$25 Billion Mistake? Kelly Grills Hegseth Over Golden Dome Missile Defense Plan — And His Explosive Warning Raises the Question: Are We Funding Science or Fantasy?

WASHINGTON — A high-stakes Senate hearing turned tense on Tuesday as Senator Mark Kelly, a former Navy combat pilot and NASA astronaut, confronted Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth over the Pentagon’s centerpiece missile-defense proposal: the $25 billion Golden Dome system. What began as a routine budget inquiry quickly escalated into the most pointed scrutiny the program has faced since its unveiling, with Kelly warning that the United States may be racing toward a project whose ambition far exceeds its scientific credibility.

The Golden Dome, pitched by administration officials as a breakthrough, multi-layer interceptor shield capable of neutralizing mass salvos of incoming missiles, has been touted as the next evolution in strategic defense. But Kelly’s questioning cut sharply against the confident public narrative, suggesting that behind closed doors, Pentagon scientists and intelligence analysts have raised serious doubts the department has not fully acknowledged.

Kelly began with a simple question: Could the system stop a full-scale attack rather than the smaller “rogue nation” scenarios often used in modeling? Hegseth responded by describing a layered network designed to counter a “wide range” of threats, but he avoided confirming whether it could handle the kind of coordinated, multi-vector missile barrage adversaries like Russia or China could launch.

“That’s the core issue,” Kelly said. “We are preparing to spend tens of billions now, and potentially hundreds of billions later, on a capability you cannot tell us will work.”

Throughout the exchange, Kelly pressed the department on four technical pillars that engineers have long identified as central to missile-defense viability: discrimination between decoys and live warheads, interception of hypersonic glide vehicles, the real-world reliability of interceptors under stress, and the lack of large-scale testing data needed to evaluate a system of this complexity.

The senator repeatedly noted that previous missile-defense programs — from the early Strategic Defense Initiative to more recent boost-phase interception concepts — were dismantled or scaled back precisely because they could not overcome these problems.

“This is not a new physics problem,” one congressional aide familiar with technical briefings said after the hearing. “It’s the same physics that killed multiple programs before it. What’s new is the political pressure to pretend we’ve solved it.”

Kelly also highlighted another issue that has raised alarms among independent analysts: the shrinking number of Pentagon testing officials. According to internal documents reviewed by committee staff, several senior evaluators who specialized in missile-defense reliability were reassigned last year, leaving the department with fewer independent voices capable of challenging optimistic claims.

“Why would the Pentagon cut the very offices responsible for telling you this thing doesn’t work?” Kelly asked. Hegseth responded that the restructuring was part of a broader modernization plan, but he did not directly address why oversight personnel tied to previous missile-defense evaluations were among those removed.

The administration has not hidden its desire to fast-track the Golden Dome. Officials argue that emerging missile threats — hypersonic weapons, maneuverable re-entry vehicles, and advanced decoys — require a new class of defensive systems built on artificial intelligence and multi-sensor fusion. But Kelly countered that no amount of classified optimism changes the fundamental uncertainties.

“I’ve flown combat missions. I’ve studied guidance systems. I’ve worked on orbital mechanics,” Kelly said. “Physics is not partisan. Physics does not negotiate. And physics does not care about a budget deadline.”

Several defense experts watching the hearing echoed that sentiment. In interviews, retired missile-defense engineers and former Pentagon test officials said that while the Golden Dome concept is ambitious, it risks repeating the same pattern that has plagued U.S. missile defense for decades: bold promises, insufficient testing, limited real-world validation, and soaring costs.

“Even if the sensors function perfectly, even if the command system integrates flawlessly, the interceptors themselves must be nearly perfect — and nothing in aerospace engineering is perfect,” said one former senior official who previously oversaw intercept testing. “If you’re wrong by even a fraction of a second, the strike fails.”

Beyond the technical concerns, Kelly and other senators raised questions about the long-term cost. Independent estimates suggest that building and maintaining a Golden Dome-style system could exceed $1 trillion over multiple decades. Kelly warned that locking the nation into that trajectory without hard data would crowd out other defense priorities.

“Before we commit a trillion dollars, we need proof — not projections,” he said.

Hegseth maintained that the Pentagon is “confident” in the program’s direction and that further testing will validate the system’s capabilities. But the secretary also acknowledged that key tests are still years away and that full operational readiness remains a distant goal.

For many on the committee, that gap — between the speed of the funding request and the slow march of scientific validation — is the heart of the concern. Kelly framed it in stark terms.

“We can spend unimaginable sums building the illusion of protection,” he warned, “or we can spend deliberately on systems that actually work. Right now, the distinction between those two paths is not clear.”

As the Pentagon pushes forward and Congress prepares for a contentious budget fight, one question now hangs over the Golden Dome project: Is the United States investing in a revolutionary shield — or a dangerously expensive fantasy?