HG S2 (Intel Bot)

Avidrone Aerospace said this week it will develop a new version of Katana, the single-rotor helicopter drone that won the top prize at DARPA’s Lift Challenge earlier this month in Dayton, Ohio. Katana carried a 51-kilogram (112.4-pound) payload aboard a 13.3-kilogram (29.3-pound) airframe, producing an official payload-to-aircraft-weight ratio of 3.84 to 1, Avidrone said. The […]View the full article

Oshkosh Defense and the Marine Corps’ Marine Depot Maintenance Command manufactured an identical, approved replacement part for a Marine Corps heavy truck at two separate production sites, one in Japan and one in Georgia, using the same secure digital blueprint during Exercise Valiant Shield 2026, the company said in a release. Oshkosh Defense, an Oshkosh […]View the full article

Most are familiar with the rolling train wreck of missed opportunities, bad theory, wasted hundreds of billions of dollars, and destroyed careers that the Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) left in its wake…and still does. Many of us remember the mission set it was supposed to meet compared to the shambolic grabassery it transmogrified into. Looking back at the sales pitch by the ascendant transformationalists just makes you sick to your stomach what they did to Vice Admiral Arthur K. Cebrowski and Captain Wayne Hughes’ concept. We also remember the mission set of the recently decommissioned-without-relief Cyclone Class Patrol ships and why we had them—with the added side-benefit of the LT/LCDR command opportunity that, with the departure of our MIW ships as well, is now gone. The requirements are still here. We can see them in the Persian Gulf today, but sadly we still have an unbalanced fleet with nothing on the low-end. I remain convinced it was a great error not to have replaced the 330-ton PC with…something. Even at the last minute, we could have extended the 4-ship production of the 600-ton Ambassador MK III missile boats that we built for Egypt. These ships were built in Pascagoula by VT Halter Marine, managed by NAVSEA…all American, and she came ready to party with: 8 × RGM-84 Boeing Harpoon SSM Block 1G in 2 quad canister launchers 1 × OTO Melara Mk 75 76 mm/62 Super Rapid DP gun 1 × Mk 31 Mod 3 RIM-116 RAM (21 missiles) 1 × Raytheon Mk 15 Mod 21 Phalanx (Block 1B) 20 mm Phalanx CIWS 2 × deck-mounted 7.62 mm M60 machine guns[1] She’s easy on the eyes too. I’ll put something else on the table for you, roughly the same size as the Ambassador MK III, the 680-ton Falaj 3-class patrol boat whose Hull 1 hit the water 18 months ago. She’s ready too. Leonardo 76mm OTO Super Rapid gun equipped with the STRALES guided ammunition system eight-cell vertical launch system loaded with MBDA VL MICA surface-to-air missiles 21-cell Raytheon Mk 49 launcher for the RIM-116 Rolling Airframe Missile (RAM) four MM40 Exocet Block 3C anti-ship missiles two 12-cell Low-cost Guided Imaging Rocket (LOGIR) guided rocket launchers two Electro Optic Systems (EOS) R400-M 30mm remote weapon stations She’s easy on the eyes as well. Yes, there are those who argue that the U.S. Navy has no use for such small ships. Frankly, I’m tired of arguing with them. They are wrong. Call them small corvettes or “heavily armed OPV”…or better yet the Salamander-approved “Sloop of War”…does not matter. It is a gapping hole in our fleet design. Imagine the surface warfare leaders we would build if they were able to earn a Lieutenant command in one of these. Since we first started talking with Jerry Hendrix about this 17 years ago, it has made complete sense…but alas, we’re on the losing end of the argument. Imagine having a couple of these working with our Arleigh Burke DDG in the latest operations against Iran? It sells itself. Leave a comment Share This Substack is reader-supported. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. View the full article

Leonardo DRS said its SGT STOUT M-SHORAD air defense system successfully defeated small drone threats during a government test, adding a capability the system was not originally built to handle. The company said the system defeated Group 1-2 unmanned aircraft, the military’s classification for small, low-altitude drones, during a U.S. government test event. SGT STOUT […]View the full article

