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Summary and Key Points: Georgia Gilholy, an international politics journalist, evaluates the Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF) fighter jet crisis as Prime Minister Mark Carney reviews the 88-aircraft F-35 purchase.
-Despite US President Donald Trump’s recent rhetoric on tariffs and annexation, Ottawa has authorized “long-lead” payments to Lockheed Martin to preserve its production slot.
F-35 Stealth Fighter in Red. Image Credit: Lockheed Martin.
The U.S. Air Force has deployed B-2 intercontinental range strategic bombers for a penetration strike into Iranian airspace to target heavily fortified underground targets, which are reported to be ballistic missile storage facilities. Following the U.S. and Israel’s initiation of a large scale assault against Iran on February 28, the destruction of the Iranian ballistic missile arsenal has been prioritised, with the limited capabilities of the U.S. and its strategic partners’ ballistic missile defences making this by far the most effective means of blunting Iranian retaliatory strikes.
The Untied States has postponed announcing a $10 billion arms sale to the Republic of China Ministry of National Defence, with officials reporting that the decision was made in order to avoid provoking the People’s Republic of China before President Donald Trump’s planned April visit to Beijing. The New York Times reported the postponement of the contracts on February 27, citing multiple U.S. officials. This arms sale includes the supply of high value surface-to-air missiles, and is currently in the late stages of the negotiation.
In a bid to diversify wireless communications innovation, the Defense Department is poised to release an open-source software stack that users from the military and commercial industry can use to develop their own custom network solutions.
The Pentagon’s FutureG office will publish the first version of the Open Centralized Unit Distributed Unit (OCUDU) radio access network project to GitHub in April, the department announced Sunday.
Iranian sources on February 28 released footage of the launch of the Fattah ballistic missile, which integrates a next generation manoeuvring re-entry vehicle to effectively evade missile defences. This was followed by the reported first ever launch of the Fattah-2, a heavily enhanced successor to the missile, on March 1. The Fattah-2 missile uses a hypersonic glide vehicle rather than a usual ballistic missile reentry vehicle, allowing it to manoeuvre in both pitch and yaw, to maintain far higher reentry speeds, and to approach targets from unexpected directions.
For most Americans, its been a long cold winter. But as February draws to a close, most of us are dreaming of spring: the flowers, the sun, the warm weather, the chance to get back outside, and – of course – spring cleaning.
For tens of millions of Americans, spring cleaning is a rite of passage of the seasons. An opportunity to clean up from winter, put away the snow shovels, and get your house and yard in order. Over the last few years, as more and more Americans have focused on their health and well being, spring cleanses have become almost as popular as spring cleaning.
Footage released by U.S. Armed Forces Central Command has shown U.S. Army MGM-140 ATACMS ballistic missiles being launched to strike Iranian air defence assets and ballistic missile launchers. Footage showed missiles being deployed from a High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS), and raised speculation that attacks are being launched from one of multiple Gulf States within range of Iranian targets, or possibly from within Iraq or Turkey.
As part of its wave of airstrikes against Iran this weekend, U.S. Central Command confirmed that it had launched its new low-cost kamikaze drones, the first time the weapons have been used in combat.
On Saturday afternoon, CENTCOM announced that it had fired its Low-cost Unmanned Combat Attack System (LUCAS) drones as part of the widespread salvo of weapons used against Iran. Details in the ongoing strikes remain limited, with the White House and military offering only a few statements, but CENTCOM did say that it had successfully launched the LUCAS drones as part of Operation Epic Fury.
Following the initiation of U.S. and Israeli attacks on a wide range of Iranian targets, and Iran’s launching of retaliatory strikes against Israel and U.S. military facilities across the region, the Qatari Air Force has reportedly scrambled F-15QA fighters to intercept attacks. The Qatari Defence Ministry reported regarding its operations: “Our fighter jets repelled air attacks, including drones and cruise missiles launched from Iran.” Designated a Major Non-NATO ally of the United States, Qatar hosts by far the largest U.S.
On Feb. 28, the United States and Israel launched coordinated but separately named military campaigns against Iran — the United States under Operation Epic Fury and Israel under Operation Roaring Lion — striking Iran’s nuclear facilities, ballistic missile infrastructure, and military leadership and command structures. In a video message broadcast, President Donald Trump again urged Iranians to “take over your government. It will be yours to take.” Whatever else the campaign accomplishes, it cannot be mistaken for coercive diplomacy.