America’s war with Iran is in its eighth month and stuck. On September 26, Donald Trump confirmed that he had rejected Tehran’s offer to reopen the Strait of Hormuz in return for lifting the American naval blockade and easing sanctions. He has reportedly told his staff that renewed bombing is likely after the midterm elections on November 3. He is reluctant to resume major combat any sooner.

The embarrassing question is whether America actually has enough missiles to bomb Iran. The West spent a generation persuading itself that making clever weapons could compensate for making fewer of them, with even fewer factories and a thinner web of suppliers behind them.

The reality of war is messier and less obliging. America has spent the past 30 years designing missiles that can perfectly find their targets. The real test, however, is whether you can keep replacing them when a war drags on for years.

Take the Tomahawk missile. These are fired from ships or submarine hundreds of miles away from their targets and allow America to hit an enemy’s defenses without risking a pilot or a plane. In the first six weeks of the Iran war, American forces fired more than a thousand of them, about a third of the total stock. Yet over the previous decade, the Pentagon had bought an average of fewer than 90 Tomahawks a year. The Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank estimates that getting back to February’s level could take four years.

Russia ‘produces in three months what the whole of NATO produces in a year’

Russia ‘produces in three months what the whole of NATO produces in a year’

Then there are the missiles America needs when Iran fires back. THAAD interceptors destroy ballistic missiles by ramming them while they’re in flight. In the first six weeks of the war, CSIS reckons, America fired between 190 and 290 from a prewar stock of about 360.

Each THAAD interceptor needs a solid rocket motor and a booster to get it off the launcher and up to speed. America still makes them at home. The trouble is that the industry has narrowed to two dominant suppliers, L3Harris and Northrop Grumman. In April, Arizona Senator Mark Kelly asked Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth how long it would take to replace the munitions America had already fired. “Months and years,” Hegseth replied. “Years,” Kelly repeated.

Britain has even less margin. General Sir Richard Barrons, a former head of Joint Forces Command who later co-led the government’s defense review, has told MPs he would be surprised if the country had enough munitions for more than about a week of a major war. NATO is in a similar position. Secretary General Mark Rutte said........

© The Spectator