As part of its latest budget request, the U.S. Navy is seeking to secure more than 7 billion dollars to invest in the acquisition of new Tomahawk and SM-6 missiles, which would allow it to reinforce its stockpiles more than considerably after the intensive use of both systems during Operation Epic Fury. According to reports from local specialized media, this would translate into an increase of up to 1,200% and 225% in the inventory of each of these missiles compared to the funds allocated for them last year, something that would largely be made possible by the increase in defense spending being pushed by the current administration of President Donald Trump.
Going into some relevant details, it can be noted that the U.S. Navy would be interested in adding a total of 540 new SM-6 missiles for that purpose, which would require an investment of around 4.33 billion dollars, a figure that stands out compared to the 1.41 billion invested last year to acquire 166 units. On the Tomahawk side, the service would seek to incorporate some 785 additional missiles, which in this case would translate into around 3 billion dollars to be invested and a marked increase over the 258 million allocated to that weapon in the previous period.
In particular, currently available reports indicate that a large portion of the missiles in question, as well as the funds allocated for them, would have to be approved as part of a reconciliation bill that would complement conventional funding. In this way, it is expected that what amounts to a major acquisition could be spread over several years in order to ease the impact on U.S. coffers, a policy already used by the current occupant of the White House on previous occasions.
It is worth highlighting at this point, as we noted on April 6, that the intensive use of long-range missiles against targets in Iran has raised alarms in Washington regarding the rapid depletion of its stockpiles and the impact this would have on preparedness to counter threats in other strategically important regions, specifically the Indo-Pacific. Such would have been the case with missiles belonging to the JASSM family, both in their original variant and in their extended-range version, which in concrete terms would amount to between 750 and 1,000 missiles fired during the first month of the conflict.
The trend just described is also evident in the case of the Tomahawk, with reports from the Center for Strategic and International Studies indicating the use of up to 850 missiles during Operation Epic Fury, which would make it the operation in which the weapon has been employed the greatest number of times, even more than during Operation Iraqi Freedom (2003). If these figures are confirmed, U.S. experts fear that replenishing this number of Tomahawks would require at least two to three years, which in turn would have a negative impact on acquisitions made by Washington’s international partners, with Japan serving as an illustrative example.
Finally, it should also be taken into account that the U.S. Navy will not only seek to acquire new Tomahawk and SM-6 missiles going forward, even though these currently constitute the most significant weapons purchases known so far in the new budget it is seeking to approve. In detail, this refers to the incorporation of up to 494 AIM-120 air-to-air missiles and 141 MK-48 heavyweight torpedoes, which would imply investments of 804 million and 571 million dollars respectively.
Images used for illustrative purposes
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