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Sometimes, history whispers to you during small and medium-sized wars. It won’t force you to listen or even understand, but it is a loud enough whisper that you know it is there. These are not private whispers, only for you. These are understandable by anyone making an effort to hear them. More often than not, it is not a good-news whisper. No, it is an uncomfortable whisper, an inconvenient whisper, an expensive whisper. You don’t have to think about the implications of this whisper, but other people may. These whispers from small to medium-sized wars are, on occasion, riddle-strewn prophecy, but more often than not they are clear and direct about what you should expect in the next big war. The various military actions following the October 7th invasion of Israel by Hamas, and the Russo-Ukrainian War of 2022, are thick with lessons. There is a lot of interesting information from this interview by RBC-Ukraine with Deputy Chief of Ukraine’s Defense Intelligence, Major General Vadym Skibitskyi. Yes, yes, yes…consider the source, etc…but what he is saying vibes well with what we’ve seen elsewhere in open source. His comments about the Russians’ suspension of AS-24 Killjoy (Kinzhal) and the modernized AS-4 Kitchen (Kh-32) production are interesting, as well as the 11,000 Shahed drones-per-month production and the long-awaited Russian Starlink equivalent are interesting, but they are not what got my attention. Here is the money quote that the U.S. needs to ponder. The SS-N-27 Sizzler (AKA Kaliber) is a functional equivalent of the U.S. Tomahawk Land Attack Cruise Missile. They have become so combat ineffective that, even though other missiles are going direct from the factory to launch at Ukraine, the SS-N-27s are being pushed into reserve like so many pre-dreadnoughts in 1914. I emphasize that for a reason. The Ukrainians have figured out how to shoot down close to 100% of them before they reach the target. Let’s say that is a bit inflated, and instead put that at 75% for planning purposes. You can bet your house that the People’s Republic of China (PRC) already has the “how” being looked at by their people. Why? Simple. They know that U.S. military planning relies in large part on certain planning assumptions about the TLAM. The U.S. has had decades of exceptional success using TLAM against second-rate to fourth-rate militaries. Like the sun rising in the east, we just assume that it is there. In many ways, we have designed a fleet around it. It is so ubiquitous that it has created almost a monoculture. It is the Cavendish banana of weapons systems…IYKYK. Did you hear that whisper from the Pontic Steppe? What if our assumptions about our preferred 1970s-era performance TLAM are dangerously dated? “They are not really drawing down their stockpiles. Almost everything being used now is coming straight off the production line. The only exception is the Kalibr missiles - most of them are currently being allocated to other Russian fleets, since all new Russian warships and submarines are equipped with these systems. In effect, those missiles are going into reserve stockpiles. In addition, our interception rate for Kalibr missiles is nearly 100% when air-defense missiles are available.” If by 2030 the PRC has the capability to shoot down 75% of any TLAM that goes feet-dry from Hainan to Shanghai, how would that change our OPLANs? What about 50%? 25%? At what point does the intercept rate of our TLAM introduce so much volatility into our warplans that the math just does not work anymore. Then what? Don’t forget the toolbox metaphor. You need a diverse toolbox, you need variety. You don’t know exactly which tool you will be at the next crisis. You need to have the desire to future-proof your arsenal as a core concept. The Cult of Efficiency will always push the accountant. Accountants are important, but ensure the warfighter remains in front of them. Keep the supporting-vs-supported relationship sound. Do you now understand my continual advocacy for Conventional Prompt Strike (CPS)? The whisper is just reinforcing what I—and others—have been feeling for years. Oh, I almost forgot…for over two years, I have been asking us to stop calling CPS, “CPS”. It should be called, “Drakon“. H/t Rob Lee.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

A West Point cadet has spent three weeks helping Army engineers solve a math problem that could determine how many enemy drones an American air defense system can shoot down before it runs out of ammunition. Cadet Alex Anteen, a member of the U.S. Military Academy’s class of 2028, worked alongside scientists at the Army’s […]View the full article

