US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has forcefully rejected mounting claims that the American military is running dangerously low on munitions, dismissing the narrative as a “manufactured story” driven by media speculation rather than battlefield reality.

Speaking in a televised interview, Hegseth insisted that US stockpiles remain robust even as Washington shoulders the burden of a grinding conflict with Iran and its regional proxies. The war has stretched across multiple fronts, including Lebanon, and has threatened vital shipping lanes through the Strait of Hormuz, a chokepoint for global energy supplies.

Concerns about US weapons inventories intensified after Acting Navy Secretary Hung Cao cited the Middle East conflict as a factor in pausing certain arms sales to Taiwan. That move fueled fears that Washington might be forced to choose between arming allies and sustaining its own operations.

Hegseth pushed back hard on that interpretation, saying the Pentagon is not facing a crisis in munitions. He argued that US production lines are surging and that the military is “building more than ever before” to meet both current operational demands and future contingencies.

The defense chief also sought to clarify earlier congressional testimony in which he warned it could take “months and years” to fully replenish some categories of weapons. He now says those remarks were meant to highlight the complexity of modern arms manufacturing, noting that certain precision-guided systems inevitably take longer to produce than basic artillery shells or small arms ammunition.

Still, the financial and strategic pressures are evident. Pentagon officials estimate the direct cost of the war with Iran at nearly $29 billion, a figure that does not account for broader economic disruption or the long-term expense of replacing high-end missiles and interceptors used in combat.

Democratic Senator Mark Kelly and other critics have warned that inventories of Tomahawk cruise missiles, Patriot air-defense interceptors and other advanced systems have been “severely drawn down” and could require years to rebuild. They argue that such depletion risks eroding US deterrence in other flashpoints, from the Western Pacific to Eastern Europe.

Hegseth has dismissed those warnings as “foolishly and unhelpfully overstated,” insisting that the United States retains ample firepower and industrial capacity to sustain current operations while preparing for future threats.