America’s war against Iran has sparked heated debates over U.S. strategic priorities, military objectives, and defense industrial capacity. It has also fueled speculation about how a hypothetical clash between the United States and the People’s Republic of China might unfold. Tehran’s ability to launch salvo after salvo of simple attack drones reflects current thinking about how the proliferation of cheap, easily producible precision weapons is changing the character of war, and previews some of the challenges that Washington might confront in a fight with Beijing.
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Following growing concerns in the Western world that the U.S. Air Force F-47 sixth generation fighter could enter service close to a decade or more behind rival Chinese programs, the first two of which brought fighters to flight prototype stages in December 2024, the possibility of the American aircraft entering service as late as the 2040s has increasingly been raised by analysts. These assessments have been based on the record of prior post-Cold War U.S.
ignoring the known knowns
It has long been a dirty little secret that we made a decision to “accept risk” in defending our bases from attack. That momentary bet became a habit…and then part of the environment.
The Army, especially during GWOT, didn’t just underfund air defense in general and treat it as a secondary career field—it never even considered what was needed to defend bases. The USAF? No better…and they relied on the Army for air defense. It was only 18 months or so ago they started to experiment with base defense.
About Face for the Afghanistan (& Iraq) Veteran
Lieutenant Colonel (Lt Col) Asad “Genghis” Khan USMC’s book, Betrayal of Command, is the modern day About Face for the Post 9/11 Afghanistan (and Iraq) war veteran. Colonel David Hackworth US Army wrote About Face: The Odessey of an American Warrior in 1989 almost two decades after he walked away from a distinguished 30-year military career. Hackworth, one of the most decorated US soldiers of the post WWII era, wrote a brutally honest critique of US military leadership, bureaucratic ineptitude, and strategic failures in Vietnam.
During the Cold War, there weren’t a lot of things the U.S. military wasn’t willing to nuke in the name of science.
The Air Force once considered a nuclear-powered bomber that would drop nukes on the Soviet Union forever. NASA once tested the effects of a nuclear blast on beer. Before we sent men to the moon, we actually considered nuking it first.
Related: This is America’s latest nuclear bomb
The Atomic Age was essentially a kid with a new toy, the U.S. military just playing around to see what its new toys could do.
The Army reduced the frequency of mandatory cybersecurity training to once every five years, according to a policy that went into effect late last month, axing an annual requirement and making individual commanders responsible for preparing their personnel for digital defense.
The move followed a Sept. 30 memo by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth directing the military to reduce the time personnel spend on cybersecurity training, with the aim of “enabling our warfighters to focus on their core mission of fighting and winning our Nation’s wars without distraction.
The Army grounded two flight crews from the 101st Airborne who hovered over and buzzed past the home of singer Kid Rock on a weekend training flight, and has launched a formal investigation into the flight. But the singer told a local news station that he doubts the crews will get in much trouble.
“I think they’re going to be alright,” he told WKRN. “My buddy is the commander in chief,”
The singer is a vocal supporter of President Donald Trump, and has been a regular White House guest.
The USS Gerald R. Ford’s already long deployment will be “record-breaking” and “probably go into the 11th month of deployed operations,” Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Daryl Caudle said on Tuesday.
“For those that are not in the Navy, that’s an extraordinary thing to even think about something of that kind of deployment length,” Caudle said while speaking at the Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank in Washington, D.C. “So my hat’s off to the Ford.
Iran’s weapons launches and arms cache continue to diminish as Operation Epic Fury enters its second month, according to Pentagon leaders who supplied updates on the large-scale military campaign that involves at least 50,000 U.S. troops so far.
Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Dan Caine said forces continue to focus on the fortification of installations, assets and personnel with a mix of air-and-missile defense capabilities, including electronic warfare options, amid this U.S.-led, Israel-coordinated operation against Iran.
The Air Force has reactivated a squadron in Nevada that flies the MQ-9 Reaper, the unmanned, heavily armed drone that is entering its third decade of flying.
The 42nd Attack Squadron at Creech Air Force Base, Nevada, was the first unit in the Air Force to fly the Reaper, beginning in 2006, clocking over 180,000 combat hours over Afghanistan across 13 years before going “dormant” in 2020.
But with its reactivation, the 42nd ‘s drones will have a capability they previously did not.