Cameras mounted on Royal Navy surveillance drones bound for special forces missions in the Gulf were secretly transmitting signals to an IP address inside China, The Telegraph reported, citing an investigation by the newspaper’s Richard Holmes. The drones in question are Kraken K3 Scout uncrewed surface vessels, roughly 8.4-meter (28-foot) unmanned speedboats built by the […]View the full article

A mysterious Chinese warship that has spent years testing stealth technology just showed up with something new bolted to its deck, and naval watchers cannot agree on whether it is designed to disorient people or fry electronics. Open-source images circulating on social media this week show China’s unnamed experimental corvette, a stealthy test vessel that […]View the full article

A British air defense startup that did not exist until late 2024 just landed a $300 million funding round that values the company at $3.4 billion, a valuation that puts it on par with established defense primes despite having built its first missile from a blank sheet of paper less than two years ago. Cambridge […]View the full article

Russia’s prized “unstoppable” hypersonic missile has gone dark, and Ukrainian military intelligence says Moscow pulled the plug on purpose to feed a different weapon entirely. Vadym Skibitsky, deputy head of Ukraine’s Defense Intelligence Directorate, known by its Ukrainian acronym HUR, told the outlet RBC-Ukraine that Russia halted production of its Kh-47M2 Kinzhal ballistic missile back […]View the full article

Panels, seminars, conferences, reports, speeches, and emotion do not build a navy. Even shipyards do not build a navy. In the American system of government, if you want a navy you have to go up to Capitol Hill and get Congress to fund it. Without money, everything else is just a PDF. What is the state of play in bringing the argument for sea power to Congress? Returning to the Midrats Podcast just in time for the Senate’s August recess will be Brent Sadler, CAPT, USN (Ret.). You can join us LIVE today from 5-6 PM Eastern at this link. If you can’t make the live show, check the Substack later Sunday for all the podcast links and make us part of your commute listen. Brent is a Senior Research Fellow for Naval Warfare and Advanced Technology in the Douglas and Sarah Allison Center for National Security at The Heritage Foundation, and a retired U.S. Navy Captain. 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

A patch of forest and lakeshore in northern Michigan has become one of the most important pieces of real estate in the U.S. military’s race to catch up with China on drone warfare. Camp Grayling and the National All-Domain Warfighting Center, a sprawling military training complex in Michigan’s northern Lower Peninsula, has been selected by […]View the full article

An Israeli drone maker best known for building some of the quietest tactical aircraft in the sky is now pouring fresh money into scaling up how many of them it can actually build, ramping up serial production at home while pushing into new markets across Europe and Asia, Israel Defense reported in an article by […]View the full article

A Florida company that started out printing furniture with giant robotic arms is now applying that same technology to something considerably more consequential, building drone boats for the U.S. military layer by layer instead of piece by piece. Haddy, a digital manufacturing company based in St. Petersburg, Florida, announced on Saturday that it has produced […]View the full article

A small Indian defense company has built a weapon that looks like it walked straight off a battlefield in Ukraine, a portable, gun-shaped launcher that fires its own miniature drone to physically hunt down and destroy enemy aircraft in midair. Picraft Technology Pvt. Ltd., a private Indian defense technology company, developed the system, called Harpy […]View the full article

A soldier in the California desert flips a switch, and a small drone lifts off the ground carrying the ability to see through darkness and, if commanders choose, to strike a target without ever putting a human pilot in harm’s way. That was the scene at Fort Irwin, California this summer, where soldiers from the […]View the full article

A Russian tank that Ukrainian and Western observers had already written off as another failed experiment in anti-drone armor may actually have done exactly what it was built to do, just not enough of it. New battlefield testimony from a combat drone specialist who spoke directly with the Ukrainian unit involved in the fight suggests […]View the full article

A Russian air defense battery that had been launching missiles at Ukrainian cities for days finally went up in flames, and Ukraine’s drone operators are taking credit for putting it there. Ukraine’s Unmanned Systems Forces, a dedicated branch of the country’s military built specifically around drone warfare, struck a Russian S-400 Triumf air defense position […]View the full article

