Raw Intel

Ukrainian forces have carried out what the military describes as the world’s first known combat mission combining a naval drone with an armed ground robot, using an unmanned surface vessel to ferry a machine-gun-equipped robotic vehicle across the Black Sea and land it directly on Russian-occupied shoreline, United24 Media reported July 13, citing Ukraine’s 123rd […]View the full article

A California aerospace firm building giant swarms of unmanned aircraft has landed a deal with the Air Force to prove it can manufacture those aircraft faster and cheaper than anyone else in the industry. Swarm Aero, a defense technology company that develops large uncrewed aerial vehicles designed to operate in coordinated fleets, announced more than […]View the full article

USNS Sacagawea (click to view full) Warships get a lot of attention, but without resupply, an impressive-looking fleet becomes a hollow force. The US Navy’s supply and support fleet has been aging, and needed new vessels. T-AKE is part of that effort, and the ships have also found themselves performing “naval diplomacy” roles. The entire T-AKE dry cargo/ ammunition ship program could have a total value of as much as $6.2 billion, and a size of 14 ships, as the US looks to modernize its supply fleet. How do T-AKE ships fit into US naval operations? What ships do they replace? What’s the tie-in to US civilian industrial capacity? How were environmental standards built in…

Americas Northrop Grumman Systems won a $75.5 million contract for the Global Hawk RQ-4 UAV. The contractor will provide multi-country aircrew and maintenance training consisting of program management support, courseware modification and development, pilot training, sensor operator training, and airframe and ground maintenance training to support the US government and Air Force Security Assistance Training international partners’ mission objectives. Foreign Military Sales (FMS) funds will be obligated at the time of task order award. The RQ-4 Global Hawk is a high-altitude, long-endurance unmanned aircraft system with an integrated sensor suite that provides intelligence,…

Right now throughout Afghanistan and the different ways out of that nation, Americans, Brits, and others are doing all they can to fill in the gaping scar of dishonor that is our defeat-of-choice and retreat from Afghanistan. There are individuals, ad-hoc groups of like minded veterans, family members, and others who are doing all they can to help Americans, family members, and those who trusted and fought with us from almost certain death. From American school kids, to helicopter pilots - people are trusted in our government to not leave them behind are trapped. There are good people on the other end who are doing extraordinary things to make up for the disgraceful offic…

I found two things curious about the response to this news over the weekend; China is looking to create its first permanent military presence on the Atlantic Ocean, on the coast of the small African nation Equatorial Guinea, according to a report in The Wall Street Journal based on classified U.S. intelligence. Though officials did not describe China's plans in detail, they said China's presence on Africa's Atlantic coast would enhance the possible threat to the U.S., as it would give Chinese warships a place to rearm and refit opposite the East Coast, the Journal reported. Gen. Stephen Townsend, who serves as commander of U.S. Africa Command, told the Senate in April …

Americas Sikorsky Aircraft won a $2.3 billion deal for procurement of 120 H-60M Black Hawk helicopters and related support for fiscal years 2022-2026, including options for an additional 135 aircraft. Bids were solicited via the internet with one received. With more than 2,100 H-60 variants in the US Army’s inventory, the Black Hawk remains the workhorse and backbone of US Army aviation. As the US Army continues to develop its Futura Vertical Lift (FVL) programs – in which the company competes with its Raider X and SB-1 Defiant – they will continue to operate the H-60M for decades to come and alongside its future replacements. According to the US Department of Defense pub…

Americas Boeing won a $12.8 million order, which provides for the rework, repair, and overhaul of 16 Harpoon capsules and six all-up round encapsulated Harpoon missiles for the Navy. Work will be performed in St. Charles, Missouri; and Burnley, Lancashire, England, and is expected to be completed in September 2024. The Florida-based 125th Fighter Wing […]View the full article

Americas Raytheon and Lockheed have received $267-million in contracts for a full-rate production of the Javelin Lightweight Command Launch Units (LWCLU) for the US Army and foreign military sales programs with Lithuania, Estonia, and Latvia. The LWCLU is part of the man-portable Javelin anti-tank weapon system used to survey and scan targets on sight. The US Army has selected five companies to demonstrate their existing self-propelled howitzers, which could potentially fill the gap left by the discontinued Extended-Range Cannon Artillery (ERCA) program. BAE Systems, Hanwha Defense, Rheinmetall, Elbit Systems, and General Dynamics have received contracts totaling $4 milli…

