this post was submitted on 16 Mar 2026
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askchapo

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How close are US munition stockpiles to depletion, and what do they do afterwards? (hexbear.net)
submitted 2 days ago by insurgentrat@hexbear.net to c/askchapo@hexbear.net
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I was looking at the production numbers for stuff like thaad missiles and tomahawks. They're all in the dozens annually and seemingly have been for ages.

Given the staggering numbers these are used in, and how it seems like the way the usa fights wars now is to launch stupid amounts at people, like multiple years worth in a day. What happens when they can't? How close are they to that, interceptors are low atm but given there are hilarious announcements like: https://en.defence-ua.com/weapon_and_tech/over_1000_tomahawks_1900_aim_120s_500_sm_6s_per_year_us_moves_to_multiply_missile_production-17408.html I assume many offensive rockets are running low.

Is that level of production feasible? I know the usa has a surprising industrial base but a 20x increase in even one armament seems ambitious, do they have the factories mothballed? The skilled workers? The raw materials?

If they don't is there any inkling of what their military people intend to do when they can't realistically threaten to park a fleet off your coast and level your cities?

I'm not a military nerd, just a random person if I'm missing sometimes obvious or said sometimes funny.

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[–] ZWQbpkzl@hexbear.net -1 points 1 day ago

It really sounds like the shift to smart bombs caused a scale down in explosive chemical production, which prevents a re-scaling up of dumb bombs.

For what your arguing to be true, the chemical problems have to be beyond the market forces, something like a raw input shortage. If you've got the article from tervell you cited handy, please share. Or at least tell me how far back in his timeline I should dig and any keywords, etc.