Ukraine’s General Staff said Ukrainian forces struck the Russian naval base at Novorossiysk overnight on August 12, 2026, damaging four Russian warships in what it described as a joint operation by Ukraine’s Defense Forces. The General Staff identified the damaged vessels as the frigates Admiral Makarov and Admiral Essen, both Project 11356 ships, the Project […]View the full article

The U.S. Navy awarded BAE Systems a $149.8 million contract to overhaul USS Boxer, an amphibious assault ship that turned back from deployment in 2024 after a rudder failure just 10 days out of port. BAE Systems Maritime Solutions in San Diego will perform the maintenance, modernization and repair work during a fiscal 2027 selected […]View the full article

I am of the last cohort of military officers who grew up training for nuclear war expected at any moment. By the time I had been on this planet less than 25 years, I was cleared, if ordered, to deliver nuclear weapons—so were thousands of us. From frigates to submarines to helicopters, pointy nosed jets and prop engined patrol aircraft—our Navy was thick with nuclear weapons. As a junior officer, it was just another PQS book, another exercise, another inspection, another qualification. No big deal. Well, it was a big deal. I saw a grown man cry over an inspection as a JO. In hindsight, it was actually kind of amazing how we just lived with those things on a hair-trigger alert—us and the Soviets. Though we got close to a few times, no one started a war no one would win because they misread something benign or vague. We both fought not insignificant wars with conventional weapons against each other’s proxies, but managed to keep a cool head in charge of the Big Board. We were both good and lucky…but we are also human. With that humanity comes a gloriously complicated set of error prone systems, thought processes, and just plain incompetence that cannot be engineered out of anything we have our hands in. There will always be wars—but wars don’t have to be existential to our species nor the nations that wage them. In WWII, all sides were equipped with chemical weapons to the gills, but no one used them…though some lobbied for their use. As a closet optimist, I am also confident that even at the extremes—in the right conditions and in the right context—every nation wants to ensure that if the ultimate kind of war gets started, it will get started on purpose. With the technology to deliver nuclear weapons anywhere on the globe in under an hour expanding and the number of space-faring nations expanding at the same pace—it only makes sense that good-faith nations should do all they reasonably can, while maintaining national sovereignty, to ensure, as best they can, that no one mistakes the harmless for the nightmare. In that light, the below note will, if we are lucky, be the first step to bringing in more nations and—perhaps—making a more substantial agreement. Perhaps a treaty? Of course, the usual transnational blobish suspects will try to expand the mandate and expand the verbiage for no other reason than that is their nature, but that would be a mistake. If anyone offers to make or call it “comprehensive”, invite them to invest their finite time in other projects. I hope smart people in hard jobs will see if we can get something simple, direct, and clear along these lines—and get it done before the end of the decade. t would be a good exercise in international cooperation, if nothing else. That isn’t a bad thing, and this is low-hanging fruit. Look at the 40 nations listed in the note below. Give or take, these are your S-tier nations. Remember them. Of course, some important names are missing: India, Israel, North Korea, Pakistan, People’s Republic of China, and Russia. Heck, throw in Brazil so once again we can see the B.R.I.C. construct is for malign actors on the world stage. It is a shame we don’t see Argentina here. Their leadership in South America would have been significantly boosted had they signed on. Ditto Chile. I would hope they were asked. This is a good step. Do not underestimate its importance…even in the busy world we have. And yes, I fully accept that this is slightly off frequency from a regular message here: the last six years have normalized the use of conventionally armed ballistic missiles at war. Especially as subsonic cruise missiles such as the Tomahawk Land Attack Cruise Missile (TLAM) and SS-N-27 Sizzler lose their efficacy in well-defended airspace, ballistic and trans/hypersonic missiles will become the new standard. However, the direction is correct. Conventionally armed ICBM have not joined the chat…yet…and the U.S. plans to fire the Conventional Prompt Strike (CPS) missile from Block V Virginia Class SSGN that could technically be called an SLBM…but these are things that talented diplomats can work out at the table. The goal is to get everyone to the table before someone does or thinks something stupid, and there won’t be a Lieutenant Colonel Stanislav Petrov to save us all. Side note: This is the first time that I have seen the construct, “Philippines (the)”. Is this new? In know that construct is a database/listing convention, but please tell me this is not a new standard of referring to the country in ordinary prose. Awkward and unprofessional looking as it appears that no one senior properly edited the note. Leave a comment Share This Substack is reader-supported. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. View the full article

