Overview
- Presenting the 2026 Annual Threat Assessment, DNI Tulsi Gabbard told the Senate that Pakistan is developing missile delivery systems that could put the US homeland within range and said long-range work could potentially include ICBMs, with overall missile threats projected to exceed 16,000 by 2035.
- Pakistan’s Foreign Office categorically rejected the assessment, calling its missile posture exclusively defensive, tied to credible minimum deterrence vis-à-vis India, and well below intercontinental range.
- Former foreign minister Jalil Abbas Jilani said the claim that US territory is within range of Pakistani missiles is not grounded in strategic reality and reiterated that Pakistan’s doctrine is India-specific.
- India’s Ministry of External Affairs responded by highlighting Pakistan’s history of clandestine nuclear proliferation and said the US remarks reinforce global concerns over Islamabad’s record.
- Independent reporting notes no public evidence of Pakistani ICBM tests or deployment and cites the Shaheen-III’s estimated 2,750 km range, while analysts point to IISS satellite imagery of a large solid rocket-motor test stand at Attock (2021–2023) and prior US sanctions as factors informing Washington’s concern.