The planned \u201cair moving target indicator\u201d system in question could ultimately feature as many as 600 satellites once it is fully operational, The Wall Street Journal reports<\/a>. Musk\u2019s company has also been linked to two more satellite ventures, which are concerned with relaying sensitive communications and tracing vehicles, respectively.<\/p>\n Handing the contracts to SpaceX would provide a strong indication that the rift between the two billionaires, which exploded so publicly<\/a> in early July, has been at least partially healed, but would do little to reassure defense sector critics who have warned the Pentagon against relying too heavily on any one contractor for national security projects.<\/p>\n open image in gallery<\/p>\n President Donald Trump and Secretary of War Pete Hegseth unveil their Golden Dome missile defense project in the Oval Office on May 20 (Getty)<\/p>\n Golden Dome, inspired by Israel\u2019s \u201cIron Dome,\u201d was announced by Trump and Secretary of War Pete Hegseth<\/a> at the White House in May and will amount to a complex system of satellites and weaponry capable of destroying incoming missiles before they hit American targets.<\/p>\n The president promised it would be \u201cfully operational\u201d before he leaves office in January 2029, capable of intercepting rockets, \u201ceven if they are launched from space,\u201d with an overall price tag of $175 billion.<\/p>\n However, the independent Congressional Budget Office<\/a> warned that it could cost as much as $524 billion and take 20 years to build, with Musk\u2019s then-rumored involvement prompting Democrats to express concerns about a conflict of interest <\/a>this spring.<\/p>\n Funding for the satellite system was set aside in Trump\u2019s \u201cOne Big, Beautiful Bill,\u201d<\/a> passed by Congress and signed into law in July, but the legislation did not name a specific contractor.<\/p>\n Asked about the reported SpaceX deal, a Pentagon official told The Independent: \u201cAs a matter of policy, we do not provide details relating to specifics of architectural discussion or pre-decisional matters. Recognizing adversaries\u2019 intent to exploit Golden Dome\u2019s breakthroughs, we are rigorously protecting its strategic advantages from external access.\u201d<\/p>\n The Independent has also reached out to the White House and SpaceX.<\/p>\n Although defense officials have yet to announce major contract awards for Golden Dome formally, more details are expected over the coming weeks. Anduril Industries, Palantir Technologies, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, and L3Harris have all been linked to the bidding process. <\/p>\n open image in gallery<\/p>\n Elon Musk looks set to win the lucrative satellite contract in spite of his spectacular falling out with Trump this summer (Getty)<\/p>\n Palantir and Lockheed were, incidentally, named among the donors<\/a> to Trump\u2019s new White House ballroom earlier this month.<\/p>\n For his part, Musk has largely retreated from the political fray after his six month \u201cside quest\u201d<\/a> in Washington ended in acrimony and disagreement over the OBBB, which saw him and Trump exchange ferocious personal insults in public via their rival social media platforms X and Truth Social.<\/p>\n The president threatened to have the South African-born tycoon deported<\/a> and his $48 billion in government contracts<\/a> placed under review during the feud. At the same time, Musk alleged that the actual reason for Trump not releasing the Jeffrey Epstein<\/a> files was that he was named in them and threatened to decommission a spacecraft used to ferry NASA<\/a> astronauts to the International Space Station.<\/p>\n Before that, Musk had donated $288 million to <\/a>Trump\u2019s 2024 election campaign<\/a> and founded DOGE<\/a>, the agency tasked with reducing waste expenditure and streamlining the federal government. <\/p>\n The two were briefly reunited and shook hands<\/a> at a memorial for the conservative activist Charlie Kirk<\/a> in Arizona in September, and the president said earlier this week that he had \u201calways liked Elon\u201d<\/a> and dismissed their spat as \u201cvery stupid,\u201d hinting at a desire for friendlier relations.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Your support helps us to tell the story From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":183115,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[90,416,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-236537","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-space","8":"tag-science","9":"tag-space","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom","12":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/236537","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=236537"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/236537\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/183115"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=236537"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=236537"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=236537"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"President](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/-BESTPIX-President-Trump-Makes-Announcement-With-Defense-Secretary-Hegseth-In-The-Oval-Office-00cj7o.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n![\"Elon](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/1761941530_127_GettyImages-2212190085.jpeg\")
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