It can engage a broader range of aerial threats at lower altitudes than a THAAD battery, but when used together, they provide even more effective overlapping layers of defense against missile attacks.
While the war with Iran has caused missile defense munitions to be depleted at a much higher rate, decades of Pentagon spending decisions, a shrinking defense industrial base and successive military operations that consume weapons faster than manufacturers can replace them have contributed to the current shortages.
"After the Cold War, we planned on fighting short regional conflicts against countries like Iraq or North Korea.
Cancian noted that the five-year timeline to bring Patriot and THAAD stockpiles just to the low pre-Iran war levels is based on the assumption that the production schedule stays on track — and that additional military operations do not further deplete the inventory.