Comment by xp84
2 days ago
Perhaps. If we need more, we can make more though, and at a faster rate than Iran can. I really doubt Iran has the capability to significantly threaten the factories where we make those munitions. The same can't be said the other way around.
I also suspect the US military is actively pursuing more cost-effective ways to blow things up, as Ukraine (and indeed Iran) has been doing. We don't have to use Patriots and Tomahawks all the time, unless we're shooting down something fast and dangerous with it. And again, Iran has a limited ability to pay for that type of thing, so I'm not that worried.
> Perhaps. If we need more, we can make more though, and at a faster rate than Iran can.
We can't. We built a system that creates a very small number of very expensive munitions and that can't be scaled up. We've been trying to scale up munitions production for years now with the Ukraine war. And it just isn't possible.
Not only does it take years to make any missile now. Our total capacity to make missiles is incredibly low. Like, we can make 600 Patriot missiles per year. We've expended twice that so far with Iran alone. We can make 100 THADD per year. We've expended 300 so far.
The US will run out of missiles way before Iran does. Iran could easily produce 2000 missiles per year and if it pushed it could make closer to 8000.
Iran will recover its missile stocks from the current war in a year. It will take the US until 2031 to do the same.