OPINION — “The Golden Dome for America Trade Summit can be held on June 11, 2025 on the Von Braun Heart downtown Huntsville, Ala., on the UNCLASSIFIED stage…The aim of the Summit is to equip non-traditional and trade companions with the data and understanding of MDA’s [Missile Defense Agency] and House Power’s function in Golden Dome for America, empowering them to take concrete actions that help and align with authorities necessities. There can be no deliberate One-on-One classes, or panels in the course of the occasion. Non-Conventional Contractors are extremely inspired to attend as MDA is extraordinarily curious about ‘outdoors the field’ considering and we consider that non-traditional contractors are important to shaping the way forward for missile protection.”
That was a Might 13, MDA announcement to contractors of an trade day to listen to extra about Trump’s Golden Dome concept for an anti-missile protection for the complete United States.
On Might 20, President Trump introduced from the Oval Workplace that he had chosen an structure for the system that “could be absolutely operational by the top of my time period,” which means January 20, 2029. He added, “We’re most likely speaking about $175 billion whole value.” That’s an quantity and a timeframe that most individuals with expertise in related businesses consider are completely unrealistic.
Then on Might 22, MDA launched a pre-solicitation discover to publicize its intent to subject — someday in June — the primary contract proposals associated to the Golden Dome structure. MDA has given the bureaucratic identify Scalable Homeland Enterprise Layered Protection (SHIELD) to the general contracting car for use by it and different collaborating Protection Division (DoD) businesses.
MDA defined, “As a long-planned technique, SHIELD will permit MDA and different DoD entities to quickly subject orders beneath one enterprise versatile [contracting] car.”
However maybe extra importantly, these proposed contracts, in response to the MDA discover, anticipate “a interval of efficiency of 10 years, which can include a base ordering interval and a number of optionally available ordering intervals.” As well as, MDA’s pre-solicitation discover stated, “The anticipated said most worth [of the proposed contracts] is $151 billion. Particular person order awards will consist of assorted contract sorts.”
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MDA’s assertion of labor is breathtaking: “The MDA requires a sophisticated, multi-domain protection system able to detecting, monitoring, intercepting, and neutralizing threats to america homeland, its deployed forces, allies, and pals throughout all phases of flight by ballistic, hypersonic, and cruise missiles, and different superior aerial assaults.”
It additionally requires “steady, layered safety towards air, missile, area, cyber, and hybrid threats originating from any vector – land, sea, air, area, or our on-line world. This effort helps providers and provides of each categorised and unclassified applications on a number of safety domains.”
Maybe SHIELD’s most formidable aim is: “This contract will present fast supply of modern capabilities to the warfighter with elevated velocity and agility, leveraging synthetic intelligence and machine learning-enabled functions the place pertinent, and maximizing use of digital engineering, open programs architectures, model-based programs engineering, and agile processes within the acquisition, growth, fielding, and sustainment of those capabilities.”
It first ought to be understood that Golden Dome is mostly a plan to broaden on varied current native and regional U.S. missile protection programs that are already deployed, plus new components presently in growth.
What these programs have in frequent are sensors and interceptors. The sensors should be capable of monitor the goal from launch by way of trajectory to terminal dive. Interceptors should be capable of get shut sufficient to destroy targets all through their enhance part, midcourse, and terminal descent.
Gen. Michael Guetlein, House Power’s vice chief of operations, who’s Trump’s alternative to guide the Golden Dome effort, has informed Congress that Golden Dome would require unprecedented cooperation amongst present navy anti-missile programs, together with ground-based Military Patriot missiles and THAAD interceptors, the Navy AEGIS ship-fired missiles, and the Air Power and House Power satellites for sensors and space-based weapons.
Earlier, earlier than he was named, Guetlein seemed to the long run telling a Senate subcommittee, “Investing in maneuverable satellites geared up with state-of-the-art sensors will improve our potential to detect and monitor rising threats, making certain we will keep fixed consciousness of the battle-space, present well timed warnings, and finally, deny our adversaries the component of shock. These capabilities [will] help to ship on the President’s Golden Dome for America initiative and spotlight the central function space-based capabilities will play in bringing that effort to fruition.”
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Guetlein additionally raised an fascinating, unpublicized subject: One of many largest wants is the approval to conduct on-orbit testing and coaching. “It’s a really constrained set of authorities that we’ve got…We might ask that that [on-orbit testing, training] open up in order that we will improve our readiness of our forces on the entrance line to have the ability to do this shield and defend mission,” he stated.
Trump’s Golden Dome plan requires “growth and deployment of proliferated space-based interceptors (SBIs) able to boost-phase intercept,” a weapon that doesn’t but exist.
As many consultants have identified, SBIs must be positioned on satellites in low-earth orbit so they might spot the flame/warmth from launched missile in the course of the three-to-four minutes of the enhance part that begins a missile’s flight.
Right here is the difficult half. Somebody or one thing has to offer the order to shoot inside a minute or two and your SBI needs to be in place to hit the rising missile. Since SBIs are at all times in movement, you want a parade of SBI-armed satellites to defend towards one missile, and twice that many towards two, and so forth.
Since Golden Dome should take into account each Russia and China, plus North Korea as potential missile threats, meaning the U.S. could possibly be taking a look at 10,000 or extra SBI satellites for even minimal deterrence.
There was a logical cause why the Reagan administration dropped the concept of its Strategic Protection Initiative (Star Wars), and I consider the SBI component of Trump’s Golden Dome plan could face the identical future.
Evidently simply proposing Golden Dome defenses has drawn threats from Moscow and Beijing that their reply could very nicely be extra offensive weapons – and maybe a few of them in area – resulting in a complete new arms race – in area.
Opinions expressed are these of the writer and don’t characterize the views or opinions of The Cipher Temporary.
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