China’s New Drone Wingmen Look Set For Military Parade Unveiling

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Satellite imagery of preparations for a major upcoming military parade in China shows that new ‘loyal wingman’ type drones, or at least mockups thereof, are set to be revealed. A video clip has now emerged that is also drawing new attention to Chinese crewed-uncrewed teaming developments.

Google Earth recently updated its library to include a satellite image taken on June 11, 2025, of a military base in Yangfang, a suburb northwest of the Chinese capital of Beijing. China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) regularly uses the facility to stage assets and train for large-scale parades. In June. 

Chinese authorities announced that a parade marking the 80th anniversary of the country’s victory over Japan in World War II would be held on Sept. 3, and that it would feature unspecified “new-type combat capabilities.” Nearly two weeks ago, video also emerged showing mysteriously unidentified vehicles concealed underneath large, box-like structures, prompting speculation that a new armored vehicle will also be unveiled at the event.

The June 11 image, which began circulating online last week, shows hundreds of vehicles, including what look to be self-propelled artillery pieces and transporter erector launchers for large ballistic missiles, and other materiel in neat rows at various areas of the Yangfang base. Of particular interest are drones under wraps on trailers at the northern end of the facility. The PLA has unveiled new and updated uncrewed aircraft designs in this same way at past parades

The Pentagon’s Policy Guy Is All In on China

Nancy A. Youssef, Jonathan Lemire, and Missy Ryan

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Elbridge Colby believes that China is the only country on the planet that has the ambition, resources, and military might to knock the United States off its pedestal as the world’s leading superpower.Most in President Donald Trump’s administration agree. But even by the standards of MAGA world, Colby is a divisive figure. And the Pentagon policy master’s prescription for how to counter China’s rise explains why. The only way to stop Beijing’s bid for global dominance, he has argued, is for the U.S. to pour everything it can into securing the Western Pacific, even if doing so comes at the expense of combatting Russia or maintaining U.S. influence in the Middle East.

That is, to remain superpowerful, the U.S. may need to temporarily stop superpowering. Colby didn’t always think this way. During Trump’s first term, he wrote a strategy document that advocated continuing to try to do it all, as superpowers do. But his attitude has evolved, and along the way, he has amped up the ire among his enemies—including fellow Republicans and U.S. allies abroad.Colby’s worldview was at the root of U.S. indecision this summer over whether to provide Ukraine with badly needed weapons. 

When the U.S. military canceled an expected shipment late last month, catching even the White House off guard, the blame—and the credit—went to Colby.It was an unlikely moment in the spotlight for a policy wonk whose stances had, until recently, been little-noticed beyond the world of Beltway think tanks. Some on the right, including hawkish GOP senators, seized upon the decision as evidence that Colby should be ousted, and began pushing the White House to act. Others in the MAGA movement cheered the suspension—Tucker Carlson is a longtime Colby fan—and described the move as evidence of a truly “America First” national-security strategy.

Both wings of the movement were ultimately disappointed: Within days of the pause, Trump not only reversed it, he went a step further in providing new support to Kyiv. And far from being fired, Colby appears secure in his position at the Pentagon, his influence undiminished. In some ways, Colby personifies an ongoing shift within the Republican Party. Trump has moved away from positioning the U.S. as defender of the post–Cold War order and toward preserving its resources for threats that directly affect the U.S. homeland—with China at the top of the list.

Fitter, faster and fiercer: How Indian Army is changing its tactics to counter two-front threats from China and Pakistan

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Amid rising regional tensions and rapid changes in military technology, the Indian Army is quietly undergoing one of its most significant shifts in decades, not with loud announcements, but through deliberate structural reforms, strategic exercises, and a visible change in how it prepares for a two- or three-front war. It is moving away from its legacy of manpower-heavy formations toward a leaner, younger, and more technology-enabled force. 

This transformation is centred on three visible pivots: reducing overall troop size while inducting younger jawans through the Agnipath scheme, modernising surveillance and combat capabilities with drones and AI-backed systems, and restructuring combat units by raising integrated formations like Rudra and Bhairav. Taken together, these reforms reflect a calibrated response to the demands of modern warfare—where speed, real-time intelligence, and joint operations increasingly define battlefield outcomes.

Younger soldiers and leaner force through AgnipathThe Army’s effort to create a younger and faster-moving force is being led by changes in recruitment. Since 2022, all new soldiers have been inducted through the Agnipath scheme as short-term Agniveers. No regular soldier recruitment has taken place since 2020.

As reported by The Print in June last year, this shift has led in a personnel reduction estimated at 1,27,660 to 1,68,660. However, officials see this as part of a deliberate shift to lower the average age of soldiers and build a leaner Army structure.The move aims to reduce non-combat staff and improve the “tooth-to-tail” ratio, freeing up resources for frontline capabilities and technology upgrades.

The Death of Democracy Promotion

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On April 29, 1999, precision-guided NATO bombs tore through the brick facades of two defense-ministry buildings in Belgrade, the capital of the rump state of Yugoslavia. The targets were chosen more for symbolic reasons than operational ones: The American-led coalition wanted to send the country’s authoritarian government, at that time engaged in a brutal campaign of ethnic cleansing in Kosovo, a clear message that human rights weren’t just words. They were backed by weapons.

For decades, the ruins of the buildings, on either side of a major artery through central Belgrade, were left largely untouched. Tangled concrete and twisted rebar stuck out of pancaked floors. Serbian architects fought to preserve the destroyed buildings; the government has treated them as a war memorial.At the time of the 1999 NATO bombings, Aleksandar Vučić, Serbia’s minister of information, was tasked with denouncing the West and backing his country’s despot, Slobodan Milošević.