A boat built to carry a 70-ton battle tank through the surf rolled off an assembly line in Vancouver, Washington, and the U.S. Army is counting down to delivery this fall. Vigor Marine Group unveiled the USAV Craney Island, the second Maneuver Support Vessel (Light) built under a program designed to replace the Army’s aging […]View the full article

Two of America’s biggest defense manufacturers teamed up to solve a problem that has quietly threatened to undercut the Pentagon’s entire hypersonic weapons push, the country’s struggle to actually build these weapons fast enough once the engineering work is done. Lockheed Martin and Albany Engineered Composites, a segment of Albany International Corp., announced a teaming […]View the full article

The U.S. Army’s search for a replacement to one of its most iconic armored vehicles is entering a make-or-break phase, and a nationwide network of American factories is racing to prove its design deserves the job. American Rheinmetall announced that its Lynx XM30 infantry fighting vehicle prototype is approaching delivery to the Army, a milestone […]View the full article

A robotic combat vehicle that can drive itself 280 miles while charging drones, powering radar and running a portable command post has rolled through a demonstration in the Utah desert for a room full of government, defense and technology leaders. Hypercraft, a Provo, Utah-based autonomous vehicle company, showed off its Razorback unmanned ground vehicle at […]View the full article

Hromadske, the Ukrainian outlet, published an exclusive video report embedded with soldiers from Ukraine’s 19th Rocket Artillery Brigade “Svyata Varvara,” one of the first Ukrainian units to receive the American-made High Mobility Artillery Rocket System back in 2022, documenting the launch process from the crew’s perspective for the first time in this level of detail. […]View the full article

An unmanned aircraft equipped with a microwave retroreflector, a device that bounces radar signals back with the strength of an object roughly twenty times its actual size, is designed to make one radar blip look like a genuine incoming strike drone. That aircraft, called Spectr, is built by OM Defence Systems, a UK based defense […]View the full article

The Defense Logistics Agency, the Pentagon office responsible for keeping military equipment supplied with everything from fuel to spare parts, published a notice on August 11 seeking manufacturers capable of building a replacement electric control panel for the B-1B Lancer, a swing-wing bomber that has served as a backbone of American long-range strike capability since […]View the full article

A team of engineers have proved that a helicopter design older than most of their grandparents can still out-fly the strangest, most futuristic drone shapes engineers could dream up. The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, the Pentagon’s advanced research arm known for funding technologies that eventually reshape entire industries, announced that its Lift Challenge had […]View the full article

Soldiers from two of the U.S. Army’s most closely watched combat divisions spent a week at an Alabama training range flying different drones head to head, then got to pick which ones actually make it into their units, according to a report from the Army’s Capability Program Executive Aviation. The evaluation, held at Clarke Range […]View the full article

U.S. and Moroccan forces have proven out a brand-new weapons testing range in North Africa by firing a low-cost, long-range cruise missile across it, the first live-fire event ever held at the site, according to a report by Army Capt. Jordan Beagle of U.S. Africa Command. The demonstration ran from August 3 to 7 at […]View the full article

DroneShield, an Australian counter-drone technology company that has spent years building systems to detect and defeat hostile uncrewed aircraft, announced Tuesday the launch of RfRecon, a portable device designed to do something most current sensors cannot: not just detect radio frequency activity, but explain what it means, in real time, from a single handheld platform. […]View the full article

A pre-revenue air taxi startup has bought its way into the defense drone business, and Boeing is the one that sold it the keys. Archer Aviation, the Silicon Valley company racing to put electric flying taxis over American cities, announced Monday that it has signed a definitive agreement to acquire three Boeing subsidiaries in a […]View the full article

