The U.S. Navy has given us the first look at Blackbeard hypersonic strike missiles under the wings of F/A-18E/F Super Hornets during actual flight testing. The Navy is hoping to have Blackbeard in at least limited service no later than 2028, giving its carrier air wings an all-new fast-flying standoff weapon, particularly for engaging enemy ships. The missile is also being designed to be relatively cheap and quick to manufacture.
The Navy’s Office of the Portfolio Acquisition Executive for Aviation (PAE-A) has released a video montage of Blackbeard undergoing flight testing, seen in the social media post below. The service confirmed that it had at least begun test-loading the missiles onto F/A-18E/F Super Hornets in a presentation at the Tailhook Association’s annual convention last month. Now we know the program has moved ahead substantially from that point.
Coming soon to a theater near you…BLACKBEARD!@USPACOM @CENTCOM @PAEAviation pic.twitter.com/KgBtIqdf8I
— NAVAIR (@NAVAIRNews) September 25, 2026
The company behind Blackbeard, defense start-up Castelion, has received several multi-million-dollar contracts from the Navy just this year explicitly to support integration of the weapon onto the Super Hornet, as well as otherwise accelerating its development. In its daily contracting on September 14, the Pentagon announced the Navy had struck yet another deal with Castelion, valued at $43.65 million, “for the manufacturing, assembly, testing, and delivery of the first production lot of 444 All-Up Rounds (AURs), defined as fully functional tactical missiles packaged within specialized shipping and storage containers.”
In terms of what we know today about Blackbeard’s design and capabilities, as we have previously written:
“A profile photo [seen below] at the company’s headquarters reveals a weapon with a ballistic missile-like booster, on top of which is mounted what could be an unpowered hypersonic glide vehicle (HGV). A booster brings an HGV to the desired velocity and altitude before releasing it toward its target. The concept is in contrast to air-breathing cruise missiles capable of traveling at hypersonic speeds. Hypersonic speed is generally defined as anything above Mach 5, which larger ballistic missiles also reach in the course of their flights. More precise performance figures for Blackbeard are lacking, but Castelion has previously hinted it could hit targets out to just under 500 miles. Alternatively, the second stage may also have its own motor, allowing it to continue accelerating or sustain high-speed flight. A similar arrangement has been suggested as the propulsion system for the Russian Zircon missile.”
“Both stages of the weapon have cruciform fins, while the upper one features a prominent ‘chine’ line along the length of its body, and a slightly beaklike nose. The trolley on which the weapon is mounted provides some idea of its overall size. The blue stripes seen on each stage normally signify that a munition is an inert, non-explosive round utilized for training or tracking purposes. This would indicate a real (unarmed) missile rather than a dummy or mockup.”
A picture shown at Tailhook had also offered a new look at the front of the missile, exposing what looked to be an aperture on one side of the design’s wedge-shaped nose. As we wrote after that image emerged:
“The apparent apertures are also seen pointed up, but many air-launched munitions do flip down after release.”
“How exactly Blackbeard is guided remains unknown, but a downward-angled aperture at the nose end for a seeker system would make sense for this weapon, which the Navy is pursuing primarily as a new way to target enemy ships. In particular, a wide array of existing anti-ship and land attack missiles, as well as certain anti-air types, have variously shaped apertures in their noses for imaging infrared seekers. Imaging infrared has the benefit of being immune to radio frequency electronic warfare jamming. In addition, it is a passive capability that does not send out signals that can give an opponent advance notice of an incoming attack. Blackbeard’s full guidance package very likely also includes some means of navigating to a target area first, and it could have multiple modes of operation.”
MACE is Project Alpha https://t.co/YatJzd7NDR https://t.co/EjrgMhEdsB pic.twitter.com/IOzpmwsTJ2
— 笑脸男人 (@lfx160219) August 26, 2026
The new flight testing footage released today also underscores the relatively small size of Blackbeard overall. While the Super Hornet is set to be the first operational launch platform, it is very likely to be integrated on other aircraft quickly thereafter. The Navy is acquiring Blackbeard under a program called the Multi-mission Affordable Capacity Effector (MACE).
