Golden Dome missile defense program won’t be done by end of Trump’s term

Donald Trump’s so-called Golden Dome missile defense program – which will feature space-based weapons to intercept strikes against the US – is not expected to be ready before the end of his term, despite his prediction that it would be completed within the next three years.

In the Oval Office last week, when he announced that the US space force would oversee the project under Gen Michael Guetlein, the president said he was confident that it would be “fully operational” before he left office.

But the implementation plan for the Golden Dome produced by the Pentagon, as described by two people familiar with the matter, envisions having the defense weapons being ready only for a demonstration and under perfect conditions by the end of 2028.

The Golden Dome program is effectively becoming operational in phases as opposed to it coming online all at once. Initially, the Pentagon is set to focus on integrating data systems before developing space-based weapons later, the people said.

What might be possible in 18 months is for the US to have the foundations of a fully operational Golden Dome, where a military network of satellites and space-based communication systems could track hundreds of inbound missiles towards the US.

There would be no capability to take out the missiles using space-based weapons at that stage. The US has roughly 40 Patriot defense batteries in Alaska and California that could be used to kill potential intercontinental ballistic missiles.

By the end of Trump’s term, instead, the Pentagon could have the network of space-based sensors and communications, and attempt to integrate it with untested space-based weapons to shoot them down.

The space-based network is likely to rely heavily on Elon Musk’s SpaceX, which has been developing a next-generation tracking system known as the “aerial moving target identifier”. The defense department acquired the first prototypes last year during the Biden administration.

But the flagship concept for Golden Dome, to identify and kill ballistic missiles in the first 30 seconds to two minutes of launch when their heat signature is greatest – known as “boost phase” – is not expected to be ready.

Posters for the proposed Golden Dome for America missile defense shield displayed at the White House on 12 May. Photograph: Mark Schiefelbein/AP

That technology remains in development and it may not be feasible for years for a counter-missile launched from space to cut through Earth’s atmosphere with enough force to eliminate a ballistic missile, the people said.

The defense department already struggles with ground-based interceptors, which have been in development since the 1980s to take out missiles in their so-called “glide phase”, but still have only a roughly 20% success rate.

A White House spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment. Pentagon spokesperson Sean Parnell said in a statement that the defense department “will not publicly disclose specific technical details regarding the capabilities or acquisition strategies of certain advanced systems”.

The Trump administration has said Golden Dome could cost in the region of $175bn, a figure derived from what the Pentagon allocated for the project, according to two people familiar with the matter: $17.6bn for 2026, roughly $50bn for 2027, and roughly $100bn for 2028.

The final cost could be higher but Pentagon officials have said privately it depends on how ambitious Trump orders Golden Dome to be.

If Trump wants the ability to protect against 100 ballistic missiles, for instance, it could necessitate Golden Dome having several thousands of satellites that will naturally de-orbit every few years and need to be replaced, one of the people said.

Trump said in a Truth Social post on Tuesday that Canada could participate in Golden Dome, but that it would have to pay $61bn or become the 51st US state to get it for free. It was not clear how Trump reached that figure.

The idea of having Canada be a part of the program was discussed at the Pentagon when Trump first ordered Golden Dome months ago, one of the people said, but it was more about Canada contributing its satellite and radar data into Golden Dome.

Initially, the White House’s national security council called the program “Moonshot”, the people said. The defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, thought it was a terrible name and came up with three tiers for a possible missile shield system: silver, gold and platinum. The only tier costed out was gold.