It’s been almost nine months since the last Long Game post. We’re overdue. For a while I thought I might stop the Long Game series I started in 2004, after all, the Long is Now…but I was mistaken. The People’s Republic of China (PRC) is still playing a long game…and we—and that includes me—just keep getting distracted. I had the following exchange with Brent Sadler at about the 52-minute mark toward the end of last Sunday’s Midrats Podcast that reminded me that, even in 2026, we’re still thinking like it’s 1996. Sal: It seem like it just happened a little while ago when they said, “Hey, there are there are PRC police stations right here in New York City.” It’s fairly high profile. It’s dropped into the background again. But there was also news that broke a couple weeks ago, and this is old news, but people are getting shocked over it. Smithfield Foods (is) owned by China. And so much of Chinese business is involved in the U.S. in real estate, agriculture, infrastructure. And it’s not benign. And it’s something that American companies cannot do in China themselves. And it is very much related and impacting national security. When we we saw this winter, the fact that CCP aligned individuals owned property right on the approach to the one airfield we have our B2s on. … out here in the provinces, it seems like the energy of having a mature conversation about what the the PRC is doing here inside of our lifelines…seems to have faded into the background a bit. Brent: No, you’re right about that. The China Select Committee, Mike Gallagher, so very much engaged with him and at the time Elaine Luria on getting two commissions, or committee special. This one has survived and there’s a sentiment and s up on the hill that this committee will probably be off ramped, and I think that’s a significant mistake. And so I’m working to continue to elevate and as long as they keep doing good work that’s meaningful and is and and is to the point and backed up by facts, the better. So the other thing is going after like paid protesters that tie back to back to the CCP,. For example, is one thing that you’re starting to see a lot of traction. But if you didn’t have the select committee, a lot of that, a lot of unfair stock listing, unfair trade practices, the threat from the Chinese on elite capture. You know, we had a mayor in California that was arrested as an agent of China. So it’s very real. The United Front Department is specifically the CCP’s tool for recruiting Americans to their cause. And with the rise of socialism, unfortunately, this is even more important. And so the committee, there’s there is a concern that it will be off-ramped. Ro Khana is not showing much desire to keep it going. The Republican chair for it, Moolenaar does, but he hasn’t been as as visible. Not by lack of effort, just hasn’t been as visible. I think partly that’s because the issues in Iran. but the work that they do is critical. I think the committee needs to continue. Certainly, there’s much work left to be done, to say the least. Our inability to maintain resolve—and a similar lack of clear-eyed focus by our allies—just calls into question the seriousness of our leaders. This isn’t the Coffee Klatch era, and yet…we have this going on in the UK, as reported in the Daily Telegraph. Royal Navy spy drones used by Britain’s elite special forces secretly sent data to China, The Telegraph can reveal. The cameras on the K3 Scout surveillance drones had components made in China which were secretly transmitting information to a device in the country. The Royal Marines have been using the £12m fleet since March and the Ministry of Defence (MoD) was forced to remove all internet connectivity from the cameras after discovering the breach Again, this is 2026. Am I the only one who read the Govini Report? It’s just embarrassing, amateurish, and unprofessional at this point. Nothing in any NATO nation’s military should have electronics made in the PRC. Any reliance on raw materials from the PRC should already be on the offramp. There can be no excuse…but the unseriousness gets worse. The balance of readers here I assume have held a security clearance of some kind. In the course of a career, you get A LOT of training on, in essence, counter-intelligence hygiene, on how to spot your own vulnerabilities and to see when you are the target of an intelligence operation of one kind of another. The higher up you go, and the more ‘entertaining’ your job is/was, the more other nations’ intelligence agencies want to get in your head, or the more terrorists want to kill/kidnap/exploit you. It is more than, “If you are a 4 and she is a 10, you’re an asset” We all carry stuff in our heads that we can’t get rid of. The longer you’ve been in, the more “interesting” your jobs have been, the more stuff you keep locked in a series of boxes in your head that you are supposed to take to the grave with you…or it some cases, just having a few of those lockboxes in your nogg’n helps your way to the grave. Our most senior officers especially have things in their nogg’n that don’t need to leak out. I guess no one is taught about Captain John Philip Cromwell, USN anymore. The below—the willful exposure of our gullible retired senior leadership to what is laughably clear to be a PRC intel operation—should be a national scandal. The amount of hours PRC intelligence operatives have been granted to conduct varsity-level elicitation is just gobsmacking. All of these people should know better. To give credit where credit is due, when I first saw this post by Natalie Winters, I squinted a bit and wasn’t really that sure about it. But…I’ve actually had the pleasure of being introduced to Natalie by our mutual friend Tom Sauer and we made small talk for a couple of minutes before she headed off to do more important things. She immediately struck me as having a sharp intellect…so I went back and read the whole thread. She pulled no punches and came right off the top rope: Top American generals formed a secret backchannel with a CCP military intelligence front that instructed them: “We wish you would advocate positions” favorable to China. Some ended up on China’s payroll. Read the whole thread. I feel bad that it took Natalie to bring this above the background noise to the point that Secretary Hegseth now has it in his scan as of last week. It is not new news…it is just news that was ignored. When you see some of the names involved, it makes sense. Check this out from Spring 2020’s Marine Corps University Press’s Journal of Advance Military Studies article by Professor Kerry K. Gershaneck titled, Political Warfare The People’s Republic of China’s Strategy “to Win without Fighting” Of particular concern to the U.S. military is the PRC’s highly successful employment of political warfare operations to co-opt retired senior U.S. military officers to lobby on behalf of PRC objectives and to undermine U.S. national security