Requirements for MACE that the Navy put out previously explicitly called for a design compact enough for carrier-based F-35C (and land-based F-35A) Joint Strike Fighters to carry four of them internally. Whether that remains a goal in any way is unclear. Still, being able to carry some number of Blackbeards internally would not only give those jets a hypersonic strike weapon, but one that they could carry in the most stealthy configuration. The Navy also notably does operate the F-35A outside of the test and evaluation community, which might point to air-launched Blackbeards entering service elsewhere in the future. As an aside, the U.S. Army is pursuing a ground-launched version of this missile, as well.
Another critical aspect of Blackbeard is the emphasis on lower cost and the ability to produce the missiles readily at scale. The conflict with Iran has fully driven home long-standing concerns about the depth of U.S. stockpiles of various critical munitions, as well as its ability to replenish them quickly. Blackbeard reflects a larger push across America’s armed forces to add more cost-effective weapons that can be acquired on faster timetables to their arsenals. Bringing in new, smaller companies like Castelion to develop and build these munitions has also been a major point of focus. To put this all in immediate context, in May, the Pentagon announced a framework agreement to buy 12,000 Blackbeards over the next five years.
As mentioned, the Navy’s stated goal now is to reach an early operational capability with Blackbeard by 2028, if not sooner. What the exact fielding plan for those missiles might be is unclear. PAE-A did write “Coming soon to a theater near you” in its post on X containing the video montage, and tagged the official accounts for U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) and U.S. Pacific Command (PACOM). CENTCOM oversees U.S. military activities in and around the Middle East, including ongoing operations against Iran. U.S. military officials have also long touted hypersonic weapons, in general, as key to success in any future conflict in the Pacific, especially a high-end fight against China.
It’s also worth noting here that U.S. military hypersonic missile programs across the services have faced repeated setbacks and delays over the years. This, in turn, has prompted discussion about a worrisome gap emerging in this arena between the United States and its chief global competitors, especially China. It is very possible now that Blackbeard could be the first operational air-launched type in American inventory, depending on how the U.S. Air Force does or does not proceed with its Hypersonic Attack Cruise Missile (HACM) program. The Air Force has said previously that it is aiming for HACM to be operational, at least on a limited level, before the end of Fiscal Year 2027, which begins next month.
If nothing else, we have clear evidence that the air-launched version of Blackbeard is now deep in flight testing for the U.S. Navy.
Contact the author: joe@twz.com
The post Blackbeard Hypersonic Missile Seen Flying On F/A-18 Super Hornet For The First Time appeared first on TWZ.
NATO member Latvia is moving toward acquiring Anduril Industries’ Barracuda family of long-range strike missiles, with Latvian President Edgars Rinkēvičs highlighting the effort during a visit to the U.S. defense technology company and a series of new defense-industry cooperation agreements involving Latvia. If the acquisition goes through, Latvia would be the first of the Baltic states to field a strike weapon in this category.
“It was great to visit Anduril to meet with Palmer Luckey and to witness signing of memoranda of cooperation with MOD of Latvia and Origin Robotics,” Rinkēvičs said in a post on X. “Looking forward to complete acquisition of Barracuda long-range missiles and [Latvian-U.S.] defense industry cooperation.”
It was great to visit @anduriltech to meet with @PalmerLuckey and to witness signing of memoranda of cooperation with MOD of Latvia and @OriginRobotics. Looking forward to complete acquisition of Baracuda longe range missiles and
— Edgars Rinkēvičs (@edgarsrinkevics) September 25, 2026
The statement does not specify the precise Barracuda variant involved, the number of missiles Latvia intends to acquire, the expected delivery schedule, or the value of the prospective purchase. We have reached out to Anduril for more details.
A likely candidate weapon is the Barracuda-500M, one member of Anduril’s family of autonomous, jet-powered cruise missiles, alongside the Barracuda-100M and -250M variants. Official descriptions put its range at more than 500 nautical miles, with a stated speed range of approximately 190 to 500 knots. The missile can be air-launched, for which it has received the official U.S. military designation AGM-189A. But with only a handful of utility biplanes and helicopters in its inventory, Latvia would acquire the surface-launched version, designated SLB-500M.
