Eve Sampson, MC Times
A new rotation of U.S.

Defense Post
The US Marine Corps has awarded General Dynamics Land Systems (GDLS) a $450-million contract for the pre-production development phase of the Advanced Reconnaissance Vehicle…

Defence Blog
Organic Precision Fires-Light, or OPF-L, a loitering munition system intended for small Marine units operating on the front line.

IntEngineering
The announcement signals a key shift in the long-running XM30 program from development to early production, marking a major step in replacing the aging M2 Bradley fleet

Raytheon secured a $627m agreement to provide the Netherlands with additional Patriot air and missile defence system equipment.

This video describes the military situation in

The states most likely to draw America into its next major crisis or war are not unknowns. They are the usual suspects: The same handful of states that have threatened the United States repeatedly across decades. Interstate rivals have caused roughly 80 percent of history’s wars and the odds of any given rivalry ending peacefully are little better than a coin toss.

On March 27, Iranian drones and missiles struck Prince Sultan Air Base in Saudi Arabia, destroying an E-3 Sentry, an airborne command center for U.S. operations in the region, and damaging multiple KC-135 tankers. It was not the first strike. Earlier in the month, an Iranian attack had already damaged five KC-135s at the same base. In the history of these aircraft, no enemy had ever achieved such a hit until Iran did both — within two weeks.These strikes are the latest in a broader pattern, part of a deliberate counterair campaign waged through asymmetric means in the U.S.

The F-35 fighter program’s primary contractor Lockheed Martin has been awarded a $11.4 million contract modification to develop additional software for Israel’s F-35 fleet, namely to produce three software data loads referred to as “productionized plus builds.” These are to be developed off existing enterprise software baselines, with work falling under Israel’s System Development and Design Phase II effort, which encompasses both software development and systems engineering activities.

The British Armed Forces have conducted a month-long operation to track three Russian submarines in British waters, accounting to a statement on March 9 by Defence Secretary John Healey. The secretary observed that an Akula class attack submarine and two spy submarines were involved, with the two secretive ships, referred to as the ‘Gugi class,’ having spent time over “critical infrastructure relevant to us and our allies.

U.S. Marines with Expeditionary Operations Training Group, III Marine Expeditionary Force test Marine-Build drones off the coast of Naval Base White Beach, Okinawa, Japan, March 22, 2026. (U.S. Marine Corps video by Cpl. Giovanni Navarrette)
For the first time, Marines and Naval Special Warfare operators struck an unmanned vessel with a small first-person view drone they launched from a boat during a test in the Pacific, the service said, billing it as a new chapter for the amphibious branch.

Iran’s drone arsenal and weapons stockpiles are mostly depleted and its capacity to produce new assets is nearly gone, according to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Dan Caine.
Those two senior officials supplied updates on Operation Epic Fury Wednesday during the first Pentagon press briefing to follow President Donald Trump’s announcement late Tuesday of a two-week ceasefire between the U.S. and Iran. 
They each broadly quantified the destruction of Iran’s military capabilities over the first five weeks of the war.

The Air Force is offering active duty pilots and other aviators up to $50,000 per year to stay in the service as part of this fiscal year’s Aviation Bonus program.
Under the program, aviators and pilots can sign contracts ranging from 3 to 12 years to be in line for up to $600,000 under the maximum bonus, according to the Air Force.
Traditionally, such bonuses have been intended to persuade pilots and other highly trained and skilled aviators to extend their service in the Air Force rather than take jobs with civilian airlines or employment elsewhere in the private sector.

The Army is conducting market research for new algorithms and sensors that could help its forces detect hazardous objects on the front lines.
The service, led by the Capability Program Executive Ammunition and Energetics, issued a notice Tuesday requesting information from industry on their automatic target recognition tools. 
“The purpose of ATR is to increase the Soldier’s ability to detect, classify, and identify threats in support of maneuver elements during autonomous breaching operations,” officials wrote.

This video describes the military situation in

The Royal Navy relies on them—but the clock i

A boom operator on a KC-135 tanker earned two Distinguished Flying Crosses on recent combat missions, the Air Force confirmed this week, a rare double-award of the military’s top medal for flight.
Staff Sgt. Gabrielle Stallings, a KC-135 boom operator, was one of 15 members of the 93rd Air Refueling Squadron who were presented with DFCs or Bronze Stars for combat flights on March 31, in a ceremony at Fairchild Air Force Base, Washington.
In all, 12 pilots and boom operators from the squadron were awarded Distinguished Flying Crosses.

As the Military Working Dog (MWD) Operational C

“World of Warships” has been on gamers’ radar for more than a decade now, and the updates just keep getting better. This year has been no exception. In its earliest days, players were abuzz with the idea of being able to fight as the Bismarck-class battleship Tirpitz. Today, the roster includes the American battleship Missouri, the Japanese battleship Yamato, the UK’s HMS Hood, and the iconic carrier USS Enterprise.

Two more Merlin Crowsnest helicopters arrive to

In 2024, Shaan Shaikh wrote, “Three Visions for NATO Air and Missile Defense,” where he laid out three potential scenarios NATO could take in the next few years to further its air and missile defense capabilities. Two years later, amidst alliance tensions and ongoing conflicts in Ukraine and the Middle East, we asked Shaan to revisit his arguments.Image: Sgt. Mariah Gonzalez via DVIDSIn your 2024 article, you laid out three potential directions NATO could take in the next few years for further developing its air and missile defense capabilities.

The US mission to rescue the downed F-15 pilot

X-Bow Systems has secured a $12.2m contract with AEVEX to manufacture rocket-assisted take-off kits for the AEVEX Disruptor drone.

