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Finland is set to begin manufacturing a new class of affordable surveillance and drone-detection aircraft at the country’s only aircraft factory, with the first prototype test flight scheduled within days, Titta Puurunen of Finnish public broadcaster Yle reported June 3. The program belongs to Sensofusion, a Finnish defense technology company that employs more than 100 […]View the full article

Show LinksUkrainian FP-1/2 drone attacks Russian frigate Admiral Essen at the Novorossiysk Naval Base Ukrainian attack on the Kronstadt Naval Base Attack on Kuwait International Airport Saronic commentary by John Konrad on gCaptain AV-8B closes its story MQ-25A opens its story AUKUS update SummarySal discusses the ongoing Ukraine conflict, its historical cont… Read more View the full article

In both comments and via a couple of email/DMs yesterday, there were some sincere questions about why no one is talking about installing the “newer” design MK-57 VLS cells that we see in the three ships of the Zumwalt Class. In isolation they appear to be fine VLS cells, but are creatures of the time and place in which they were designed. Let’s go back to their first name: the MK-57 Peripheral Vertical Launch System (PVLS). They are a custom solution for the DDG-1000 Class designed in the Age of Transformation™ in the first decade of this century. It is an evolutionary dead-end riding on a white elephant. The MK-57 has a common problem found on most designs from this decade of error: it was built around novel ideas about warship construction and design that time proved wrong. Critique and best practices were hand-waved away, and entire systems were designed around weapons that simply never showed up. That left the future with all the costs of compromise without the promised delivery of new systems. Seriously, whatever happened to those “larger missiles” that were supposed to fit in there that couldn’t fit in a MK-41? Here are three major downsides from my seat that explain why we will not see them again: Inefficient use of volume: The Mk-57 is built in 4-cell modules rather than the traditional 8-cell grids, which isn’t too much of an issue. However, they take up significantly more interior hull space per missile. If you need a 1x4, the nice sales representative at LMT can get that for you in a MK-41. Not worth the additional cost: For the price and deck space it demands, it did not offer a proportionally higher return in firepower. Though they were designed to accommodate larger, next-generation missiles, that design limits the flexibility of what can be loaded. It has a slightly wider cell diameter than the MK-41, but is still not large enough to house the Conventional Prompt Strike (CPS) / hypersonic missiles. Exceptionally FPV vulnerable: Though I am sure they can be installed elsewhere, with the Zumwalts they were installed next to the skin of the ship. Everyone is worried about small drones (FPV), especially nearshore and in port. They carry small warheads, which are not too much of a concern to a big ship (however, the shaped-charge warhead of an RPG-7 many seem to be strapped with will cut right through our thin-skinned warships)...but when you have a big missile just an external bulkhead away from the side of the ship...you can figure it out from there....not to mention a Fitzgerald/McCain like collision or Cole attack. At the end of the day—larger with no additional gain, more expensive without any value, expanded vulnerability without any enhansed lethality. That is why we don’t see them. 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. Navy is doubling down on what it considers its most capable air and missile defense radar at sea, committing $516 million to keep the system integrated, tested, and ready across the fleet. Raytheon Missiles and Defense, the Marlborough, Massachusetts-based defense arm of RTX Corporation, secured a $515.8 million contract modification this week to […]View the full article

An Israeli defense firm is preparing to show off a laser weapon at Eurosatory later this month that can burn through a drone in under two seconds while drawing only a fraction of the power that comparable directed-energy systems require. Esh-Tech, a laser-focused defense technology company based in Omer, Israel, announced DroneLight on June 3, […]View the full article

Ukrainian forces struck the Russian Baltic Fleet corvette Boyky at Kronstadt Naval Base on the night of June 2-3, 2026, in the same overnight operation that set the St. Petersburg Oil Terminal ablaze on the opening day of Putin’s annual economic forum, with Ukraine’s Unmanned Systems Forces and the Security Service of Ukraine confirming the […]View the full article

Canada announced on June 2 that it finalized a deal in January 2026 to purchase 26 HIMARS rocket artillery systems from the United States for approximately $1.9 billion, giving the Canadian Army its first long-range precision strike capability and a weapon that Ukraine has used to devastating effect against Russian logistics, ammunition depots, and command […]View the full article

A Ukrainian defense technology company has unveiled a heavy quadcopter drone designed specifically for satellite-controlled strikes, precision minelaying, and logistics resupply at ranges and from positions that conventional radio-controlled drones cannot reach, delivering a capability that Ukrainian frontline units requested directly as the nature of drone warfare on their front evolved in ways that ground-based […]View the full article

