Raw Intel

Two Royal Australian Air Force F-35A Lightning II stealth fighters landed at Ohakea in New Zealand on September 8, the first time the jets have visited the country, the New Zealand Defence Force said. The aircraft, from the RAAF’s No. 3 Squadron, flew training missions through September 10 alongside New Zealand forces, including mock bombing […]View the full article

American Rheinmetall has won a $7.28 million contract to deliver 12 Mission Master SP autonomous ground vehicles and five amphibious kits to the U.S. Marine Corps, the company announced. The Defense Logistics Agency is managing the procurement, with ADS Inc. serving as prime contractor supporting the Marine Corps Warfighting Laboratory. The vehicles will be used […]View the full article

The Netherlands and Sweden signed a letter of intent for the Dutch government to buy a Saab GlobalEye surveillance aircraft, the Dutch Ministry of Defence announced September 10. The Netherlands does not currently operate an aircraft capable of this kind of long-range surveillance and instead relies partly on NATO’s aging AWACS fleet. The Dutch aircraft […]View the full article

The U.S. Navy has added $38.2 million to a BAE Systems contract to overhaul two Mk 45 Mod 4 naval guns, the main deck gun mounted on the Navy’s destroyers and cruisers. Naval Sea Systems Command issued the cost-plus-incentive-fee modification to an existing contract, funded through fiscal 2024 shipbuilding money that will remain available beyond […]View the full article

The U.S. Army has awarded a $581 million contract to build a new plant to manufacture IMX-104, the explosive used to fill 155 mm artillery shells and mortar rounds, as the service works to close a production gap that has slowed its ammunition buildup. Nitradyn LLC of Tampa, Florida, will design, construct and commission the […]View the full article

The U.S. Air Force has added $826 million to its bulk missile contract with Lockheed Martin, pushing the total value of the deal past $10 billion for the first time. The Air Force Life Cycle Management Center at Eglin Air Force Base, Florida, issued the contract modification for continued production of the Joint Air-to-Surface Standoff […]View the full article

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has awarded Conti Federal Services a $74.8 million contract to build a new radio frequency and measurements hangar for the B-21 Raider stealth bomber at Whiteman Air Force Base, Missouri. The facility will include space for one B-21 aircraft, along with supporting workshops, material storage, and administrative offices. Three […]View the full article

The U.S. Air Force has awarded four manufacturers a combined $149 million to build metal cases for large bunker-busting bombs, splitting the work across small forging and machining shops rather than a single prime contractor. Superior Forge and Steel of Lima, Ohio; Ellwood National Forge of Irvine, Pennsylvania; Faxon Machining LLC of Cincinnati, Ohio; and […]View the full article

Helicopters have carried flares to dodge heat-seeking missiles since the late 1960s. The U.S. Army just committed nearly $4.84 billion to replace that decades-old defense with a laser that jams the missile itself. The Army Contracting Command at Redstone Arsenal, Alabama, awarded Northrop Grumman the firm-fixed-price, indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity contract on September 8 for full-rate production of […]View the full article

General Dynamics Land Systems will complete deliveries of Poland’s 250 M1A2 SEPv3 Abrams tanks by the end of 2026, the company said, finishing the order in under 24 months. Poland signed the contract for the tanks in April 2022, alongside Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, with the deal valued at $4.75 billion. Beyond the 250 […]View the full article

As a long-standing member of Team Philippines, I spent most of the day yesterday with a smile as I watched Philippine Defense Secretary Gilberto C. Teodoro at Seoul Defense Dialogue 2026. One of the things that I have been so heartened by what I’ve seen over the last half decade or so is the growing closeness and maturity of our relationship with the Philippines. I have my biases as a retired naval officer who worked with Filipinos for decades, and my hometown has a well-established population of Filipinos in the tens of thousands. They are great people with so much talent and so much potential. We had a spotty decade or so post-Cold War, but with a more balanced view of …

British radar maker Blighter is pushing for more sales in Central and Eastern Europe, showcasing its border and low-altitude air surveillance radars this week at the MSPO defense exhibition in Kielce, Poland. The company builds ground-based radars that use electronic scanning array antennas rather than the mechanically rotating dishes found on older radar systems, letting […]View the full article

AEVEX Corp. has won $20.5 million in new U.S. government contracts to build and develop one-way attack drones, the company announced September 9. AEVEX did not name the government agency behind the awards or specify which of its drone models are covered. The work includes delivering the aircraft themselves along with engineering, development and integration […]View the full article

Elbit Systems has introduced FUSE, a new business line bringing together the Israeli defense contractor’s autonomous drone and ground vehicle systems under one portfolio, the company announced September 9 in Rosh HaAyin, Israel. FUSE centers on software called Dominion-X, which lets a single operator control multiple autonomous aircraft and ground vehicles at once, a setup […]View the full article

Israeli drone maker Aero Sentinel says its G2 unmanned aircraft completed a week of demonstrations with a Romanian defense company during a Romanian Land Forces exercise, flying reconnaissance missions of up to 75 minutes despite heavy electronic jamming. Aero Sentinel did not name the Romanian partner company, the exact exercise, or its location and dates. […]View the full article

Russia spent a record 44% of its federal budget on the military in the first half of 2026, according to calculations published by Janis Kluge, a research fellow at the German Institute for International and Security Affairs, based on data from Russia’s Finance Ministry. Direct military spending totaled 10.7 trillion rubles, about $125 billion at […]View the full article

Norwegian defense company KONGSBERG has selected a radar built by U.S. firm Echodyne to help its remote weapon systems detect and shoot down drones, the companies announced September 9. KONGSBERG has integrated Echodyne’s MESA radar into its PROTECTOR RS4 and RS6 remote weapon stations, turning the widely used gun mounts into counter-drone systems capable of […]View the full article

A Russian military-affiliated Telegram channel has raised alarm that Ukraine’s reach at sea now extends beyond the Black Sea into the Mediterranean, framing a string of drone strikes on Russian-linked vessels there as part of a wider pattern that has already put Russian military and commercial assets at risk across three separate seas. Ukraine’s drone […]View the full article

U.S. soldiers trained on a counter-drone defense system during a course at the Combined Arms Training Center in Grafenwoehr, Germany, the U.S. Mission to NATO said in a social media post. The training center, known as CATC, is run by the 7th Army Training Command and offers close to 60 courses for U.S. troops, ranging […]View the full article

Finland has agreed to buy more than 100 Patria TREMOS mortar systems, with an option for hundreds more, defense manufacturer Patria announced. Deliveries under the serial production contract begin this year and will continue through 2028, Patria said. The Finnish Army designates the system the 120 KRH M3. Finland already received a smaller pre-series batch […]View the full article