The United Kingdom Ministry of Defence has confirmed that manufacturing of the Challenger 3 main battle tank will not begin on a fixed timetable, instead proceeding only after performance trials are successfully completed, signalling a more risk averse approach to bringing the new vehicle into service. Defence Minister Luke Pollard said the program is “currently undergoing demonstration phase trials to prove the performance of the tanks,” and that manufacturing will start once performance is validated “rather than being tied to a specific deadline.

The new Russian Defence Ministry State Armaments Program for 2027-2036 has paid specific attention to the modernisation of the country’s nuclear triad and air defences, according to the Kremlin’s materials prepared for the Russian president’s meeting on the program. “Special attention is paid to building up the capabilities of land troops, maintaining and modernising the nuclear triad, creating an all-embracing air defence system and boosting the export potential of Russian armaments and equipment,” the materials were reported by state media to have stated.

The Korean People’s Army has successfully test fired a new type of long range surface-to-air missile, which demonstrated the ability to destroy a target 200 kilometres away. The launch was conducted over the Sea of Japan, referred to in Korea as the East Sea, and was observed by figures from the country’s political leadership including Chairman of the ruling Korean Workers’ Party Kim Jong Un.

This video describes the military situation in

If you ask a civilian to imagine war, they almost always picture the noise. They imagine the deafening crack of outgoing artillery, the scream of low-flying jets, or the chaotic exhilaration of small-arms fire. It is a sensory overload designed for the cinema, an almost-symphony of violence where the danger is loud, visible, and unnervingly human.
But if you ask a veteran about their worst day in the field, there is a good chance the memory is less about the combat and more about the environment.

Military life is the world’s most reliable chaos generator. Schedules shift, phones die, inboxes become landfills, and the one document you need suddenly exists only in the dimension where missing socks go. A binder doesn’t prevent emergencies, but it does prevent emergencies from turning into administrative horror. 
Start with five buckets: identity, medical, financial, legal, and property. Milspouses need to add military-specific tabs for deployment contacts and key documents, but civilians can probably save that space for other things.

The Defense Department’s latest report to Congress on China’s military developments stated that Beijing has been catching up with the United States in the race for new generative AI capabilities.
This year’s iteration of the annual study was quietly released by the DOD this week before the Christmas holiday.
“In 2024, China’s commercial and academic AI sectors made progress on large language models (LLMs) and LLM-based reasoning models, which has narrowed the performance gap between China’s models and the U.S. models currently leading the field,” Pentagon officials wrote.

American forces carried out strikes northwest Nigeria on Thursday, targeting Islamic State militants in northwest Nigeria. 
President Donald Trump announced the operation on social media Thursday afternoon. He said the attack was against ISIS, which he said was killing Christian Nigerians in the country’s northwest. Trump did not provide many details on the operation, although U.S. Africa Command said in its own release that it hit several ISIS camps in the Sokoto state.

The RAF women’s football team have domina

Anastasia Obis, Federal News Network This year the Army has embarked on one of its biggest transformations in decades, while the Air Force dropped most of its sweeping plans.

Ticku, E.T. The US is the world’s preeminent military power.

Paul Kengor, Spectator I recently had a strange, sad experience while watching an old movie with the family.

Francis P.

Hard Choices Create Quiet Professionals | Milit

Almost exactly 6 years after the Space Force was founded, a basic training class made history as the first to march in the traditional boot camp graduation ceremony wearing the service’s own, distinctive dress uniform.
Until the Dec. 18 ceremony at Joint Base San Antonio–Lackland, Texas, enlisted troops in the Space Force had graduated in modified versions of the Air Force’s “blues” dress uniforms.

Next year will likely focus on building digital networks, intercepting European drone incursions and securing critical subsea infrastructure.

TASL has begun delivering WhAP armoured vehicles to Moroccan Army following the commencement of local manufacturing operations in Morocco.

This video describes the military situation in

Astor Defence is a winner in the Business Expansion category in the 2025 Army Technology Excellence Awards.

