Nuclear powers slam Trump’s Golden Dome defense plan as dangerous and destabilizing
The U.S.’s chief adversaries, Russia, North Korea and China, all of which are nuclear-armed nations, have condemned President Donald Trump’s space-based defensive plan he dubbed the “Golden Dome” as “dangerous” and a threat to global stability.
The president discussed his $175 billion plan, which will use satellites and other technologies to detect and intercept a missile strike “even if they are launched from other sides of the world,” Trump said last week.
The defensive plan, though it is believed to be years away before being fully operational despite Trump’s three-year goal mark, sparked stiff backlash from the U.S.’s top competitors, who took direct aim at what they called Trump’s “arrogance.”
U.S. President Donald Trump makes an announcement regarding the Golden Dome missile defense shield next to U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, D.C., U.S., May 20, 2025.
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North Korea’s foreign ministry, whose leader shared an uncommonly cordial relationship with Trump during his first term, called it the equivalent of an “outer space nuclear war scenario” that supports the administration’s strategy for “uni-polar domination.”
According to local media outlets, the ministry on Tuesday said it was a “typical product of ‘America first’, the height of self-righteousness, arrogance, high-handed and arbitrary practice.”
The White House did not immediately respond to Fox News’ Digital’s questions regarding the reactions to the plan, intended to resemble Israel’s “Iron Dome” defensive capability.
Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping exchange documents during a signing ceremony following their talks at the Kremlin in Moscow on May 8, 2025. (KIRILL KUDRYAVTSEV/AFP via Getty Images)
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But the North Korean foreign ministry claimed the defensive strategy was actually an “attempt to militarize outer space” and “preemptively attain military superiority in an all-round way.”
Similarly, on Tuesday, Russian foreign minister Maria Zakharova said the strategy would undermine the basis of strategic stability by creating a global missile defense system, reported Reuters.
But her comments were not the first time Moscow aligned its condemnation of the “Golden Dome” as it issued a joint statement with China earlier this month after Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping met for formal talks in Russia.
The duo called the plan “deeply destabilizing” and claimed it erodes the “inseparable interrelationship between strategic offensive arms and strategic defensive arms.”
They also argued that it would turn “outer space into an environment for placing weapons and an arena for armed confrontation.”
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth speaks during an event with President Donald Trump in the Oval Office of the White House, Tuesday, May 20, 2025, in Washington. (Alex Brandon/AP Photo)
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Russia has remained relatively muted in its response following Trump’s Oval Office discussion on the Golden Dome, which came just two days after Trump held a two-hour phone call with Putin.
But China reiterated its objection to the plan, and following Trump’s announcement on it, Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Mao Ning said last week, “The project will heighten the risk of turning space into a war zone and creating a space arms race, and shake the international security and arms control system.”
Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth has rejected the claims that the plan could be viewed as an “offensive” strategy and told Fox News Digital, “All we care about is protecting the homeland.”
Morgan Phillips contributed to this report.