Raw Intel

The U.S. Navy is paying Raytheon up to $30.2 million to line up additional suppliers for key parts of the AIM-9X Sidewinder air-to-air missile, including the cooling engine for its heat-seeking sensor and its warhead components. The undefinitized contract modification, announced by the U.S. Department of War, covers engineering work to qualify new manufacturing sources […]View the full article

The United States will supply the Philippine Coast Guard with three secondhand King Air 350 turboprop aircraft, two of them fitted with surveillance sensors, under a $39.6 million contract that finalizes a deal the two countries signed in February. The U.S. Department of War announced the firm-fixed-price award to Technology Service Corp., a small business […]View the full article

The Pentagon has ordered another $52.3 million worth of L3Harris proximity fuzes that turn laser-guided APKWS rockets into drone killers, more than doubling the value of a fuze contract signed just four months ago. The firm-fixed-price modification, announced by the U.S. Department of War, adds to a contract the Naval Surface Warfare Center Indian Head […]View the full article

The U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory has awarded Honeywell Aerospace $25.6 million to keep developing a small, radiation-hardened gyroscope accurate enough for “strategic” use, the class of navigation sensor that has to work in space and survive the effects of a nuclear environment. The cost-plus-fixed-fee contract covers what the Pentagon calls the compact strategic gyroscope […]View the full article

The U.S. Air Force has awarded balloon maker Aerostar a $64.4 million contract to quickly build a prototype for an urgent high-altitude balloon requirement under a project called Swamp Gas. The contract covers development of a “minimum viable product” prototype, meaning an early working version with just enough capability to be tested and used, to […]View the full article

Russia plans to spend a record 17.1 trillion rubles ($201 billion) on its military in 2027, while its budget deficit this year is now expected to reach double the government’s earlier forecast, according to government documents seen by Reuters. The defense figure is about 27% higher than the 13.5 trillion rubles Moscow had previously penciled […]View the full article

The U.S. Air Force has awarded Raytheon a multi-year contract worth up to $20.7 billion to build AMRAAM air-to-air missiles, a deal the company says will push production of the weapon to record levels. The award, announced Sept. 25 by the U.S. Department of War, covers complete missiles, spare guidance sections and related work, and […]View the full article

President Donald Trump on Monday denied discussing U.S. weapons sales to China with Chinese President Xi Jinping, a day after his ambassador to Beijing said Trump had floated the idea, though Trump added that China would “probably like to buy” American arms. Trump was asked by reporters about comments by David Perdue, the U.S. ambassador […]View the full article

Denmark’s armed forces have taken delivery of nine unmanned ground vehicles built by Dropla, a Danish company founded by Ukrainians, to train drone operators, including conscripts, at the country’s military drone center. Denmark’s defense procurement agency, known by its Danish initials FMI, bought the Dropla 4×4 vehicles for the Danish Defence Drone Center, the agency […]View the full article

The CIA has restored the helicopter that carried the first American team into Afghanistan after the Sept. 11 attacks, repainting it in the camouflage it wore in 2001 to mark the 25th anniversary of the mission. The Russian-designed helicopter sits on the grounds of CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia. It flew a seven-man CIA team, […]View the full article

Ukrainian missile maker Fire Point has changed the published specifications of its FP-7.x anti-ballistic interceptor, now listing a combined infrared and radar seeker for the weapon instead of the infrared-only seeker it described earlier. The company posted an updated specification card for the missile on X, which it calls the FP-7.x Freyja interceptor. In August, […]View the full article

Redwire has now delivered more than 300 of its Penguin reconnaissance drones to Ukraine, the company said, and the version flying there today climbs much higher than the aircraft first sent in 2022 so that Russian FPV attack drones have a harder time reaching it. The U.S. space and defense company disclosed the figure in […]View the full article

Liminal Industries, a U.S. startup building unmanned ground vehicles meant to be produced and fielded in large numbers, has advanced to the second phase of the GroundBreaker 1 competition and will demonstrate its DUEL-V vehicle to U.S. military evaluators in North Dakota next month. The company announced Sept. 28 that its Phase I submission passed […]View the full article

It is no secret that I am a huge fan of Japan’s yet-unnamed cruiser, the ASEV. I put my thoughts down about it 18 months ago. You can click here to review if you wish. Like I said to more than one person, “So, the Japanese are going to get the CG(X) we should have already in the fleet?” Well, now the Italians are making me green with envy too. Europe’s Organisation for Joint Armament Cooperation (OCCAR) has issued a €3.7 billion ($4.2 billion) contract for the production of two Italian Navy DDX destroyers to the Orizzonte Sistemi Navali (OSN) joint venture, made up of local firms Fincantieri and Leonardo. “The DDX programme is set to redefine the Italian Navy’s capability…

Russian air defense troops appear to be using Chinese-designed shoulder-fired anti-aircraft missiles, according to an analysis by Ukrainian defense outlet Militarnyi of footage aired on Russian state television. The launchers were shown during an exercise by a mobile fire group of Russia’s 51st Air Defense Division in the Rostov region, in a segment broadcast by […]View the full article

South Korea’s arms procurement agency has asked Türkiye whether it can buy the Turkish PD170 drone engine, a powerplant already flying on some of the world’s most combat-tested drones, as Korean military drone programs suffer a string of public crashes. Turkish Aerospace Industries, or TAI, recently received an inquiry from South Korea’s Defense Acquisition Program […]View the full article

Taiwan broke ground Monday on an aerospace and drone industrial park in the southern county of Chiayi, where the island’s main military research institute wants to build a drone supply chain free of Chinese parts. President Lai Ching-te led the Sept. 28 ceremony, which also opened a new Minxiong campus for the National Chung-Shan Institute […]View the full article

The U.S. Navy’s newest destroyer, the future USS Ted Stevens (DDG 128), arrived in Whittier, Alaska, on Sept. 27, less than a week before it is due to be formally commissioned there in a ceremony the state has not hosted in more than a decade. The Flight III Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer will be commissioned […]View the full article

The U.S. Department of War is setting up a permanent team inside the Pentagon comptroller’s office to find programs and processes it considers wasteful, inefficient or duplicative and recommend cutting, merging or reshaping them, under a memo signed by Deputy Secretary of War Steve Feinberg. The new Force Agility and Streamlining Team, or FAST, will […]View the full article

Japanese radar satellite company Synspective has signed a contract with Mitsubishi Heavy Industries to launch two of its StriX satellites on Japan’s H3 rocket in 2027, moving part of a constellation that feeds imagery to Japan’s Ministry of Defense onto a domestic launcher for the first time. The company announced the agreement Sept. 18. The […]View the full article