“An incredibly busy year, operationally”✨
Tho

The Chinese People’s Liberation Army Air Force has or the first time deployed a contingent to the United Arab Emirates (UAE) for joint exercises with the UAE Air Force. Spokesman for China’s Ministry of National Defence Senior Colonel Zhang Xiaogang revealed that the drills were conducted from December 9 to 22, and represented the third iteration of the “Falcon Shield” exercises between the two countries, after the previous two rounds of exercises were hosted in China.

The Chengdu Aircraft Corporation has made significant further progress in the development of a very heavy ultra long range sixth generation fighter, bringing the program’s third flight prototype into flight testing. Images showed the aircraft in flight alongside a J-10C fighter on December 25, with the prototype having visible differences from its two predecessors signalling continued evolution and refinement of the design.

The Belarusian Air Force has received a new batch of Russian Su-30SM2 fighters, marking the latest in multiple deliveries since 2019 to significantly enhance the post-Soviet state’s aerial warfare capabilities.

The U.S. Army has confirmed that the M270A2 rocket artillery system has for the first time been involved in live-fire testing in South Korea, marking its debut in a forward-deployed environment. The deployment reflects the prioritisation of positions in Korea for the receipt of the most capable equipment available in the U.S. Armed Forces, as the Korean People’s Army deployed north of the inter-Korean demilitarised zone continues to field one of the most capable land forces in the world and to rapidly modernise its capabilities.

More people have completed the task of climbing

Eighty years ago, American troops were home for Christmas for the first time in years. For the previous four years, troops had faced holidays away from family, and in whatever conditions the war presented, from snowless tropics to brutal winters of northern Europe. But even in the most expansive footprint of the war, cooks, supply troops, and even frontline leaders did their best to make sure Christmas dinner wasn’t forgotten.

During World War II, some 9,000 chaplains served in the U.S. military, representing a wide spectrum of faiths, including Protestant, Catholic, and Jewish traditions. These men did not carry weapons, yet they repeatedly placed themselves in harm’s way to comfort the wounded, counsel soldiers, and uphold morale in the most dangerous theaters of the war. They marched with infantry units across Europe, stormed beaches under fire in Normandy and the Pacific, parachuted behind enemy lines, and ministered in muddy foxholes under relentless artillery bombardment.

Ryan Thomas LaBee, Military.

S&S

Tony Lentini, RCDefense
I grew up an Army Brat and served in the Army myself as a young man.

The announcement on December 22 that the U.S. Navy is scheduled to procure ten unprecedentedly large missile armed surface combat ships has fuelled considerable speculation regarding whether there will be a turning point in fleet capabilities in the 2030s. Informally referred to by U.S. President Donald Trump as ‘Trump class’ warships, and otherwise as ‘battleships,’ the vessels are expected to be large missile cruisers that succeed the Ticonderoga class cruisers which are currently being phased out of service.

From The Great Escape to Elf…🎄🎬
What wi

The Belarusian Defence Ministry has signed a new contract with Russia’s leading producer of air defence equipment Almaz-Antey for the maintenance and repair of Belarusian Armed Forces air defence equipment at a new centre in the country. The ministry reported regarding the agreement: “The air defence repair service centre, established this year in the Republic of Belarus, will begin servicing and repairing Minsk-owned air defence equipment in the coming months in cooperation with Russian companies.

A new batch of Su-35 fighter aircraft has ben delivered to the Russian Aerospace Forces, marking the latest delivery of the year following successful efforts to significantly expand the type’s scale of production. Russian state defence conglomerate Rostec reported regarding the delivery: “The United Aircraft Corporation of the Rostec State Corporation has manufactured and delivered another batch of Su-35S multirole fighters to the Russian Defence Ministry.

North Korean state media on December 24 published the first images of the country’s long anticipated first nuclear powered submarine, revealing that the ship is currently under construction and displaces 8,700 tons. This follows reports from South Korean military sources in October 2024 that the North had begun construction of the first nuclear submarine, an reports for several years from North Korean government sources that the development of such a ship is planned.