Vučić is not Milošević—he has not led his country into genocidal wars or faced judgment for war crimes at The Hague—but until recently, he might have expected that his authoritarian style would make relations with Washington rocky. That time is past. Instead of harshly condemning Serbia’s abuses, America’s president, Donald Trump, will build a Trump Tower Belgrade on top of the defense buildings’ ruins. “Belgrade welcomes a Global Icon,” the slick website for Trump Belgrade proclaims. “TRUMP. Unrivaled Luxury.” The contract for the project has been signed with Affinity Partners, Jared Kushner’s investment firm, which is largely funded with billions of dollars in cash from Saudi Arabia.

This story is the material expression of the second Trump administration’s turn against a long-standing tradition of Western democracy promotion—and of an embrace of conflicts of interest from which the world’s despots can only take inspiration. The authoritarians who govern small countries such as Serbia no longer need to fear the condemnation, much less the bombs, of the American president when they crack down on their opponents, enrich themselves, or tighten their grip on power. On the contrary—the American flirtation with similar practices emboldens them. 

Subverted By Drones

Source Linik

For years, US drones like the MQ-1 Predator and MQ-9 Reaper dominated our vision of unmanned warfare. But that view of drone warfare—remote controlled from across the globe, exquisite, expensive—now looks out of date. It is not systems like the Predator or the Reaper that dominate the battlefields in Ukraine, Israel, or Iran, but instead cheap quadcopters, mines, and missiles. 

The “unmanned war” playing out in those battlegrounds at this moment is a story of intense and rapid experimentation and innovation. How are these wars changing our understanding of drones and warfare, and will they force the United States to re-evaluate its beliefs about unmanned technology and the future of the American way of war? Ukraine is perhaps the battlefield where contemporary drones have been most prolific. 

Both Ukraine and an invading Russia have experimented extensively with drones, missiles, mines, and even unmanned naval and surface vehicles.The drones that dominate that battlefield are not the expensive systems used by the United States during the war on terror, but instead are primarily short-range, commercial unmanned aerial systems. These small quadcopters employ first-person view, using thermal or electro-optic cameras to give a controller on the ground a bird’s-eye view of the battlefield through a helmet or a digital display. 

These systems are useful for intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR)—spotting enemy targets, cueing artillery or air support, and providing commanders with an understanding of the battlefield. But they are more than eyes in the sky. Many are armed with small anti-tank or anti-personnel munitions capable of attacking targets up to nine miles away; others carry remote mines that both Ukraine and Russia have used to slow down ground troops trying to take territory.

The Hoover Institution Launches Technology Policy Accelerator to Guide US Innovation

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Hoover Institution (Stanford, CA) – The Hoover Institution has officially launched the Technology Policy Accelerator (TPA), a bold new initiative aimed at helping US government and business leaders navigate the rapidly evolving landscape of emerging technologies and their implications for national security, economic growth, and global leadership.The TPA’s mission is to support more informed policymaking by producing insights that clarify how emerging technologies are reshaping geopolitics, society, and the economy. It operates as a collaborative hub—connecting Silicon Valley and Washington, academia and industry, and science and strategy—to foster dialogue and advance understanding across sectors.

The TPA’s scholars contribute to these efforts through cutting edge research, briefings to government leaders, congressional testimonies, and wide-ranging public engagement across media platforms. They also participate in conferences and seminars that bring together experts from government, industry, and academia to exchange ideas and explore solutions to pressing technology policy challenges.Speaking at the launch event on Stanford’s campus on Monday, June 16, Condoleezza Rice, Tad and Dianne Taube Director of the Hoover Institution and America’s 66th secretary of state, emphasized why Stanford is uniquely suited for this initiative.

“Senator Stanford, when he created and founded Stanford University, gave us a great gift of this land that allowed us all to be co-located,” she said. “And then, of course, what he could never have known was that Stanford would then be co-located in the hub of innovation in the country and in the world, here in the Silicon Valley.”That proximity gives us a unique ability to bring together the scientific community, the private sector, and the public sector to address the most pressing technological challenges and opportunities of our time.”

Rice also underscored a growing concern about the erosion of America’s commitment to fundamental research, pointing to Stanford’s unique role at the heart of the country’s innovation ecosystem. She emphasized that the breakthroughs which have shaped industries and strengthened national security – including the double helix, transistors, and the founding of Hewlett Packard and Google – have emerged from the foundational research conducted at universities like Stanford.

Iran-Israel AI War Propaganda Is a Warning to the World

Mahsa Alimardani and Sam Gregory

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The Democracy, Conflict, and Governance Program is a leading source of independent policy research, writing, and outreach on global democracy, conflict, and governance. It analyzes and seeks to improve international efforts to reduce democratic backsliding, mitigate conflict and violence, overcome political polarization, promote gender equality, and advance pro-democratic uses of new technologies.Learn More

On June 23, 2025, WITNESS received a WhatsApp video showing clouds of smoke billowing from Evin prison in Tajrish, Iran. Filmed from a nearby apartment, the communication carried a stark message: “They are trying to open Evin.” The infamous prison—a site of torture, killing, and confinement of dissidents, journalists, and activists—had been bombed. Israeli officials deemed the strike “symbolic,” a gesture against the Islamic Republic’s repression. For many Iranians, shattering the gates of Evin seemed to be a resonant symbol of hope for the freedom of the nation’s best and brightest long held behind its walls.

