Maria Levi did not carry a rifle. She carried pasta. After an Allied prisoner of war escaped from an Italian camp in September 1943, Levi waded barefoot across a river with a pot balanced on her head to feed him. It sounds like a fable until you remember what it really was: supply and sustainment, delivered by a civilian, in occupied territory, to a man the Germans would happily shoot. She was one of the thousands of Italian women who did their part to win World War II.
Related: 6 military spouses who grabbed a weapon and joined the fight
Italy’s armistice on Sept.
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Marines, civilians and members of industry interested in attending the U.S. Marine Corps’ AI “workshop” at Quantico should mark their calendars for March 9-12, 2026, according to a new MARADMIN message released Monday.
The gathering was originally scheduled to take place last month, but it was postponed due to a lapse in appropriations associated with the federal government shutdown.
The Marine Corps’ service data officer is organizing the event, which will focus specifically on generative AI and agentic AI.
The term “agentic AI” has been added to the name of the event.
Ishaan Tharoor, The Washington Post
Chris Panella, Business Insider The US Navy is struggling to compete with China due to a spate of failed ship classes. A new report warns there’s no easy fix.
Hanson, Alaska News Huntington Ingalls Industries has delivered the guided missile destroyer USS Ted Stevens to the the U.S. Navy, the company announced Monday.
Zacks HII strengthens its role as a top U.S. naval contractor with the delivery of Flight III destroyer Ted Stevens, marking another milestone for Ingalls Shipbuilding.
Jack Buckby, 19FortyFive New watchdog data shows F-35 availability at 50% and Air Force readiness sliding to 67%. “Fly, fix, fight” now meets hard reality.
Some weapons win firefights, and then some weapons decide whether a firefight is even allowed to happen.
In Iraq and Afghanistan, the MK19 Mod 3 automatic grenade launcher lived firmly in the second category. It didn’t need to be fired often to do its job. This beast’s presence, mounted high, visible, unapologetic, was more than enough to ease anxiety. Its presence rewrote behavior, redrew boundaries, and simplified decisions in wars defined by the fog.
This was not about precision or finesse. It was about controlling the battlespace in environments where space was a problem.
2025 was a busy year for defense tech, but this year’s most-read Cogs of War pieces have a clear throughline. Readers were most interested in whether the United States can still build things that matter at scale. From drones and shipyards to software, data centers, quantum materials, and missile defense, our writers expressed frustration with systems and processes that slow production, reward hype, and turn industrial weakness into risk. Factories, labs, infrastructure, and the laws that govern them hold power.
Lattice Materials has secured an $18.5m award from the US Department of War for critical minerals germanium and silicon.