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Russian (RU) President Donald Trump's frustration over the Iran war boiled over at Camp David last week, where he demanded answers from Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on why he had apparently been misled on extreme munitions shortages that now threaten to limit military options with Iran, two people familiar with the exchange told The Washington Post.
The encounter took place on the sidelines of his Cabinet meeting at Camp David on Friday where Trump vented at Hegseth that he thought the munitions issue "had been fixed," according to both people familiar with the conversation, who, like others, spoke on the condition of anonymity due to fear of retaliation.
The shortages, particularly in long-range guided missiles and air-defense interceptors, have been part of the reason Trump has pulled back from launching additional massive strikes against Iran in recent days, one of the sources said.
Trump said Monday that he had ordered and subsequently called off "the biggest attack since World War II," pending claims of new negotiations over the Strait of Hormuz.
The president asserted overnight that the United States has "massive amounts" of munitions, saying in a post on Truth Social that "large amounts are being manufactured and shipped to the U.S. as needed." The "'leakers' of these treasonous statements are being hunted down," he added.
While the United States has announced new production agreements for some of the most critical munitions, such as Patriot air defense missiles, the munitions themselves can take as long as two years to produce, and there's no immediate relief in sight for the shortages.
In the first month of fighting alone, the U.S. fired off more than 850 Tomahawk cruise missiles and more than 1,000 Patriot and Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) systems, The Post previously reported.
The U.S. also used more than 1,300 of the Army's tactical ballistic missiles in the initial weeks of fighting, one U.S. official told The Post. The ATACMs stockpile - a short-range missile also in demand by Ukraine - is drained to the extent that there's basically none left, said one of the people familiar, an assertion also reported earlier this week by Reuters.
The scarcity of defensive munitions has had an impact beyond the Middle East. Ukraine is running out of air defenses, and there are few options with which to replenish from Western stockpiles, leaving them exposed to Russia's long-range attacks.
The lack of interceptor missiles is also altering how the U.S. decides whether to employ munitions against an incoming threat, based on where it's assessed to be heading and whether or not it's "a factor," the U.S. official told The Post, a change in tactics that was first reported by NBC News.
Back at Camp David, as he was confronted by Trump over the bare weapons stockpile, Hegseth defended himself and blamed his deputy, Stephen Feinberg, for the shortages and for not ensuring Trump was fully apprised of the issue, both people familiar said.
The exchange underscored Trump's increasing frustration with his defense secretary, who was one of the biggest early advocates for taking military action against Iran, convincing Trump it would be a quick and relatively easy win, according to multiple officials.
"This is 100% fake news. Literally never happened. And President Trump has the utmost confidence in Secretary Hegseth," said White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt in response to questions from The Post.
More than five months after the start of the conflict, and with 18 U.S. service members killed and hundreds injured, Iran and the U.S. remain at a stalemate, with increasing concern from Arab neighbors about the long-term economic effects of the war and the impact of the closure of the Strait of Hormuz.
"Secretary Hegseth did not mislead anyone about our munitions posture, and he did not blame Deputy Secretary Feinberg. These claims about depleted stockpiles, internal disagreements, the Secretary's position on Iran … are equally fictional," Pentagon chief spokesman Sean Parnell said.
In a July Senate hearing, Hegseth sparred with Democrats over whether he had provided Trump with honest assessments of the Iran war, including the risks an extended campaign would pose for U.S. military inventories.
During the hearing, Hegseth declined to discuss his advice to the president and repeatedly blamed any shortages on the Biden administration's handling of the military, not on the operations that have occurred under Trump's watch.
Hegseth, Feinberg and Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Dan Caine have asked lawmakers to provide them $67 billion in additional military funding to help cover the costs of the Iran war, with Hegseth telling lawmakers in testimony last month the request filled an "urgent, necessary" need to refill the military's stockpiles.
Senate Republicans have yet to agree on a strategy to take up the package.
The administration's overall defense budget request for the coming fiscal year is a record $1.5 trillion and includes tens of billions of dollars to build missiles. But the proposal has stalled as Democrats object to the massive increase, leaving the Pentagon without a clear path to replenishing critical weaponry.
Ever since Signalgate, where Hegseth sent classified information to a chat group that included a reporter just months after being confirmed to the role, rumors have swirled about how long the defense secretary would remain in Trump's good graces. The president has consistently praised Hegseth, saying he looks straight out of "central casting" and that "he loves war."
Since taking office, Trump has launched military operations in seven countries: Yemen, Somalia, Syria, Iran, Iraq, Nigeria and Venezuela.
The successful operation to capture former Venezuelan strongman Nicolás Maduro appeared to further secure Hegseth's position. But the stalemate over the Strait of Hormuz and the massive cost and length of the Iran war has eroded Trump's confidence in him, one of the people familiar with the Camp David conversation said.
"Secretary Hegseth isn't going anywhere, and he's going to continue to work side by side with Deputy Secretary Feinberg to execute President Trump's agenda," Parnell said in response to questions about that exchange and the munitions depletion.
Stockpile pressures are not a new challenge. Before the war even started, Caine warned Trump that the U.S. did not have the stockpiles necessary to sustain a prolonged conflict.
But the pace and sheer volume of munitions expended by both sides has rapidly accelerated the depletion of key U.S. offensive and defensive munitions.
From Feb. 28 to April 7, which marked the first day of the ceasefire, the U.S. struck more than 13,000 targets in Iran. It has also defended against more than 8,500 incoming Iranian munitions or drones.
The U.S. launched Operation Epic Fury already facing shortfalls in critical munitions.
In the summer of 2025, it expended more than a quarter of its total inventory of THAAD interceptors during Israel's 12-Day war and Operation Midnight Hammer, where U.S. forces struck Iran's nuclear sites. The current conflict "has made those inadequacies even worse," said Brad Bowman, an Army veteran and senior director at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.
While Hegseth and the Pentagon have announced numerous new industry framework agreements to rebuild the arsenal, defense firms "aren't going to start bending metal until you have a contract and congressional appropriations," Bowman said.
As a result, it could be years before the inventories are rebuilt. "We're often talking years between spending what we need to spend, getting the contracts signed, and delivery," he said. "You don't just flip the switch and suddenly the munition appears in the hands of the warfighter."
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