Ukraine struck a major Russian oil terminal in Saint Petersburg and hit a military industrial target near the Baltic Fleet’s Kronstadt base on the night of June 2-3, with President Volodymyr Zelenskyy confirming the operations were part of his “long-range sanctions” campaign designed to make Russia’s war economy pay a direct price for its attacks […]View the full article

A Japanese opposition lawmaker has gone directly to Defense Minister Shinjiro Koizumi in a parliamentary committee hearing to demand that Japan supply Patriot air defense missiles to Ukraine, citing Zelensky’s stated desperation for interceptors and arguing that Japan now has both the legal authority and the moral obligation to act. Shigefumi Matsuzawa, a member of […]View the full article

Saab rolled out the first Gripen F two-seat fighter to the Brazilian Air Force on June 2 at its Linköping facility in Sweden, presenting the newest variant of the Gripen E family to the air force that helped develop it and marking a milestone in one of the most substantive defense industrial partnerships between a […]View the full article

American Rheinmetall is spending $41 million to expand and modernize six manufacturing facilities across Michigan, Ohio, and Maine, accelerating production capacity for some of the U.S. Army’s most important ground combat modernization programs while deliberately avoiding the time and cost of building entirely new factories. The German defense giant’s American subsidiary announced the capital investment […]View the full article

Ukraine’s 146th Separate Repair and Restoration Regiment published photographs of a Soviet-era BMP infantry fighting vehicle fitted with a Spanish GUARDIAN 30 remote weapon station. The photographs, posted to the regiment’s official social media page, show a standard BMP hull carrying the GUARDIAN 30 turret in place of the original conical Soviet turret that the […]View the full article

I’d like to revise and extend my remarks from my post this March, Up-arm the Fleet? With What? There is a limiting factor to my argument that I have no one but myself to blame for in the subtitle: To hell with your RCS. I want more weapons topside, now. If you want to hear the topside thoughts, give the linked-post above a read. What I’d like to ponder this fine Tuesday is something below decks. Nothing new, really. Nothing that needs to be invented. Nothing that requires all that much more than…space below deck. Right now, the smallest standard installation of the MK-41 VLS system is a single-module 8-cell package, 4x2. It is not a small bit of kit. The basic module is available in two sizes: strike and tactical length. The strike module is approximately 25 feet (7.6 meters) long and capable of launching large missiles, such as those that support sea-based midcourse ballistic missile defense and long-range strike. The tactical module is approximately 22 feet (6.7 meters) long and is capable of accommodating the same missile types as the strike length with the exception of the Tomahawk cruise missile and missiles designed for a ballistic missile defense role. But it can bring a lot to the table. The launch control system features an open, distributed architecture that allows for easy integration of future technologies. Open architecture both in the weapon control interface and the missile mechanical and electrical interface allows the system to support any missile in any cell. This is a capability unique to MK 41 VLS. The missiles currently integrated with MK 41 VLS include Evolved Sea Sparrow Missile (ESSM), Tomahawk Cruise Missile, Standard Missile 2, Standard Missile 3, Standard Missile 6 and Vertical Launch ASROC (VLA). Lockheed Martin has consistently demonstrated the ability to integrate new weapons. Future missile integration could include Long Range Anti-ship Missile (LRASM), Common Anti Air Modular Missile (CAMM), ASTER, Future Cruise/Anti-Ship Weapon (FC/ASW) and Barak. As we outlined in some detail in the March post linked to above, and over the last few decades on a regular basis here and on the Midrats Podcast, when the next big war arrives, every ship that comes in for maintenance is going to have (we hope) scores of people scrambling about installing weapons anywhere the engineers will let them when reality reminds everyone that war at sea is a nasty and dangerous place once the enemy can shoot back. We also have Cooperative Engagement Capability (CEC), the distributed lethality concept, quad-packed ESSM, and, really, if you can add two VLS cells here, and two VLS cells there, and then do that to four ships that otherwise would not have them…after a while, you have quite a bit more to play with in the aggregate. Anyway, when the enemy is coming at you up close and personal, you cannot have enough weapons. Where to put them? We have more options than you think. That big 8-cell module isn’t something you can shoehorn in via a SHIPALT willy-nilly, even if you are an LPD-17 Class ship that was designed for but not fitted with the MK-41 VLS. What if you could break that 8-cell into smaller bits from 1x1, 2x1, 2x2 etc to fit what space you could find? Lucky for us, that solution already exists. Nod to the thinkers at LMT. BEHOLD the ‘A Name Only an Engineer Would Love” …. Single Cell Launcher. Lockheed Martin has developed a scalable, modular, flexible missile launcher to provide an improved capability for navies around the world. The Single Cell Launcher maximizes commonality through use of the structure, software and electronics associated with the combat proven MK 41 Vertical Launching System (VLS)…leveraging the latest state-of-the-art MK41 VLS launch control system, MK 25 Quad Pack Evolved Sea Sparrow Missile (ESSM) Canister and a scalable, mechanical structure. Yes, I struggle through marketing-speak too—but this is the life we have chosen. This design provides a flexible system that is easily configurable, particularly where size and space concerns are paramount. SCL was designed to meet the need for a smaller, lighter and more flexible launcher for smaller ship classes which supports naval fleets around the world. I don’t know about you, but this is just plain sexy. OK, so here is what I’d like to see at peace when we have some time and the ability to scale up hardware production, because this will unquestionably be asked for at war where we don’t have the time or hardware. Get a few teams of young engineers with the best software out there. Give each team a random selection of USS, USNS (soon USS), and USCGC in active service or expected to be in active service and give them the simple task: “Tell me where you can put these on your ship, and the tradeoffs for doing so.” For each ship, give me three options Low impact Medium impact Maximum load” Tell them you want your first brief in 14 days. Then, look over at the Lockheed guys and tell them, “Make the electronics, CEC, and CIC interface common and simple—and do it now.” Then, get out of their way with a departing quote from The Great Man: Chop, chop. Peace is a luxury and we are all about to have to learn to live on poverty wages. 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

