Elon Musk’s SpaceX is reportedly the forerunner to win a $10 billion contract to build Donald Trump’s Golden Dome — inspired by Israel’s Iron Dome, Reuters claimed. Elon Musk, however, refuted the claim and said SpaceX has not tried to bid for any contract in this regard. “Our strong preference would be to stay focused on taking humanity to Mars.”
“If the President asks us to help in this regard, we will do so, but I hope that other companies (not SpaceX) can do this,”Musk wrote.
The Reuters report, however, did not claim that SpaceX was leading it in its name. The report said SpaceX formed a consortium with two other companies with close Trump ties — defense startup Anduril in which billionaire Peter Thiel is a key investor and Palatir which Theil co-founded — for the bidding.
The Reuters report said SpaceX representatives held talks at the Pentagon, outlining the consortium’s proposals. The grouping, which does not have formal name, is proposing it would launch as many as 1,000 satellites to orbit the earth watching for missile threats as the first stage of the process. Design and preliminary engineering for that alone would cost up to $10 billion, Reuters reported.
What is Trump’s Golden Dome?
Golden Dome is a proposal like Israel’s Iron Dome which will create a shield protecting the United States against multiple missile threats, including ballistic, hypersonic and advanced cruise missiles. In his January 27 executive order, Trump cited a missile attack as “the most catastrophic threat facing the United States.”
Some sources, however, told Reuters that Golden Dome is still in its very early stages and the decision of who will make it too is.
The three companies, SpaceX, Anduril, Palantir met with top officials in the Trump administration and the Pentagon to pitch their plan to build and launch 400 to more than 1,000 satellites circling the globe to sense missiles and track their movement, the Reuters report said. A separate fleet of 200 attack satellites armed with missiles or lasers would then bring enemy missiles down, three of the sources said. The SpaceX group is not expected to be involved in the weaponization of satellites, the report said citing sources
