WASHINGTON — The general in charge of America’s Golden Dome missile defense shield said today that a high-profile and technologically ambitious element of the project, space-based interceptors (SBIs), may not make it into the final architecture as originally envisioned if the tech is shown to be prohibitively costly.
“We are so focused on affordability. If we cannot do it affordab[ly], we will not go into production,” Space Force Gen. Michael Guetlein told members of a House Armed Services Strategic Forces subcommittee today.
“Because we are looking at the threats from a multi-domain perspective to make sure I have redundant capabilities and I don’t have single points of failure,” he added. “So, if boost-phase intercept from space is not affordable and scalable, we will not produce it, because we have other options to get after it.”
As in past engagements, the four-star general heading up the sprawling, multilayered homeland air defense system maintained that SBI technology exists today, but coupled the optimisim with reassurance before lawmakers that the price tag will be a key driver. (Though Guetlein was discussing boost-phase intercept, in which adversary missiles are destroyed shortly after launch, the Space Force has expressed interest in space-based mid-course intercept as well.)
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Late last year Space Force began awarding SBI prototype deals to multiple vendors, and the service’s fiscal 2027 budget request includes $2 billion in procurement funding for “Special Space Activities.” Given that nowhere in the Space Force’s request is there any mention of funding for the classified contracts issued last year to begin SBI prototyping for Golden Dome, it’s possible some SBI funding is held in the special activities pot.
Guetlein, appoint Golden Dome czar by President Donald Trump in May 2025, was testifying today alongside several other senior military officials about America’s missile defense enterprise and the administration’s newly revealed FY27 $1.5 trillion budget request. However, few details about Golden Dome spending plans were discussed.
And while subcommittee Chairman Rep. Scott DesJarlais, R-Tenn., praised the department for becoming more transparent with its Golden Dome plan. However, Rep. Seth Moulton, D-Mass., the panel’s top Democrat, pushed back on it from a “technical and fiscal perspective.”
“It is clear to me now that the reality does not match what President Trump has promised to the American people: An impenetrable shield … against all threats,” he said.
So far, Pentagon officials including Guetlein have remained relatively tight lipped in public about the plan they contend will cost $185 billion, but FY27 budget documents shed a bit more light on their spending projections.
The potential for SBIs was briefly touched on in a newly released an unclassified version of the Space Force’s Objective Force plan for the next 15 years. It notes, “If the Space Force builds space-based interceptors or supports their employment, it should undertake a focused study into the specification required to do so.”
By The Numbers
Earlier this month the White House submitted its fiscal 2027 (FY27) budget request to Capitol Hill. That request included $1.5 trillion in defense spending for next year with $1.15 trillion in the base budget request and an additional $350 billion from a forthcoming reconciliation ask. (A separate supplemental funding request for operations in the Middle East may also be forthcoming.)
Although the in-depth budget justification documents detailing specific plans and timelines has not yet been released, initial documents outline broader Golden Dome and missile defense spending plans.
For Golden Dome the Pentagon wants to spend $17.5 billion in FY27, but with only $398 million in the base budget — a potentially risky move if lawmakers do not pass the reconciliation bill.
Tom Karako, a missile defense expert with the Center for Strategic and International Studies, called that decision part of a larger “legislative strategy” where by placing Golden Dome dollars and items like critical munitions in the reconciliation plan it forces lawmakers’ hand and provides the department with more flexibility and time to spend the dollars.
“[It] is a little bit of a risk, but I think it’s probably a good one, because it makes it must pass,” Karako told Breaking Defense last week.
As for the actual numbers, the Golden Dome request parses out spending among the services and agencies across three pots of money: research and development, procurement, and maintenance (O&M), procurement.
The bulk of the request, $14.2 billion, is spread across the services and agencies to cover research and development efforts, with nearly $4.5 billion coming from MDA’s pot, $4.5 billion from the Space Force, $615 million from the Air Force, $427 million from the Army and $174 million for the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. Another $2.3 billion pot is placed under a nondescript Golden Dome umbrella, while $452 million is allocated for developmental work on directed energy systems development, and $497 derived from the Under Secretary of Defense for Intelligence & Security budget.
In total, Pentagon budget documents lay out plans to spend $2.2 billion in procurement on Golden Dome next year, with MDA’s budget covering $1.8 billion while Air Force coffers cover $365.7 million.
And when it comes to the $1.2 billion O&M spending plan for Golden Dome next year, MDA’s budget could cover the lion’s share with a $893 million ask, followed by $143.5 million from the Air Force budget and $7 million from the Army. There is also another $106 million slated to come from a broad Golden Dome account too, according to budget documents.
While budget documents released so far do not detail just which service and agency programs fit under the Golden Dome homeland defense umbrella, there are various technology candidates scattered throughout.
MDA’s FY27 budget request, for example, includes nearly $12.4 billion for research and development funding, up from the $8.2 billion allocated for FY26. Almost $1.5 billion from that total would go towards ballistic missile defense “enabling programs,” another $1.7 billion towards “special programs” and $1.3 billion for “improved homeland defense interceptors.”
The administration is also requesting $5.7 billion to pad the agency’s procurement coffers next year, an increase from the $2.5 allocated this year. That includes $800 million for an unspecified type and number of Counter-Small Unmanned Aircraft Systems, $1.2 billion for Aegis ballistic missile defense, and $4.2 billion to purchase 136 Standard Missile-3 Block IIA’s.