Star Wars returns with an executive order from President Donald Trump, aimed at creating the Iron Dome missile defense system for the United States.
The order, issued on Monday night, was not a detailed plan for constructing a vast defense network in space, but rather a loosely defined set of directives to speed up existing programs or explore new ways to protect the continental US. It focuses more on enhancing current defense systems than on deploying a comprehensive anti-missile infrastructure.
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On the same evening, just two blocks away, the Office of Management and Budget released a 56-page spreadsheet outlining the suspension of funding for thousands of programs. These cuts included major U.S. efforts to prevent terrorist access to nuclear materials, protect against biological weapon threats, and manage global initiatives aimed at curbing the spread of nuclear arms.
The two announcements highlighted the administration’s conflicting priorities in its early weeks. Trump seeks to expand the Space Force and take bold steps to build defense capabilities, even at the risk of triggering new arms races—a vision dating back to Ronald Reagan’s era with mixed outcomes.
Yet, in its pursuit to dismantle what it perceives as the “deep state,” the administration is also cutting funding for many programs designed to mitigate the risk of attacks on the U.S.—attacks that could come in forms beyond missile strikes from North Korea, China, or Russia.
A judge temporarily halted Trump’s spending freeze on Tuesday, but the president’s intentions remain clear.
While Trump labels his plan the “Iron Dome,” it bears little resemblance to the Israeli system, which is designed to intercept slow-moving missiles, unlike the high-speed intercontinental warheads it would need to defend against.
Any system meant to protect the U.S. will have to contend with Russia’s arsenal of 1,250 deployed weapons, China’s rapidly expanding stockpile—which the Pentagon expects to match Russia’s in the next decade—and North Korea’s growing threat since Trump’s diplomacy with Kim Jong Un faltered.
Both Russia and China are experimenting with hypersonic weapons, which follow unpredictable paths in the atmosphere, making them harder to track. Additionally, Russia claims to have developed an autonomous nuclear torpedo capable of crossing oceans to strike the U.S. West Coast.
Despite concerns, missile defense enthusiasts celebrated Trump’s announcement, hoping it would accelerate existing programs. Thomas Karako, director of the Missile Defense Project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, noted that the order would speed up work on space-based sensors to detect hypersonic missiles like those launched by the Biden administration last year.
“The big piece is space-based interceptors,” Karako explained. “That is coming, even if the implications of space as a warfighting domain haven’t sunk in for people.”
Missile defense has been a long-standing interest for Trump, who sees it as the next step for the Space Force, which he created during his first term. However, the program could spark a new arms race, according to some experts. Moreover, Trump’s plan fails to address the growing threats of nuclear terrorism and potential blackmail involving nuclear bombs smuggled into the U.S. Experts argue that the terrorism threat is far more significant than the possibility of a missile strike.
In the wake of the September 11 attacks in 2001, the U.S. government scrambled to seek advice on how to better protect against terrorist threats, including nuclear, biological, chemical, and cyberattacks. Ernest Moniz, former energy secretary under President Obama and current head of the Nuclear Threat Initiative, criticized the administration’s approach, calling it a “terrible trade-off.” He emphasized that while deploying missile defense systems against hypothetical missile threats, the U.S. is cutting programs aimed at preventing nuclear and biological terrorism.
“The Iron Dome reference conjures up the success of the Israeli missile defense, but that’s misleading, given the relatively short-range missiles Israel defends against and the small territory it needs to protect,” Moniz explained.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt responded to questions about suspending nuclear counterterrorism programs, stating, “This is not a ban. This is a temporary pause to ensure that all of the money going out from Washington, D.C., aligns with the president’s agenda.”
Critics argue that Trump’s executive order is more of a list of unproven ideas than a well-thought-out program. Theodore A. Postol, a professor emeritus of science and national security at MIT, labeled the missile defense plan “a compendium of flawed weapons systems.” He predicted it would become “a giant black hole for taxpayer dollars,” producing no results.
Stephen I. Schwartz, a consultant who tracks military spending, noted that the U.S. has already spent more than $400 billion on anti-missile technologies over the years. Despite this massive investment, many of the proposed systems, like the “Brilliant Pebbles” project—meant to use small rockets to destroy enemy missiles—have failed to deliver.
During his first term, Trump expressed optimism about reinventing missile defense. “Our goal is simple: to ensure that we can detect and destroy any missile launched against the United States anywhere, any time, any place,” he declared in 2019. The goal was to ensure America’s military dominance and avoid taking chances when it came to defense.
However, Trump’s plans appeared largely incremental. The Pentagon’s explanation for the 2019 initiative focused on defending against missile strikes from regional powers, not large-scale attacks from Russia or China.
In fact, the Pentagon later revealed that it had successfully tested a new missile interception method, launching two interceptors against a mock warhead, rather than one. This test simulated defense against a smaller adversary like North Korea, but experts argue that it won’t be effective against the massive, coordinated attacks that could come from Russia or China.
Critics of missile defense technology argue that large numbers of incoming missiles and decoys—common in nuclear attacks—make a reliable defense system all but impossible.
Source: The Economic Times
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