Raw Intel

U.S. Marines are testing the next generation of battlefield logistics with the Tactical Resupply Unmanned Air System (TRUAS), a heavy-lift cargo drone designed to deliver critical supplies directly to small units in remote and contested environments. Marines with Combat Logistics Battalion 7, Combat Logistics Regiment 1, 1st Marine Logistics Group conducted field trials of the […] The post U.S. Marines push TRUAS drone to its limits in resupply tests first appeared on Defence Blog.View the full article

U.S. Army soldiers from Alpha Company, 2nd Battalion, 3rd Infantry Regiment, 1st Stryker Brigade Combat Team, 7th Infantry Division, demonstrated counter-drone tactics for Japan Ground Self-Defense Force soldiers from the 22nd Rapid Deployment Regiment at Yakima Training Center, Washington, on Oct. 28, 2025. The exchange, which paired Stryker infantry units with partner forces, was presented […]View the full article

Hanwha Aerospace opened its exhibition at the Egypt Defence Expo (EDEX) 2025 today with a broad showcase of ground and air defense systems aimed at deepening cooperation with the Egyptian Armed Forces. The South Korean company is positioning its offerings as comprehensive modernization solutions tailored for Egypt’s operational requirements. At the center of Hanwha’s presentation […]View the full article

The United States Missile Defense Agency has awarded Lockheed Martin Space a $142.6 million contract modification to provide continued maintenance and sustainment support for two Terminal High Altitude Area Defense batteries operated by the United Arab Emirates, according to an official contract announcement. Lockheed Martin Space, based in Sunnyvale, California, received the noncompetitive contract modification, […]View the full article

India has selected Shield AI to supply V-BAT unmanned aircraft and autonomy software to the Indian Army, confirming a new defense procurement focused on autonomous intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance operations. According to Shield AI, the agreement includes delivery of V-BAT vertical takeoff and landing drones along with licenses for the company’s Hivemind autonomy software, which […]View the full article

South Korea’s Hanwha Aerospace on February 26 shipped the first AS9 self-propelled howitzers produced at its Australian manufacturing facility, marking the initial delivery of a locally adapted K9 artillery variant from the company’s overseas production base, the firm announced. According to the company, a ceremony was held at the Hanwha Armoured vehicle Centre of Excellence […]View the full article

Turkish state-owned defense contractor ROKETSAN confirmed that serial production and deliveries of its TAYFUN ballistic missile and SOM cruise missile are continuing as planned, according to a recent company statement and remarks by CEO Murat İkinci. As noted by ROKETSAN, “serial production and deliveries” of the TAYFUN ballistic missile and SOM cruise missile are proceeding […]View the full article

California-based Saildrone has announced a new class of unmanned surface vessel called Spectre, a 52-meter (170-foot) platform capable of reaching speeds up to 30 knots and designed to deliver persistent anti-submarine warfare, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, and strike capability to naval operations. The announcement, made at the Sea Air Space conference, marks the most ambitious […]View the full article

Romanian manufacturer IRUM has unveiled the IRON-690, a modular autonomous ground drone designed for defensive support operations, at the Black Sea Defense and Aerospace exhibition in Bucharest. The prototype was presented at BSDA on May 13, 2026, according to IRUM’s press release. The IRON-690 is not a conventional vehicle but an adaptable autonomous platform configurable […]View the full article

It is far past time to pick up the conversation point we last visited back in September: AUKUS. Just to refresh everyone on my position that I’ve held since this program was announced a half-decade ago: this is one of the most important military and diplomatic initiatives of this century. There are a host of reasons we discuss this on a regular basis. They are also why I have been emphatic that it not only must work, but must come online as early as possible. Australia is one of our most critical allies. She is one of our most reliable allies. She occupies one of the most strategic positions in the world. Our greatest adversary—and hers—are aggressively attempting to subd…

Echodyne’s counter-drone radar has become one of the most widely deployed sensors on modern battlefields, showing up on test ranges in the United States, at military training grounds in Lithuania, and in active combat use in Ukraine, and the Kirkland, Washington company told The Defence Blog in a written interview that it is now racing […]View the full article

