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Taiwan detected six Chinese military aircraft, seven People’s Liberation Army Navy ships and one Chinese official ship operating around the island in the 24 hours to 6 a.m. local time on Oct. 29, the Ministry of National Defense said on social media. Five of the six aircraft sorties entered the northern, central and southwestern parts […]View the full article

North Korea launched what may have been a ballistic missile at about 12:36 p.m. local time on Oct. 29, and it is presumed to have fallen near the east coast of the Korean Peninsula without reaching Japan’s territory or exclusive economic zone, Japan’s Ministry of Defense said on social media. Tokyo said Japan, the United […]View the full article

Norway’s Kongsberg ended the third quarter of 2026 with a record order backlog of NOK 174.2 billion (about $18.8 billion), after taking in NOK 23.3 billion (about $2.5 billion) in new orders, more than double the NOK 9.5 billion it booked in the same quarter last year. The defense group reported on Oct. 29 that […]View the full article

Tennessee has launched a bid to host the planned United States Space Academy, proposing a campus at the Coffee County Joint Industrial Park near Tullahoma, minutes from Arnold Air Force Base and about 60 miles (97 km) from Huntsville, Alabama. Gov. Bill Lee announced the bid on Oct. 28 alongside U.S. Sens. Marsha Blackburn and […]View the full article

SummaryIn Episode 49 of the UNCLASS Read Board Podcast, Sal reflects on voting ahead of election day, how Washington-area Navy leadership can shape civilian perceptions of the service, and why he believes demographic and fiscal pressures will reshape the postwar international order. He also revisits his “Terrible Twenties” forecast, comparing it with de… Read more View the full article

Finland will buy the RGW110 heavy disposable anti-tank weapon from Germany’s Dynamit Nobel Defence to replace the APILAS launcher its soldiers have carried since the 1980s, the Finnish Army said on Oct. 28. The purchase is worth about €84.5 million (about $94 million) excluding value-added tax, and deliveries of the weapons, training equipment and instruction […]View the full article

Ukraine’s parliament has approved in a first reading a 2027 state budget that sets aside 4.885 trillion hryvnias (about $107.5 billion) for security and defense, equal to 43.8% of the country’s projected gross domestic product. The Verkhovna Rada passed draft budget No. 16000 on Oct. 28 with 239 votes in favor, 25 against and 26 […]View the full article

Japan will host a final assembly plant for the AIM-120 AMRAAM air-to-air missile after Defense Minister Shinjiro Koizumi and U.S. Secretary of War Pete Hegseth agreed on Oct. 28 to build the facility as part of joint U.S.-Japanese missile production, Nikkei reported. The two met for about 30 minutes in Cebu, the Philippines, on the […]View the full article

A Russian Navy intelligence-gathering ship sailed southwest through the Tsushima Strait between Japan and South Korea on Oct. 27 and 28 and headed into the East China Sea, Japan’s Joint Staff Office said. The Joint Staff identified the vessel as a Vishnya-class intelligence collection ship and released a map showing its hull number, 535. That […]View the full article

Belgium has started building a new maintenance center for its army’s armored vehicles in Rocourt, near Liège, where a joint venture of FN Herstal, John Cockerill Defense and Thales Belgium will repair and service the Belgian Land Component’s vehicles and their weapons under a 20-year deal. Belgian Defence Minister Theo Francken laid the foundation stone […]View the full article

Britain will lead development of three new sensor and effects packages for underwater drones under the AUKUS security partnership with the United States and Australia, with the systems due to be available across all three nations’ uncrewed underwater fleets from 2027, the UK Ministry of Defence said on Oct. 27. The three payloads are a […]View the full article