On social media, Israel tried to capitalize on this development. Its foreign minister posted another clip showing Evin’s entrance gates being blown apart in an apparent surgical strike. He boasted on X (formerly Twitter), “¡Viva la libertad, carajo!” (“Long live freedom, damn it!”). But unlike the first video, the Israeli footage was likely fake.Forensic analysis of the Israeli clip suggests that it was likely created using artificial intelligence (AI). For example, it contained still images of the Evin gates found in an article published in 2021; these images could have been manipulated by AI tools. These findings were corroborated by the Deepfakes Rapid Response Force, a rapid response mechanism for evaluating deceptive AI run globally by WITNESS.1

Although the Israeli foreign minister’s video depicted a clean precision strike, in reality, the attack on Evin was far from that; Israel’s bombs resulted in significant collateral damage. Human rights groups and other observers reported on the deaths of residents and commuters near the prison, casualties among family members who were visiting or posting bail, and serious injuries and deaths among the prisoners Israel claimed it was freeing. Advocates even reported that surviving prisoners were moved to more harrowing conditions because the prison was destroyed.

UK to recognise Palestinian state unless Israel meets conditions

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The UK will recognise a Palestinian state in September unless Israel takes "substantive steps to end the appalling situation in Gaza", Sir Keir Starmer has said.The PM said Israel must also meet other conditions, including agreeing to a ceasefire, committing to a long-term sustainable peace that delivers a two-state solution, and allowing the United Nations to restart the supply of aid, or the UK would take the step at September's UN General Assembly.

Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the move "rewards Hamas's monstrous terrorism".The UK government has previously said recognition should come at a point when it can have maximum impact, as part of a peace process.However, the PM has been under growing pressure - including from his own MPs - to act more quickly.Last week France also announced it would officially recognise a Palestinian state in September - the first of the G7 group of the world's richest countries to do so.

Giving a news conference after holding an emergency cabinet meeting, Sir Keir said he was announcing the plan now because of the "intolerable situation" in Gaza and concern that "the very possibility of a two-state solution is reducing".He told reporters that the UK's goal of "a safe secure Israel alongside a viable and sovereign Palestinian state" was "under pressure like never before".The PM added that his "primary aim" was to improve the situation on the ground in Gaza, including ensuring that aid gets in.

In outlining the steps UK wanted the Israeli government to take, Sir Keir also said it should make clear there will be no annexations in the West Bank.The current Israeli government is opposed to progress towards a two-state solution so it is highly unlikely to agree to the conditions.Meanwhile, Sir Keir said Hamas must immediately release all hostages, sign up to a ceasefire, disarm and accept that they will play no part in the government of Gaza.In response to the announcement Netanyahu wrote on social media: "A jihadist state on Israel's border TODAY will threaten Britain TOMORROW.

The Collapse of Syria Has Begun

Ted Galen Carpenter

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Violence is accelerating under Syria’s new Islamist government, as is the persecution of ethnic and religious minorities. This tragedy was entirely predictable. As far back as Barack Obama’s first term, critics warned that Washington’s flirtation with and assistance to Sunni Arab radicals would turn out badly. Nevertheless, Joe Biden’s administration persisted in that approach in an effort to overthrow the secular government of Bashar al-Assad. 

From the standpoint of US policymakers, Assad had committed two unpardonable sins. He transformed his country into Iran’s closest regional ally, and he forged closer ties with Vladimir Putin’s Russia. Indeed, Russian air power played an important role in 2016 in enabling Syrian government forces to rout the predominantly Sunni insurgency and regain control of key portions of Syria.The ability of Tehran and Moscow to prop up Assad’s government gradually faded as the years passed, however.

Moscow’s assistance, especially, became less reliable as the Kremlin changed its principal strategic focus to the conflict in Ukraine. During the final year of Biden’s administration, a de facto alliance consisting of the United States, Israel, Saudi Arabia, and Turkey redoubled its efforts to bring Syria’s insurgents to power.That move finally succeeded. In December 2024, a Sunni Islamist coalition led by the Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) movement—once an affiliate of Al Qaeda—successfully ousted the Assad government. Washington and its allies had worked diligently for that goal since 2011, even though the effort triggered a civil war that had produced more than 600,000 fatalities and over 13 million people displaced.

Biden administration officials, as well as the always reliable pro-imperial mouthpieces in the establishment news media, predictably portrayed the rebel victory as the “liberation” of the oppressed Syrian people. The lead segment on the December 15, 2024, edition of the CBS program “60 Minutes” was typical. Such propaganda continued a long, dishonorable tradition of portraying even Washington’s most corrupt and vicious authoritarian clients as proponents of freedom and democracy.

These wargames explored drone attacks on US military bases

Michael Peck

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in March 2024. (Sgt. Gianna Chiavarone/U.S. Army)In March 2025, the U.S. government conducted a wargame on how to defend military bases in the United States from drone attacks.Just three months later, what had seemed a theoretical possibility became frighteningly close to reality. In June 2025 came Ukraine’s Operation Spiderweb. Ukrainian agents had spent months smuggling hundreds of drones deep inside Russia. In a coordinated strike, more than 100 small drones destroyed 20 to 40 Russian warplanes on five airbases scattered from Moscow to Siberia.

The damage extended to more than Russian airpower or the Kremlin’s pride. The drone’s-eye videos of burning bombers sent a chilling signal to nations around the world. If this could happen to Russia, then it could happen to any country — including the United States.Since 2022, the U.S. Army’s Joint Counter-Small Unmanned Aircraft Systems Office, or JCO, and the RAND Corp. think tank have held six wargames on how to mitigate the drone threat.