The 13th Marine Expeditionary Unit recently fielded the Light Marine Air-Defense Integrated System, known as LMADIS, and immediately began working it into underway training aboard the Wasp-class amphibious assault ship USS Makin Island off the California coast, Staff Sgt. Michael Virtue reported for the 13th MEU. Marines assigned to the 3rd Low Altitude Air Defense […]View the full article

Ukrainian drone maker Buntar Aerospace raised $10.4 million in funding from Axon Enterprise and Munkene AS, placing the round among the six largest disclosed funding rounds in Ukraine this year, according to venture capital firm Defence Builder, citing data from Vestbee. The full list, in order of size: language-learning platform Preply at $150 million, UFORCE […]View the full article

A Safran Patroller surveillance drone flew along Poland’s eastern border with Belarus on Thursday, passing near the Białowieża Forest and the town of Hajnówka, flight-tracking data showed. The flight was flagged on X by the open-source account Coffe Report. A Flightradar24 capture from 14:50 UTC listed the aircraft as a Safran S-15 Patroller, categorized as […]View the full article

There she is…just look at her—a B-52G in all her Cold War 1980s livery that says, “Yes, my belly is bright white, because I’m going to nuke you and don’t want to get all hot afterwards” glory. For generations before us, and for generations to come, whenever a military competitor posed a challenge to our nation, you were usually one or two bullet points away from someone asking, “Hey, can we configure a B-52 to do that?” As one finds with platforms with built-in flexibility and square footage, the answer is usually “yes.” By the time the 1970s were over, the U.S. Navy realized that it didn’t just have a Soviet submarine problem, it had a significant Soviet surface fleet to…

It has been a bit more than four years ago that navalists were in their second month of excitement about the prospects for a larger Navy with the incoming Trump Administration. As most did not expect him to win in 2016, few of us paid any more than passing attention that he picked up on work already done under Obama’s SECNAV Mabus to mark “350-355” as the number needed given the realities of the evolving global security situation – specifically China’s not so peaceful rise. Not fully appreciated at the time, partisanship and incomplete information led many to not give credit to the Obama team for their work prior to the election. Likewise, in a few years the larger f…

Americas Northrop Grumman Systems won a $195 million contract modification to a previously awarded fixed-price incentive (firm-target) contract (N0001918C1037). This modification exercises options to provide support services to include non-recurring engineering, software support activity and product support in support of E-2D Advanced Hawkeye (AHE) Lot 9 full rate production (FRP) aircraft. In addition, this modification adds scope to procure one E-2D AHE CV-22B variation in quantity aircraft Lot 10 FRP aircraft. The E-2D Advanced Hawkeye (AHE) is the newest variant of the E-2 aircraft platform. It features a state-of-the-art radar with a two-generation leap in capability…

Tired of hearing "DELTA" related to COVID, when in a good and just world when you heard that word it would be used to talk about old Russian Soviet Era SSBN or 2-seater all weather F-18s? Well, we're not sure we'll cover either of those topics on today's episode or that we'll totally ignore COVID's impact in the natsec arena, but it's a melee - so you never know what will come up in the maritime national security conversation. We do have a few topics to get the conversation started; giving Deming a second look, the CNO admits what everyone knew about FORD for over a decade, China rattles the nuclear saber at Japan, and our friends return to the Pacific. Remember, with …

...and there she goes. Laid down when Eisenhower was CINC. Commissioned when Kennedy was CINC. Decommissioned 49 years later when Obama was CINC. The Vietnam War, most of the Cold War and almost two decades after it ended, was in movies such a Seven Days in May and The Final Countdown, from A-1s to F/A-18s, all the way through to the conflicts in Africa, Southwest and Central Asia of this century. Our last conventional carrier to be decommissioned, and now she's off to the breakers; The USS Kitty Hawk, the nation's last oil-fired aircraft carrier, departed Bremerton on Saturday for a 16,000-mile journey around South America for its ultimate fate: scrapping at a Texas…

Time to raise a topic we first brought up the first year of this blog over 17-years ago; riverine. As we discussed at the time, we invaded a nation, Iraq, dominated by major river systems, yet because of the stupidity of the 1990s defense policies, we divested of our riverine forces. The last units left the reserves just a few years before we would need them again. As a result, we not only did not have the ability to take advantage of the unique mobility riverine environments can provide for our own military operations, we surrendered the waters to the enemy's use unopposed. The requirement was still there, we just ignored it in DC while the US Army did what it could wit…