Last week, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) reported that the space-based portion of the Golden Dome missile defense system would cost $700 billion to build over the next 20 years and a billion a year to operate. The CBO’s determination assumed the Golden Dome’s primary mission was to deter a large intercontinental missile strike against the United States.
The attached space war game after-action report, “China Gets Its Own Golden Dome: What to Worry,” which SpaceNews just posted, identifies two other possible missions for the Dome—enforcing a heavy space launch blockade against China and using the Dome’s missile interceptors to establish space superiority. These missions are ones the Chinese have publicly identified as ones they might pursue against the United States.
These missions could be accomplished with an order of magnitude fewer space-based interceptors that could be launched in a matter of weeks, rather than years. Such a system would be vastly less expensive to deploy than a system even designed to deter only small to medium-sized missile attacks.
It is unclear which mission—missile defense, space launch blockade enforcement, and space superiority—the Pentagon is giving priority to. This lack of clarity caused a considerable amount of chaos in the gameplay and was reflected in the game’s three key findings:
- It will be impossible to use the Golden Dome effectively or bargain about it until the Pentagon determines what the system’s primary mission is.
- Without clarity on the Dome’s primary mission, Dome-related diplomacy could make matters worse.
- It will be futile to deploy the Dome unless it can survive grey and overt attacks made on the ground or in space.
As always, I’m curious to get your take on the attached.
As Ever,
Henry S.
September 8, 2026
Edited By: Henry Sokolski
China Gets a Golden Dome of Its Own: What to Worry
An unspoken assumption in the Golden Dome’s development is that America will be the only nation to deploy such a system. NPEC’s three-day multiple-move space game, which took place this June, assumed otherwise.
Game players included current and former Pentagon space officials, Hill and military staff, as well as outside space experts. Some participants were keen supporters of the Golden Dome. Others were not. All took the game seriously.
What unfolded — calm punctuated by chaos — was unexpected. It certainly differed from America’s previous experience with the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI). That program never deployed a space defense system. Nor did Moscow try to counter it by developing a system of its own. Instead, Russian fears SDI might shift the correlation of military forces in America’s favor produced paralyzing despair within the Russian general staff.
None of these welcome developments unfolded during the game. Unlike Moscow, Beijing is wealthy enough to develop a space-based missile interceptor system of its own. In the game, it does.
The Scenario
Early in 2036, China announces its intention to deploy its own Golden Dome-like system, Smart Hawk. The Pentagon argues it can beat the Chinese to the punch by deploying several hundred Golden Dome space-based interceptors before Beijing does, but the White House instead chooses to negotiate with the Chinese to prevent a “destabilizing” offense-defense arms race.
The Chinese agree, and 36 months of space negotiations without the Russians ensue. A variety of space transparency measures are discussed. But ultimately, China sees little advantage in striking any deal that Washington could accept. China, meanwhile, uses the negotiating period to continue preparations to launch its own space-based missile interceptor system.
In December of 2039, Xi Jinping’s successor decides to launch China’s Smart Hawk system and completes its heavy launch deployment of the system by the end of April 2040. The import of this decision increases: Tensions in the South China Sea flare up in February 2040 with a Chinese vessel ramming a joint U.S.-Philippine-manned Coast Guard ship, causing the loss of several American Coast Guard personnel.
The President of the United States reacts secretly authorizing the Pentagon to temporarily disable several critical Chinese satellites using adverse solar storms as a cover. The hope is that these deniable, temporary disablements might force dialogue and bring the Chinese back to the negotiating table.
At nearly the same time, both China (which has two heavy launch sites) and the U.S. (which has three) experience launch failures that disable at least one heavy launch site for each. The U.S. believes its launch failure was truly an accident and that China had nothing to do with it. Beijing, however, privately questions if the U.S. caused China’s launch failure.
China and the U.S. continue to deploy their respective space-based missile defense systems. Further military escalation seems imminent. Hoping to buy time, the Chinese offer private track-two talks. By the game’s end, both sides are still deploying their space-based interceptor systems. It is unclear if these unofficial talks progress.
Throughout the game, the predominant Chinese and American view is that the prime mission for space-based missile defenses is to reduce each other’s ability and interest in launching a nuclear first strike. However, players had difficulty pinpointing what the Golden Dome’s precise capabilities and various missions might be. Some believed the system’s key objective could be to establish U.S. space superiority.
One way to accomplish this would be to use the Dome’s space interceptors to target critical Chinese and Russian satellites. Another might be to put a limited Golden Dome constellation in orbit, not to blunt missile strikes against the U.S. or its allies, but to enforce a possible U.S. blockade of Chinese space launches from China’s two coastal heavy-lift launch sites.
Closing these strategic space chokepoints could prevent China from launching the Smart Hawk system. In addition, it could hold China’s and Russia’s key satellites at risk and help establish U.S. space superiority. The China team discussed this possibility and considered executing this mission against the U.S.
After the game’s play, NPEC’s space policy adviser, Pete Hays, reviewed the bidding using unclassified Brilliant Pebble calculations to estimate what a space “blockade” constellation might entail. A good number of security analysts believe blunting even a modest first strike would require thousands of interceptors, cost hundreds of billions of dollars, and take years to deploy. He determined, however, that a blockade constellation could consist of an order of magnitude fewer interceptors and be far cheaper and quicker to deploy with a handful of Starship launches conducted over several days or weeks.
Initially, such a system might be unable to prevent first strikes against the U.S. but could help assure space superiority and prevent China or Russia from gaining the heavy-lift access to space required to deploy their own systems.
To read the full after-action report, click here.