Author: Defenceline Webdesk

On August 9, Taliban officials claimed to have captured 74 light and heavy weapons that were allegedly being smuggled in from Pakistan to support what they termed “subversive and destabilizing activities.” Islamabad strongly denied the claim as baseless and urged Kabul not to let Afghan soil be used against Pakistan.  The Taliban’s claim insinuated that Pakistan was supporting the resistance movement that has been brewing for some time in northern Afghanistan but has escalated to alarming levels since July. The movement is especially strong in the strategically important northeastern Badakhshan province, which borders not only Pakistan but also China and…

Sandra Erwin, SpaceNews Gen Michael Guetlein says Congress must find a way to finance the next phase as most initial funding is already committed Source link

The Inflection Point Modern conflict is reshaping how nations prepare for and sustain military operations. We are at an inflection point in history, a pivotal moment when the ability to generate combat power will depend not only on fielding the world’s most advanced capabilities, but on delivering them at the speed, scale and affordability today’s security environment demands. The United States and its allies face increasingly complex and rapidly evolving threats that require industry to meet the moment through innovation and a renewed focus on producibility. The need is clear: we must field capable, affordable precision munitions to counter low-cost…

The Diplomat author Mercy Kuo regularly engages subject-matter experts, policy practitioners, and strategic thinkers across the globe for their diverse insights into U.S. Asia policy. This conversation with Dr. Wayne Tan – professor at the Graduate Institute of International Politics, National Chung Hsing University (Taiwan), where he also serves as director of the Center for Indo-Pacific Strategy and Non-Traditional Security – is the 521st in “The Trans-Pacific View Insight Series.”   How would you characterize Kuomintang (KMT) party chair Cheng Li-wun’s political narrative regarding Taiwan’s autonomy and sovereignty? Political narratives should not be confused with strategic reality. One of the…

Aamir Khollam, Interesting Engineering The Army wants to make its CH-47 Chinooks easier to upgrade as avionics technology changes. Source link

DETROIT — After ditching its original software strategy for autonomous vehicles, the Army has decided to lean on industry to build case-specific autonomous capabilities for different mission sets, an Army official told Breaking Defense. The initial idea to have the Army develop a software backbone for its envisioned fleet of autonomous vehicles in what was called the Army Robotic Software (ARCS) program “made sense before there was robust industry investment in all of autonomy,” Michael Rose, chief technology officer for the Army’s Mission Autonomy capability program office, told Breaking Defense on the sidelines of the GVSETS conference. “The whole premise…

Eighty-one years after the atomic bombings of Hiroshima on August 6, 1945, and Nagasaki on August 9, Japan is confronting an increasingly difficult contradiction: how to uphold its identity as the only country to have suffered atomic attack in wartime while strengthening deterrence against an increasingly formidable group of nuclear-armed neighbors. The dilemma came into sharper focus during this year’s Hiroshima and Nagasaki commemorations. Prime Minister Takaichi Sanae stated that Japan “maintains” its Three Non-Nuclear Principles and reaffirmed Tokyo’s commitment to pursuing a world free of nuclear weapons. Yet when asked whether the principles would continue to be explicitly affirmed…

T. Reeves, National Defense The Navy’s first Auxiliary Floating Dry Dock Medium built in more than four decades successfully hit the water in late July Source link

“When evil-doing comes like falling rain, nobody calls out ‘stop!’ When crimes begin to pile up they become invisible.” German playwright Bertolt Brecht’s observation on the political apathy that engulfed Germany in the 1930s resonates with 21st century survivors of the Chinese state’s war against Uyghurs in its northwestern heartland, known by exiles as East Turkestan.  Germany’s slide into fascism brought book burnings and arrests of “undesirables.” It lead step by step to antisemitism, concentration camps, torture, and death. That brutal history echoes today in Beijing’s campaign against the Turkic peoples of its western regions – and in the silence…

Emily Ryan Miller, Defence Blog For the soldiers doing the flying, the appeal wasn’t just faster paperwork. It was actually having a voice in what shows up in their unit’s equipment shed. Source link