President Donald Trump said the United States is “stocked” with the supplies to wage war with Iran, but experts have said we could face a shortage of certain military supplies.
In a March 2 Truth Social postTrump said the U.S. has a “virtually unlimited supply” of certain munitions.
“Wars can be fought ‘forever,’ and very successfully, using just these supplies (which are better than other countries finest arms!),” Trump wrote. “At the highest end, we have a good supply, but are not where we want to be.”
The president made similar remarks March 3 at the White House.
Trump’s comments stood in contrast to reporting by The Washington Post days before the start of the Iran war that Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, expressed concern that the U.S. munitions stockpile had been significantly depleted. Trump pushed back on the Post’s story, writing on Truth Social that Caine did not oppose the war, but Trump’s post did not address whether there is a munitions shortage.
We asked the White House what specific weapons Trump referred to when he said we “are not where we want to be” and received no answer to that question.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a statement, “The U.S. military has more than enough munitions, ammo, and weapons stockpiles to achieve the goals of Operation Epic Fury laid out by President Trump — and beyond.”
Some lawmakers and experts have said the U.S. will need to replenish certain supplies.
Days after the Feb. 28 launch of the war, the commander of U.S. Central Command, Adm. Brad Cooper, said, “We’ve already struck nearly 2,000 targets with more than 2,000 munitions.”
It’s unknown how long the U.S. will remain at war with Iran; Trump said March 2 that the administration had projected four to five weeks, “but we have capability to go far longer than that.”
Some munitions will need to be replenished
Munitions inventories vary by type. Ryan Brobst, an expert on U.S. defense strategy at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, pointed to three broad categories:
Air and missile defense interceptors launched to hit enemy missiles. This supply is the most strained by the current war. However, there is evidence that the U.S. and Israeli forces destroyed significant quantities of Iranian missile launchers which alleviates pressure for the U.S. to restock.
Standoff munitionssuch as cruise and ballistic missiles, will require some replenishment.
Air dropped munitions. The damage to Iran’s air defense network has allowed U.S. aircraft to use air-dropped munitions such as the Small Diameter Bomb which are stockpiled in large numbers. “The U.S. military will not run out of air-dropped munitions anytime soon,” Brobst said.
Kelly Grieco, a defense policy expert at the Stimson Center, a think tank, said the biggest concern is an interceptor missile shortage. If the U.S. used about half its stockpile of interceptor missiles, for example, it could run out in about a month, if Iran fires missiles at a similar rate to the 12-day war in June 2025 between Iran and Israel.
Before this war began, the U.S. was already trying to grow its stockpiles of key interceptors. Lockheed Martin was expanding production of certain missile systems while Raytheon was scaling up other missile production under multi-year agreements with the Pentagon, Grieco said.
Every time the U.S. deploys a missile or missile interceptor in Iran, Grieco said it is not available in another region. “You can go through these things much faster than you can replace them.”
Mark Cancian, a retired colonel and military specialist at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said the U.S. artillery shell stockpile is low, but those aren’t being used in this war. Those would be used in a ground war, but so far there are no U.S. troops on the ground in Iran.
Better-stocked munitions
Trump said the U.S. has a good supply of munitions at middle and upper levels.
That’s true for certain commonly used short and medium-range air launched missiles, but not true of ground launched precision missiles.
“Trump’s comment about having a good supply at the ‘highest end’— Patriot, THAAD and SM-3, for example — is accurate if ‘good’ is interpreted as adequate,” Cancian said. “However, Pentagon war planners will become increasingly concerned as these inventories diminish” because they would be needed if the U.S. ever enters a conflict with China.
Following closed-door briefings with administration officials March 3, some lawmakers expressed concern about the military stockpile.
Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va., the ranking Democrat on the Senate intelligence Committee, said, “When you combine the amount of munitions that we have spent over the last year attacking the Houthis, the amount of munitions that are spent on … the seven different military conflicts the president has put America into, our munitions are low.”
Sen. Mark Kelly, D-Arizona, who serves on the Armed Services Committee, said that at some point, “This becomes a math problem and how can we resupply air defense munitions. Where are they going to come from?”
What is the Defense Production Act that the administration might invoke?
NBC News reported that in meetings with lawmakers, the Trump administration said it could invoke the Defense Production Act to speed up munitions production.
The act, which was passed in 1950 and amended periodically since, provides the president with the power to influence domestic industry in the interest of national security.
The government can tell private businesses when and how to fulfill orders for certain goods. Over the years, its scope has expanded from military needs to include natural hazards, terrorist attacks and other national emergencies. It was invoked in 2001 during the Iraq War, in 2017 during the aftermath of hurricanes in Puerto Rico and in 2020 and 2021 because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The use of the act is unlikely to change anything in the short term, but it could eventually replenish stockpiles.
“If there is a time to bolster the defense industrial base, it is now,” Brobst said.
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