former President Trump’s freewheeling rallies, he regularly brings up hisaim to buildan “Iron Dome”missileshieldforAmerica. Itisone of the few itemized priorities in the Republican National Committee platform, which calls for “agreat Iron Domemissiledefenseshieldover our entire country.”
Some national defense commentators pounced, deriding the ideaas infeasibleand calling it “snake oil”andaboondogglethat won’t work. They described the technical characteristics ofIsrael’s Iron Dome systemand waxed tediouslyabouthow impractical the literal system would be forabig country likeAmerica that is separated from its enemies by vast oceans.
ButTrumpisrighton the policy,andall one must doisnote that he has beenarguing foramissileshieldfor 25 years. Heislikely using the “Iron Dome” nameas shorthand becauseaverageAmericansareaware ofIsrael’s system since it’s regularly protectingIsraelis from the rockets of Iranand its proxies.
Former President Trump takes the stage during a campaign rally at Mohegan Sun Arena at Casey Plaza on Aug. 17, 2024 in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. (Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images)
Trumphas been persistentaboutthe unacceptability of enemies threatening theUnited States with nuclearmissiles.Ina1999 interview with Charlie Rose, he repeatedlyemphasizedhis view that the proliferation of nuclear weaponswasthe biggest problem facing the United States. He said it would be wise to preemptively strike the North Korean nuclear weaponsand delivery program if diplomacy failed.
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The same year, he told Wolf Blitzer that the United States must focus on the threat of nuclear weapons, urging a focus on the North Korean nuclear program.Again, he emphasized the need to try to negotiate,and said negotiation would only be possible if Pyongyang knew the United States was seriousaboutpreemptively destroying the illicit program with conventional weapons if it would not negotiate.
When pressed forahistorical parallel,Trumppraised theIsraeli decision to take out the Osirak nuclear reactor in Iraq in 1981.
And, given the growing complexity of the nuclear threats, the youngerTrumpsaid,with certainty – that the United States must haveamissiledefenseshieldto defend theAmerican homeland. He credited President Ronald Reagan for beingrightaboutthat,alluding to Reagan’s famous Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI),andrightly noted that modern technology had made it more feasible.
VideoIt wasafeature ofTrump’s bid for the presidency.And on Jan. 17, 2019, PresidentTrumplaid out his vision formissiledefense inaspeechat the Pentagon.
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He said, “[W]e will recognize that spaceisanew warfighting domain, with the Space Force leading the way. My upcoming budget will invest inaspace-basedmissiledefense layer. It’s new technology. It’s ultimately going to beavery, very big part of our defenseand, obviously, of our offense.
“The system will be monitored,and we will terminateanymissilelaunches from hostile powers, or even from powers that makeamistake. It won’t happen. Regardless of themissiletype or the geographic origins of theattack, we will ensure that enemymissiles find no sanctuary on Earth or in the skiesabove.”
This wasan extraordinary break from U.S. policy,and it was even moreambitious than the officialMissileDefense Review, the policy document that would be the blueprint for the Pentagon. There was no plan foradefensive inceptor layer in space to interceptmissiles launched fromanywhereand headed towardAmericans.And others inside theadministration choked out this initiative in favor ofalower budget than the oneTrump’s initiative would require.
VideoBy the timeTrumpleft office, the homelandmissiledefense system was not significantly improved. Therewere silos empty when interceptors could have filled them, canceled promising next-generation technologies,and theTrumpadministration failed to initiate programs that could have provided the scientificand technological demonstrations to qualitatively improve the layeredmissiledefense system.
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The Bidenadministration has kept the homeland defense system on life support but the U.S. homelandmissiledefenseisstruggling to keep up with the currentmissilethreats facing the country. It has ground-based long-range interceptors inAlaskaand California. This systemisdesigned to interceptaNorth Koreanattack.North Korea’s record-breakingmissiletesting schedule during the Bidenadministration underscores the need to bolster the U.S.missiledefense system so that rogue nations cannot overwhelm it.
But to qualitativelyimprove homeland defense, it should havean interceptor layer beyond the sea-andground-based systems. On this,Trumpisparticularlyrightaboutthe need to upgrade the U.S.missiledefenseshieldbyaddingan interceptor layer in space. This layer would provide the optimal vantage point for intercepting ICBMs from nations withmissilearsenals far more numerous than the ones North Korea or possibly Iran could possess.
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It would not be possible to buildan impenetrableshieldthat obviates the need to maintainacredible nuclear deterrent, however. Rather, the scopeandaim of suchanew layer for the current system would be to bolster the success of deterrence, much likeIsrael’s Iron Dome has forIsrael.
The system should be designed to protect the most criticalareas in the United States from Chineseand Russianmissilethreats so that neither peeradversary could successfully coerce the United States from projecting powerabroadand coming to theaid of ourallies.
Trumpcould respond to his critics by pointing to the 2023 report of the U.S. Strategic Posture Commission, which said, “DOD [Department of Defense] must lookat newapproaches toachieving U.S.missiledefense goals, including the use of space-basedand directed energy capabilities,as simply scaling up current programsisnot likely to be effective.”
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The commission did not recommend specific technologies. But thanks to theadvances of technology,and the lower cost of satellite launches, space-based solutionsare promisingafar more capable system thanAmerica has ever had,and in the long runamore cost-effective system thanastrictly ground-and sea-based interceptorarchitecture.
VideoIsraelisbracing for what could beanotherattack by Iran or by one of its proxies,and the Iron Domemissiledefense system stands ready to defend. The last time Iran tried this, Iron Dome performed impressively, causing Iran to succeed in none of its militaryaims before being on the receiving end ofanIsraeli retaliatory precision strike.
The Iron Domemissileinterceptor gaveIsrael time to respond inaway of its choosingand made this kind ofattackagainstIsrael far lessappealing.
Likewise,adapting U.S. homelandmissiledefense would strengthenAmerica’sadvantage. Like Iron Dome, it would cause enemies to doubt the success of the possible strike, protect U.S. leaders’ability to resist enemies’ coercive threats toattackand, if deterrence fails, it would limit the damage ofanattack.
Duringthe time Trumphas been talkingaboutthis concept, the threat environment has deteriorated further,and now the United Statesisfacing down multiple nuclearadversaries. Rather than mockingan “Iron DomeMissileShieldforAmerica,” itistime we built one.
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Rebeccah Heinrichs is a fellow at the Hudson Institute where she provides research and commentary on a range of security issues and specializes in missile defense and nuclear deterrence. Follow her on Twitter, @RLHeinrichs.
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