The United States believes Iran has regained access to a majority of its missile sites, according to a report Tuesday that said Tehran’s network remains far more intact than Washington has publicly suggested. Senior U.S. officials said the active sites include 30 along the Strait of Hormuz, where the missiles could threaten U.S. naval ships in the area.
The assessment lands at a tense moment because it cuts against recent public claims that Iran’s arsenal has been crippled. Pete Hegseth said the stockpile had been “depleted and decimated,” but U.S. military agencies claimed that 90% of Iranian underground missile facilities are at least partially operational, and Iran still keeps roughly 70% of its mobile launcher inventory.
That means the danger is not limited to the sites that still function normally. Iran can also use missile stockpiles in non-operational facilities by digging them out of bombed storage sites and launching them with mobile systems, giving it a back-up option even where fixed infrastructure has been damaged. U.S. officials also say Iran’s current missile stockpile is around 70% of its prewar stockpile.
The report builds on earlier warnings that Tehran has preserved more firepower than many outside observers expected. On April 11, The reported that Iran still retains thousands of short-range ballistic missiles and can reactivate their launchers. It also said Iran’s short- and medium-range missile stockpile remains in the thousands despite a massive depletion since the start of Operation Epic Fury.
The picture is further complicated by competing estimates of how many missiles remain usable for different targets. The Jerusalem Post previously reported that Iran retains a maximum of 1,000 missiles capable of reaching Israel, a figure that sits alongside broader U.S. concerns about the overall inventory and the ability to restore launch capacity.
For Washington, the problem is that the missile threat appears durable even after strikes, damage and months of pressure. A force that can still draw on mobile launchers, partially operational underground sites and stockpiles in the thousands is not a force that has been neutralized. It is a force that can still fire, and still force U.S. planners to reckon with it.
