A new assessment reports that the U.S. Army has used nearly all of its ATACMS and Precision Strike Missiles (PrSM) during the five-month conflict with Iran, raising concerns about military readiness for future conflicts and the ability to deter adversaries such as Russia and China. The assessment follows a Reuters report earlier today that the U.S. precision long-range missile stockpile is nearly exhausted.
A new assessment Tuesday evening reports that the U.S. Army has used nearly all of its ATACMS (Army Tactical Missile System) and Precision Strike Missiles (PrSM) during the five-month war with Iran, raising concerns about military readiness for future conflicts. The assessment follows a Reuters report earlier today, as covered by The Zioneer, that the U.S. precision long-range missile stockpile is nearly exhausted.
The Reuters report, published at 13:02 Jerusalem time on Tuesday, evolved through three versions: first stating that the U.S. used most of its long-range missiles, then specifying nearly all ATACMS and PrSM, and finally reporting the stockpile nearly exhausted. Minutes after the Reuters report, a social media post disputed the claims, arguing that the true stockpile data is classified and unknowable. The topic has been a recurring theme: an open-source intelligence assessment published on July 24 warned that while the U.S. has enough munitions to sustain combat, precision-guided stockpiles risk depletion and could take 1–4 years to rebuild to prewar levels.
The broader context of the conflict includes over a month of sustained U.S. strikes against Iranian military infrastructure. As The Zioneer reported on June 10, CENTCOM had already expended hundreds of Tomahawk cruise missiles in the opening weeks of the conflict. A July 17 report detailed another wave of strikes on dozens of military targets. The current assessment underscores growing concerns about the sustainability of the U.S. campaign and the long-term readiness of the American arsenal.
The accuracy of the stockpile depletion claims remains subject to debate. The Reuters report relied on unnamed sources, and the social media post noted that the classified nature of the data makes independent verification impossible. The new assessment, whose source was not specified, adds to the discussion but does not resolve the underlying uncertainty.
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