America's Missile Shortage & Cuba Spy Buildup

**Mike Baker** (0:11)
It's Wednesday, the 5th of August, welcome to The President's Daily Brief. I'm Mike Baker, your eyes and ears on the world stage. And why yes, I am back on the road. All right, let's get briefed. First up, America's five-month war with Iran has left the Pentagon facing an uncomfortable reality. It's running dangerously low on some of its most important long-range weapons. We'll have the details later in the show. The Trump administration is quietly expanding America's intelligence footprint in Cuba. We'll explain what that could signal about Washington's plans for the Communist Island. Plus, Syria is offering to slash its dependence on Russian oil in exchange for relief from US sanctions. And in today's Back of the Brief, the US is warning businesses that North Korean operatives are posing as remote IT workers to funnel money back to Kim Jong Un's regime. I know, I too am shocked that North Korean operatives are engaged in shenanigans.
But first, today's PDB Spotlight.
Five months into America's war with Iran, new reporting from Reuters indicates the conflict is placing growing strain on one of the US military's greatest advantages. That would be its arsenal of long-range precision weapons. According to an exclusive report published Tuesday, the US Army has used quote, virtually all of its stockpile of army tactile missile systems. Now, those are better known as Atacams, as well as nearly all of its newer precision strike missiles. One source also told Reuters that the US has burned through just under half of its global inventory of Tomahawk cruise missiles since the war with Iran began back in February. Those figures have not been independently verified by Reuters, and neither the White House nor the Pentagon are commenting on the stockpile numbers. But multiple administration officials reportedly acknowledge that the pace of munitions use has sparked increasingly urgent discussions about America's readiness should another major conflict erupt. Atacams and the newer precision strike missile are army weapons launched from systems like the High Mars rocket launcher. They allow commanders to hit high-value targets, air defense systems, command centers, ammunition depots and missile launchers from hundreds of miles away with remarkable accuracy. The Navy's Tomahawk cruise missile serves a similar purpose. Fired from destroyers and submarines, Tomahawks have long been America's preferred weapon for striking heavily defended targets without having to send pilots into hostile airspace. And according to Reuters, that's exactly why the Pentagon relied on these weapons so heavily during the Iran campaign. One source familiar with the planning said the Trump administration deliberately leaned on long range precision missiles because they reduced the need for riskier missions involving manned aircraft flying over Iranian air defenses. From a military standpoint, that strategy does make perfect sense. If you can destroy an Iranian radar installation or a missile battery from hundreds of miles away, instead of sending an American fighter pilot into contested airspace, well, you're going to choose the missile almost every time. The problem is that precision guided weapons are not something that you can replace overnight. And for that, I award myself the PDB statement of the obvious award for today.
Each missile costs well over a million dollars. That seems like a bargain. And production has historically been measured in the hundreds, not the thousands. The precision strike missile in particular is still a relatively new system, meaning stockpiles were already limited before the Iran conflict began. The army plans to eventually replace Atacams entirely with the newer precision strike missile, but that transition is still underway. In other words, the Pentagon has been drawing down weapons that were never especially abundant to begin with. And of course, this drawdown does have global implications. Military planners don't just prepare for the current or today's conflict. They're constantly asking what happens if another crisis breaks out tomorrow. China, of course, remains the Pentagon's primary challenge. Russia continues its war in Ukraine. North Korea is expanding both its missile and nuclear programs. The US also maintains security commitments across Europe, the Middle East and the Indo-Pacific. Those same long-range precision missiles would likely play a major role in any future conflict involving a sophisticated military, particularly one with advanced air defenses. This Reuters report also helps explain several stories that we've been covering over the past week. Last week, the Center for Strategic and International Studies estimated that roughly 65 percent of America's Patriot missile interceptors and more than a third of its THAAD interceptors had been expended during the conflict. Reuters reports those estimates closely match internal government figures cited by two of its sources. Separately, reports emerged that President Trump decided against launching another major round of strikes on Iran after military advisers raised concerns about dwindling stockpiles of key munitions. Although Reuters notes that one US official disputed that account, saying Gulf state diplomatic pressure ultimately drove the president's decision.