objectives.44 The PLA has successfully co-opted retired U.S. military flag and general officers through organizations such as the Chinese Association for International Friendly Contact (CAIFC) and other programs such as the Sanya Initiative.45 Established in December 1984 as a political warfare platform, CAIFC’s “main function is establishing and maintaining rapport with senior foreign defense and security community elites, including retired senior military officers and legislators.”46 CAIFC routinely sponsors retired U.S. officers for free visits to the PRC for what amounts to political indoctrination sessions. According to Mark Stokes and Russell Hsiao, “CAIFC facilitates influence operations through PRC foreign affairs, state security, united front, propaganda systems, and military systems.”47 To entice American and other foreign retired military officers, “CAIFC serves as a window to China’s broader business community.” In some cases, foreign retired officers have been required to “agree to publish editorials supporting China [sic] position and criticize U.S. regional policy in exchange for business development support in China.”48 The Sanya Initiative began in February 2008 as a PRC initiative to influence senior retired U.S. flag and general officers to support PRC security interests. At the first meeting at Sanya Resort on the PRC’s Hainan Island, senior PRC political warfare and intelligence officers led the PLA side, and U.S. participants were led by retired Admiral (and former Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff) William A. Owens. According to a Congressional Research Service report on the Sanya Initiative, “The PLA side asked the U.S. participants to help with PRC objections to U.S. policies and laws: namely the Taiwan Relations Act (TRA), Pentagon’s report to Congress on PRC Military Power, and legal restrictions on military contacts in the [National Defense Authorization Act] NDAA for FY2000.”49 Meetings were subsequently held during 2009, in Honolulu, Hawaii; Washington, DC; and New York City. As a result, Owens (who had business interests in China as a managing director of AEA Investors in Hong Kong) published an opinion piece opposing the Taiwan Relations Act as harmful to the relationship with a rising great power—China—that has increasing wealth and influence in the world.50 Owens and certain other U.S. officers continued to meet with senior CCP officials and to support PRC security objectives in discussions with members of Congress and DOD officials.51 That point about Owens is not made up. Heck, he’s proud of it. Put on your Red Hat, remember all your counterintelligence briefings, and give his Wikipedia page a read. Retired four-stars make an ungodly amount of money in retirement pay alone…but that is not enough for some. Let’s go back to Natalie’s thread. She’s naming names. I’m so disgusted that I’m more than happy to list them here. Why have Owens get all the love? I’m not even going to list what their final jobs were in the military. You all know the names. Peter Pace Bill Owens John Abizaid George Casey Ray Odierno Jonathan Greenert Ronald Fogleman Norton Schwartz Dennis Reimer Joseph Prueher Timothy Keating John Keane Walter Sharp Charles Jacoby Charles Wilhelm Robert Van Antwerp Stephen Lanza Karl Eikenberry …and of course, we all know who the guy in the middle is. Read Natalie’s longer post on this decade+ intel operation. Of course, there is a cameo by Hillary Clinton, some walkabouts of the U.S. Naval Academy…and many of the usual suspects. What do you do with this? In 2009, Owens became a consultant to Huawei, the Chinese telecommunications company that was already facing scrutiny in Washington over national security concerns. He later founded Amerilink Telecom Corp., a Virginia-based company created to market Huawei equipment in the United States. According to the Financial Times, Huawei was Amerilink’s first customer, and Owens acknowledged he began consulting for the company before launching the venture. Amerilink was not merely a reseller. A U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission report found that the company worked as both a distributor and consultant for Huawei, helping the company pursue business in the United States. During Huawei’s effort to win part of Sprint Nextel’s network contract, Amerilink proposed serving as an intermediary that would address Washington’s security concerns by independently testing Huawei equipment and overseeing its deployment. … Owens continued publicly defending Huawei after the Sprint effort failed. Speaking at a 2014 China conference, Owens said: “I object to the way Huawei was treated in the United States because it’s unfair.” He argued that American policy toward Huawei had been driven by politics rather than evidence. His public advocacy extended beyond Huawei. In November 2009, Owens authored an essay titled “America Must Start Treating China as a Friend.” In it, he argued that the United States should rethink its approach toward Beijing and questioned continued American arms sales to Taiwan, writing that Washington should reconsider policies that Chinese leaders viewed as hostile. At the same time, Owens maintained a significant business presence in Asia. He served as chairman and senior partner of AEA Investors Asia, a Hong Kong-based private equity firm, and later led Red Bison Advisory Group, whose public materials described advising companies and developing partnerships involving enterprises in China. He’s like something out of a novel or spy movie…and not one of the good guys. As a cherry on top, he’s associated with all sorts of the usual suspects on the left like Issue One. I mean, really people. It is all just too spot on. I’m not the only one seeing this, am I? CUSEF’s later materials show the operation continued after the original Sanya branding faded. In its 2023 and 2024 reporting, the foundation described a “U.S.-China Military-to-Military Dialogue” involving retired American four-star generals and admirals meeting Chinese counterparts in an annual, closed-door setting. Fun CUSEF detail. Google “Sanya Initiative”. This is one of the returns. If you try to click it, you get this. Huh. Somehow, Stimson got involved around 2020 as well? Are they still? …and yes, I understand the good-faith idea around these exchanges…but it is a bad idea, a wrong idea, and an idea—if you understand how the PRC intelligence services work—an idea that only makes sense to useful idiots, incurious people wanting to feel important again, or the compromised. The PRC is dead serious about kicking the U.S. out of its position in the world. We act like we don’t know—or care—that they do. Having our own retired GOFO willingly allowing themselves to be open to compromise is, again, a national scandal. A.Maze.Ing. Leave a comment Share This Substack is reader-supported. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. View the full article