The announcement points to a potentially significant expansion of Latvia’s precision-strike capabilities as NATO’s eastern flank continues to build out longer-range conventional fires.
Latvia has already ordered the U.S.-made Army Tactical Missile System, or ATACMS, which will be fired from M142 HIMARS launchers. The system is expected to enter Latvian service in 2027 and has a maximum range of about 186 miles.
Latvia’s ATACMS capability will give the country a foundation for ground-launched precision fires, but the broader European trend is toward significantly greater reach.
Ground- and sea-launched cruise and ballistic missile systems capable of hitting targets at between 1,000 and 2,000 kilometers (620 and 1,242 miles) or more are an emerging target for several European NATO members. France, Germany, Poland, Italy, Sweden and the United Kingdom are pursuing combinations of indigenous development and foreign procurement to address this requirement.
Latvia’s neighbor Poland, for example, has been building a layered long-range strike architecture combining JASSM/JASSM-ER air-launched cruise missiles with HIMARS and ATACMS. Warsaw’s ambitions are extending toward ground-launched weapons with ranges potentially reaching 3,000 kilometers (1,864 miles) and the country has previously expressed openness to hosting U.S.-owned nuclear weapons on its territory, too.
Latvian interest in Barracuda fits into the same larger transformation in European conventional strike capabilities.
For NATO’s Baltic members, the logic is particularly straightforward, with mobile, ground-launched weapons providing an additional means of striking military targets at depth without requiring control of the air over the launch area.
The potential Barracuda acquisition would represent another step in a broader European shift toward deep precision strike, a term increasingly used to describe conventional weapons capable of holding targets hundreds or thousands of miles away at risk.
Deep precision strike is widely acknowledged as an increasingly important European capability gap. European NATO members have historically relied heavily on air-launched cruise missiles and other aircraft-delivered weapons, while ground-launched long-range systems have been comparatively scarce.
The deterioration of the European security environment following Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, together with the 2019 collapse of the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty, are important factors behind renewed European interest in long-range conventional strike.
A key driver behind Europe’s push for longer-range conventional strike is the desire to build a credible deterrent capable of holding targets deep inside Russia at risk, potentially including Moscow. Ukraine’s long-range strike campaign has demonstrated the strategic value of being able to impose costs at significant distances, while also underscoring the importance of having sufficient stocks of precision weapons. For NATO’s eastern flank, systems such as the ground-launched Barracuda could therefore provide not just another fires capability, but an additional means of imposing costs on an adversary without relying exclusively on airpower.
Importantly for Latvia, the emerging European approach is not limited to large air forces. NATO’s prospective deep-strike requirements are likely to place significant emphasis on mobile ground-launched systems because they can be dispersed and offer survivability advantages while avoiding the cost and vulnerability associated with relying exclusively on aircraft or ships as launch platforms.
That makes systems such as the surface-launched Barracuda particularly relevant to countries on NATO’s eastern flank.
Anduril has positioned Barracuda as part of an effort to address what it describes as a shortfall in affordable, producible long-range precision weapons. A prototype surface-launched Barracuda-500 successfully demonstrated its launcher, missile, and booster concept in testing in 2025. Anduril has emphasized that the family is intended to be more producible and affordable than many existing “exquisite” long-range weapons.
The emphasis on production capacity is notable in light of lessons emerging from the war in Ukraine, where both sides have demonstrated the importance of maintaining substantial stocks of precision weapons and relatively inexpensive one-way attack systems.
European governments are increasingly wrestling with the same issue. However, there is a fundamental tension between rapidly filling capability gaps through off-the-shelf purchases and developing indigenous European weapons that can strengthen the continent’s defense-industrial base, which is also a critical political consideration.
Latvia’s emerging relationship with Anduril appears to combine elements of both approaches, by acquiring an American-developed strike capability while simultaneously pursuing industrial cooperation with U.S. defense companies.
There is also a recent European precedent for combining Barracuda procurement with local industrial participation.
In July 2026, Anduril signed a strategic agreement with Polish national maintenance, repair and overhaul provider Wojskowe Zakłady Lotnicze Nr 2 (WZL-2) to establish production of the Barracuda-500M at WZL-2 facilities in Bydgoszcz, Poland. Polish state-owned defence group Polska Grupa Zbrojeniowa said Poland was the first European country to sign such an agreement with Anduril.