Greece has signed an agreement to expand its fleet of Shield AI V-BAT drones for maritime surveillance operations across the Aegean Sea, the company announced June 2, deepening a partnership that has already seen the Hellenic Army deploy the systems for intelligence and reconnaissance missions across one of NATO’s most geographically complex operating environments. The […]View the full article

The U.S. Navy bought six specialized reconnaissance boats designed by former Australian Navy frogmen, built in North Carolina, and validated through two years of testing with Marine Corps special operations units. Naval Sea Systems Command awarded The Whiskey Project Group USA a $17.5 million contract for six Multi Mission Reconnaissance Craft (MMRC), expeditionary watercraft designed […]View the full article

Before any American strike package enters defended enemy airspace, an EA-18G Growler goes in first to blind the radars, jam the communications, and break the targeting chain that would otherwise kill the jets behind it. The Navy invested $61 million to significantly improve that aircraft’s ears. The Naval Air Systems Command at Patuxent River Naval […]View the full article

Every warship in the U.S. Navy practices shooting down the kind of supersonic cruise missiles that China and Russia have spent decades perfecting, and the Navy paid nearly $100 million to keep that practice running for another five years with the only American target missile that can actually replicate what those weapons do. The Naval […]View the full article

Lockheed Martin opened a purpose-built missile production facility in Courtland, Alabama on Monday dedicated entirely to manufacturing the Next Generation Interceptor, the missile that will eventually replace the aging Ground-Based Interceptors currently guarding the United States against ballistic missile attack from Alaska and California. The 88,000-square-foot Missile Assembly Building 5 represents a concrete physical step […]View the full article

Finland’s next generation of warships is getting armored protection from a specialist composite materials company, with Integris selected to supply advanced naval ballistic protection systems for all four Pohjanmaa-class corvettes currently under construction at Rauma Marine Constructions’ shipyard in Rauma, Finland. The partnership began at the earliest stages of ship design rather than as a […]View the full article

The first Eurofighter built under Spain’s Halcon I program has rolled out of the factory at Getafe, Madrid, with Airbus Defence and Space confirming that the aircraft is ready for its first engine run and maiden flight, marking the arrival of a new generation of European air combat capability on the Spanish Air Force’s flight […]View the full article

Northrop Grumman completed a successful flight test of its Jackal precision strike missile on June 1, demonstrating the core systems that will define how American ground forces deliver long-range strikes in the most contested environments they are likely to face. The test validated the missile’s automated turbojet engine startup, autopilot-controlled flight, and high-speed maneuvering, confirming […]View the full article

Britain has ordered hundreds more Lightweight Multirole Missiles from Thales to rebuild stockpiles and reinforce the air defense of British forces in the Middle East, with the contracts worth a combined £36 million, roughly $48 million, George Allison of the UK Defence Journal reported June 1. The two contracts were placed by the National Armaments […]View the full article

The U.S. military fired more than 1,000 Patriot interceptors during the Iran conflict but received only 172 new ones in return, according to a Center for Strategic and International Studies analysis, leaving American air defense stockpiles in a deficit that won’t be replenished until 2029 at the earliest. That gap has driven a search for […]View the full article

An Israeli fire control technology company has now secured contracts with all four major branches of the U.S. military, completing a sweep across the American armed forces that took less than a year. Smart Shooter announced June 1 that it received its first significant U.S. Navy contract, a $1.8 million award for soldier-portable SMASH 2000LE […]View the full article