A California aerospace firm building giant swarms of unmanned aircraft has landed a deal with the Air Force to prove it can manufacture those aircraft faster and cheaper than anyone else in the industry. Swarm Aero, a defense technology company that develops large uncrewed aerial vehicles designed to operate in coordinated fleets, announced more than […]View the full article

Money is flowing into defense technology at a pace that would have seemed unthinkable a decade ago, and the people writing the checks are not just Pentagon program managers anymore. Individual investors, boutique venture funds and family offices are increasingly betting on drone makers, artificial intelligence startups and companies building weapons for a war in […]View the full article

The Swedish Armed Forces will receive 45 heavy recovery and technical rescue vehicles built entirely in Poland, a deal that marks one of the few instances in which Sweden has turned to a manufacturer outside its own borders for this kind of specialized military hardware. Szczęśniak Pojazdy Specjalne, a family-owned vehicle manufacturer based in Bielsko-Biała […]View the full article

A defense company that just unveiled a laser powerful enough to shoot down threats from a fighter jet cockpit also posted a record $32 billion order backlog, and the two facts are not unrelated. Elbit Systems, an Israeli defense technology company that develops everything from night vision goggles to unmanned aircraft, reported second quarter 2026 […]View the full article

A Ukrainian company that built its drone-detection network by listening for the sound of incoming Shahed attack drones has tried something its own engineers had never planned for, and it worked well enough to change how the technology might be deployed across NATO’s eastern flank. Zvook, a Ukrainian defense and space manufacturing company headquartered in […]View the full article