The bill for the war. It’s heavy. And it’s just starting to come in.
Intel officials say the Pentagon is staring down a tab that will likely blow past $100 billion. President Donald Trump ignited the conflict with days of missile strikes against Iran, and the math is brutal. Two sources deep in the machinery put the total cost of Operation Epic Fury in the $50 to $100 million range by the end of May.
Confidential congressional estimates echo this, pegging current spending at around $80 billion.
The Trump administration hasn’t shared its own numbers publicly. Not yet. In June, the White House asked Congress for $88 billion to cover parts of the fight, but insiders call that a lowball figure. An undercount.
So where’s the final total? The Pentagon can’t even tell you yet.
Part of the issue is inventory. Specifically, aircraft. The service is still deciding which planes lost in the fight—those destroyed or wrecked beyond repair—deserve replacements. Defense officials have warned lawmakers: if we don’t buy a new one, we don’t ask for the money. So the cost vanishes from the ledger. Clever. Maybe too clever.
When pressed on this discrepancy, a War Department official offered nothing more than: “We have nothing further to announce.”
Silence, as usual.
The nonpartisan Congressional Research Service (CRS) compiled public reports on May 20 and painted a grim picture. The US has lost at least 17 manned aircraft and 25 drones since the fighting started.
Those drones aren’t cheap paperweights. Among them was an MQ-4C Triton. A high-altitude Navy surveillance bird. One airframe costs over $600 million. Just one.
Then there are the bases.
Repair costs will mount. Iranian retaliatory missiles and suicide drones hit several regional installations hard. Some were hammered so severely that defense officials have whispered behind closed doors about something darker. If a base is too vulnerable, maybe we don’t fix it. Maybe we shut it down. If the lights go out permanently, do you even account for the repair bill? The officials suggest we might not.
Iran has successfully struck key hubs, including the headquarters of US Naval Fifth Fleet in Bahrain. A hit the Pentagon hasn’t publicly confirmed.
The only public number came from then-acting comptroller Jay Hurst. In May, he told Congress the tab was roughly $29 billion. He stood by it Tuesday at his confirmation hearing to become permanent comptroller. He didn’t update the figure.
Why? He claimed that $29 billion mostly covers munitions and the fuel cost of keeping two aircraft carriers circling the Middle East. It barely touches the hardware loss.
Is this how we fight now? Without knowing what we’re losing?
AI Rules Written in Ink That Doesn’t Dry
Meanwhile, the tech front is burning.
Tuesday saw the launch of Operation Gold Eagle. A clearinghouse. A bureaucratic dam built to catch software vulnerabilities before hackers and advanced AI models exploit them.
The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) will run it. They’ll use secret AI models to find the cracks in the digital dam. This marks the first real execution of Trump’s June 2nd executive order—a framework for overseeing the growing threat of smart, hostile AI.
The White House is writing the rules for AI as it happens.
Take Anthropic. Still locked out. They can’t distribute Claude Mythos or Fable 5 because they tripped over US administration guidelines. Nobody can explain exactly what they did wrong. Just that it happened. The White House even pressured Anthropic to cut ties with South Korean giant SK Telecom over alleged connections to China.
Then there’s OpenAI. They launched GPT-5.5-Cybere and an initiative called “Patch the Planet.” An effort to fix open-source bugs. A direct response to the fear that AI can now read code and find exploits humans missed.
Speaking of misses: AI recently found a root bug in Linux. It’s been there for 15 years. Everyone missed it. AI didn’t.
Who’s shaking hands now?
In Beijing, the mood isn’t confident. Top AI experts in China are reportedly freaked out. They see an arms race hurtling toward what one researcher called a “Chernobyl moment.” On both sides of the Pacific, the experts know something bad is coming.
The crackdown on models like Fable 5 and Mythoys hides a plain fact. Dangerous AI isn’t a bug. It’s a feature of the next decade. And it’s arriving regardless of US bans or executive orders.
Scars on the Hardware
The physical world is also bruised.
In Mississippi, an explosion wrecked Anduril ’s rocket motor test site. The defense contractor’s prototype business could face disruptions. Important? Maybe. Not world-ending, but a dent in the supply chain.
In the Atlantic, we finally looked at why OceanGate ’s Titan submersible imploded. A new report suggests US government agencies simply failed to talk to each other. Communication breakdowns led to fatal oversight gaps. Again, bureaucracy fails people.
And for oil investors holding their breath for relief? Don’t bother. Even if peace holds in Iran, gas prices aren’t dropping back to pre-war levels anytime soon. Markets don’t heal overnight.
Back in Canada, a new report showed officials missed chances to inspect the Titan before its doom. Recommendations for stronger oversight? Standard boilerplate. Nothing concrete to prevent the next disaster.
We have a new comptroller who won’t tell us the real cost of war. We have AI that can hack systems faster than we can patch them. And we have allies and adversaries who see the cliff ahead, yet we keep driving forward.
The Pentagon bill climbs. The AI race accelerates. The questions multiply.
Who’s counting the rest?