Americas The US has selected a design for the futuristic “Golden Dome” missile defense system, says President Donald Trump, adding that it will be operational by the end of his time in office. Just days after returning to the White House in January, Trump unveiled his intentions for the system, aimed at countering “next-generation” aerial threats to the US, including ballistic and cruise missiles. An initial sum of $25billion has been earmarked in a new budget bill – although the government has estimated it could end up costing 20 times that over decades. The Rock Island Arsenal Joint Manufacturing and Technology Center (RIA-JMTC) plans to ramp up production of 3D-printed…

In a rare and visually striking operation, a U.S. Army CH-47 Chinook helicopter transported a retired U.S. Air Force A-7D Corsair II fighter jet by air across the Missouri River this week. The fighter jet, which once served with the 185th Tactical Fighter Group in Sioux City, Iowa, was relocated to its new home at […] The post U.S. Army airlifts retired fighter jet first appeared on Defence Blog.View the full article

Kalashnikov Concern has delivered a new batch of SV-98 sniper rifles to Russian forces under a 2025 state contract, the company said in a statement this week. The rifles, chambered in 7.62×54R, are widely used in combat operations and were handed over on schedule, the manufacturer noted. According to the company, the SV-98 is equipped […] The post Russia sends new sniper rifles to frontline troops first appeared on Defence Blog.View the full article

Though there are aspects of this that are more Mel Brooks than Tom Clancy, this should cause people in positions of responsibility for our strategic defense to pause and ponder. We don’t hire enough imaginative thinkers, and the clock watchers and pension counters who seem to do most of the domestic risk mitigation work have never met with a functional Red Team. You can only go so far with physical security outside the base fence because we live, thankfully, in a very free country relative to other places in the world, and there are few open spaces left around. Risk will always be there, or if you squint hard enough, it seems to be there. The below is just amazing when yo…

L3Harris Technologies has delivered the first production Meadowlands Counter Communications System to the U.S. Space Force Combat Forces Command’s Mission Delta 3 – Space Electromagnetic Warfare unit. According to a statement from the company, the delivery is intended to support Space Force units tasked with electromagnetic warfare missions by providing mobile jamming capabilities that can […]View the full article

Sweden has signed a contract to acquire sovereign Synthetic Aperture Radar satellites from ICEYE, establishing a national space-based intelligence capability, the Swedish Defence Materiel Administration announced on January 12 in Stockholm. According to the Swedish Defence Materiel Administration (FMV), the multi-million, multi-year agreement was formalized by Brigadier General Carl-Fredrik Edström, Director of the Air and […]View the full article

The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), the Pentagon’s research and technology arm, issued a solicitation for its Compositional Learning-And-Reasoning for AI Complex Systems Engineering (CLARA) program, inviting proposals for high-assurance artificial intelligence research. The solicitation was released by DARPA’s Defense Sciences Office and seeks innovative basic or applied research concepts in “high assurance artificial […]View the full article

A report published by the Chinese newspaper Global Times says China is seeking to expand exports of military aircraft following what the publication described as the first combat success of the export-oriented J-10CE fighter jet during an overseas air battle in 2025. The report indicates that the aircraft’s performance generated increased international attention toward Chinese […]View the full article

U.S. Marines from the 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit conducted an extensive series of combined arms training exercises at Camp Santiago, Puerto Rico, throughout March 2026, integrating light armored vehicles, attack and reconnaissance drones, vehicle-mounted mortar systems, and MV-22B Osprey assault operations into a sustained training package that tested the unit’s full expeditionary combat capability. The […]View the full article

Largest Turkish defense electronics company posted its strongest quarterly export performance in years on April 28, 2026 — and the numbers behind ASELSAN’s first-quarter results suggest a company that has moved well beyond its domestic market roots. ASELSAN, the most valuable company listed on Borsa İstanbul, reported inflation-adjusted revenue of 34.3 billion Turkish lira for […]View the full article

New photographs of China’s experimental sea-skimming aircraft known as the “Bohai Sea Monster” have emerged online, and this time they reveal something that earlier images did not: four external weapons pylons mounted under the wings, strongly suggesting the craft is being developed with a combat role in mind, not just as a transport. The new […]View the full article