New footage released by the Chinese People’s Liberation Army Eastern Theatre Command Air Force has for the first time shown a J-10C fighter carrying a new type of air-launched ballistic missile. The missile closely resembles the YJ-21 anti-ship ballistic missile which is carried by H-6K bombers, and appears to be a miniaturised version. The YJ-21 was first unveiled at the 2022 Zhuhai Airshow, and combines a 1500 kilometre range and Mach 10 speed, making it among the most potent anti-ship weapons fielded anywhere in the world.

As the Chinese People’s Liberation Army Air Force has continued to retire its Russian-sourced fighter aircraft from service, state media outlets have revealed that the first retired J-11A fighters from the type’s first production batch have been sent to the Air Force Engineering University for ground crew training. These aircraft can be seen carrying the Russian-made R-27 air-to-air missile, as well as its successor domestically produced PL-12 missile, with ground crew seen arming the aircraft and servicing them.

An annual report by the U.S. Department of Defence to Congress on Chinese military capabilities has highlighted that the country’s increasingly capable new fighters being offered for export appear poised to gain more dominant positions on global markets. The report specifically singles out the J-35 fifth generation fighter, J-10C lightweight fourth generation fighter, and its very light counterpart the JF-17, as aircraft which have particularly high export prospects.

Ukrainian forces repelled a Russian cavalry assault using FPV drones in Donetsk Oblast. Cavalry, in this case, actually using horses.
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In 2020, Justin Lynch wrote “Yet Another About Information Technology and the Character of War,” where he argued that the character of war changes over time and the United States should write the future character of war rather than allow it to be written by somebody else.Image: Imperial War MuseumIn your 2020 article, “Yet Another About Information Technology and the Character of War,” you argue that the United States should seek to shape the next character of war rather than merely predict it.

…manage expectations and be content…

With this Monday’s announcement of USS Defiant (BBG-1) absorbing all the oxygen, it is easy to forget that just five days ago we found out about our next frigate. As I mentioned in my Tuesday article, I spun off this discussion just to focus on Defiant.
Well, I did more than that. I deleted it all. It was just too complicated. The frigate announcement was the second, after the LST announcement, of steps we are taking after the cancellation of my poor, abused baby—he Constellation Class FFG.

The B-29 Superfortress was not designed to be nice. It was a pressurized, four-engine behemoth built for one specific purpose: to carry 20,000 pounds of explosive steel to the Japanese mainland. It was one of the machines that ended World War II by turning cities into cinder blocks. It was serious about its job too, carrying eight .50-caliber machine guns in remote-controlled turrets, plus two more .50-cals joined by one 20mm cannon in the tail turret. Just the sound of it in the sky caused fear.

It’s been a year of livestreaming firsts, und

Well, it’s nearly Christmas and very nearly the end of 2025. It’s been quite a year in military news, and while we’re grateful you’ve been with us through it all, we (like you) are ready for a break.
Over the past year, we’ve covered many stories that are worth acknowledging. Now, the typical format for a note like this is for me to rattle off a bunch of examples of our coverage, link to them, and basically pat ourselves on the back while getting a few more clicks for the website before the year wraps up.

The postwar decades crackled with technological ambition. As defense contractors sketched the future of aviation, the space race accelerated with new spacecraft designs. Amid this ferment, a quieter revolution was brewing.

Tyler Rogoway, The WarZone
The lack of an American amphibious aircraft capability has become more glaring as the possibility of a conflict with China looms larger.

CDR Salamander
What am I surprised the most about?

Jennifer Hlad, Defense One
III MEF includes the 3rd Marine Littoral Regiment, which is “leading the service” in various capabilities.

Gidget Fuentes, USNI News
Confidence in Amphibious Combat Vehicles Grows as Landing Craft Deploy

Jeff Schogol, Task and Purpose
President Donald Trump announced that the Navy’s new “battleships” will each be armed with “state-of-the-art electric railguns.