Ousted US Army Chief of Staff General Randy George warned months before the US-Israeli war against Iran that American missile defence stockpiles were critically low and could take until 2030 to recover, CBS News reported on Thursday, citing US officials familiar with his assessment.
George raised the warning in late December, two months before the conflict began. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth removed him from his post in April as the war was under way.
The assessment, included in the Pentagon’s fiscal 2027 force allocation planning, identified shortages of Terminal High Altitude Area Defence (THAAD) interceptors and Patriot missiles, with supplies expected to remain at strategically low levels until 2030.
Officials attributed the shortfall to weapons transfers to Ukraine, US military support for Israel and limited defence industry production capacity, according to the report.
War further strains supplies
The conflict with Iran has added pressure on US stockpiles. A Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) estimate found that US forces entered 2026 with about 2,300 Patriot interceptors and used between 1,050 and 1,430 of them during the conflict.
The US had about 355 THAAD interceptors before the war, of which an estimated 190 to 290 were expended, according to the estimates.
Mark Cancian, a retired Marine colonel and senior adviser at CSIS, told CBS News that the systems would be crucial in a potential conflict with China.
“Air defence, missile defence, that will be huge,” he said, explaining that a major confrontation with Beijing would require substantial interceptor supplies.
Replenishing the stockpiles could take years. CSIS estimates that new THAAD interceptor contracts take more than four years to fulfil, while Patriot PAC-3 orders take an average of three and a half years.
Pentagon denies shortage
The Pentagon rejected claims that US forces face a shortage of munitions.
“Claims of US munitions shortages are false,” chief spokesperson Sean Parnell told CBS News.
He added that Washington retained “everything required to strike at the time and place of the President’s choosing”.
