Why It Matters
The United States may face meaningful constraints on its ability to sustain military operations and support allies after expending large quantities of munitions and missile-defense interceptors, yet the precise scope of those constraints remains publicly unverified. A new Congressional Research Service (CRS) report examines whether U.S. inventories can support continued operations and what Congress might do about replenishment, funding, and industrial capacity.
The Department of Defense (DOD) has not made public the precise numbers of specific munitions expended in the conflict. The report cites estimates from sources including a think tank, a news article, and the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), while noting that the armed services committees have reportedly received classified briefings. CBO estimated the United States had "probably used between one-half and two-thirds" of its inventory of certain missile-defense interceptors, and put the cost of replacing munitions expended through Aug. 1 at $21.7 billion, including $7.3 billion for land-attack cruise missiles, $13.1 billion for missile-defense interceptors, and $1.2 billion for other munitions.
The Trump administration has offered competing public messages. President Donald Trump said in September that the United States had "more munitions than we could ever possibly even think of using," while the DOD Inspector General, citing DOD acquisition officials, said expenditures had caused "strategic inventory shortfalls" and exposed resupply bottlenecks.
The Big Picture
CENTCOM Commander Admiral Brad Cooper testified that U.S. forces conducted more than 13,500 strikes in the first 38 days of major combat operations, and that the United States and regional partners intercepted more than 6,000 one-way attack drones and more than 1,500 ballistic missiles.
CBO estimated that replacing certain interceptors would probably take at least five years even with increased production, underscoring the defense industrial base's limited capacity to scale quickly. DOD separately estimated replacement costs at $27.7 billion, according to CBO, while the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) submitted a supplemental funding request on June 24 that included $21 billion for munitions.
The House adopted the concurrent budget resolution H.Con.Res. 113 in July, which included reconciliation instructions allowing up to $60 billion in deficit increases for fiscal years 2027 through 2036; the resolution did not specify how much would go to munitions, and the Senate had not considered it as of the report's publication date.
Congress is also considering provisions in H.R. 8800 that would require reporting on the financial cost of operations against Iran, the status of munitions stockpiles, and the integration of foreign military sales (FMS) demand into industrial-base planning. Finite U.S. industrial base capacity introduces trade-offs between filling Foreign Military Sales (FMS) orders and replenishing U.S. stockpiles, and the CRS report says FMS delivery delays may result in cancellations, potentially affecting U.S. and partner interoperability and integration.
The Bottom Line
The CRS report identifies a medium-term concern that depleted stockpiles could affect the U.S. ability to establish what the 2026 National Defense Strategy describes as "a strong denial defense along the First Island Chain" in the Indo-Pacific, presenting this as a potential vulnerability for Congress to assess rather than a certain outcome. Whether Congress addresses that risk through additional appropriations, expanded production authorities, or oversight of FMS prioritization remains unresolved, as the key legislative vehicles are still under consideration as of Oct. 5.
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