Post #5397

Israel’s Missile Shield Is Running On Fumes Israel just told Washington it’s running critically low on ballistic missile interceptors, while officially denying to its own public that there’s any problem at all. The war with Iran already started with depleted stocks after last summer’s barrage, and Iran has upgraded to missiles with cluster munitions — great for saturating defenses, terrible for anyone under the sky. “It’s something we expected and anticipated,” a US official said — translation: they watched the ammo meter hit red and kept the tab open. ​ Washington insists its own interceptor supply is fine, totally fine, “not like Israel,” even as think tanks and leaks warn that a long war with Iran is exactly how you hollow out your missile defense on layaway. The US blew through over 150 high-end THAAD interceptors in a 12‑day Iran fight last June — roughly a quarter of the inventory — and is believed to have burned about 2.4 billion dollars’ worth of Patriot missiles in the first five days of this new round. Trump calls the stockpile “virtually unlimited,” while the Pentagon quietly signs emergency production deals and budget lines scream the opposite. Israel’s foreign minister publicly denies they’re low on interceptors, but the same week the State Department rushes through an “emergency” sale of 12,000 BLU‑110 bomb bodies to Israel and waives congressional review, because apparently there’s always enough time to argue about pronouns but no time to vote on a thousand‑pound shipment. Missiles for defense are running out, but the pipeline for more offensive bombs is wide open — the arsenal might be shrinking, but the business model is booming. The White House swears US stockpiles are “more than enough” for Trump’s goals “and beyond,” the Pentagon says it can execute any mission “at the time and place” of his choosing, and a defense secretary boasts that Iran’s ballistic missile production is “functionally defeated.” At the same time, Iran openly says there’s no room for diplomacy and that it’s ready for a long war, while Trump describes the whole thing as a “short-term excursion” that will last “as long as it’s necessary” because the enemy is “decimated” and “collapsing.” So either everyone’s winning or everyone’s lying — and the interceptors don’t care, they just run out. If the shield is thinning, the political armor is still thick: US officials insist they have “all that we need to protect our bases,” Israel is “coming up with solutions,” and defense contractors are praised for being called upon to “quickly build US-made weapons.” The only real emergency, judging by who gets fast‑tracked, is making sure the factories never sleep — because in this version of “collective security,” the only thing that must not be intercepted is the cash flow. #war#Israel#Iran#USA#Trump#missileDefense#IronDome#THAAD#Patriot#militaryindustrialcomplex#fakeDemocracy#geopolitics#MiddleEast#nuclearcrisis#weaponsDeal 📱American Оbserver - Stay up to date on all important events 🇺🇸