“We are trying to understand the policies and authorities we have in place to prevent us from contending with a scenario like Operation Spiderweb,” said Paul Lushenko, an assistant professor at the U.S. Army War College who helped run the drone wargame.Many of the details of these wargames are classified, but one key finding is that protecting domestic U.S. bases can’t be just the military’s job.

“The tabletop exercise emphasized the need for a framework to integrate, enable, and synchronize state, local, tribal, and territorial authorities into counter-drone operations at or near military bases,” noted an essay by the game’s designers. But this, in turn, raises a slew of jurisdictional and communication issues.This image, taken from video released June 1, 2025, by a source in the Ukrainian Security Service, shows a Ukrainian drone striking Russian planes deep in Russia's territory during Operation Spiderweb. (Ukrainian Security Service via AP)

America Should Assume the Worst About AI

Matan Chorev

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National security leaders rarely get to choose what to care about and how much to care about it. They are more often subjects of circumstances beyond their control. The September 11 attacks reversed the George W. Bush administration’s plan to reduce the United States’ global commitments and responsibilities. Revolutions across the Arab world pushed President Barack Obama back into the Middle East just as he was trying to pull the United States out. And Russia’s invasion of Ukraine upended the Biden administration’s goal of establishing “stable and predictable” relations with Moscow so that it could focus on strategic competition with China.

Policymakers could foresee many of the underlying forces and trends driving these agenda-shaping events. Yet for the most part, they failed to plan for the most challenging manifestations of where these forces would lead. They had to scramble to reconceptualise and recalibrate their strategies to respond to unfolding events.The rapid advance of artificial intelligence—and the possible emergence of artificial general intelligence—promises to present policymakers with even greater disruption.

Indicators of a coming powerful change are everywhere. Beijing and Washington have made global AI leadership a strategic imperative, and leading U.S. and Chinese companies are racing to achieve AGI. News coverage features near-daily announcements of technical breakthroughs, discussions of AI-driven job loss, and fears of catastrophic global risks such as the AI-enabled engineering of a deadly pandemic.There is no way of knowing with certainty the exact trajectory along which AI will develop or precisely how it will transform national security. 

Policymakers should therefore assess and debate the merits of competing AI strategies with humility and caution. Whether one is bullish or bearish about AI’s prospects, though, national security leaders need to be ready to adapt their strategic plans to respond to events that could impose themselves on decision-makers this decade, if not during this presidential term. Washington must prepare for potential policy tradeoffs and geopolitical shifts, and identify practical steps it can take today to mitigate risks and turbocharge U.S. competitiveness. Some ideas and initiatives that today may seem infeasible or unnecessary will seem urgent and self-evident with the benefit of hindsight.

United States Navy Force Structure

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The author of this report addresses the mismatch between the challenges that the U.S. Navy is likely to face in the international arena over the next decade and beyond and the Navy’s likely force structure. Over several decades, the Navy’s force structure has gotten smaller, although the overall capabilities of its ships and submarines have improved and expanded. In this report, the author considers potential force structure shortfalls and suggests possible adjustments that can be made to how the Navy approaches force structure development. The author recommends that particular emphasis be placed on platforms that are capable of being deployed in sufficient numbers to provide a persistent presence before crises develop.

The findings discussed in this report are based on research conducted from October 2023 to October 2024. Previously, the author spent several years researching the U.S. Navy and its interactions with potential adversaries, particularly the forces of the People’s Republic of China (PRC). In this report, the author applied this previous work to what is viewed as a significantly changed set of circumstances from those that drove the development of Navy force structure up to this point in history. This was an exploratory project intended as a roadmap for future study.

The U.S. Navy’s historical missions included presence and crisis response below the level of general war. These historical missions have provided options for decision-makers throughout the Navy’s history. The PRC invested in maritime military and paramilitary forces that allow it to coerce without resorting to high-end force. The Navy’s force structure is purportedly optimised for a major conventional battle, but military exercise results have cast doubt on the actual relevance of much of its force for such a campaign.

Small surface combatants may have significant value in crisis response and presence. However, the industrial base is not well positioned to produce them. The requirements process that the Navy employs is consensus-based and does not account for capabilities that lack significant community sponsorship. The force has insufficient capacity to meet either worldwide presence or crisis response requirements.The Navy is unable to meet the sustainment demands associated with a large and dispersed force structure.

Opportunities After Midnight: Hammer

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We are in a period of momentous change in the Middle East. The successes of Operation Midnight Hammer and the military activities leading up to it not only set back Iran’s nuclear program but also shattered the illusion that Iran is a reliable or capable protector for its proxies. Iran failed to assist Hamas in any meaningful way, with the civilians of Gaza suffering the terrible consequences of the war. In Lebanon, Hezbollah has been weakened, with the Lebanese state working towards reestablishing authority in the country. In Syria, while stability is fragile, a new government is in place. The United States has lifted sanctions to allow Syria a chance at recovery and reintegration into the region and, more broadly, the international community. 

Iraq, too, stands at a turning point, with the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) defeated five years ago and with upcoming elections that could further challenge Iranian influence and allow the country to chart a more independent path. The common thread is clear: Iran is no longer able to project disruptive power across the region to the extent it once did. Yet Iran is down, not out. History has handed us an opening. There is a strategic opportunity to set a new course for the Middle East, helping its people improve their lives, improving global stability, and realigning the war-torn countries of the region toward the United States. 

