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New footage from American Rheinmetall shows the company’s XM30 infantry fighting vehicle concept in greater detail
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Jared Keller, Defense News
The U.S. military is closing in on its high-energy laser weapon of choice for counter-drone missions. Now it needs the vehicles to support it.
Following confirmation that the Chinese People’s Liberation Army Air Force 1st Air Brigade had been re-equipped with J-20A fifth generation fighters, significant questions have been raised regarding the implications of this enhancement to the elite unit’s combat capabilities. The brigade transitioned from baseline J-20 fighters to the heavily enhanced J-20A variant, with its older fighters being reallocated to lower priority units.
Footage released by Russian sources has shown the T-90M main battle tank in a new configuration, which integrates further explosive reactive armour, anti-drone ‘cage’ protection, and the Arena-M hard kill active protection system.
Editor’s note: This is the first article in a limited series celebrating American defense technologies born from wartime and their effects on broader national security, politics, and society. This series will run for several weeks to commemorate America’s 250th anniversary, and winners will be selected by a reader vote undertaken through our newsletter later this summer. Prior installments can be found at the Arsenal of Innovation page.
For many observers, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth’s speech on the future of NATO, delivered in Brussels on June 18, 2026, constituted a perfect example of how the Trump administration is angrily abandoning the longstanding U.S. commitment to European security. The prevailing picture is that the administration is eager to shift the burden of Europe’s defense and is thus moving to withdraw U.S. forces from the continent, even though Europe is moving to do more militarily.
Footage released on July 3 has confirmed the delivery of J-20A fifth generation air superiority fighters to a fourth air brigade in the Chinese People’s Liberation Army Air Force, namely the 1st Air Brigade at Anshan under the Northern Theatre Command. The 1st Air Brigade was notably also the fourth unit to receive baseline J-20 fighters, which were first delivered in January 2021, while also being the first frontline unit to receive J-20s powered by indigenous WS-10C engines.
New footage released on July 3 has shown a Russian Aerospace Forces Su-57 fifth generation fighter carrying four externally mounted R-77 active radar guided air-to-air missiles, with the new configuration appearing to be optimised for medium range air defence operations. With the Su-57 estimated to be able to carry up to six R-77M missiles internally in its primary weapons bay, the carriage of four external missiles increases its total payload to ten beyond visual range missiles.
The Ukrainian Armed Forces have conducted their first-ever ballistic missile strike against Moscow, marking a major milestone in the country’s rapidly expanding long range attacks on major population centres. Although Ukrainian authorities have not officially confirmed the weapon used, Russian military sources and multiple media reports have claimed that the attack employed a newly developed Ukrainian-produced ballistic missile.
Russia is fighting this war badly. That is not the same as losing it; the difference is the whole argument.
The latest CSIS assessment hands Washington the numbers it has wanted to hear for three years. Roughly 1.4 million Russian casualties since February 2022.
Putin and Russian Military Creative Commons Image
Somewhere between 400,000 and 450,000 dead. Advances in some sectors are measured not in miles but in tens of meters a day.
A monthly loss rate that may now be running ahead of the pace at which Moscow can put fresh men into uniform.