Trump’s golden dome offers the promise to protect the US from any Hiroshima and Nagasaki on its soil. But what is the reality? Is Trump’s Golden Dome more than a nickname for his hair? The term he uses is supposedly a US-wide version of the Iron Dome that is intended to protect Israel and has had some success. Initially mentioned at his inauguration in January 2025 and later confirmed in a large-scale briefing to the American public in May 2025, what are the realities?

If successful, this futuristic and ambitious missile defence program may become a defining project of Trump’s second administration. In reality, implementing such technology in the predicted timeframe and on budget has been a cause for concern and speculation amongst many strategic analysts. Whether it represents a new step forward in military defence capabilities or becomes another unfulfilled presidential initiative, like Peace in Ukraine or the Mexican border wall, remains to be seen.

The following key ideas have dominated mainstream Western media reporting on the subject. Is it technologically feasible? How much will the cost exceed the predicted budget? Is the timeframe of implementation by 2028 realistic? A multitude of comparisons to President Reagan’s failed ‘Star Wars’ strategic defensive initiative from the 1980s only further emphasise the focus on the project’s feasibility.

Little analysis is given to the international ripple effects caused by proposing such an extensive, all-encompassing, strategic missile defence program, at least in the mainstream Western bubble. This discourse avoids the inescapable relationship between strategically offensive and defensive technologies. Discussions relating to Russian and Chinese responses to the proposal are ignored, with many articles only mentioning these countries as the threats that the Golden Dome would be protecting the U.S. from.

Proposing a multilayered defence network, incorporating Low Earth Orbit (LEO) satellites, ground-based radar systems, directed energy platforms, and kinetic interceptors, the administration aims to create a protective shield over the United States capable of intercepting missile attacks from external threats. Hypothetically, the network could identify incoming missile threats and neutralise them during their boost phase, the initial stage of a ballistic missile’s flight, where it moves slowest while building momentum and calculating a trajectory.

Protection or Provocation?

The Golden Dome proposal represents a shift towards defence against near-peer competitors, those states that possess similar capabilities of power and influence. Previous American strategic missile defence systems have been small-scale, directed towards the limited missile threats from rogue actors. By focusing on neutralising offensive nuclear capabilities within ballistic, hypersonic, and cruise missiles, it is clear that the Golden Dome is a defence against threats from China and Russia. If successful, the Golden Dome would signify a substantial upset to the idea of mutually assured destruction that has maintained international stability since the Cold War. Historically, there has been a strong understanding of the importance of mutual vulnerability, as seen in the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, which limited U.S. and Soviet missile defences. If the U.S. insulates itself from external nuclear attacks, China and Russia will start to perceive their own countries as being under greater threat from pre-emptive strikes. If you are confident in the ability of your shield, then you are more likely to use your sword on your enemy. Strategic missile defence programs also create an impetus for opposing countries to increase their nuclear stockpiles. In their joint response to the Golden Dome announcement, China and Russia pledged to “counter” the proposed defences.

When a country decreases the chances of opposing missiles getting through its defensive shield, the natural response from an opposing state is to increase the number of missiles it fires. By announcing the Golden Dome, President Trump is pushing the enemies of the U.S. to reignite a new phase of an already accelerating nuclear arms race.

An attempt to flood missile defences with overwhelming force could lead to states facing worse devastation than if missile defences had never existed. An example of this was seen in the 1970s, when the Soviet Union installed 100 missile interceptors to protect Moscow, the U.S. responded with a large increase in the nuclear missiles targeting Moscow. With the last treaty limiting the build-up of nuclear weaponry in the U.S. and Russia set to expire in February 2026, there is a considerable concern that the Golden Dome could usher in a new arms race between the major powers of the world.

In an attempt to counter the defensive measures put in place by the Golden Dome, there is likely to be a move towards new technologies that are still currently in the development stage. The nuclear ‘super weapons’, first unveiled by Russia in 2018, could be the direction opposing countries choose to pursue to circumvent the defence strategy of the Golden Dome, including the Poseidon nuclear power torpedo, which can contaminate a large area of water with radiation, and the new RS-28 Sarmat ICBMs with shortened boost phases and South Pole trajectories aimed at avoiding U.S. missile defences.

Arms Race in Space

In addition to the concern around a return to the Cold War era nuclear arms race. The scope of Golden Dome technology, specifically its LEO element, is likely to increase movement towards armaments in Earth’s orbit. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning highlighted how the Golden Dome violated “the principle of peaceful use in the Outer Space Treaty” (created in 1967) and that its implementation “heightened the risk of turning space into a war zone and creating a space arms race”. There is growing concern that placing weapons in space, whether defensive or not, will open a ‘Pandora’s box’ of states looking to implement offensive technologies in space. If circumventing Golden Dome’s defences proves too challenging, states may look to eliminate the LEO satellites that provide the detection framework it relies on. While China demonstrated the ability to carry out satellite-to-satellite physical manipulation in January 2022, this is still a slow, planned process. Most analysts assume that a strike on the LEO network would likely take the form of a nuclear detonation in the outer atmosphere. This strategy is far less precise and would knock out numerous essential satellites at that orbit level, including those necessary for GPS location services. Such conflict in the atmosphere would have untold adverse effects for the entire population of Earth, not solely limited to those states involved in conflict.

The recent Strategic Defence Review published by the UK government suggested that 20% of the national GDP is reliant on satellite services, with disruption to GPS services alone estimated to cost the UK £1 billion a day. The process of transforming space into yet another battlefield, for states to express conflict and power, marks a loss of the unifying quality that space has had for so long. Throughout the Cold War, space was an area for opposing states to collaborate and look past their differences, but it is clear that this is no longer the case.

Does Successful Implementation Even Matter?

With mainstream Western voices, such as The Guardian, The Times, CNN and The New York Times, all focusing on the feasibility and likelihood of exceeding the budget of the Golden Dome, there is an implication that the project may not fully come to fruition. Previous evidence of Trump’s changeable policies means that commentators are reticent to believe it until they have more details. However unlikely the Golden Dome is, it still is a changing force for global warfare, even just as a concept. The nuclear arms race is based on probability and state psychology. States that feel under threat by the announcement cannot wait for the next several years, waiting to see if Trump’s proposal is successful. The mere announcement of the project is enough to make Russia and China heavily consider increasing their nuclear weapons stockpile. As seen with the previously mentioned RS-28 Sarmat missiles, announced in 2018 and recently suffering a massive test failure in 2024, updating missile technology can be a lengthy and costly process. States threatened by the Golden Dome are likely to have started to prepare for the worst-case scenario since the formal announcement on May 20th this year. If predictions are correct, and Golden Dome fails to materialise to the full extent that was announced, then the world could end up in a situation where nuclear stockpiles have risen while protection has not.

Analysis of the Golden Dome proposal requires objectivity, and more emphasis must be placed on understanding adversary perspectives. President Trump has repeatedly stated his view that “it would be great if everybody would get rid of their nuclear weapons”, yet the Golden Dome’s proposal flies in direct opposition to his ideas of denuclearisation. The U.S. needs to be aware of the threat that the Golden Dome is perceived to pose to Russia and China’s feelings of state security and the contradiction therein. The current U.S. administration would be well served to remember the symbiotic nature of its nuclear sword and shield before initiating the repeating cycle of escalation that had the world living in fear for so much of the 20th century.