Bezpieczeństwo zaczyna się od silnych sojuszy.
— Ministerstwo Aktywów Państwowych
Polish officials have also emphasized the missile’s intended low production cost relative to higher-end U.S. cruise missiles. The planned Polish program is expected to progressively increase Polish content and eventually incorporate broader European elements, including software solutions from Anduril.
Latvia has not publicly detailed whether any Barracuda-related production, assembly, or other industrial work would be conducted in the country.
However, Latvia’s Investment and Development Agency says the country’s defense-technology delegation in the United States is seeking opportunities involving joint development, testing, manufacturing, system integration and supply chains. Origin Robotics is among the Latvian companies participating in that effort.
The broader Latvian delegation includes companies working across unmanned and counter-unmanned systems, communications, electronics, sensors, software, artificial intelligence, cybersecurity, and manufacturing.
Exactly how Latvia intends to employ Barracuda, how many missiles it plans to acquire, and whether any portion of the system will eventually be produced or integrated in Latvia remain unclear from the president’s announcement.
For now, the development marks another indication that long-range precision fires are moving from a capability concentrated among Europe’s largest military powers toward a broader requirement across NATO’s highly strategic eastern flank.
Contact the author: thomas@thewarzone.com
The post Latvia To Order Anduril’s Barracuda Cruise Missile For Long-Range Strike Capability appeared first on TWZ.
As Manila and Tokyo mark the 70th anniversary of normalized diplomatic relations, elevate their ties to a Comprehensive Strategic Partnership, and face rising security tensions in the West Philippine Sea, the arrival of Kitagawa Katsuro as Japan’s new ambassador to the Philippines comes at a pivotal moment in regional geopolitics. He arrives not merely as […]
The post Japan’s new ambassador will test Manila’s China balancing act appeared first on Asia Times.
For the past six months or so, a curious-looking vessel with a very boxy superstructure has been taking shape at a shipyard in the Chinese city of Shanghai. A new satellite image lends credence to an earlier assessment that this is a mothership to support China’s growing fleets of ever-larger submersible drones, though it could also have other roles.
TWZ obtained the image of the ship in question, which was taken on September 10, from Vantor. Since then, it has also received an overall coat of gray paint, pointing to future service with the People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN). It is some 669 feet (204 meters) long and around 98 feet (30 meters) at its widest. In terms of basic length and width, the vessel being built now is very roughly comparable to China’s Type 071 amphibious warfare ship. However, it appears to be much taller overall than the Type 071.
The new ship has been under construction at the Hudong-Zhonghua Shipyard on Changxing Island in Shanghai since at least April. This yard produces a variety of naval vessels, including surface combatants and amphibious assault ships, as well as commercial designs.
The September 10 image, which shows the ship from the stern, is interesting for a number of reasons. It notably confirms that the design not only has a well deck, but that it is sized around what looks to be a large cradle-like platform visible in the shot. The very roughly 164-feet (50-meter) long rectangular platform has an arch-shaped structure at one end and two teardrop-shaped ones at the other, as well as six pillars, three on each side, in between. The teardrop-shaped structures, in particular, point to the platform being at least a semi-submersible, as they would help with stability and otherwise guide the flow of water while being pulled along.
The satellite image also clearly shows six large struts extending from the top of the stern end of the superstructure, each one which is paired with a shorter strut, for a total of 12. Earlier this month, independent naval analyst H.I. Sutton, who tracks undersea warfare developments in particular, posited that these struts could be used to lower a platform or some other similar structure below the hull of the ship. He also assessed that they could be used as part of a larger system capable of moving payloads between decks internally. This would help account for the configuration of the core superstructure, especially how high it is all the way from the front to the back. Overall, signs point to the inside of the superstructure being largely hangars and other open work spaces, allowing for multiple large UUVs to be carried and supported. Individual UUVs would be launched and recovered, one at a time, via the cradle.