The first casualty of war is always the plan—something the Russian Army relearned the hard way when it invaded Ukraine in 2022. Kyiv was supposed to fall in a matter of days. When the shock of Russia’s initial assault subsided, however, the two opposing armies became entrenched in a virtual stalemate. This stalemate has remained more or less unchanged ever since.
World War I devolved in much the same way. The German plan for the war was supposed to take all of six weeks.

U.S. troops carried on one of the Global War On Terror’s most enduring battlefield traditions by downing millions of energy drinks during the Iran war.
The topic came up during Wednesday’s Pentagon news briefing as Air Force Gen. Dan Caine, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, provided reporters with a string of final tallies for U.S. military operations against Iran following President Donald Trump’s Tuesday announcement of a two-week ceasefire. Among statistics on battlefield targets struck, Caine addressed what troops had been chugging.

The British Army has received two Airbus H145 Jupiter HC Mk2 helicopters in Brunei, part of a £148m ($196m) Ministry of Defence (MoD) initiative to renew the UK’s rotary fleet.

The US and Iran have agreed to a two-week ceasefire today (8 April) with talks starting in Islamabad on Friday 10 April.

Dieter Dengler was so poor while growing up in Germany that he and his brothers picked through garbage for scraps.
Desperate to escape his impoverished circumstances, Dengler was willing to go anywhere. He was in high school when he saw a magazine that spotlighted U.S. military pilots. It seemed like a great opportunity to Dengler, who immigrated to America in 1957 and enlisted in the Air Force.
Related: 7 POWs who were total badasses after being taken captive
Dengler spent four years in the Air Force without learning to fly. During that time, though, he became a U.S.

The Armed Forces may be ready, but what about t

Watch live as U.S. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Air Force Gen. Dan Caine hold a press conference in the Pentagon Press Briefing Room.

The post LIVE 0800 EST: Pentagon Press Briefing appeared first on Armed Forces Press.

This video describes the military situation in

Jangoulun Singsit, Naval Technology
HII and GrayMatter Robotics plan to integrate Physical AI for autonomous surface preparation, coating, and inspection in shipbuilding

Defense N.
The U.S.

Everstine, Aviation W.
General Atomics Aeronautical Systems Inc.

DefScoop
The Army’s request comes amid concerns over the Pentagon draining its weapon stockpiles during Operation Epic Fury

Daniel Terrill, Army Times
The Army last week

This exclusive Cogs of War interview is with Jeffrey E. Stern, an award-winning journalist and author of the newly released The Warhead: The Quest to Build the Perfect Weapon in the Age of Modern Warfare, which details the development of Paveway, the precision-guided bomb. We asked him to share his thoughts on the bomb’s history and its role in air campaigns, and the relationship between government, science, and industry. You spent years researching and writing this book about Paveway, a relatively underdiscussed weapon.

Somewhere behind the Novodarivka breach point in June 2023, Ukrainian armored formations sat staged and ready. The ammunition was there. The fuel was there. The original concept of operations called for 12 brigades to push through roughly 30 kilometers of frontage, isolate Tokmak within days, and drive south before Russian forces could consolidate. They never moved. The engineers could not open the lane. Without the lane, none of the rest of it mattered.

Inside the hot, humid and hostile ‘green

uncomfortable truths are still truths
The rescue of the pilot and weapons sensor officer from the F-15E Strike Eagle that went down in Iran is—even with the limited information we have right now—an almost-unbelievable act in the history of the profession of arms.
I am looking forward to the details to come out, but let’s let that work its way through the system. That isn’t what I want to focus on today.
As always, let’s first look at the chart.

Personnel across the Army’s data teams have been “banging their heads against the wall” over information management issues and the service recently launched a new hub meant to help alleviate those headaches, senior military officials told reporters Tuesday.
The Army Data Operations Center went live April 3. A nucleus for network-focused staff across division-level units and above to call for help about connectivity or data issues, officials said the ADOC will free data teams from “red tape” so commanders can make quicker decisions.

Pete Hegseth Has A Problem: Trump Burned Through 4 Defense Secretaries in Term One. The Pattern Is Starting Again
Pete Hegseth was something of an unconventional choice to serve as secretary of defense.

Before his selection, Hegseth was best known as a Fox News host, although he had also led a couple of veterans groups. During Trump’s first term, Hegseth lobbied for leniency for soldiers accused of war crimes.

Hegseth’s confirmation process was tumultuous.

The Trump administration’s budget request for fiscal 2027 calls for significant funds to increase stockpiles of a long-range Army missile that’s been used during the United States’ ongoing war with Iran.
Recently released budget documents show that the Army is asking for nearly $2 billion to purchase more Precision Strike Missiles (PrSM) in FY27 — nearly four-times the amount that Congress allocated in fiscal 2026, which was $546 million.

The American military launched more one-way attack drones last night against Iran, U.S. Central Command announced Tuesday, adding that “hundreds” of unmanned platforms have been involved in Operation Epic Fury in various roles to date.
Tuesday’s announcement comes several weeks after Centcom noted that it had employed long-range kamikaze drones in combat for the first time during the early days of the Iran war, which President Donald Trump commenced on Feb. 28.

The Army’s new XM8 rifle is a shorter, lighte

This video describes the military situation in

This video describes the military situation in

This video describes the military situation in

The 1st Battalion Royal Welsh Battlegroup in Es

The Army plans to host civilian-run data centers on its bases, according to recent federal contracting documents and official statements. 
In late March, Army officials announced that it “conditionally selected” global investment firms to build, operate and manage commercial data centers on “underutilized” land at Fort Bliss, Texas and Dugway Proving Ground, Utah. The data centers are being built under an agreement with private developers to use available acres of Army property in exchange for access to computing power.