But this opportunity cannot be secured 1 The opinions and conclusions expressed in this testimony are the author’s alone and should not be interpreted as representing those of RAND or any of the sponsors of its research. 2 RAND is a research organization that develops solutions to public policy challenges to help make communities throughout the world safer and more secure, healthier and more prosperous. RAND is nonprofit, nonpartisan, and committed to the public interest. RAND’s mission is enabled through its core values of quality and objectivity and its commitment to integrity and ethical behavior. 

RAND subjects its research publications to a robust and exacting quality-assurance process; avoids financial and other conflicts of interest through staff training.project screening, and a policy of mandatory disclosure.and pursues transparency through the open publication of research findings and recommendations, disclosure of the source of funding of published research, and policies to ensure intellectual independence. 

Netanyahu Is Spoiling Trump’s Chance for Peace

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Following the Israeli and U.S. attacks on Iranian nuclear sites and the subsequent Iranian-Israeli cease-fire, another agreement seemed to be close at hand, this time in Gaza. Late last week, however, both the United States and Israel halted their participation in the negotiations, accusing Hamas of a lack of coordination and good faith. Hamas, the Islamist organization and de facto authority in the Gaza Strip, wants the United States to guarantee that the cease-fire will become permanent, Israel to withdraw its military, and the UN and other aid providers to surge humanitarian assistance to Palestinians who are facing mass starvation.

U.S. President Donald Trump’s continued deference to Israel and his withdrawal from the talks are a huge mistake. Unless a deal can be made, Trump’s desire to preside over a broader regional peace that includes the normalization of diplomatic ties between Israel and Saudi Arabia will be dead in the water. Such a comprehensive regional agreement is desperately needed after 21 months of death and destruction in Gaza and persistent conflict between Israel and much of the Middle East.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his ultranationalist governing coalition, however, have not shown any signs that they are ready to prioritize a durable peace. Even if the remaining Israeli hostages held by Hamas since October 2023 are released, Netanyahu has emphasized that an end to the war in Gaza is impossible until Hamas is completely disarmed and its leaders exiled. And even then, he wants Israel to maintain security control over Gaza and the West Bank indefinitely. Meanwhile, as Egyptian, Qatari, and U.S. 

mediators were shuttling back and forth between the Palestinian and Israeli negotiators, Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz advanced a plan for relocating Gaza’s population into a so-called humanitarian city—what former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert refers to as a “concentration camp”—built on the ruins of Rafah near the enclave’s southern edge. Under Katz’s proposal, over two million Palestinians would be held in an area a third the size of Washington, D.C., until they can be resettled abroad.

Pentagon unit seeks Ukraine-like conditions for drone testing

Courtney Albon

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For most of the firms that participated in a late June drone trial staged by the Defence Innovation Unit in remote Alaska, it was the first time their systems had flown outside of a lab setting. The five companies brought drones and radio prototypes to a range near the U.S. Army’s Fort Wainwright to see how they’d fare against simulated electronic warfare systems looking to jam their navigation and command-and-control capabilities. DIU was assessing whether any of them were ready to transition to the military services for further development or fielding.

With a few exceptions, the lack of field testing showed. While several companies made progress by the end of the four-day test event, they struggled initially to maintain targets and navigate flight routes. Some of that was due to jamming and some of it was because their technology wasn’t as mature as expected. That outcome is not unusual for a prototype demonstration, DIU officials told Defence News during the event. 

In fact, the government team in Alaska wanted to see how the companies responded when the systems failed and whether they could iterate and come back the next day with a better solution. That process is vital for both the DOD and the companies, but most small, commercial firms don’t have access to test space where they can learn and refine their products under the types of conditions they might face in the field. That’s a problem for the Defence Department, whose leaders want to field technology — and drones in particular — from a broader pool of companies and at faster rates. 

DIU’s Trent Emeneker, who leads several autonomy projects for the organization and helped facilitate the Alaska testing, said in order to field systems that meet the needs of troops on the ground, DOD needs to change the way it tests in two key ways — by providing more opportunities for small tech companies to wring out their systems, and staging those tests in the field with military operators. If we want to succeed, we have to embed engineers with warfighters, and we have to be out in the field testing,” he said. “We have to do it all the time.” Commercial accessHelping DOD get to that “all-the-time” testing cadence is a rising priority for DIU.

The U.S. Fired 25% of Its Best Missile Interceptors in Just 12 Days. It Will Take a Decade to Replace Them.

Jack Buckby

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Key Points and Summary – The recent 12-day war between Israel and Iran exposed a “critical supply gap” in America’s most advanced missile defences. The U.S. reportedly fired between 100 and 150 THAAD interceptors—costing nearly $2 billion—to help defend Israel, depleting as much as a quarter of its entire stockpile. The crisis is magnified by the fact that the U.S. only produces about 12 of these interceptors per year, meaning it would take over a decade to replace what was used.

-This unsustainable burn rate helps explain President Trump’s hesitancy to send similar advanced systems to Ukraine. U.S. Missile Interceptor Supply Gap Exposed After Iran Strikes. The United States reportedly used as much as one quarter of its Terminal High Altitude Area Defence (THAAD) interceptor missiles to help down missiles launched at Israel by Iran during the 12-day war.

Between 100 and 150 THAAD rockets, part of the United States’ most advanced and strategically important missile defence system, were used at a cost of roughly $12.7 million each – or almost $2 billion in total. The news comes from reports by CNN and The Wall Street Journal, citing sources familiar with the cooperation. The revelation exposes a critical supply gap at a time when the White House is not only working to modernise its own forces, but also resuming arms shipments to Ukraine following a brief pause.

