As the U.S. Army’s support to the joint force space mission takes shape with its newly populated Space Operations Branch, the service is also poised to support what’s expected to be a critical year for testing and development of the Golden Dome for America (GDA) missile shield project.
Speaking with reporters at the Association of the United States Army’s annual meeting last week, Lt. Gen. John L. Rafferty, commanding general of U.S. Army Space and Missile Defense Command, confirmed that an Army air defense unit had been “earmarked” for GDA support.
The unit, which he declined to identify, is “a well-trained organization that we know can meet the demands of Golden Dome for America when the systems are fielded,” Rafferty said.
With the current air defense systems across the joint force grouped in aggregated packages, including a sensor, an interceptor and a command-and-control package, Rafferty said he understood GDA as a way to do some disaggregation and bring together command-and-control systems into a group that can work together across the United States.
“So now, as you array sensors and interceptors and C2 platforms across the country, you can use any sensor, best shooter, right C2, in that disaggregated way,” he said. “So we believe that right now … we have the most experienced air defense and combat-seasoned air defense formations in the world [and] we have the right people with the right experience to manage the system when they get here, with some training.”
Joint Task Force Gold, a 100-person unit established in January under U.S. Northern Command and led by Army officers, is also leaning into preparation for Golden Dome with planning drills and stakeholder gatherings, said Col. Kevin “Stoney” Stonerook, deputy commander of the task force.
“We are helping put together the team of teams, all the different stakeholder communities, be that vendors and other government agencies, to really provide a cyber warfare capability for GDA,” Stonerook said. “We definitely know that we are involved in putting together some of the sites as we look at building out GDA across the country and other areas, and trying to integrate all those capabilities across the multiple layers of GDA, but there’s a lot we still have to figure out.”
The task force, he said, had hosted a series of planning “sprints” beginning in February, working with about 300 members of the “GDA stakeholder community” on-site in Colorado Springs to hash out a concept of operations for the project and to identify unanswered questions.
The next planning sprint, Stonerook said, was set for the end of October.
“We’re continuing to find out more and help focus the efforts of not just the JTF-Gold 100-plus personnel, but all the rest of the stakeholder communities to really focus on those questions needing to be answered for … operationalization,” he said.
Pentagon officials have said they’re looking to field an early version of GDA by the end of next year — to meet a goal of having an operational shield by the end of President Donald Trump’s second term, with a more fully realized version of the system to be built out by 2035.
But lawmakers on both sides of the aisle have expressed frustration with slow progress and inconsistent communication from the White House over the way forward with the ambitious and expensive project.
The Pentagon requested $17.5 billion for Golden Dome in fiscal 2027 through a $350 billion reconciliation package, and just about $400 million for the project in research and development funds, within the base budget request. As Air and Space Forces Magazine reported in September, dispute over passage of the reconciliation bill could leave the bulk of funding in jeopardy.
At the panel with reporters, Rafferty maintained the Army was all in on supporting development of the shield system.
“I really try to draw no distinction between [Army Space and Missile Defense Command] and JTF-Gold,” he said. “It’s going to take all of us to help enable the defense of the homeland through Golden Dome for America, and it is SMDC’s No. 1 priority to protect the homeland. So we’re all in to help to deliver that.”
