Author: Defenceline Webdesk

Imagine an alternate near-future in which the U.S. military had more vigorously pursued the development of hypersonic weapons. When a major U.S. Air Force exercise deploys such weapons to Guam, Tinian, and Saipan, it surprises Chinese military leaders who believed that U.S. hypersonic missile development had been stymied by underfunded research, technological gaps, and a lack of prioritization. This month’s Fictional Intelligence is a “what if” thought experiment that takes the form of a memo on this stunning turn of events, written by a colonel in the PLA Intelligence Bureau of the Joint Staff of the Central Military Commission. In this…

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Leonardo’s revenue rose 12.2% year-on-year in first half 2026. Credit: JHVEPhoto/Shutterstock.com. Leonardo has raised its full-year 2026 (FY26) financial guidance after reporting a sharp rise in new orders during the first half of the year (H1), reinforcing its presence in the markets it operates. The company now expects new order intake to increase from approximately €26.2bn ($30bn) to €28.2bn. Discover B2B Marketing That Performs Combine business intelligence and editorial excellence to reach engaged professionals across 36 leading media platforms. Find out more Leonardo has also raised its earnings before interest, taxes and amortisation (EBITA) guidance from about €2.15bn to €2.21bn,…

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Remote Controlled Howitzer (RCH) 155mm. Credit: Rheinmetall via LinkedIn. Rheinmetall has secured a contract to supply weapon systems for the British Army’s new fleet of Remote Controlled Howitzer (RCH) 155 wheeled howitzers. The contract, valued in the low three-digit million-euro range, was awarded in the second quarter of 2026, following the UK’s order for 72 of the advanced artillery vehicles. Discover B2B Marketing That Performs Combine business intelligence and editorial excellence to reach engaged professionals across 36 leading media platforms. Find out more Under the terms of the contract, Rheinmetall will deliver 72 remote-controlled 155 mm L/52 weapon systems, known…

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Debates about international order usually begin with the same question: who will lead next? Will the United States recover its authority? Will China mature into a responsible provider of public goods? Will some concert of major powers manage the transition? The question is familiar and increasingly misleading. The defining condition of this century is not a clean transfer of hegemony from one state to another. It is the erosion of the possibility that any single state, or compact group of great powers, can supply order for everyone else. We live in a G-minus world. The term does not simply mean…

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Mongolia just made a historic breakthrough by signing a deal to buy oil products from South Korea.  Successful negotiations between Mongolian Minister of Industry and Mineral Resources Damdinnyam Gongor and South Korea’s Ministry of Trade, Industry, and Energy have resulted in an unprecedented agreement that will completely change the rules of the game in the domestic fuel market.  For Ulaanbaatar, it’s a powerful strategic move toward energy independence. Currently, Russia supplies over 90 percent of Mongolia’s refined petroleum products, with the rest purchased from China. According to the agreement reached on July 30, Seoul will supply Mongolia with 50,000 tons…

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Recently, Human Rights Watch published a distressing investigative report, tellingly titled “Skeletons and Skulls Scattered Everywhere.” The report confirmed that the Arakan Army had massacred at least 170 Rohingya civilians, including 90 children, and likely killed or wounded hundreds more in the village of Hoyyar Siri (Htan Shauk Khan in Burmese) in the Buthidaung Township of Myanmar’s Rakhine State on May 2, 2024.  This constitutes only a small fraction of the Arakan Army’s record of human rights violations against the Rohingyas. Since the ethnic armed organization (EAO) has wrested control of much of the Rakhine State in 2023-2024, it has…

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In this episode of The Diplomat’s Asia Geopolitics Podcast, hosts Ankit Panda and Katie Putz examine the status of the Russia-North Korea partnership. Since the signing of a Comprehensive Strategic Partnership Treaty in 2024, the two have held three strategic dialogues, the most recent in late July in Moscow. How transactional is the massive shift in their relations and how sensitive is it to the Ukraine war? And what does China — which has its own nuanced relations with North Korea and Russia — think about the growing closeness between Moscow and Pyongyang? You can subscribe to The Diplomat’s Asia…

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WASHINGTON — L3Harris is postponing its planned spin off of its missile solutions unit until at least mid-2027, with its chief executive saying that the business is being undervalued even as demand soars for solid rocket motors and other weapons components. The company wants to let the market “settle down” and will revisit an initial public offering in mid-2027, rather than completing the spin off by the end of the year as originally projected, CEO Chris Kubasik told investors during a Wednesday earnings call. L3Harris announced the spin off in January, concurrent with the Pentagon announcing that they would take…

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