In making his assessment, Sutton drew specific attention to a previously shown rendering of a proposed Chinese scientific research vessel with a roughly similar strut-based system at the stern for deploying submersibles and other large payloads. However, on that design, the system was entirely exposed rather than contained with an extended superstructure.
The platform seen immediately behind the ship being built at the Hudong-Zhonghua Shipyard aligns with Sutton’s assessment about the purpose of the struts. At the same time, launches and recoveries could also be conducted in a more traditional manner via the well deck. The design of the cradle-like platform would seem to suggest the latter option is at least part of the plan.
The general idea of launching and recovering payloads through the bottom of the hull of a ship, including through moon pools, is hardly new. As another point here, Russia is known to have highly specialized mothership submarines that can carry crewed midget submarines and large uncrewed submersibles attached underneath their hulls, and that are also capable of launching ultra-long-range nuclear-powered and nuclear-armed torpedoes. The idea of deploying and retrieving large UUVs via well decks using cradle-like systems is something being explored by other navies globally, including in the United States. All that being said, a large specialized ship built for the purpose of launching and recovering very large underwater vehicles in an operational capacity is unique.
The image from September 10, as well as other recent views of the ship, highlight other features that are now taking shape. This includes a large opening on the starboard side, which could be for launching and/or recovering lifeboats or other watercraft, or moving payloads to and from the pier while docked, as well as a multi-pronged mast on top of the bridge. An additional part of the ship’s superstructure extends behind the bridge area, and there is what looks to be a hangar inside. There is no attached helipad present now, but one could well be added later on somewhere on top of the superstructure. Many naval auxiliaries, as well as commercial ships designed for offshore support and other specialized tasks, have open helipads on raised frames attached to different parts of the superstructures.
Though there is growing clarity about the ship’s design, many questions do remain about the full breadth of its intended purpose. In Sutton’s view, the PLAN has a need, just in general, for a dedicated mothership to support its growing uncrewed underwater vehicle (UUV) fleets. The PLAN is pursuing various tiers of UUVs to perform a host of different missions, including intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR), as well as mine-laying, special operations support, and even launching direct attacks on enemy vessels. Larger and larger UUV designs have been steadily emerging in China, which could require more specialized launch and recovery options to be feasibly employed operationally, especially from other vessels at sea. Deployment and retrieval at sea could, in turn, support very long duration missions far from China’s own shores.
“With smaller UUVs, even up to 20 meters like the AJX-002 and HSU-100 paraded in Beijing last year, they are road mobile. Truck mounted cranes should be sufficient for getting them in and out of the water making operations much simpler. With these latest, much larger XXLUUVs [extra-extra large uncrewed underwater vehicles] however, China will start to need dedicated port facilities,” Sutton wrote previously on his website. “Until now China has been using floating docks to house the two XXLUUV prototypes being tested on Hainan. One of these docks was purpose built while the other may have been taken up from general use.”
China's naval unmanned systems.
— Zhao DaShuai 东北进修
Consisting of (in order), AI enabled unmanned submersible (HSU-100), used for detection and attack.
Unmanned patrol boat.
Unmanned mine-laying/attack submersible (AJX-002), this was previously mistaken for a nuclear powered torpedo.
Because the… pic.twitter.com/Mlj55XLNBH
“This arrangement also has a significant drawback: each floating dock can only carry a single XXLUUV,” Sutton added. “Or if more than one, then they both need to be placed in the water at the same time. Because the whole dock floods, there cannot be one undergoing maintenance while another is being launched or recovered.”
A mothership vessel able to discreetly deploy and recover large uncrewed and crewed submersibles and other large payloads underwater could be tasked with more specialized missions, including cutting cables, retrieving objects from the seabed, and other kinds of undersea espionage. There is overlap here with more benign roles, such as submarine rescue, salvage, and even deep-sea scientific research. There is also the matter of servicing an expanding array of Chinese underwater infrastructure, including sensor and communications networks. As something of a corollary, Russia’s spy ship Yantar is officially described as an oceanic research vessel. In China, the line between military and non-military assets and capabilities, including ships, is often very blurry, to begin with, as TWZ regularly highlights. This dichotomy was observed right at the Hudong-Zhonghua Shipyard around the end of last year after pictures of a commercial cargo ship being used to showcase a new family of containerized weapons, sensors, and other systems went viral online.