Reports suggest that the United States provided the rockets after learning that Israel was short on Arrow interceptors, with officials concerned that the country was only weeks away from running out. Israel, however, denied the reports. The THAAD ballistic missile defense system, designed and manufactured by Lockheed Martin, has been in service since 2008. The system is designed to intercept short- and medium-range ballistic missiles in their descent or reentry phase. Its missiles do not carry a warhead, instead relying on kinetic energy to destroy missiles before they reach their intended targets.

Stop Them Cold’: Gen. Petraeus Issues Stark Warning on Path to Ukraine Peace

Alex Raufoglu 

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WASHINGTON DC – Retired Gen. David Petraeus, who commanded US and coalition forces in Iraq and Afghanistan, said Monday that a ceasefire in Ukraine is unlikely until Western aid allows Kyiv to dramatically shift the battlefield dynamic.His comments came as President Donald Trump announced a drastically shortened deadline for Russia to agree to a truce. Speaking at a Hudson Institute event in Washington DC, Petraeus, also a former CIA director, emphasized that Ukraine needs substantial assistance to make Russian President Vladimir Putin realize he cannot achieve further gains at an acceptable cost.

“I don’t foresee a ceasefire deal between Russia and Ukraine until the US, European and other Western countries provide so much assistance to Ukraine that they can change the dynamic on the battlefield,” said Petraeus, now a chairman of the KKR Global Institute.He pointed to Putin’s high tolerance for casualties, noting Russia has sustained “one million killed and wounded,” with more than 500,000 unable to return to the front lines.

“That’s the kind of cost he’s been willing to bear. So you would have to do something very dramatic. You have to stop them cold on the battlefield,” he said.Petraeus, reflecting on his own experiences writing condolence letters during his combat commands, expressed difficulty comprehending the scale of losses in Ukraine. He also suggested that Russian commanders, such as Yevgeny Prigozhin, the late leader of the Wagner mercenary group, may have become “somewhat crazed” from witnessing so many deaths.

For Putin to consider a realistic settlement, Petraeus said, Ukraine must be able to “stop them cold, perhaps even push them back a bit.”He dismissed Russia’s current demands – including the replacement of President Volodymyr Zelensky, the demilitarization of Ukraine, and a ban on NATO membership – as “obviously unacceptable to President Zelensky and really to the Ukrainian people.”Meanwhile, President Trump on Monday dramatically tightened his deadline for Russia to agree to a ceasefire with Ukraine, reducing it to less than two weeks from the 50 days he initially announced.

Did the West Provoke Putin’s War on Ukraine?

Andrew Goodman 

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Abstract: A number of prominent scholars, journalists, and politicians have advanced the thesis that the West provoked Putin into attacking Ukraine by enlarging NATO into Central and Eastern Europe and by declaring in 2008 that Ukraine would become a member as well. The dubious assumptions on which this thesis is based are contradicted by my personal experiences at NATO and with Vladimir Putin, which show, first, that the Russian Government has always known that NATO’s 2008 declaration was essentially hollow; and second, that well before he became Russian President, Putin saw the West as an adversary and believed Ukraine naturally belonged to Russia’s sphere of influence. 

Putin’s war against Ukraine is best seen, therefore, as Putin’s last-ditch effort to stifle Ukrainian efforts to escape from Russia’s orbit rather than the result of Great Power competition.I would argue that attributing responsibility to the West for provoking Putin ignores that he has long been on a quest to return Russia to a position of dominance over Ukraine and other countries in Eastern Europe. During his politically formative years in the 1980s and 90s, Putin served as a KGB operative in the German Democratic Republic (GDR), and then as a city official in St. Petersburg. 

His words and deeds over these years demonstrate that his original and enduring goal has been to return Russia to great power status with all the trappings that accompany such a position, including the domination of neighbouring states. From this perspective, the war in Ukraine would primarily be the result of Putin’s desire to end Ukraine’s persistent efforts to escape the Russian orbit. Rather than try to explain the war in Ukraine as a consequence of great power competition, it seems to me more likely that the war is the outcome of great power/lesser power dynamics.

The current debate over responsibility for the war in Ukraine effectively began with an article written by John Mearsheimer in 2014, which argued that the West was at fault for the events leading up to Russia’s annexation of Crimea. Mearsheimer sees the ongoing conflict in Ukraine as a consequence of NATO’s 2008 declaration that Ukraine would (someday) become a member of the Alliance. On several occasions since the war began in February 2022, Mearsheimer has reiterated his view that NATO’s engagement with Ukraine sparked Putin’s decision to take military action.

Why has the Russian ruble performed so well this year?

Justin Klawans

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While Russia's economy has faced significant turmoil due to heavy war-related sanctions, the country's currency has not suffered. The Russian ruble has grown significantly and is up 45% against the U.S. dollar in 2025. And interest rates on ruble deposits have similarly seen widespread growth, helping to attract investment savers. But according to financial analysts, the spike in the ruble's value may end up doing more harm than good to Russia's economy.

What did the commentators say?

The ruble has become the "best-performing global currency, posting this year's strongest gains against the dollar," said Bloomberg. It has even outperformed generally safe commodities like gold and silver, as well as typically strong European currencies like the Swedish krona and Swiss franc.The spike in the ruble, as shown by data from the Bank of Russia, has been "driven primarily by the central bank's tight monetary policy and optimism" that the war in Ukraine could end, said Reuters. 

