American forces might not be able to fend off Iran’s drones.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Dan Caine admitted in a closed door meeting with U.S. lawmakers Tuesday that Iran’s Shahed attack drones have become a bigger problem than initially predicted, reported CNN.
The drones are capable of flying low and slow, a facet of their design that has made them difficult targets for U.S. air defenses, particularly as the U.S. and its allies run low on interceptor munitions.
One source told CNN that the U.S. has been “burning” through long-range precision-guided missiles over the last four days.
Nonetheless, Hegseth and Caine attempted to downplay concerns about the drone threat, noting that U.S. partners in the Gulf states had been stockpiling interceptors, a source familiar with the briefing told the broadcast network.
But U.S. requests for more interceptors have not yet been fulfilled.
“It’s not panic yet, but the sooner they get here the better,” a regional source told CNN.
Arizona Senator Mark Kelly, a prominent member on the Senate Armed Services Committee, emerged from the meeting with Hegseth and Caine with a cold message: “We do not have an unlimited supply.”
“The Iranians do have the ability to make a lot of Shahed drones, ballistic missiles, medium range, short range and they’ve got a huge stockpile,” Kelly told CNN. “So at some point … this becomes a math problem and how can we resupply air defense munitions. Where are they going to come from?”
Military officials have stressed since Sunday that fighting Iran has already drastically depleted America’s missile defense systems.
Yet Donald Trump and his officials have insisted, invariably, that American munitions are well-stocked. In a Truth Social post on Tuesday, the president announced that “medium and upper medium” grade munition stocks had “never been higher or better,” though he noted that “at the highest end, we have a good supply, but are not where we want to be.”
In the weeks leading up to the explosive hostilities, Caine—Trump’s top military advisor—warned the White House against such an attack, arguing that it could entangle America in a prolonged conflict. That is turning out to be true. The White House has thus far offered several possible timelines for the conflict, refusing to stick to just one.
Per Trump’s own estimates, the war could rage for a few days, or several weeks, or “forever.”
Meanwhile, Hegseth hasn’t informed the public of any such lapse in America’s defense systems. Instead, he suggested to reporters at the Pentagon Wednesday morning that the conflict was continuing without a hitch.
“We are punching them while they are down, which is exactly how it should be,” Hegseth said.
Although he did let a clue about munitions stockpiles slip: Hegseth announced the military would begin using gravity bombs, “which we have a nearly unlimited stockpile.”
Robert Pape, a professor of political science at the University of Chicago, warned on X that “this means we are running out of precision munitions.”
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