It is also worth pointing out that the boxy and largely enclosed design of the ship now being built at Hudong-Zhonghua Shipyard will inherently make it difficult to observe any activities onboard. This will have the additional knock-on effect of helping keep any payloads, as well as the crew, shielded from the elements. This could be valuable for operations in harsher locales, including waters in and around the Arctic, an ever-more strategic part of the world where China is working to be more engaged.
We also do not know if the apparent mothership vessel is intended to be a one-off or part of a larger class. It could be a stepping stone to broader plans or be part of an already extensive fleet of bespoke naval auxiliaries, as well as unique ostensibly commercial vessels, in service in China today. The PLAN’s aforementioned UUV ambitions will bring along significant test and evaluation requirements, as well as the need to support actual future operations.
If nothing else, evidence is only growing that the new ship under construction at the Hudong-Zhonghua Shipyard is intended to serve, at least in part, as a mothership for large submersible drones.
Contact the author: joe@twz.com
The post China Appears To Be Building A Mothership For Large Uncrewed Submarines appeared first on TWZ.
The crew of the USS Abraham Lincoln touched American soil for the first time in nine months, when the strike group pulled into Apra Harbor, Guam, for a brief logistics stop and on-base liberty. The supercarrier, alongside guided-missile destroyer USS Frank E. Petersen Jr., arrived on September 19 and left the next day. Lincoln is 307 days into her deployment, 19 short of the record set earlier this year by the USS Gerald R. Ford, and is now just weeks away from San Diego. Meanwhile, two flattops are on station in the Middle East supporting blockade operations, and the USS Ronald Reagan has rejoined the fleet after an extended maintenance availability.
Here’s TWZ’s weekly carrier tracker monitoring America’s flattop fleet, including deployed Carrier Strike Groups (CSG) and Amphibious Ready Groups (ARG), using publicly available open-source information. Check out our last report here.
The USS Abraham Lincoln is currently conducting routine operations at an undisclosed location in the U.S. 7th Fleet area of responsibility (AOR), presumably steaming east en route to her homeport at Naval Air Station North Island in San Diego. After leaving Thailand on September 6 following a five-day liberty port call, Lincoln topped off the Petersen Jr. in the Gulf of Thailand and linked up with two Royal Australian Navy frigates for joint training in the South China Sea. Publicly available flight tracking data shows the carrier transited the Balabac Strait eastbound around September 13, and the Surigao Strait northbound two days later to enter the Philippine Sea. After going dark for a few days, she resurfaced in Guam and moored at Kilo Wharf over the weekend.
“Due to the brief nature of the logistics stop, the crew were afforded on-base liberty to access base services and attend a Navy Entertainment-sponsored concert,” CSG-3 spokesman Lt. Cmdr. Tyler Barker wrote in an email to Stars and Stripes. The carrier took on stores, mail, and equipment, according to Barker, and 13 Fleet and Family counselors are now aboard to run return-and-reunion classes but “the crew and ship remain focused and ready.”
A homecoming date has not been announced publicly. Unless Lincoln makes another stop (in Hawaii, for example) or conducts additional training on the way, she should arrive in early October just shy of Ford’s record. The Chief of Naval Operations, Adm. Daryl Caudle, said in June that Lincoln would likely shift her homeport to Naval Base Kitsap-Bremerton in Washington state, which aligns with TWZ’s reporting that she is expected to begin a Drydocking Planned Incremental Availability (DPIA) after returning stateside. The timeline for the DPIA is unclear.
The American public got a rare look at ongoing combat operations aboard the USS George Washington when two reporters embarked earlier this month. Fox News’ Trey Yingst and CBS News’ Tom Hanson reported live from the flight deck, as F-35C Lightning IIs and F/A-18E/F Super Hornets launched behind them, in hits that aired September 11 to 14. The only other publicized media embark since the war began on February 28 went to CNN’s Pamela Brown, who reported on the conditions aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln while the flattop was still in theater.
