Smart Bombs: Military, Defense and National Security
As I noted in a previous piece on the stealthy Zumwalt-class guided-missile destroyers (DDGs), the name of Admiral Elmo Russell Zumwalt Jr. is a...
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Michael Rubin argues that restoring Turkey's place in the Joint Strike Fighter program would reward a decade of the behavior that got Ankara expelled...
The expectation that cutting U.S. aid would force Ukraine to fold is dead: Russia cannot win this war without a mass mobilization or nuclear...
Western analysts fixate on North Korea's missiles. The real danger is speed — a mass artillery-and-missile salvo in the war's first hours, backed by...
China's aerospace industry did something that looked impossible 20 years ago: it built one of the world's largest stealth-fighter fleets. But the J-20's greatest...
The second Trump administration is reviewing America's military footprint in Europe, and the worst-case outcome is a full withdrawal. Andrew Michta argues that would...
The US-Iran Memorandum of Understanding is being judged on whether it cools tensions in the Persian Gulf. Strategic-studies scholar Andrew Michta argues that's the...
Iran: A War at the Wrong Time and Place: As the war in Iran continues and analysts debate how long it will last and...
Strategic expert Andrew A. Michta explores how Russia is capitalizing on the Iran War to consolidate gains in Europe. With U.S. resources drained and...
Boeing is losing billions on fixed-price defense programs, but the warning was there decades ago. The Navy’s A-12 Avenger II collapsed after Washington tried...
The jet in the air-show photos is not Russia's cancelled stealth fighter. It is the stand-in for a fighter that was never built at...
Khrushchev had killed the capital ship for good, or so Soviet doctrine said. Then a submarine hunter began absorbing missions, one requirement at a...
China's H-20 stealth bomber has been talked about for roughly a decade. And yet, the stealth warplane has never flown in public.
Iran is moving to charge ships for passing through the Strait of Hormuz — the waterway that carries a fifth of the world's oil...
A film celebrating ten years of China's Y-20 transport slipped in something no other country has shown on official camera: a sixth-generation fighter refueling...
A decade after it surfaced, China's H-20 has no flying prototype and no production line. The reasons are industrial, not financial: an intercontinental flying...
A new 1.5-gigawatt project in Utah will use five 300-megawatt Holtec small modular reactors rather than two massive conventional ones, part of a broader...
Trump calling Taiwan a "bargaining chip" is the headline, but Denny Roy argues the deeper story is structural: a Chinese military that makes intervention...
For weeks, an August 18 deadline loomed: the day a U.S.–Iran understanding expired, and, by President Trump's own warning, the day fighting over the...
The diplomatic center of gravity in the Middle East has decisively shifted to Riyadh. On June 23, 2026, talks between Iranian Majlis Speaker Mohammed...
Germany still must address a readiness issue: large portions of the army are not considered fully combat-ready, with some readiness estimates for land forces...
The KN-23, North Korea's version the Russian Iskander missile, showed up to fight in the Ukraine war. And it isn't the same platform as...
On May 21, 2025, a brand-new North Korean destroyer rolled over and partially capsized at its own launch ceremony — with Kim Jong Un...
Fake Russian IDs, Orders Never to Be Captured, and 50% Casualties: Inside North Korea’s Secret War in Ukraine The Russian Army has sustained nearly...
Summary and Key Points: Dr. Bruce E. Bechtol Jr., a political science professor and proliferation expert, evaluates the strategic partnership between Iran and North...
As I noted in a previous piece on the stealthy Zumwalt-class guided-missile destroyers (DDGs), the name of Admiral Elmo Russell Zumwalt Jr. is a...
Former President Donald Trump posted on Truth Social declaring that “ANYBODY running for the Office of President of the United States should agree to...
At the 1-year mark of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, expectations about the final outcome run the gamut from the belief that a definitive Ukrainian...
Does Nikki Haley Really Just Want to Be Vice President?: When you are someone who is not well known across the country, and you...
Ron DeSantis Is Becoming a Punching Bag for Donald Trump. When Will He Fight Back? Could it Cost Him?: In political campaigns, especially at...
