WASHINGTON, June 3. /TASS/. The deployment of the US Golden Dome missile defense system is an unattainable dream and a waste of money, the Chairman of the Board of Directors of the US Arms Control Association, Thomas Countryman, told TASS.

"Golden Dome remains a bad idea. It's not just an impossible dream. It is a very expensive impossible dream that would be a waste of money, and that would not provide the security that [US President Donald] Trump seems to think it would provide," the expert, who served as Acting US Under Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security in 2016-2017, noted. "I hope that the United States Congress will prevent the US from going down a very expensive and dangerous road," he added.

"Now, both the US and Russia and China are all working on ballistic missile defense, and there is an appropriate role, perhaps, for ballistic missile defense. But it is up to at least those three parties to discuss reasonable restraints on ballistic missile defense to recognize the connection between defense and offense in nuclear strategy and to choose paths that will be not just less expensive but less dangerous for all three nations," Countryman, who participated in the annual meeting of the Arms Control Association. Countryman served approximately 35 years in the US foreign service, emphasized. Under the administration of the 46th US President Joe Biden, he was a senior advisor in the State Department's Bureau of International Security and Nonproliferation.

Trump stated in May 2025 that the US had determined the architectural outline of the Golden Dome system, which would include, among other things, the deployment of interceptors into space. According to him, its construction would take about three years. The US Congressional Budget Office presented estimates in May indicating that the total cost of deploying and operating the system could be about $1.2 trillion.