One of the more tiresome phrases one hears bandied about is usually a variation on one of these generally interchangeable themes: The International Rules Based Order Liberal International Order It is all on borrowed time. It was a vision of what was once the center-right and center-left who wanted to create a different, more humane world. Its triumph and high water mark was victory in the Cold War, but then it lost its way once the 68’ers (typified by Bill Clinton in the U.S. and Tony Blair in the UK, along with their fellow travelers in other Western nations) took power. In a series of feel-goodism project from open-borders to unchecked social spending, they eventually degraded themselves into cronyism, sectarianism, and corruption. Financially unsustainable and intellectually spent, its sputtering death rattles are there for all to see. What comes next, I don’t know—but we’re not going to like it parts of it. How much of the Old Order remains will vary from country to country, but the hangover of the errors of the last six decades will not be easy to fix without some very—from a late 20th century perspective—illiberal actions. Don’t get me wrong, I am a fan of what was attempted after WWII, but it was only effective for a quarter century or so. It had enough momentum to coast and drift another quarter century, then it started to eat itself by those who didn’t remember why it existed and what it was supposed to do. I wish the best parts of it could last forever, but our inheritance was mortgaged and can’t be paid back. That is what will lead the reset as we move into mid-century. It is that simple. The math is what it is. Across the West and the non-Western developed nations there is a similar problem. The first ingredient is one they all share, but the West has a second accelerant that is especially dangerous. We’ll get to that in a second, but let’s look at the first. All the economic models we’ve developed, in peace and war, since Adam Smith were based on a few assumptions, one of which was a proper demographic pyramid. Lots of young people coming up to take a productive role in society, advance civilization, and—in the last hundred years of the modern welfare state—help fund a growing government that cares for those who cannot care for themselves. In the West, the U.S. has one of the healthiest demographic profiles. Not great, but in the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king. Give the chart below a look, especially at 1926 during the Roaring Twenties, and again in 1965 with LBJ’s Great Society kickofff. In the last couple of weeks, we’ve all been watching the cities in Europe—especially in France—burn. She’s not alone. Significant leftist riots have been seen in Italy and Belgium. In spite of their decades-old welfare states, the masses claim not to have enough. The gravy train is over, but no one wants to admit it. The Western Welfare State is running on inertia and political cowardice at this point, right up until the bondholders close their wallets. Yes, I include the U.S. in this, but we won’t see the collapse first. That will happen in Europe, and when the break comes, it will make the events of the last month seem like an event hosted by the Daughters of the American Revolution. It is baked into the cake. The tens of millions of unskilled, unassimilated, and unemployable illegal migrants living off national treasuries to which they have never contributed are just another accelerant to the conflagration that is coming. For the sake of brevity, let’s take one of our Western allies, Italy, as an example. As we showed the relatively healthy American demographics earlier, let’s look at the Italian one, over a shorter period. What is coming down the tracks for Italy and most of the West? These are the good old days. There is a good datapoint by Ani Chkhikvadze in the Washington Examiner titled Italians are taking to the streets, but are they honest about the problem? After decades beneath the American security umbrella, many Italians came to enjoy the luxury of regarding war as somebody else’s concern. That bargain made possible generous welfare commitments. Even with war raging in Ukraine and Russia conducting terrorist attacks across Europe, many Italians still feel the threat is distant. “I’m here because I’m anti-war,” said one protester. “The government puts a lot of money in armament and in war, but we are dying poor and nobody is doing anything.” These claims deserve closer scrutiny. In Italy, pensions, healthcare, and social protection absorb about 56% of all public spending, roughly 28% of GDP. It’s the third-highest allocation of any European Union nation. Pensions dominate the bill at about 16% of GDP, the second-highest share in the EU after Greece. In contrast, defense spending sits at roughly 2% of GDP, but far lower than the U.S. and other NATO allies would like to see. Moreover, Italy has only reached this level by counting security spending as part of its armed forces total. In Italy, pensions, healthcare, and social protection absorb about 56% of all public spending, roughly 28% of GDP. It’s the third-highest allocation of any European Union nation. Pensions dominate the bill at about 16% of GDP, the second-highest share in the EU after Greece. In contrast, defense spending sits at roughly 2% of GDP, but far lower than the U.S. and other NATO allies would like to see. Moreover, Italy has only reached this level by counting security spending as part of its armed forces total. But the basic problem is the same as that afflicting France. Namely, that with debt approaching 140% of GDP, Italy needs to cut spending, or cut spending and raise taxes. Demographics also matter here. Young Italians have good reason to feel disadvantaged by a system that devotes far more to pensions than to education, which receives roughly 4% of GDP. These outlays will only increase as Italy’s population continues to age rapidly. Rising rents and everyday expenses make life harder, even for those with jobs. But another state subsidy won’t solve the issue. The real answer is to leave more money in people’s pockets by cutting spending and taxes, and by removing heavy barriers to building homes and creating jobs. Italy knows where irresponsible fiscal management leads. What are their political options? Unlike her predecessors, Meloni has done a good job cutting back some of that expenditure and steering the budget toward balance, and ratings agencies have taken note. But rising fuel prices and protests by truck drivers, shop owners, and fishermen in the south are testing that discipline, bringing pressure from small-business owners her coalition counts among its voters. Whether discontent ultimately costs Meloni power remains uncertain. On the Left, Elly Schlein’s Democratic Party and Giuseppe Conte’s Five-Star Movement struggle to form a coherent alternative. On Meloni’s far-right, former general Roberto Vannacci’s radical Futuro Nazionale competes for conservative voters. There is plenty of competition to channel Italy’s unhappiness. Meloni is the moderate option. The left is small, but incredibly active and violent. The ‘normies’ just want order and, in a way, the effective welfare state they have always been promised—but will never be able to afford once the borrowing stops—an effective welfare state. There is no rich and fat U.S.A. that will be able to come to the rescue. The PRC will have problems of its own and, if anything, will offer only temporary help in exchange for permanent vassalage. The wheels will come off Europe first. One of the largest barriers to stopping the inevitable is the European Union (EU) and the European Commission on Human Rights (ECHR). Their ruling center-right and center-left nomenklatura created this crisis; they won’t be able to arrest it. The EU and ECHR—as they exist and function today—are largely responsible for the masses of migrants who are heavy weights around the ankles of European leaders trying to navigate the coming train wreck. The money spent on the migrant masses no one invited will have to be the first thing to go once the levee breaks. There is growing talk of action, but for now it is only talk. When action does take place, how do you think these masses and their allies will react? At the ballot box and through ‘vibrancy’ in the streets, the left relies on unassimilated migrants of the first, second, and third generations of unassimilated migrants as the shock troops of their Red-Green-Green alliance of traditional leftists, neo-pagan environmentalists, and Islamic supremacists seeking power. They need a flag. Here, I have one for them. They’ll like the construction with the communist red, environmentalist green, and Islamic green. Must credit Salamander. That is what you are seeing in the streets from Paris to Milan: a test drive of the RGG Alliance in case the normies decide to vote for someone else but them to address the problem. It is good, in a way, that most of the West’s enemies—China and Russia—have worse problems from a demographic and debt perspective. But the accelerant to disorder, and the inability of the ruling powers to stop it, are Western problems that make what is to come unavoidable—and worse than anyone would have imagined at the turn of the century. Leave a comment Share This Substack is reader-supported. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. View the full article

