A Patriot Advanced Capability 2 Interceptor missile is fired from Koror, Palau, on Aug. 21, 2025. The Pentagon is taking offers on a 10-year, $151 billion contract for a next-generation missile defense system known by the abbreviation SHIELD. (Frank Spatt/U.S. Army)
WIESBADEN, Germany — President Donald Trump’s vision for a missile defense system dubbed the Golden Dome may be coming closer to fruition, as the Pentagon is taking offers for fulfilling a contract pegged at $151 billion.
An updated solicitation for the Scalable Homeland Innovative Enterprise Layered Defense, or SHIELD, program gives interested companies until 6 p.m. Eastern Standard Time on Thursday to submit proposals.
The initial Defense Department contract announcement in September drew more than 1,500 inquiries during a five-day question period, according to official documents attached to the updated announcement.
SHIELD would include ground- and space-based systems, satellites and weapons capable of detecting and destroying missiles fired at the U.S. homeland.
In a January executive order titled “The Iron Dome for America,” Trump called on the DOD to develop a next-generation missile defense shield to protect the U.S. against ballistic, hypersonic and advanced cruise missiles.
The term Iron Dome is an Israeli missile defense system that protects a vastly smaller territory than the one envisioned for the U.S.
The American version was later rechristened the Golden Dome. In May, Trump said the missile defense system would cost $175 billion and be operational by the end of his term.
It’s unclear how much of the Golden Dome the SHIELD program would cover, but Trump’s proposal has received pushback for various reasons.
“There are certainly technical challenges with the integration of all these capabilities into one,” Gen. Gregory Guillot, head of U.S. Northern Command and North American Aerospace Defense Command, said during a congressional hearing in May. However, Guillot added that such a system is possible.
Other questions about the viability of Trump’s vision revolve around the cost estimates.
A constellation of space-based interceptors designed to defeat intercontinental ballistic missiles could cost as low as $161 billion, according to a Congressional Budget Office memo in May.
But an advanced system capable of defending an attack by peer or near-peer adversaries, such as Russia or China, could cost upward of $542 billion over 20 years, the CBO said.
Todd Harrison, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute who focuses on defense strategy and budgeting, put the price tag even higher while speaking on a Sept. 16 episode of “The President’s Inbox” podcast, sponsored by the Council on Foreign Relations.
“To do the scale of protection they’re talking about for a Russian or a Chinese or a Russian-Chinese simultaneous launch, worst case you are talking something that’s going to go into the trillions of dollars over the next 20 years or so,” Harrison said.