The Russian bank's handling of China's currency, the yuan, has also played a role, as Russia has been "selling the Chinese yuan, its only major intervention tool, to support the ruble." As a result, when the ruble "strengthens against the yuan, its rate against the dollar strengthens as well to avoid arbitrage." This has made China's currency more valuable in Russia than the U.S. dollar, and in "2024, 95% of Russia's trade with China was settled in yuan and rubles."

The "strength of the ruble has less to do with a sudden jump in foreign investors' confidence than with capital controls and policy tightening," said CNBC. Russia's central bank has "maintained a restrictive stance to curtail high inflation," and there has also been a "decline in foreign currency demand from local importers" due to the shrinking U.S. dollar, Andrei Melaschenko, an economist at Renaissance Capital, said to CNBC. The decline in the dollar has "given the ruble a boost as banks don't need to sell rubles to buy the dollar or yuan."

What next?

Missile Systems in Homeopathic Doses

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In mid-July 2025, Germany submitted an official Letter of Request for the Typhon missile system, also known as the “Strategic Mid-Range Fires System.” While the Letter of Request does not imply that a procurement decision has been finalised — the German parliament would still need to allocate funding in any case — it signals a strong interest on Germany’s part. This post examines the request and offers insights into how quickly a Typhon purchase could help close Germany’s capability gap in the deep strike segment.

Thanks for reading Missile Matters — with Fabian Hoffmann! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work. For about a year now, Germany has publicly emphasised its intention to acquire a deep precision-strike capability, capable of engaging targets far behind the frontline. Germany has been a founding member of the European Long-Range Strike Approach (ELSA) program, announced in July 2024, which seeks to develop a European ground-launched conventional missile system with a range between 1,000 km and 2,000 km.

Additionally, in October 2024, Germany and the United Kingdom signed the Trinity House Agreement, under which Germany committed to developing a new long-range strike capability with a range exceeding 2,000 km in partnership with the United Kingdom. This commitment was recently reaffirmed. Beyond aspirational programs and conceptual work, Germany’s actual missile procurement has remained limited, however, despite the demonstrated importance of missile systems in Ukraine and repeated affirmations by German officials of the value of systems like the Taurus KEPD 350.

In 2023, Germany likely ordered 75 AGM-158B JASSM-ER cruise missiles (1,000 km range), the maximum number it was authorised to buy, alongside its 35 F-35A Lightning II aircraft. In June 2025, Germany placed an order for an unspecified number of Joint Strike Missiles (500+ km range), valued at approximately $645 million. Assuming a per-unit cost of $3–3.5 million, this corresponds to roughly 180 to 215 missiles.At best, these acquisitions can be described as “homoeopathic” in scale. Moreover, the deep strike segment — if defined as a range significantly exceeding 1,000 kilometres — has remained unaddressed.

Israel’s Zones of Denial

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On June 13th, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu launched the first in a series of attacks that his military and intelligence establishments had been preparing for more than a decade, striking at the heart of Ayatollah Khamenei’s nuclear program.Photo illustration by Cristiana Couceiro; Source photographs from GettyOne night, not long after a ceasefire between Israel and Iran took hold, I was sitting at the bar of a crowded restaurant north of Tel Aviv, a place buzzing with high-spirited talk and laughter, jokes shouted over bottles of wine. All at once, every phone in the room lit up with alerts. One read:

BREAKING: The I.D.F. has identified a ballistic missile launch from Yemen toward Israeli territory. The Israeli Air Force is operating to intercept the threat, the I.D.F. said.The news came with a map scarred with a blob of angry red, covering nearly all of central Israel—including, as far as I could tell, the bar where I sat with a burger and a beer. For a moment, everything seemed to pause.

Starting on June 13th, with the onset of Israel’s prolonged bombardment of Iran’s nuclear facilities and the aerial assassinations of many of its military and intelligence chiefs and nuclear scientists, Israelis had regularly been warned by wailing sirens and bulletins on their phones that ballistic missiles and drones of retaliation were headed their way. They had just a few minutes to clamber out of bed, wake the kids, and get to municipal bomb shelters or to a mamad, a safe room equipped with steel doors, reinforced concrete, and blast-resistant windows. Through twelve days of war, schools and most businesses closed. The streets were nearly abandoned.

In the early days of the war, the Israel Defense Forces estimated that between eight hundred and four thousand Israelis would be killed. In the end, the number of dead was twenty-eight. Physical damage, to be sure, was widespread. Windows were blown out at the headquarters of Mossad. Missiles had hit the Soroka hospital, in Beersheba; several buildings in central Tel Aviv close to the Kirya, the country’s military nerve center; the Bazan oil refinery, in Haifa; the Weizmann Institute of Science, in Rehovot; the Tel Nof airbase; the Zipporit armor-and-weapons-production base; and a ten-story building in Bat Yam, where nine people were killed, including five members of a Ukrainian family. 

Putin Tries to Build Himself a Position of Strength

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The July 23 Russian-Ukrainian talks in Istanbul yielded no diplomatic progress, as both sides remain entrenched in incompatible positions. Both sides, however, found it important to demonstrate readiness for further communication and to continue the exchange of prisoners. Both Ukraine and Russia appear to be seeking to make an impression on the U.S. administration with their diplomatic maneuvers, and Moscow commentators say that the U.S. position is what ultimately determines the outcome of the conflict.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has doubled down on nuclear signaling to project strength abroad amid economic strain and sanctions. While Russia expands its submarine forces, cracks in its naval capacity and economic system mar the facade of strategic dominance. Expectations for the third round of Russian-Ukrainian negotiations in Istanbul on July 23 had been very low, and the forty-minute-long talks delivered exactly that. Neither side showed any flexibility in their incompatible positions on the frameworks of a peace deal outlined in memos presented at the previous meeting on June 2 (RBC, July 22). 

