Iran war exposed US munitions shortfalls and production bottlenecks, Pentagon IG says

The U.S. has burned through so many munitions during the Iran conflict that it now faces shortfalls, compounded by bottlenecks in its industrial base limiting its ability to resupply, military officials told the Pentagon’s watchdog agency.

The concerns and efforts to replenish the stock were outlined in a congressionally mandated Defense Department inspector general report that is the agency’s first to detail the costs and outcomes of the Iran war for DOD, the State Department and other areas of the federal government.

Issued Monday, it comes about a month after Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth publicly denied reports that the war had heavily depleted U.S. weapons stockpiles. The IG report covers the period from the start of the joint U.S.-Israeli campaign Feb. 28 through June 30.

President Donald Trump likewise said this month that the U.S. has “far more” ammunition than it could ever use against Iran and is producing an unprecedented amount of “Exquisite and Elite Weapons” for daily delivery to the Middle East and elsewhere.

But the IG cited Pentagon acquisition officials who said the defense industrial base needs “significant lead time” to boost production capacity.

The most persistent bottlenecks involve the production of solid rocket motors, the availability of high-grade explosives and propellants and the recruitment of skilled manufacturing labor, the report said.

Meanwhile, as of June 29, expended munitions accounted for $22.3 billion of the Pentagon’s $33.4 billion estimated price tag for the war at that point, the IG reported.

The cost of munitions is the part of the estimate the acting Pentagon comptroller told Congress he was the most confident about.

U.S. Central Command conducted some 36,000 combat sorties and more than 1,800 fire missions, it told the IG in August, according to the report. The commander of CENTCOM, Adm. Brad Cooper, told Congress in May that U.S. forces struck some 13,500 targets.

An F/A-18E Super Hornet assigned to Strike Fighter Squadron 151 prepares to launch from the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln during Operation Epic Fury, March 29, 2026. CENTCOM said U.S. forces flew about 36,000 combat sorties and struck roughly 13,500 targets in Iran during the campaign’s major combat operations phase, which ran from Feb. 28 to an April 7 ceasefire. (U.S. Navy)

Missile defenses had intercepted more than 6,000 attack drones and over 1,500 ballistic missiles targeting U.S. and partner forces as of May, Cooper told the Senate Armed Services Committee at that time.

The IG report’s cost estimate did not include the tab for military construction or infrastructure repairs because the Defense Department has not determined what its future posture in the Middle East will be, how it will rebuild or how much of the costs allies will bear.

Iranian drone and missile strikes have left hundreds of buildings and structures on several U.S. bases damaged or destroyed, including at the Navy’s main regional logistics hub in Bahrain, CENTCOM officials told the inspector general.

Last week, acting Navy Secretary Hung Cao said in an interview that Iran “blew the hell out of Bahrain.” When contacted by Stars and Stripes, CENTCOM declined to discuss its battle damage assessment.

Three unidentified U.S. officials and three people familiar with internal cost estimates told NBC News in July that the war had thus far cost $80 billion to $100 billion.

Iranian strikes also forced the relocation of Army medical evacuation helicopters that had been covering Syria, Jordan, Iraq and Kuwait at the beginning of the war, as the military moved the assets out of Kuwait and Iraq for security concerns, the report said.

Since then, most medical evacuations have been conducted by ground, including by local ambulances to nearby treatment facilities, while fixed-wing aircraft have transported patients out of theater for higher levels of care, the report said.

The report also tallied the damage or destruction of dozens of military aircraft, including four F-15 fighter jets, over a half-dozen KC-135 tankers and 30 MQ-9 Reaper drones.

The costs of replacing or repairing such equipment were also excluded from Pentagon estimates because of uncertainty about timing and contract pricing, the report stated.

The report also detailed the State Department’s estimated $113 million in war-related expenses. That figure included nearly $80 million in evacuation-related costs for diplomatic personnel and their families, other U.S. citizens and eligible foreign nationals. Those estimates were likely to grow, it said.

About 9,000 private U.S. citizens were evacuated from the region during the period, the report said.

The aircraft carrier USS George H.W. Bush sails in the Arabian Sea, May 3, 2026. The carrier arrived in the Middle East in late April to help sustain uninterrupted two-carrier coverage in support of Operation Epic Fury, the U.S. campaign against Iran that a Pentagon inspector general report estimated has cost $33.4 billion so far. (U.S. Navy)

More than 50,000 military personnel were deployed throughout CENTCOM over that span, including parts of the 82nd Airborne Division, whose deployments were recently extended into 2027.

While Trump said at the outset that the war would last weeks, this weekend he said it could go until right after the midterm elections in November.

Some senior White House officials have reportedly raised concerns privately that it could drag on through the end of his presidency.

Since the war began, 11 U.S. military personnel were killed in action and seven more died in noncombat incidents, while over 820 have been wounded in action, according to the latest Pentagon figures.

Stars and Stripes reporter Phillip W. Wellman contributed to this report.