One of the sources said the drawdown of the ATACMS and PrSM stockpiles reflected a decision by the Trump administration to avoid riskier ways of attacking Iranian targets, such as by using piloted aircraft to drop bombs.
Because these weapons allow the military to attack targets from a distance, analysts say they would be valuable in a war against an adversary with strong air defenses, such as China. They have been used to strike targets inside Iran, according to a March report by the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS).
According to the report, PrSM stockpiles were low to start with, since it is a relatively new munition, but the U.S. military has ordered a large number of them for 2027. The Army has said that ATACMS are being phased out and that production is shifting to the newer PrSM missiles.
Military leaders have for weeks warned the president that stockpiles of defensive weapons — including Patriot interceptors, which are effective against ballistic missiles — were dwindling, said two of the sources. Last week, several media outlets reported Trump had decided not to launch another massive offensive inside Iran in part because his military advisers had warned about the U.S. stockpile.
A U.S. official disputed those accounts, saying Trump chose not to move forward with another attack because of pressure from Gulf states.
The Middle East conflict has sparked intense debate about Trump's authority to prosecute hostilities against Iran without congressional authorization. No request for a declaration of war or an authorization to use military force has been submitted to Congress.
Last week, CSIS published a report estimating that between February and July about 65% of Patriot interceptors had been expended and that the number of THAAD ballistic missile interceptors in U.S. stockpiles was at least 38% lower than at the start of the war. Patriots and THAADs are systems that detect and destroy incoming missiles and are among the most effective in the country's arsenal.
While Reuters has not seen the supply figures, those numbers match internal U.S. data, two of the sources said.
The U.S. also burned through a little less than half of its global supply of Tomahawk cruise missiles, which are generally launched from ships, since the start of the war, one of the sources said.
Reuters could not independently verify that number.
The Tomahawk is a Navy weapon, launched from destroyers, cruisers and submarines, and has long served as the sea service's principal means of striking heavily defended targets without risking pilots.
Raytheon, a unit of RTX RTX.N, has reached a tentative multi-year agreement with the Pentagon aimed at boosting Tomahawk production, alongside increases in other munitions, as Washington races to rebuild stockpiles.
LMT•