Both sides, nevertheless, found it important to show readiness for further communications and to continue the exchange of prisoners, relaxing the principle of equal numbers for the wounded and sick (Interfax, July 23). Ukraine sought to strengthen its proposition for an immediate, unconditional ceasefire by suggesting a meeting between Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Russian President Vladimir Putin in August, and the Turkish mediators appear eager to facilitate it (The Moscow Times, July 26). The Kremlin rejected this idea outright, despite U.S. President Donald Trump’s opinion on this meeting as “possible” being published in official media (RIA Novosti, July 25).

Both parties appear to be seeking to make an impression on the U.S. administration with their diplomatic maneuvers, and Moscow commentators emphasize particularly that Trump did not appear irked by the poor outcome of the Istanbul talks (Nezavisimaya gazeta, July 24). The prevailing opinion is that Zelenskyy merely amplifies the stance of key European states, primarily Germany and the United Kingdom, which are firmly set on continuing the war, so speaking with him makes little sense (RIAC, July 18). Commentators argue that the U.S.

Trump’s New Two‑Week Ultimatum for Putin: Will This Attempt at High Speed Diplomacy Work?

Guy D. McCardle

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In a charged summer escalation, President Donald Trump announced today that he is slashing the 50‑day window he previously gave Russian President Vladimir Putin to negotiate a peace deal or ceasefire in Ukraine—cutting it down to just 10 to 12 days, aiming for progress by roughly August 7–9, 2025.

How do you think that is going to work out? Putin isn’t exactly the kind of guy who likes being told what to do. Stay tuned.Barely two weeks ago, Trump unveiled a 50‑day ultimatum, warning Putin of “very severe tariffs” —possibly up to 100 percent—and secondary sanctions targeting third‑party economies unless a ceasefire or peace deal was secured. That deadline would have expired in early September.

But the conflict has refused to cool. Russia’s missile and drone strikes have continued to rain death and destruction on Kyiv and other urban centres, even after the ultimatum was issued. Trump declared his disappointment bluntly:I’m not so interested in talking [to Putin] anymore. He talks. We have such nice conversations … and then people die the following night in a missile strike. Every time I think it’s going to end, he kills people.”

Infanteering in the Drone Age

Benjamin Reed

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When I went to military police One Station Unit Training at Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri, in the summer of 2006, I remember my drill instructor looking at a training schedule; we were supposed to learn how to dig foxholes. He waved it off and said, “We’ll skip this. If you ever find yourself needing to dig a foxhole or a trench, something is seriously wrong.” He wasn’t wrong; for that era, doctrine didn’t prioritise field fortifications. That lack of training, combined with herniated discs, left me struggling when I had to dig trenches in the southern Donbas. Learning early 20th-century infantry operations became a baptism by fire. I managed to earn my stripes as a proper grunt nonetheless; this being my third war after Iraq and Afghanistan.

Much of the combat I experienced in Ukraine occurred during the static phase of 2022, where neither side launched significant offensives in the areas where I was deployed. I often felt futile in my role, reduced to praying artillery wouldn’t reduce us to pink mist. So I decided to enhance my capabilities. I started working with the local drone team of the Ukrainian Volunteer Army before transitioning to the International Legion, where I served as both a rifleman and drone operator. 

There was no dedicated drone unit at the time; my duties were ad hoc. Still, having ISR drone capabilities at the squad level was a game-changer. But it came with new responsibilities: I had to become a field technician. Hobbyist drones malfunction, and support was limited. This added stress contributed to my burnout, and I left in August 2022. But being a war junkie, I came back a year later. The war had evolved. FPV drones were everywhere. 

I enrolled in a Ukrainian suicide FPV drone course outside Kyiv to learn a new skill set. Again, with this skill came technical troubleshooting duties. But I never got to apply them operationally; during training, I jumped from a Humvee, and my back and knee flared up. An MRI revealed I needed a knee replacement, along with four herniated discs. That effectively ended my ability to continue. Since then, FPV proliferation has only increased. These drones now account for as much, if not more, lethality than artillery, traditionally responsible for 70% of battlefield deaths. 

The European Humiliation By Trump Is Ultimately Europe's Fault

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I’m going to start this post by describing two almost identical powers that existed one century apart. One of these powers had reached its relative position in 1900 and the other in 2000. These powers were both continent-spanning, with large populations, access to natural resources, excellent universities, and were scientifically and technologically advanced, They both had great deal of hope for their future developments and it was widely believed that they would both grow strongly in the coming decades.

In statistical and military terms they were also eerily similar. The 1900 power possessed around 18% of world GDP and the 2000 power either 20.2% (according to PPP) or 21.2% (at current prices). Moreover, one had the fourth largest population groupings in the world in 1900 and the other had the third largest global population.

The 1900 power actually had, relatively speaking, a less effective military, with one of the numerically smallest armies in the western world, certainly if measured by population, and either the 4th or 5th largest navy. The 2000 power would have had the second strongest military in the world in comparison—though with major weaknesses. Both of these militaries were technologically advanced for the time, with professional personnel well trained for their different eras, though with serious limitations on where and how they could deploy.

I’m sure many of you guessed right away who I am talking about—the 1900 power is the United States of America and the 2000 power is the European Union. Sometimes its forgotten how strong the European Union was seen to be in 2000, not just a secondary power to the USA, but potentially even a rival. Richard Haas, writing for the Brookings Institute, in late 1999 summarized the uneven state of the US-European relationship as: