U.S. military and Pentagon officials expect to prioritize cyber and communications gear, AI, data integration and other multi-domain warfare assets next month at the Technical Exchange Meeting they’re hosting to meet with select industry representatives looking to showcase their latest products and services.

An astonishing 25% of veterans who receive VA care are dealing with diabetes and those who have served are nearly twice as likely to develop the disease as the general population. A new diabetes resource hub from Disabled American Veterans (DAV) and Dexcom, a global leader in glucose biosensing put everything vets need to know about the condition in one place.
Also Read:
The site is designed to give veterans, caregivers, and advocates a single destination for understanding and managing diabetes, from diagnosis through day-to-day care.

Marines now have 12 months to be clean-shaven, even if they are receiving medical treatment for a skin condition, according to a new policy released Friday. 
Those who can’t shave cleanly within a year face separation from the service, regardless of on-the-job performance.
The new no-exceptions shaving rules were released Friday under a Marine Administrative Message, or MARADMIN.

The USS John F. Kennedy (CVN-79) is the second Gerald R. Ford-class carrier, currently nearing delivery after major delays. As of recently, the Kennedy has completed builder’s sea trials and is expected to be delivered around March 2027.

But amidst the evolving threat environment, could the Kennedy be either the last Ford-class carrier or the last US aircraft carrier ever built? The answer is almost certainly no on both counts.

(April 14, 2017) The aircraft carrier Pre-Commissioning Unit (PCU) USS Gerald R. Ford (CVN 78) pulls into Naval Station Norfolk for the first time.

Cost overruns, production complications, changing requirements, and substantial design flaws are among the reasons the once-promising Constellation-class Frigate came to an abrupt end. This development opened the door to the now-emerging, vastly different FF(X) endeavor.

Initially intended as a producible, lower-cost, yet high-capability ship with many off-the-shelf, readily obtainable parts and technologies, the Constellation class wound up massively deviating from its initial conceptual vision and devolved into a developmental and financial crisis.

An artist rendering of the U.S.

The Navy has successfully completed the highly-anticipated maiden flight of Boeing’s MQ-25 Stingray, a critical milestone for the service’s effort to field its first aircraft carrier-based unmanned aerial vehicle.
The test flight occurred Saturday at MidAmerica St. Louis Airport in Illinois, where the MQ-25 took off and flew for about two hours while executing various maneuvers and tests, according to a Navy news release.

When A&E was first launched more than 40 years ago, its name was “Arts and Entertainment,” so it makes sense that it teams up with World Wrestling Entertainment to look back at those decades through the lens of sports entertainment—because the WWE is both art and entertaining.
The network is now back with all-new seasons of its WWE hits, “Biography: WWE Legends,” “WWE LFG (Legends and Future Greats),” and “WWE’s Greatest Moments.”
Don’t pretend like you’re not interested.

U.S. Special Operations Command’s acquisition, technology and logistics directorate is looking to partner with members of industry and nonprofit organizations via a new initiative focused on modernizing SOCOM’s maritime and cross-domain capabilities, according to a sources-sought notice published Friday on a government contracting website.

The up-and-coming Northrop Grumman B-21 Raider 6th-generation stealth bomber is not a supersonic warplane; ditto for (1) its immediate predecessor, the pre-merger Northrop B-2 Spirit (the original stealth bomber), and (2) the septuagenarian B-52 “Stratosaurus” (unofficially AKA the “Stratosaurus”).

Indeed, the only member of the US Air Force’s strategic bomber triumvirate that flies in excess of Mach 1 is the B-1B Lancer (aka “the Bone“).

A second B-21 Raider, the nation’s sixth-generation stealth bomber, joins flight testing at Edwards Air Force Base, Calif., Sept.

The United States Air Force and United States Navy will have to keep their current fighter fleets in service longer than anticipated, following new information that their upcoming sixth-generation fighter will not enter service according to previously established timelines.

During comments given as part of the McAleese Defense Programs Conference last month, Representative Rob Wittman, a republican from Virginia, said that the Navy’s F-47 will not be “available” to the Air Force until the mid-2030s. Air and Space Forces Magazine was the first to report on the development.

HMS Prince of Wales sailed from Portsmouth for

This story is developing…
In a flagrant display of insubordinate Marxist ideology, the U.S. Air Force Academy terrazzo was overun last Friday with hundreds of females from a USAFA affinity group for women that literally threatened the Secretary of War during the ongoing conflict in Iran.
Apparently up to 500 women showed up for the event which was reportedly sponsored by the Academy and USAFA AOG.

Welcome to The Ukraine Compass, a weekly digest of Ukrainian commentary and analysis from across the political spectrum only for War on the Rocks members. Each Monday, we bring you a curated selection of articles from Ukrainian media offering insight into how Ukrainians themselves debate the issues shaping their country.American coverage often narrows the view to the battlefield — these pieces widen it, revealing the texture of daily life, politics, and public argument in a nation at war.

The British Army wants to double its lethality

India has demonstrated a new Infantry Fighting Vehicle family known as the Vikram VT21 Advanced Armoured Platform.

The B-1B Lancer was first developed in the 1970s and was designed to penetrate Soviet airspace at high speeds and high altitudes in order to deliver devastating nuclear strikes. However, today the strategic landscape is completely different.

Over time, both China and Russia have begun fielding advanced air defense systems such as the HQ-9 and the S-400, thereby reducing the likelihood that the B-1B could penetrate their airspace. Despite this, the USAF retains 45 B-1Bs in its inventory.

Babcock has presented its Toyota-based General Logistics Vehicle as a proposed replacement for the British Army’s outgoing Land Rover fleet.

Inside a sprawling facility known as Arsenal-1, traditional rules of the defense industry are being dismantled one airframe at a time. April 2026 has arrived and technicians are proof-testing a $1 billion bet that America can still manufacture military power at a scale and speed that rivals the commercial sector. Standing at roughly half the size of an F-16, the Anduril YFQ-44A Fury is the centerpiece of this industrial experiment.

The hierarchy of the United States Army is not known for its collective sense of humor.
Ivan Reitman, then an up-and-coming movie producer, knew this when he and his partner, Dan Goldberg, approached military brass in the early 1980s. They wanted to make a comedy about two besties who seek to escape the monotony of their daily lives by enlisting in the Army.
Also Read: It’s official: ‘Top Gun 3’ is in developmentThey wanted to shoot much of the film on a military base, which required the Army’s approval.

For the uninitiated, a bug-out bag (sometimes just called a “BOB”) is simply a backpack you keep packed with the essentials to survive for about three days or so. It helps if you suddenly have to get the hell out of Dodge for whatever reason. It helps you stay alive during a disaster like a storm, flood, or blackout or when you’re doing some secret squirrel stuff and your cover is blown.
Also Read: Your standard rifle can now be an anti-drone weapon. Seriously.

China’s H-20 stealth bomber is a mystery: If imitation is the most sincere form of flattery, then China’s defense-industrial enterprises succeed in flattering about half the world.

The tendency of Beijing’s advanced weapons platforms to appear to be partially or completely reverse-engineered analogs of designs from other countries is well known.

H-20 Bomber Mock Up. Image Credit: Creative Commons.

H-20 Bomber from China. Image Credit: Creative Commons.

Many analysts are still waiting to see a genuine, indigenous Chinese invention rather than a copy of someone else’s kit.

During the 1995–1996 Taiwan Strait Crisis, the United States did more than demonstrate political resolve. It demonstrated operational reach in a form Beijing could neither match nor meaningfully contest. Two aircraft carrier battle groups moved into waters proximate to Taiwan, establishing an immediate airpower presence and underscoring Washington’s ability to intervene on short notice.