Ethiopia has taken delivery of its first 12 Russian Su-35 fighter jets and will also receive four batteries of the S-400 long-range air defense system, Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed said on social media on Oct. 28. Abiy said the jets arrived under an earlier agreement with the Russian government and a year ahead of the […]View the full article

Singapore-based BeeX used its ALPHA underwater drone to place explosive charges on a moored sea mine and a swinging steel target and then destroy both during a closed-door mine countermeasures demonstration in the United Kingdom, the company said on Oct. 27. The one-day event, held on Sept. 17 and hosted by British defense consultancy Copper […]View the full article

Austrian startup GuardAero showed its APS1 drone-defense system for military vehicles to Arnold Kammel, secretary general of Austria’s Ministry of Defence, during the Austrian Armed Forces’ National Day display at Vienna’s Heldenplatz on Oct. 26. The Graz-based company shared images of the presentation on social media, saying APS1 was shown as part of its research […]View the full article

The UK Ministry of Defence has hired Astroscale UK as prime contractor for LEDA, a new £15 million (about $20 million) military space program under which the company will build, launch and operate a spacecraft to study how satellites maneuvering close to other spacecraft could be used in orbital warfare, and how to counter them. […]View the full article

BAE Systems has completed the first live-fire test of its Adaptable Deck Launcher, a deck-mounted missile launcher that lets U.S. Navy and allied ships carry more Evolved SeaSparrow air defense missiles and reload them at sea with standard shipboard equipment. The company announced the test on Oct. 27 from China Lake, California, home of the […]View the full article

Lockheed Martin has broken ground on a factory expansion in Troy, Alabama, that will triple the space it uses to build the AGM-183A Air-Launched Rapid Response Weapon, the U.S. Air Force’s first hypersonic missile to enter production. The company held the groundbreaking for the expansion of its Building P-20 on Oct. 27, the day after […]View the full article

The Russian Pacific Fleet’s ballistic missile submarine Generalissimo Suvorov fired a Bulava intercontinental ballistic missile from beneath the Sea of Okhotsk on Oct. 28, sending it across the country to the Chizha test range in the Arkhangelsk region, the Russian Defense Ministry said. The ministry said the launch was carried out from a submerged position […]View the full article

ASELSAN, Türkiye’s largest defense electronics company, ended the third quarter of 2026 with a record order backlog of $30.7 billion, after adding $7.5 billion in a single quarter and passing the $30 billion mark for the first time in its history. The Ankara-based company reported its results for the first nine months of the year […]View the full article

Quantum-Systems has unveiled an armed version of its Reliant long-range drone, showing the aircraft fitted with a mixed load of 82 mm mortar rounds and 40 mm grenades. Dave Sharpin, chief executive of Quantum-Systems Inc., the U.S. arm of the German drone maker, shared images of the configuration on social media on Oct. 28, thanking […]View the full article

X-Bow Systems will build the solid rocket booster that launches CoAspire’s ground-based cruise missile under the U.S. Navy’s CHAOS program, an effort to give allied nations a low-cost weapon for striking ships and land targets. The Albuquerque, New Mexico, company said Tuesday that CoAspire, the prime contractor, selected it to develop and produce the ground-launched […]View the full article

Italy’s 13th military aid package for Ukraine, which is expected to include Aster 30 air defense missiles, is ready but frozen, and Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s government appears to be waiting for the outcome of the U.S. midterm elections on Nov. 3 before moving it forward, La Repubblica reported Tuesday. If the delay continues, Rome […]View the full article

Lockheed Martin plans to open a dedicated maintenance facility in Poland for Patriot PAC-3 interceptors, the company announced Tuesday. The PAC-3 Missile Maintenance Facility is being set up in coordination with the U.S. government and will serve NATO allies that operate the interceptors. The site will repair and recertify the missiles. According to the company, […]View the full article

The U.S. Army has picked Amazon Web Services and World Wide Technology to help build an autonomous cyber defense system that can find and stop network threats with little human involvement, choosing the two companies on Oct. 23, 2026, for a Project Griffin pilot worth a combined $2.6 million. The U.S. Army said it wants […]View the full article