The Pentagon’s most futuristic research arm has put out a call for a missile that can outrun and outsmart the very air defenses that increasingly threaten American pilots and ships. The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, the Pentagon office famous for turning science fiction concepts like stealth aircraft and self-driving cars into real military hardware, […]View the full article

Getting a fighter jet part built faster in America might soon depend on cutting through a mountain of paperwork that has nothing to do with engineering and everything to do with accounting. The Department of War wants the companies that build its weapons to tell it exactly which forms and financial audits are slowing them […]View the full article

A missile that first destroyed tanks in the jungles of Vietnam more than five decades ago just landed another half-billion-dollar contract, and the Army plans to keep firing it well past the year 2050. The U.S. Army awarded Raytheon, the missile-making arm of aerospace giant RTX based in Tucson, Arizona, a $536 million modification to […]View the full article

A British engineering company that spent decades building Formula 1 race cars has announced it will start delivering a weapon that flies faster than 460 mph, carries a 300-kilogram (661-pound) payload, and never comes back from its mission. MGI Engineering, a defense firm based in Witney, Oxfordshire, announced that its TigerShark autonomous strike drone is […]View the full article

Out of 61 Russian cruise missiles fired at Ukraine in a single wave, Ukrainian air defenses shot down 54, and F-16 fighter jets alone accounted for 38 of those kills, Militarnyi reported, citing a statement from Yevhenii Karzhau, deputy commander of Ukraine’s Air Force. The figures place the American-made jets at the center of one […]View the full article

One of my evergreen arguments is over the use of, “kids” to describe those who serve. I’m sorry, 18, 19, and even 25-year-old men and women are just that, men and women. We all put our lives in their hands every day, I find the paternalistic “kid” a bit insulting and can cause some to expect less of them. Perhaps it is just me being pedantic, it probably is. “Kids” is better than “boy” and “girl,” I suspect—but maybe it isn’t just me, maybe it is just “us.” We don’t expect much from our young men and women as a society compared to what was expected just a few generations ago. Adult college graduates—especially the young men—still living at home. They have the car, clothes and the external trappings of an adult, but they live as small children with no plan or drive. Waiting for the roast-duck of life to fly in their mouth, making excuses for their own timidity and poor decisions. Don’t even get me started with the men and women in their early twenties, smart and well educated, who can’t even deal with different opinions or little words that seem to send them into a spiral. Do they behave as such because we let them, or do we encourage them to never rise to adulthood? Either way, it is mostly the fault of poor leadership from their elders. Back to boys and girls—but in this case let’s look at the term “boy” as it was used just over 100 years ago. A first class boy, or as it were, a Boy First Class; At the outbreak of war, Jack’s father Eli, an ex-soldier, re-enlisted as a Private in the 57th Coy. Royal Defence Corps. It was The Royal Navy that appealed to Jack and at the age of 15 he took references from his Headmaster and his employer along to a local recruitment office and enlisted. He was sent to Keyham Naval Barracks in Plymouth for his basic training where he earned sixpence a week as a “Boy Second Class”. He passed out as Boy First Class J. T. Cornwell J/42563 and when he left Keyham, (referred to in naval terms as H.M.S. Vivid) he was posted to H.M.S. Lancaster which was moored at Chatham. Jack was later ordered to join the fleet at Rosyth in Scotland and on the 2nd of May 1916 he joined the newly commissioned H.M.S. Chester. The Battle of Jutland began on the 31st of May 1916, the first shots being fired at 14:28. H.M.S. Chester was stationed ahead of the fleet in The North Sea. Lookouts reported distant gunfire and her Captain ordered “Action Stations” before setting off at full speed to investigate. Close ahead they encountered four German cruisers. Jack took orders via headphones from his Officer on the bridge. He was fully responsible for setting the gun’s sights and his speed and precision would determine whether they were to hit or miss their target. The German cruisers opened fire and Jack’s gun was one of the first to be hit before it could be brought into action and he suffered a serious wound to his chest. H.M.S. Chester simply could not match the firepower of the four enemy cruisers. A report from the Commanding Officer of H.M.S. Chester: “Boy (1st Class) John Travers Cornwell of the “Chester”, was mortally wounded early in the action. He nevertheless remained standing alone at a most exposed post, quietly awaiting orders till the end of the action, with the gun’s crew dead and wounded all round him”. H.M.S. Chester sustained severe punishment, being hit seventeen times. She was ordered back to the port of Immingham on the Humber. Jack was taken to hospital in Grimsby and attended by Dr. C. S. Stephenson, but he could not be saved and died of his wounds on June 2nd, 1916. His body was brought back to East Ham in a naval coffin and his family buried him in a private ceremony at Manor Park Cemetery, in a communal grave numbered 323. When the story of Jack’s heroism and somewhat humble burial was publicised, it was decided, due to strong public opinion that Jack should have a burial fit for a hero. On the 29th of July 1916, Jack Cornwell’s body was exhumed and carried by gun carriage from East Ham Town Hall to Manor Park Cemetery where he was reburied with full naval honours. In the procession, along with members of the family were: Mr. R. Banks Martin the Mayor of East Ham, Sir John Bethell M.P.,The Bishop of Barking, boys from Walton Road School, local cadets and scouts and boy sailors from H.M.S. Chester. The Admiralty was represented by Dr. Macnamara M.P. On the 15th of September 1916, the official citation appeared in The London Gazette stating that John Travers Cornwell had been posthumously awarded the Victoria Cross by King George V. What about his mother? On the 25th of October 1916 Jack’s father Eli died whilst on active service. The following month, on the 16th of November 1916, Jack’s mother received her son’s V.C. from The King at Buckingham Palace. By 1919, Jack’s mother Lily, was living in reduced circumstances and working in a sailors’ hostel to supplement a very small pension awarded for her son. She was found dead at her home in Commercial Road, Stepney, on the 31st of October 1919 aged 48 and never saw the memorial erected on her son’s grave. She shares a grave with Jack and Eli at Manor Park Cemetery, although her name is recorded as Alice. The memorial stone was unveiled on the 31st of December 1920, by Dr. Macnamara M.P. with members of the family present and A.H. Wiseman, the Mayor of East Ham. The Boy Scouts and Sea Scouts provided a guard of honour. Finally, a little note for you next time you are in London. It’s right across from Captain Bligh’s house; The gun that Jack manned from H.M.S. . Chester, was taken to the Imperial War Museum in March 1936 and is still on display today, along with Jack’s medals which were deposited in the museum by Jack’s stepsister Alice Payne on the 28th of November 1968. Now I am mad at myself. When I was at the IWM, I walked right past his gun. When you get a chance, take up my slack and visit a bit of what a “boy” can do. Fullbore. First posted APR2016.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

