Raw Intel

Canada signed two contract amendments with Lockheed Martin on May 15, committing a combined $1.15 billion to keep its CC-130J Hercules tactical transport fleet flying and modernized through the end of the decade. The first amendment, valued at $462 million, extends the current maintenance and support contract through June 2029. The second, estimated at $684 […]View the full article

Canada broke ground on two major military construction projects in Latvia on May 19, laying foundation stones for a rotary-wing helicopter facility at Lielvārde Air Base and accommodation buildings at both Lielvārde and Riga in a combined investment of €64 million, or approximately $70 million. The ceremony marked the latest installment in what has become […]View the full article

Russian Su-35 and Su-27 fighter jets repeatedly and dangerously intercepted an unarmed Royal Air Force RC-135W Rivet Joint reconnaissance aircraft operating in international airspace over the Black Sea in April 2026, the UK Ministry of Defence revealed on May 20, 2026, releasing images and video of the encounters. In the most serious incident, a Russian […]View the full article

The U.S. Air Force published a request for information on May 20, seeking industry proposals to design and build a new external weapons pylon for the B-52 Stratofortress bomber capable of carrying munitions up to four times heavier than anything the current hardware can handle. The notice, issued by the Air Force Life Cycle Management […]View the full article

The U.S. Air Force published a sources sought notice on May 20, 2026, signaling that the Long Range Standoff nuclear cruise missile program is moving toward production and that the government is now looking beyond its current sole developer to understand what industrial capacity exists across the defense industry. The notice, issued by the Air […]View the full article

SummaryIn this episode, Sal discusses recent congressional testimonies by Navy leaders, the MQ-25 Stingray, and the realities of directed energy weapons on ships. He emphasizes learning from past military delays, the importance of technological progress, and the significance of understanding bureaucratic growth through Parkinson’s Law. Show LinksActing S… Read more View the full article

The decades-long slide into near irrelevance of the industry that led to our victory in WWII—our shipbuilding overmatch over the Axis powers—continues to receive more attention over the last couple of years. We have been “appreciating the problem” for as long as I’ve been blogg’n, and it has been a regular topic of The Long Game series we started at the OG Blog in 2004. There is a critical mass of “problem appreciation” that is beginning to resonate across the maritime sphere, but everyone is still waiting for concrete—pun intended—action. It won’t happen overnight, but one does want to see real progress. I am optimistic, but the task is as great as the generational negle…

Smart Shooter, the Israeli defense company that has turned AI-guided fire control into one of the most rapidly adopted infantry technologies of the past five years, signed a new contract with Israel’s Ministry of Defense on May 20 to supply SMASH Hopper lightweight remote-controlled weapon stations valued at approximately NIS 6.7 million ($1.8 million), with […]View the full article

Russia’s United Aircraft Corporation confirmed the new Su-57 prototype’s maiden flight, with test pilot and Hero of Russia Sergei Bogdan at the controls in a sortie described by officials as proceeding normally in accordance with its test plan. Denis Manturov, Russia’s First Deputy Prime Minister, announced the milestone, describing the aircraft as a platform combining […]View the full article

American Rheinmetall recently brought the Marine Corps Warfighting Laboratory’s operators at Marine Corps Base Quantico, Virginia through a week-long training course on the Fieldranger Remotely Controlled Weapon Station, culminating in day and night live-fire exercises against realistic mission scenarios. The training, which drew participants from both Fleet Marine Force combat units and the Supporting Establishment […]View the full article

Latvia has signed a multi-year framework agreement with Origin Robotics to secure a continuous supply of BLAZE autonomous interceptor drones, and structured the deal so other European nations can plug directly into it without running their own procurement from scratch. The Latvian Cabinet of Ministers approved the first contract under the framework on April 21, […]View the full article

Northrop Grumman’s YFQ-48A Talon Blue autonomous combat aircraft completed its first taxi test on May 14 at Mojave, California, moving under its own power for the first time and bringing the Air Force’s third designated drone wingman prototype within striking distance of its first flight. Crane Aerospace and Electronics, part of Connecticut-based Crane Company, supplied […]View the full article

GE Aerospace has secured a U.S. Air Force contract to advance the preliminary design of its GE426 engine, a propulsion system built specifically for the medium-thrust class of autonomous combat aircraft the Air Force is developing to operate alongside crewed fighters. The award marks the next development milestone for a program that passed its concept […]View the full article

A German autonomous systems company has demonstrated what it claims is the world’s first fully automatic drone launch and recovery system capable of operating from a moving vessel without any human intervention, and unveiled the commercial product at the Combined Naval Event in Farnborough, United Kingdom. CiS, a European developer of autonomous aerial systems, announced […]View the full article

AimLock and FN America unveiled a joint counter-drone weapon system at SOF Week 2026 in Tampa on May 19, combining AimLock’s artificial intelligence targeting technology with one of the most widely deployed remote weapon stations in the Western military market to create a system capable of detecting, tracking, and automatically calculating firing solutions against small […]View the full article

Taiwan’s state defense research institute publicly unveiled its next-generation anti-armor rocket, showing off a weapon significantly more capable than what Taiwanese infantry currently carry and explicitly designed to counter the armored vehicles a Chinese amphibious invasion force would land on Taiwan’s beaches. The National Chung-Shan Institute of Science and Technology, known as NCSIST and the […]View the full article

BAE Systems built an armored vehicle with drone-killing capabilities in ten months and put it in front of soldiers at Fort Hood, Texas, for training — without waiting for a government contract to fund it. The AMPV-30, a version of the U.S. Army’s Armored Multi-Purpose Vehicle fitted with a 30mm cannon and a radar system […]View the full article

We need to talk about an unpleasant subject. I briefly mentioned it last week, and talked about it a little on the latest Midrats Podcast, but that is enough fiddling around the topic. Time to man up and address the topic head-on. I think the DDG(X) program is a dead program walking. There could be an error, as there was with BBG-1 vs. BBGN-1 in the chart, but let’s look again at the latest Shipbuilding Plan. There is no DDG(X) in the plan…just Arleigh Burke DDGs being built, as the Salamander says, until the crack of doom. In the Shipbuilding Plan, it is mentioned only once in this paragraph. The Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer (DDG 51) is the most capable s…

A Romanian Air Force F-16 patrolling Baltic skies under NATO’s air policing mission shot down a suspected Ukrainian drone over southern Estonia on May 19, marking the first time NATO fighters have actively intercepted and destroyed a drone over the Baltic states rather than simply scrambling to track one. The incident unfolded around midday, with […]View the full article

The U.S. State Department approved a potential $236 million sale of AGM-184 Joint Strike Missiles to the Belgian government on May 18, clearing the path for Brussels to arm its growing fleet of F-35A fighter jets with a weapon specifically designed to strike ships and hardened targets from well outside the range of enemy air […]View the full article