The United States Air Force is interested in buying two Tesla Cybertrucks, not to transport them but to destroy them. Procurement documents published Wednesday on a US government contracting website indicated that the electric pickups will be used to test munitions at the White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico, since they are likely to appear on battlefields in the future.
The two Cybertrucks are included in a bigger order comprising 33 vehicles that will be used in live missile fire testing. The agreement is that the trucks do not require to be in operation; they just have to be towable, with their high-voltage batteries taken out. The unusual procurement was first reported by the defense blog The War Zone.
The request of Tesla to produce a stainless steel-clad Cybertruck was explained in a justification document. The contracting officer observed that the vehicles were durable and could withstand damage and could therefore be adopted by the adversaries to be used in the military. The document reads: In the operating theater, it may be expected that the kind of vehicles that the enemy is using may switch to Tesla Cybertrucks because they have not been found to take the usual level of damage that is expected when there is a major impact.
Neither Tesla nor the Air Force responded to the solicitation, but the prospect of Cybertrucks on the battlefield is not altogether far-fetched. Tesla CEO Elon Musk had boasted of the pickup as being apocalypse-proof at its 2023 launch. Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov last year displayed a modified Cybertruck with a mounted machine gun, purportedly on its way to the front lines in Ukraine, before alleging that Tesla had remotely disabled it and making fun of Musk as a man.
Its aggressive design and armor-like body would not be useful in a real-life combat situation, according to experts who spoke to Business Insider. The model has been dogged by eight recalls since its launch, with complaints of body parts coming loose and also the sticking of accelerator pedals.
Musk previously estimated that he would sell more than 250,000 units a year, yet to date in 2025, Tesla has sold only 10,700, according to Cox Automotive. The Air Force wants to know whether the Cybertruck is a military threat or a novelty on the battlefield, so it will blow up a few.