The U.S. Army has put more money behind a flying bomb that can circle over a battlefield for an hour, watch its target the entire time, and abort the strike mid-flight if something looks wrong, one day after the weapon proved it could pass every test the Army threw at it. Mistral Inc. and Uvision […]View the full article

A seven-ton U.S. Marine Corps supply truck can now creep past enemy positions in near silence, running purely on battery power with its diesel engine switched off entirely, and the company that built that capability is about to show it off in Michigan. Eaton, an intelligent power management company, announced its Mobility segment will display […]View the full article

Poland’s state-owned defense conglomerate is convening its entire arms industry around one table next week to answer a question with real stakes for the continent’s future: can Polish factories help Europe build a missile shield without depending on Washington to do it? Polska Grupa Zbrojeniowa, known as PGZ, Poland’s state-controlled defense holding company that oversees […]View the full article

A laser sight small enough to mount on a rifle just got its moment on Capitol Hill, and the story behind how it got there says a lot about how the Pentagon is trying to fix a problem that has quietly killed off some of America’s most promising defense technology for years. B.E. Meyers & […]View the full article

Indonesia cut the first piece of steel for its own submarine on Aug. 7, 2026, marking the moment the Southeast Asian nation moved from training its engineers in France to actually building a warship on home soil. The steel-cutting ceremony took place at PT PAL’s shipyard in Surabaya, officially launching construction of Indonesia’s first Scorpène […]View the full article