Can Trump’s expensive ‘golden dome’ rocket defense system be done?

Connopes rain from outside the atmosphere of the earth. Faster-Dan sound cruise missiles that touch the American infrastructure. Sky-high nuclear explosions.

These are just a few of the nightmare-like scenarios that experts warn that could come true if the dated and limited defense systems of the US were overwhelmed in a future high-tech attack.

Even a single, relatively small nuclear detonation hundreds of kilometers above the heads of Americans would create an electromagnetic pulse – or EMP – that would have apocalyptic results. Aircraft would fall out of the sky throughout the country. Everything, from portable electronics and medical devices to water systems, would be made completely useless.

“We would not go back 100 years,” says William Fortschen, an author and arms researcher at the Montreat College in North Carolina. “We would lose it all, and we don’t know how to rebuild it. It would be equivalent that we go back 1000 years and start all over again.”

In response to these hypothetical – but experts say it very well – threats, US President Donald Trump focused on a “next generation” rocket shield: the Golden Dome.

But although many experts agree that building such a system is necessary, Trump’s high costs and logistical complexity will be extremely challengingly to reinforce Trump’s mission to strengthen America rocket.

An executive order in which is called to create what was initially called “Iron Dome for America” ​​noted that the threat of weapons of the next generation “Intens and more complex” has become “Catastrophic” scenario for the US.

Patrycja Bazylczyk, a rocket cafe expert at the Washington DC headquarters for strategic and international studies, the BBC told that existing systems are aimed at intercontinental ballistic missiles or ICBMs, such as those used by North Korea. But powerful countries such as Russia and China also invest in newer technologies that can not only hit neighbors, but also opponents away an ocean.

One of the threats that have been publicly identified by American defense officials are Hypersonic weapons can move faster than the speed speed And fractional orbital bombing systems – also known as FOBs – that can supply core heads from space.

Each – even in limited numbers – are deadly.

“The Golden Dome reoriented our rocket policy for our great power competitors,” said Mrs. Bazylczyk. “Our opponents invest in long -distance strike options, including things that are not your typical rockets that we have been dealing with for years.”

The White House and the Defense Officers have so far provided few concrete details about what the Golden Dome – who is still in its conceptual stages – would actually look like.

Speaking next to Trump in the Oval Office on May 20, said Minister of Defense Pete Hegseeth only that the system will have several layers “over the land, sea and space, including spaces -based sensors and interceptors”.

Trump added that the system will be able to intercept rockets “Even if they are launched from other sides of the world, and even if they are launched in space”, with various aspects of the program that is as far away as Florida, Indiana and Alaska.

In earlier testimonies in the congress, the newly mentioned overlooker of the program, Space Force General Michael Guetlein, said the Golden Dome will build on existing systems that are largely focused on traditional ICBMs. A new system would add – several layers that can also detect and defend against cruise rockets and other threats, also by intercepting them before launching or in the different phases of their flight.

Currently, the US Missile Defense Agency is largely based on 44 intercepts based on the ground in Alaska and California, designed to combat a limited rocket attack.

Experts have warned that the existing system is miserably insufficient if the American home country was attacked by Russia and China, each of whom had an extensive arsenal of hundreds of ICBMs and thousands of cruise missiles.

“(Current systems) were founded for North Korea,” said Dr. Stacie Pettyjohn, a defense expert at the center for a new American safety. “It could never intercept a big arsenal like that of Russia, or even a much smaller one such as China’s.”

The Congressional Research Office, or CBO, has said that “hundreds or thousands of” space -based platforms would be needed to “even offer a minimal defense” against incoming rockets – a potentially extremely expensive proposition.

Trump revealed for the first time his concept for the Golden Dome during a joint speech to the Congress in March, when he said that “Israel has it, have other places, and the United States should have it too”.

The president referred to Israel’s “Iron Dome” systemWho has been using the country since 2011 to intercept rockets and rockets.

The iron dome of Israel, however, is designed to intercept a threats of a shorter distance, while two other systems – known as David’s Sling and the arrow – fight larger ballistic missiles, as they have been fired by Iran and the Houthis in Yemen.

Mrs Bazylczyk described the iron dome as aimed at “lower layer” threats, such as rockets fired from Gaza or South Libanon.

The Golden Dome would also go, to also detect rockets with a longer range, she said.

To achieve that, she said it should combine different options.

“And I will look forward to the command and control system that all this can weave together,” she said, and noted that such a thing does not exist at the moment.

Creating that system will be an incredibly complicated – and precious – proposition.

In the Oval Office, Trump suggested that the Golden Dome could be completed by the end of his term of office, with a total cost of $ 175 billion over time, including an initial investment of $ 25 billion that has already been reserved for it.

His estimate is far beyond synchronization with the CBOs, which has set the potential price tag on the rooms based on $ 542 billion for 20 years. Experts have said that the total costs can ultimately absorb a large part of the massive American defense budget.

“I think that is unrealistic,” said Dr. Pettyjohn. “This is complicated, with multiple systems that have to be integrated together. Each of those steps has its own risks, costs and schedules.”

“And going fast will add more costs and risks,” she added. “You will probably produce something that is not so thoroughly evaluated … There will be failures on the way and what you produce, may need a great overhaul.”

The establishment of the Golden Dome has also fueled that it can lead to a new “weapon race”, where we prepare enemies to find their own efforts to find ways to overwhelm or bypass his defense.

Spokesperson Mao Ning of the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs Mao Ning said reporters that the plan “increases the risk that the space will be a battlefield”.

Those involved in investigating sausage-case scenarios and the American defense policy break these worries. Potential enemies, they claim, already invest heavily in attacking possibilities.

“The Golden Dome wants to change the strategic calculus of our opponents,” said Mrs. Bazylczyk. “Improving the air and missile weather of Homeland reduces the confidence of a potential attacker in achieving all the objectives they are looking for.”

“It increases the threshold for them to participate in this attack,” she added. “And it contributes to the overall deterrence.”

Even a partially completed Golden Dome, Mr. Fortschen said, could prevent a nightmare scenario from taking place.

“I will breathe a lot easier,” he said. “We need that type of system. The Golden Dome is the answer.”