For Chinese planners, the most consequential lesson was not diplomatic. It was military and deeply uncomfortable. The People’s Liberation Army struggled to consistently track those carriers.

Australia has committed an investment of A$750m for the manufacturing of 268 next generation Bushmaster protected mobility vehicles.

Playing Battlefield 6 online is like your boot-camp platoon: a mixed bag of great humans, massive turds, and everything in-between.
In some matches, you have players who want to work as a team. In others, you’re punching the air because they only care about their kill/death ratio. The former is definitely a lot more fun than the latter, but one thing is absolutely missing from most matches—support by fire.

19FortyFive loves the F-16 fighter and has spent a lot of time over the last 9 months or so taking as much original photography of the legendary warplane as you can see below. But times are changing: The Lockheed Martin F-21 is a proposed, advanced single-engine multi-role fighter jet based on the F-16 Fighting Falcon, specifically tailored for the Indian Air Force (IAF).

It features advanced avionics, including a modern AESA radar, new cockpit displays, and technologies derived from the F-22 and F-35.

19FortyFive spent a lot of time with this fighter jet (both fighters that were built, that is), and we have the photos in this essay to prove it. The YF-23, colloquially known as the Black Widow II, was a prototype stealth fighter developed by Northrop and McDonnell Douglas for the U.S. Air Force’s Advanced Tactical Fighter (ATF) program in the late 1980s and early 1990s.

The Pentagon is proposing a massive spending increase for the Defense Autonomous Warfare Group, or DAWG, which oversees the development of drones and other unmanned systems.
The Defense Department’s proposed budget for fiscal year 2027 asks for nearly $54 billion for the DAWG, up from just $225.9 million that it has received for the current fiscal year, budget documents show. 
The DAWG was created to unify the Defense Department’s efforts to quickly mass-produce unmanned systems for U.S. troops, a Pentagon official told Task & Purpose.

U.S. President Donald Trump announced in December that the U.S. Navy would pursue development of a new “Trump-Class Battleship.”

In a speech typical of the president, he declared it would be “the fastest, the biggest, and by far, 100 times more powerful than any battleship ever built.”

Iowa-Class 5-Inch Guns. Image by Harry J. Kazianis/National Security Journal.

Those Iowa-Class Guns. Image Credit: Harry J. Kazianis/National Security Journal.

Mark Cancian, a senior adviser at CSIS, wrote on December 23 that “this ship will never sail.”

Cancian is probably right.

The French firm Thales which was a primary developer of the SAMP/T NG has announced that the Danish Defence Ministry has signed a contract to purchase system, becoming the first client for the system outside the two developer countries France and Italy. Denmark will initially purchase four systems totally approximately €1.47 billion as part of the country national air defence plan, with a total budget of €7.8 billion.

Naval N
Idaho is the eighth Virginia-class boat in the Block IV configuration

USNI N.
American officials are considering foreign designs and having U.S.

Diana Stancy, BD
Aircraft carriers George HW Bush, Abraham Lincoln and Gerald R Ford are now operating in the Middle East amid Operation Epic Fury.

Stefano D’urso, The Aviationist
The U.S.

Kris Osborn, 1945
The U.S.

The “Juniper” series of events are designed to test collective US-Israeli readiness and improve the interoperability of defense systems. Photo courtesy of the IDF Spokesperson’s Office. Source: DVIDS.

A real policy push has emerged in the United States to extend certain legal protections to Americans who serve in the Israel Defense Forces (IDF). In 2024, members of Congress introduced H.R. 8445, a bill that would amend federal law “to provide for the eligibility of United States citizens who serve in the Israeli Defense Forces for certain protections relating to such service.

This video describes the military situation in

Senior officials in the Department of War claim that the Golden Dome missile defence shield is ahead of schedule and within budget.

