Raw Intel

ESOX Group has completed development of its X2 unmanned ground vehicle and opened the platform to client pilot programs, the company announced this week. The X2 uses four in-wheel electric motors, called Theron motors, delivering a combined 1,000 newton-meters of torque directly to the wheels. ESOX said the design eliminates the gearbox and driveshaft found […]View the full article

A fire broke out overnight Sunday at a WB Electronics facility in Skarżysko-Kamienna, Poland, adding another name to a growing list of European defense manufacturers hit by fires, explosions and suspected sabotage in 2026. The blaze started shortly after midnight in the plant’s assembly department, according to Radio Kielce, which cited a spokeswoman for local […]View the full article

Soldiers of the U.S. Army’s 25th Infantry Division spent two weeks in the field in Hawaii this month testing new command-and-control software under realistic combat conditions, wrapping up the fifth round of the division’s Lightning Surge experiments with a brigade certification exercise called Nakoa Fleek. The exercise ran from Sept. 14 to 25 at Schofield […]View the full article

Satellite imagery has confirmed damage to two radar systems, a maintenance facility and an ammunition depot at Russia’s Millerovo airbase in Rostov Oblast, following a Ukrainian drone strike on the night of August 30, according to images published by the Dnipro OSINT. Ukrainian outlet Militarnyi reported that Ukraine’s 1st Separate Center of the Unmanned Systems […]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

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky visited a group of Ukrainian military pilots training in Canada on September 12, 2026, ahead of their eventual transition to Western fighter jets including the F-16 and Sweden’s Gripen. Four L-39 training jets flown by Ukrainian cadets performed a flyover to greet him at the airfield. The visit took place at […]View the full article

The U.S. State Department has approved a possible sale of 48 F-35 fighter jets to Saudi Arabia, a $24.3 billion deal that would make the kingdom just the second country in the Middle East, after Israel, cleared to fly the stealth aircraft. The Defense Security Cooperation Agency notified Congress of the potential sale on Sept. […]View the full article

The U.S. Navy is asking defense companies to pitch designs for a carrier-launched combat drone that could fly, fight and land on aircraft carriers alongside manned fighters, according to a request for information released August 31 by Naval Air Systems Command. The RFI covers the first increment of the Navy’s Collaborative Combat Aircraft program, run […]View the full article

China has developed a new light, highly mobile rocket launcher built on an upgraded version of the Dongfeng Mengshi MV3 tactical truck, carrying a 20-round launch pod that can fire guided or unguided 122 mm rockets out to 40 km (25 miles), according to images and details shared by Chinese military commentator DS北风 on X. […]View the full article

…and there you go. President Donald J. Trump signs the Greenland security deal with Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen and Greenland Prime Minister Jens-Frederik Nielsen. We’ve kept up reasonably steady reporting the last couple of years on Greenland. I was never quite sure where it would come out, but I was confident that it would be—non-inclusive—in between the two extremes we heard coming out of the overly excitable and narrowly sourced commentariat of the U.S. invading or the U.S. being kicked out…and it did. I have to give a nod to our Australian friend Liz Buchanan who gave some great observations on the issue on the Midrats Podcast back in September of 2025 an…

U.S. Army soldiers from the 11th Airborne Division took a mobile counter-drone system to India’s Rajasthan desert during exercise Yudh Abhyas 2026, showing Indian Army troops how it finds and defeats small drones. The system, the Mobile Low, Slow, Small Unmanned Aircraft Integrated Defeat System, or M-LIDS, was set up at the Mahajan Field Firing […]View the full article

The U.S. Navy has picked Boeing to build F/A-XX, its first sixth-generation carrier-based strike fighter, choosing the company over Northrop Grumman and awarding a development contract valued at more than $20 billion. The U.S. Department of War announced the award on Sept. 29. The contract covers the full-scale development phase and buys multiple test aircraft […]View the full article

For a very long time on the anniversary of 9/11/2001, I have simply posted the Fox News recording of that morning that I had on in the background as I went through my daily routine in Bahrain, and generally left it at that. Last weekend, my 25-year-old daughter and a few of her friends decided to stay with me over the weekend as I did some preseason prep work on our hunting property. Just me and a hunt camp full of young, happy, professional, and accomplished women having dinner, drinks, even making S’mores over the fire-pit—it was a joy. It had me thinking of her, just a few months old when 9/11 took place. This reality is all that she has known: it just is. She is a gr…

The U.S. Navy has awarded Ursa Major two contracts worth a combined $137 million to develop and qualify solid rocket motors for two new missiles: a small air-to-air missile for fighter jets and a ship-launched interceptor meant to eventually replace the Standard Missile family. The Colorado company announced the awards on Oct. 5. The larger […]View the full article

Alarms have been going off for well over a decade about the neglect of the island nations and territories in the Southwest Pacific where tens of thousands of Americans and hundreds of thousands of Japanese died fighting during the last great Pacific war, WWII. Regulars here are familiar with previous articles from 2022 through 2025, in addition to her 2024 visit to the Midrats Podcast, by our friend Cleo Paskal, all demonstrating her consistent advocacy in the area. If you’re new to the topic and want to catch up on the recent history, read the links above and come back. You can set up the podcast for a listen on your next commute. We have a nice bit of supporting fires o…

Social media users shared widespread footage Thursday evening of a glowing, tentacled shape in the night sky, with some posts claiming it showed a missile launched toward Ukraine. Within hours, astrophysicist and satellite tracker Jonathan McDowell offered a more mundane explanation, and Russia’s Ministry of Defense confirmed it the next day. “Russia appears to have […]View the full article

Russia has begun building underground production space for its Shahed and Geran attack drones at the Alabuga industrial zone in Tatarstan, according to Ukrainian open-source intelligence analyst Dnipro Osint, who estimated roughly 42,000 square meters of underground area has already been constructed there. Dnipro Osint said the shift underground appears to have followed earlier Ukrainian […]View the full article

The U.S. Marine Corps has released a photo of Marines with the 11th Marine Expeditionary Unit driving a Light Marine Air Defense Integrated System, known as LMADIS, a mobile counter-drone system, in the Middle East on Sept. 2-6. The caption says only that the photo was taken in the U.S. Central Command area of responsibility, […]View the full article

Canada’s first F-35A fighter jet completed its maiden flight Sept. 23, taking off from Lockheed Martin’s production facility in Fort Worth, Texas. The aircraft, which carries the construction number AR-1 and will be designated CF-35A once in Royal Canadian Air Force service, flew with an F-35C acting as a safety chase plane. The jet already […]View the full article

There are certain people who, due to the quality of their work, the content of their character, and their downright excellence and dedication to their chosen field, influence generations of people. In a way, they become a benchmark, a reference point, an ideal. In naval history, for the last few generations of naval officers, one name has risen to the top of everyone’s list, Dr. Craig L. Symonds. Dr. Symonds passed away earlier this week. Craig L. Symonds, beloved scholar, writer, professor, husband, father, and grandfather, passed away at home on Tuesday, October 13th from complications due to cancer. He was 79. Craig was born and raised in Anaheim CA on December 31st, 1…