The United States military has consumed a significant portion of its precision munitions stockpiles during recent conflicts, triggering concern among military planners and a sharp public denial from President Donald Trump. According to multiple sources familiar with the data, US forces have used nearly all of their long-range, high-precision Army missiles — including ATACMS (Army Tactical Missile Systems) and the newer PrSM (Precision Strike Missiles) — during operations against Iran. Separately, roughly 65 per cent of American Patriot air defence interceptors were expended between February and July, leaving fewer than 850 on hand, down from approximately 2,330 before the conflict with Iran began, according to estimates from the Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS).

The shortages are reported to have had real strategic consequences. The Washington Post reported that Trump confronted Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth about the ammunition problem at a Camp David cabinet meeting, and that depleted missile stocks contributed to the cancellation of planned follow-on strikes against Iran. CNN reported that US forces had exhausted roughly 80 per cent of their THAAD air defence interceptor reserves. The reduction in long-range precision weapons — each costing more than $1 million — means the US military could be forced to rely more heavily on riskier crewed bombing missions if large-scale operations resume. White House spokesperson Karoline Leavitt and the Pentagon's chief spokesperson Sean Parnell both flatly denied the accounts of the Camp David exchange, calling the reporting fictitious.

Trump himself took to his Truth Social platform to push back forcefully. He declared that the United States possesses "massive quantities" of ammunition, "much more than any other country in the world," and threatened those who leak contrary information with lengthy prison sentences. He offered no specific figures to support his claims, but said defence companies are expanding factories and production at record levels. One official familiar with the situation told Reuters that US Central Command — which oversees American forces in the Middle East — has been able to partially replenish stocks by drawing from US military reserves elsewhere in the world.

The Patriot missile system sits at the centre of the wider global shortfall. First deployed in the 1991 Gulf War, the Patriot — built by Raytheon Technologies with interceptors also produced by Lockheed Martin — is now operated by 19 countries and is scheduled to remain in service until 2048. Demand has surged due to Ukraine's need to defend against nightly Russian ballistic missile strikes and the heavy use of interceptors against Iranian missiles in the Gulf. Saudi Arabia alone consumed about 86 per cent of its 2,800 PAC-3 interceptors in the first 38 days of fighting, leaving it with roughly 400 missiles. Six to eight countries have formally requested additional supplies to replenish depleted stocks.

Efforts to rebuild inventories are under way but will take time. The US has approved the sale of 5,250 interceptor missiles to Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, and last month awarded Lockheed Martin a contract worth up to $58.6 billion for further Patriot interceptor production. Talks are also continuing on the possibility of allowing Ukraine to manufacture some Patriot missile components for final assembly in Europe — a deal Trump has questioned but not formally blocked. Lockheed has also introduced a new, cheaper interceptor variant, the PAC-3 ACE, intended to cost half as much as existing missiles. The gap between current inventories and strategic requirements, however, underscores how sustained high-intensity conflict can rapidly deplete even the world's largest defence arsenal.