The term “affordable mass” entered public defense discourse in 2021 as a munitions concept, which the Air Force adopted in 2023 to describe its effort to field large numbers of lower-cost, semi-autonomous aircraft to complement crewed fighters. The term has since spread in defense reporting, think-tank commentary, service initiatives, and even on War on the Rocks.

The military modernization and technological ambitions of the People’s Republic of China dominate headlines in Washington. Hypersonic missiles, AI breakthroughs, and an expanding navy are the visible symbols of competition with the Chinese Communist Party. But if the United States is serious about long-term competition, it should prioritize — or at least pay equal attention to — the Chinese Communist Party’s other weapon: united front.  Understandably, military power and advanced technology feel urgent and concrete.

On the night of Aug. 9, 1942, an Allied fleet of 17 warships guarded the approaches to Guadalcanal. The fleet was newer, larger, and better equipped than the Japanese force bearing down on it. It had six heavy cruisers, two light cruisers, and nine destroyers. It carried radar, a technology that should have detected the enemy long before any lookout could spot a ship through the darkness. By the numbers, the Allied squadron was on average 10 years newer and outweighed its opponent by more than 85 percent in total displacement. On paper, the result should have been straightforward.

The Army kickstart their title defence against

The most iconic Forces sport fixture takes plac

United States Ambassador to Peru Bernie Navarro has confirmed that the Peruvian Defence Ministry has committed to procuring F-16 Block 70 fighter aircraft, following the sudden resignation of both Defence Minister Carlos Díaz and Foreign Minister Hugo de Zela. The sale has been made as the U.S. has struggled to market the F-16 abroad, and as serious production and delivery delays have caused major controversies in client countries.

L Todd Wood talks with John Konrad of GCaptain about the firing of the Secretary of the Navy.
!function(r,u,m,b,l,e){r._Rumble=b,r[b]||(r[b]=function(){(r[b]._=r[b]._||[]).push(arguments);if(r[b]._.length==1){l=u.createElement(m),e=u.getElementsByTagName(m)[0],l.async=1,l.src=”https://rumble.com/embedJS/u2y1af”+(arguments[1].video?’.’+arguments[1].video:”)+”/?url=”+encodeURIComponent(location.href)+”&args=”+encodeURIComponent(JSON.stringify([].slice.apply(arguments))),e.parentNode.

The Chinese People’s Liberation Army Navy has deployed a carrier strike group led by the aircraft carrier Liaoning for operations in the South China Sea. The ships are holding exercises near the Philippines, where the Philippines Armed Forces, alongside forces from the United States, Japan, Australia, Canada, France, and New Zealand, have been jointly holding the Balikatan joint military exercise from April 20.

The command overseeing the top special operations units in the military is looking for industry partners — companies, research groups and non profits — to work with to develop new technologies for use in missions. 
On Friday, April 24, U.S. Special Operations Command put out a broad solicitation on the SAM.gov website looking for participants to “accelerate” the use of high-tech tools as part of the Advancing Naval Capabilities through Holistic Opportunities and Resources (ANCHOR) Initiative.

This video describes the military situation in

The U.S. Army and Navy are cooperating in the Pacific to develop new tactics and concepts of operation to support a fast-increasing number of mobile land-fired weapons systems, such as the Typhon Mid-Range-Capability (MRC) missile system. The Typhon has been sent to the Philippines and Japan. 

In development for several years, the Army’s Typhon MRC is capable of firing the Army’s emerging Precision Strike Missile, as well as land-fired variants of the Standard Missile (SM)-6 and Tomahawk.

The Dassault Mirage 2000 is a single-engined fourth-generation fighter developed by Dassault Aviation in the 1970s and introduced into French service in the 1980s.

Though the jet was initially developed as an air-defense and interceptor aircraft, it eventually evolved to serve a number of specialized roles for France and, more successfully, for international operators—indeed, the Mirage became one of France’s more successful fighter exports.

Mirage 2000 Fighter. Image Credit: Creative Commons.