Smart Bombs: Military, Defense and National Security
There’s a big international weapons program that probably doesn’t pass the post-coronavirus pub test for supply chain security. As US President Donald Trump’s recently said, ‘It’s...
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Growth at 0.4 percent and a blown deficit look like pressure toward peace. Latham's case: four years of war built a political economy with...
China's naval drone force is early but growing fast, and its sharpest edge isn't firepower. Cheap, expendable craft, wave-powered surface drones that loiter for...
Twice in thirteen months, Iran has forced the Pentagon to drain scarce interceptor stocks in a theater Washington calls secondary. Latham's argument: Beijing is...
Tehran treats the Strait of Hormuz as non-negotiable, Holmes writes, and no air campaign eliminates every missile. That leaves four courses: walk away and...
For all the talk of spending targets, the Ankara NATO summit's real work happened elsewhere. Europe is being handed responsibility for NATO's conventional defense...
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...
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...
The Soviets built it, SALT II banned it by name, and Moscow gave it up. In 2021, China flew it again — with a...
Feared on reputation, bought as defiance — and now possibly traded away in Ankara. The twenty-year arc of Russia's most consequential weapons export. Meet...
Tucked inside an answer about F-15s and F-16s was a price nobody requested: $15.9 million to make the A-10 a nuclear bomber. The memo...
She cost $285 million, made Thailand Southeast Asia's only carrier power, and hasn't launched a jet since 2006. The Chakri Naruebet is easy to...
Social Security’s funding gap is not a forecast — it is arithmetic. The size of the shortfall is known, the levers that can close...
The Memorandum of Understanding that paused the fighting has collapsed, Farley writes, because it never settled the status of the Strait of Hormuz or...
U.S. gas prices rose for the first time in eight weeks — 'Iran is the reason why,' per GasBuddy's Patrick De Haan — while...
Washington and Tehran can't agree whether the Strait of Hormuz is open — Trump declared it open under a new U.S. 'guardian' regime, while...
Carafano argues Iran has lost its nuclear option, its missile mass, its proxy network, and its grip on the Strait of Hormuz all at...
Ukrainian drones set two major Russian refineries ablaze overnight — including Salavat in Bashkortostan, the last gas refinery untouched in 2026 — while Russia...
Trump is stuck. He started a war with Iran he expected to end quickly; six months on, the central point of contention is control...
The United States can hit almost anything Iran places near the Strait of Hormuz. It cannot hit the strait itself. That distinction is the...
Last year North Korea's newest destroyer rolled over at its own launch, and the world assumed the program was finished for years. Instead Pyongyang...
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...
There’s a big international weapons program that probably doesn’t pass the post-coronavirus pub test for supply chain security. As US President Donald Trump’s recently said, ‘It’s...
Over at the LA Times, I offered my thoughts on the recent Trump decision to get tough on China. While events in recent days...
I’ve taken a close interest in civil‐military relations for decades. I was taught the importance of civilian control over the U.S. military as a young NROTC midshipman....
The hospital at which I work offered antibody serology tests to all medical staff last Wednesday. The test detects IgG, the immunoglobulin that appears in...
In a post last month, we raised concerns about the unforeseen and underappreciated costs of expanding export controls on U.S. technology. Either those concerns fell on...
