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Iran war depletes US supplies · THE DAILY BRIEF

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: And with the fighting in the Middle East dragging on,
• 0:02
  Speaker 1: questions are being asked about the state of American weapons stockpiles.
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: Media reports say that five months of strikes on Iran
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  Speaker 1: have severely depleted the US military's supply of missiles, especially
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: advanced interceptors. Earlier this week, President Trump brushed off concerns
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: that the US is low on AMMO.
• 0:20
  Speaker 2: And we have plenty. We have a lot of ammunition,
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  Speaker 2: different types. You know, Biden gave a lot to Ukraine
• 0:27
  Speaker 2: and so we're building that up. But we have a lot.
• 0:30
  Speaker 2: We have a lot of the mid level stuff too.
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  Speaker 2: I mean, more than we could ever use no matter what.
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  Speaker 2: But we have a lot. I'd like to have more,
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  Speaker 2: to be honest, but so much was given to Ukraine
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  Speaker 2: by Biden.
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  Speaker 1: All right, Joining me now is Mark Kansion. He is
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  Speaker 1: a former colonel in the US Marine Corps. He's now
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  Speaker 1: a senior advisor at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: Market's good to have you with us again on the program.
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: You know, the US went into this war against Iran
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  Speaker 1: with the biggest in the most advanced military arsenal in
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  Speaker 1: the world, and after five months of operations, I mean,
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  Speaker 1: where does it stand in terms of stockpiles weapons.
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  Speaker 3: Well, the weapons have been depleted, and even going into
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  Speaker 3: the war, many observers believe that the stockpile was insufficient
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  Speaker 3: for a conflict with China. We've used about half of
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  Speaker 3: seven key munitions that we've tracked. We've used about half
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  Speaker 3: of four of those, and then about a third of
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  Speaker 3: the other three. It'll take several years to rebuild those inventories.
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  Speaker 3: But the presidents probably talking about are other munitions we
• 1:45
  Speaker 3: have a lot of, but they're less effective.
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: Several years to restock certain weapons, How is that possible?
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  Speaker 2: Mark?
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  Speaker 1: I think people around the world hearing that find it
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: hard to believe that the world's biggest and the most
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: powerful military needs years to replace weapons.
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  Speaker 3: The problem is that the US industrial base, particularly on munitions,
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  Speaker 3: had been sized after the Cold War to fight small
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  Speaker 3: regional wars. These wars didn't put a lot of demand
• 2:20
  Speaker 3: on US munitions. They were expected to be over quickly,
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  Speaker 3: and as a result, the US did not build large inventories,
• 2:28
  Speaker 3: and that started to change with the war in Ukraine,
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  Speaker 3: where it became clear that these inventories were not going
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  Speaker 3: to be adequate. But it takes time to first build
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  Speaker 3: political consensus, get the money out there and then build
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  Speaker 3: the munitions.
• 2:43
  Speaker 1: And when you look at the war against Iran or
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: at the moment, it looks like things are escalating. This
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: war had spread. We're seeing who these engage in the
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: Red Sea. The US is hitting militants in Iraq. Does
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  Speaker 1: the US military does it have enough capacity to fight
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  Speaker 1: an expand war?
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  Speaker 3: Well, it does have that capacity. Keep in mind that
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  Speaker 3: the United States has about fifty thousand troops in the
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  Speaker 3: Middle East. It has a military of two point one million.
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  Speaker 3: But if the war expands, it needs more forces. It'll
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  Speaker 3: have to deploy some active duty forces that aren't planned
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  Speaker 3: for deployment and maybe aren't fully supplied. But they also
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  Speaker 3: will need to call up a lot of reserves and
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  Speaker 3: that'll be very disruptive. No, we've done that in the past.
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  Speaker 3: We did it for a desert storm, we did it
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  Speaker 3: in Iraq and Afghanistan. But it's very destructive.
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  Speaker 1: With the US short on some advanced weapons, missile defense, etc.
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  Speaker 1: Where does that leave US allies who depend on supplies
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  Speaker 1: of American military tech.
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  Speaker 3: Well, one of the problems with this depletion is that
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  Speaker 3: there will be competition for new production. To look at
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  Speaker 3: Patriot for example, there are eighteen countries that use Patriot.
• 4:03
  Speaker 3: Many of them want to buy more. Some of them
• 4:06
  Speaker 3: are in the Gulf and have depleted their own inventories.
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  Speaker 3: But the United States wants to get priority, and if
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  Speaker 3: that happens, then our allies and partners are going to
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  Speaker 3: go to the back of the line. You're already seeing
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  Speaker 3: some diplomatic back and forth as decisions are being made
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  Speaker 3: about who gets priority for the new production until the
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  Speaker 3: supply can catch up with a demand.
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: What do you make of reports this week that Ukrainian
• 4:34
  Speaker 1: President Zelenski and US President Trump discussed Ukraine acquiring a
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  Speaker 1: license to manufacture Patriot missiles inside Ukraine.
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  Speaker 3: Well as a diplomatic political issue, it's great because it
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  Speaker 3: means that Ukraine and the Trump White House are on
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  Speaker 3: much closer terms than they were a year and a
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  Speaker 3: half ago. We're all aware of how bad things started off.
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  Speaker 3: The practical aspects of building Patriots in Ukraine maybe will
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  Speaker 3: be formidable, and may be too formidable, because they have
• 5:13
  Speaker 3: to establish a new supply chain to get components. They
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  Speaker 3: can't compete with what we're doing because that would slow
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  Speaker 3: down our production, and they have to build the facilities.
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  Speaker 3: It'll take years at best to get any production in Ukraine.
• 5:32
  Speaker 1: When it comes to future weapons development and procurement. How
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  Speaker 1: closely is the US military looking at Ukraine and the
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: low cost solutions that its military has come up with,
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  Speaker 1: especially in drone and anti drone tech.
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  Speaker 3: Well, the US has been watching it very closely, as
• 5:54
  Speaker 3: as the whole world. Every military has its eyes on
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  Speaker 3: Ukraine and now Iran. The US started to build lower
• 6:06
  Speaker 3: cost drones and also counter drone systems early on in
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  Speaker 3: the Ukraine War. However, we were way behind the Ukrainians,
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  Speaker 3: who are now the world leaders in both of these technologies.
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  Speaker 3: US is working with Ukraine and we're seeing some of
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  Speaker 3: those new systems come out as Lucas for example, which
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  Speaker 3: is a low cost drone actually a copy of the
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  Speaker 3: iraniansha Head, and there were some inexpensive counter drone systems also.
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  Speaker 3: It's going to take a while for the US to
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  Speaker 3: catch up though, and I think what you'll see coming
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  Speaker 3: out is a high low mix of inexpensive and expensive.
• 6:50
  Speaker 1: Mark Anteen is always Mark, good to have you on
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  Speaker 1: the program, good to get your insights on this.
• 6:55
  Speaker 3: Thank you, thanks for having me on the program. Ass