What challenges could Trump's Golden Dome face to make it operational by end of his term?

Golden Dome missile defence plan: As the US President Donald Trump on Tuesday selected a design for the $175-billion project and identified a Space Force general to lead the programme, experts suggest it could confront major technical and political hurdles, and the actual cost to achieve its objectives could be much higher than he has projected.

While the US president pushes for a defence system capable of countering a broad range of enemy weapons, comprising intercontinental ballistic missiles, hypersonic and cruise missiles, and drones, he also wants it operational by the end of his second term.

‘Main challenges will be cost’

A nonresident senior associate in the Missile Defense Project at Washington's Center for Strategic and International Studies, Melanie Marlowe, said, “The main challenges will be cost, the defense industrial base, and political will. They can all be overcome, but it will take focus and prioritization.”

She added, "The White House and Congress are going to have to agree on how much to spend and where the money will come from. Our defense industrial base has atrophied," though “we have begun to revive it”.

Marlowe also emphasised the need for further advancements in sensors, interceptors, and other key elements of the project.

Price estimate ‘not realistic’

Assistant professor of international affairs and aerospace engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology, Thomas Roberts, said the price estimated was “not realistic”, adding, “The challenge with the statements from yesterday is that they lack the details needed to develop a model of what this constellation would really look like."

‘Question is how to most cost effectively counter’ it

A senior engineer at the RAND Corporation, Chad Ohlandt, stated "the threat is clearly getting worse," but the "key question is how to most cost effectively counter" it, further continuing, "Any questions of realism or feasibility" for Golden Dome “depend on where we set the bar. Defend against how many threats? Threats of what capability? What is to be defended? As you raise the bar, it becomes more expensive.”

‘Number of bureaucratic, political, science and technological milestones need to be achieved’

Associate fellow at the Royal United Services Institute, Thomas Withington, said, "there are a number of bureaucratic, political, science and technological milestones that will need to be achieved if Golden Dome is ever going to enter service in any meaningful capacity. It is an incredibly expensive undertaking, even for the US defense budget. This is serious, serious money. I'm not holding my breath as to whether we will actually ever see this capability."

Inspired by Israel's Iron Dome, the Golden Dome is designed to defend the United States against advanced missile threats, including hypersonic and space-launched missiles. The Pentagon chief Pete Hegseth said the system aims to protect “the homeland from cruise missiles, ballistic missiles, hypersonic missiles, drones, whether they're conventional or nuclear”

(With inputs from AFP)