WATCH: In SASC Hearing, Kelly Presses Secretary of Defense on Feasibility and Cost of Golden Dome Missile Defense Plan

Today, during a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing, Arizona Senator and Navy combat veteran Mark Kelly pressed Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth on the feasibility and cost of President Trump’s proposed Golden Dome missile defense system, a plan that could cost taxpayers hundreds of billions of dollars. 

During the hearing, Kelly questioned whether the Pentagon was rushing into a half a trillion-dollar system without first proving it could handle the real-world complexity of modern threats: “Do you believe that we can build a system that can intercept all incoming threats? This is a very hard physics problem[…]. And considering what the future threat might be, it might even be more complicated than that. And you’re proposing spending, not just $25 billion, but upwards of at least half a trillion to a trillion dollars. I am all for having a system that would work but I am not sure that the physics can get there on this.” 

Kelly also raised concerns about the Secretary’s decision to cut 74% of the Pentagon’s Office of the Director of Operational Test Evaluation who would be responsible for ensuring systems like Golden Dome work before deployment: “I also strongly encourage you to—before we spend $25 billion or $175 billion or $563 billion or a trillion dollars—put together a group of people to figure out if the physics will work. You could go down a road here and spend hundreds and hundreds of billions of dollars of the taxpayer money, get to the end, and we have a system that is not functional.” 

Kelly, a former Navy pilot and astronaut with a background in engineering, called for rigorous oversight and testing before investing in costly, unproven defense systems at the expense of other programs. 

Click here to download a video of Kelly’s remarks. See the transcript below: 

Sen. Kelly: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Secretary, I want to talk about the proposed Golden Dome missile defense system. There’s a request to spend $25 billion this year alone. First of all, is this system designed to intercept a full salvo attack? 

Pete Hegseth, Secretary of Defense: Senator, it’s a multi layer system that would include different types of salvos. 

Sen. Kelly: So, it’s not just it’s not just rogue nation? Okay. 

Sec. Hegseth: Well, it’s not meant to be just one nation. It could be utilized in multiple scenarios. 

Sen. Kelly:  Against Russia? China? Full salvo? So, what kind of reliability are you aiming to build into the system? Are we looking for something like four nines on intercept success? 99.99% reliability? 

Sec. Hegseth: Obviously you want you seek the highest possible. You begin with what you have and integrating those C2 networks and sensors. Building up capabilities that are existing, with an eye toward future capabilities that can come online as quickly as possible. Not just ground based, but space based. All aspects. 

Sen. Kelly: So, against future capability too? So, do you believe that we can build a system that can intercept all incoming threats? You think we could build that system? This is a very hard physics problem. 

Sec. Hegseth: You would know as well as anybody, sir, how difficult this problem is. And that’s why we put our best people on it. We think the American people deserve it. 

Sen. Kelly: Let me tell you what I think we’re facing here: hundreds of ICBMs launched simultaneously; varying trajectory, MRVS; so multiple reentry vehicles; thousands of decoys; hypersonic glide vehicles; all at once.  

And considering what the future threat might be, it might even be more complicated than that. And you’re proposing spending, not just $25 billion, but upwards of, I think CBO estimated this, at least half a trillion, other estimates, a trillion dollars. I am all for having a system that would work. I am not sure that the physics can get there on this. It’s incredibly complicated.  

So, I want to get to another issue that you’re facing here. How much of the staff of the Office of the Director of Operational Test and Evaluation did you cut? 

Sec. Hegseth: After collaboration, sir, with the service departments, the joint staff, and others, we identified that as a place where there were redundancies and multiple additional layers that weren’t necessary. So, most of it most of it is. 

Sen. Kelly: I’ll tell you what you cut, you cut 74%.  

Sec. Hegseth: So, most of it most of it is.  

Sen. Kelly: Most of it. And was your decision to cut more than half of the Pentagon’s Testing and Evaluation Office staff driven, in part, by concerns about the office’s plan to oversee testing of Golden Dome? 

Sec. Hegseth: The concerns were not specific to Golden Dome, sir. It was years and years of delays, unnecessarily, based on redundancies in the decision-making process, that the Service’s co-comms and the joint staff, together with OSD, identified, as a log jam, that was not helping the process. It was slowing it down. 

Sen. Kelly: Well, Mr. Secretary, to get the reliability we would need, you need something that’s at four nines. 99.99% reliability, with all these challenges. And you cut the staff of the people who are going to make sure this thing works before we make it operational. Before we give it to the war fighters. You got to go back and take a look at this.  

But I also strongly encourage you to, before we spend $25 billion or $175 billion or $563 billion or a trillion dollars, put together a group of people to figure out if the physics will work. You could go down a road here and spend hundreds and hundreds of billions of dollars of the taxpayer money, get to the end, and we have a system that is not functional. That very well could happen. 

And you’re doing this just because the president, and I understand your role as a Secretary of Defense, you got to execute what the president says, but this this idea, you know, might not be fully baked. And you can get in front of it now and figure it out. And if you put the right physicists on this, and I’m not saying go to the big defense contractors, going to scientists, and I know there’s a questionable relationship with this administration and scientists, but go to some scientists. Figure out what we would have to do to build a system and then make smart decisions, before we spend hundreds and hundreds of billions of dollars. 

Sec. Hegseth: Senator, we’re doing that, leveraging existing technologies and not premising the project on aspirational technologies, what we can actually do and would welcome. 

Sen. Kelly: Well $25 billion in the first year is a lot of money. That’s more than just figuring out if we have the ability to build a system that can handle a full salvo threat, hypersonic glide vehicles, MRVS thousands of decoys.  

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.