“Last weekend, the aircraft carrier came under Iranian missile attack; the first of three attacks on US warships in the last week alone,” Yingst said, indicating it was the USS George Washington, and not the USS George H.W. Bush, that was targeted by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) in early September. The Navy declined to comment when TWZ asked which carrier was targeted after Iranian state media claimed the strike had been successful. “We’re pretty much employing all our capabilities right now,” Washington’s commanding officer (CO), Capt. Nicholas DeLeo, told Yingst.
“The GW is surrounded by four to five guided-missile destroyers at any moment,” Yingst also reported. He flew out to USS Shoup, positioned off the starboard side at the time, to make the point and speak with the warship’s CO. Shoup is the only destroyer officially confirmed to be part of CSG-5. “My ship is in charge of coordinating defense amongst the various other units, allocating defensive assets to it, be it potentially a missile to shoot something down or just aircraft to go identify and monitor the picture,” Capt. William Buford said. Based on that description, Shoup’s CO appears to be coordinating Integrated Air and Missile Defense (IAMD) for the strike group, a question we’ve been asking the Navy to confirm. TWZ understands additional destroyers operating in the U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) AOR are also escorting Washington, but a U.S. official declined to say which ones.
Hanson asked DeLeo about the recent IRGC ballistic missile threat targeting Navy ships in the region. “We have a variety of ways to protect, both offensively and defensively, a Navy ship, and we employ all these methods,” he told the network. “It’s something that we train to.” Hanson also pressed the commander of CSG-5, Rear Adm. Jeff Heames, on whether he was concerned about the munitions stockpile, a dynamic TWZ detailed in a special feature yesterday. “Of course we’re concerned about the expenditure to some degree, but I have no concerns locally at my level here,” Heames replied.
In addition to Washington, Bush is still working the blockade from the Arabian Sea, nearly six months into her deployment. As of CENTCOM’s latest social media update on September 21, U.S. forces in the region had redirected 110 commercial vessels to ensure “total compliance” with the blockade. More than 50 ships “supporting humanitarian efforts” have been allowed through, according to the command. CENTCOM recently stopped publishing the number of ships boarded, seized, or disabled kinetically.
The USS Ronald Reagan is officially back. The Navy, in a recent statement, confirmed the flattop “returned to the fleet capable and mission-ready.” The carrier had been out of action since March 2025 for a DPIA at Puget Sound Naval Shipyard in Washington state and completed four days of sea trials in early September. While the Navy does not comment on upcoming deployments due to operational security, current speculation points to a spring 2027 deployment, but that is not confirmed.
Reagan is the only carrier currently homeported at Naval Base Kitsap-Bremerton in Washington. Previously, she was America’s only forward-deployed carrier based in Yokosuka, Japan, until swapping hulls with the USS George Washington in 2024. USS Nimitz was stationed at Naval Base Kitsap-Bremerton before circumnavigating South America to Naval Station Norfolk this summer, where she is being used primarily for training before deactivation in 2027. The yet-to-be-commissioned PCU John F. Kennedy, the second and newest Ford class supercarrier, is slated to homeport in Washington state no earlier than 2029.
Overall, three U.S. carriers are deployed (with one heading home), one is preparing to deploy in the near term, three are working up in various states of readiness, three are in current or upcoming maintenance, and one is being used primarily for training before deactivation next year. One amphibious ready group is deployed, one is forward-stationed and in port, four are working up or in port, and three are in maintenance.
Note: Positions are general approximations. Non-deployed LHA/LHD amphibious warships are not shown.
Contact the author: ian.ellis-jones@recurrent.io or @ianellisjones
The post Where Are The Aircraft Carriers?: September 23, 2026 appeared first on TWZ.
A French Navy Mistral class amphibious assault ship has been photographed carrying Naval Group’s new Rampart modular launcher, a system designed to allow a single weapon station to employ different types of rockets, missiles, and other effectors against a wide range of threats.
The imagery, captured off Toulon during training on September 21, reveals the launcher installed on the ship’s forward starboard sponson. While the specific identity of the vessel is unclear, this represents the first publicly observed evidence that Rampart has moved into shipboard testing.
— PEtienne
— G.GYSSELSSHIPCOLLECTION (@GGYSSELSSHIPS) September 22, 2026
Naval Group announced in June that the first at-sea firing campaign for Rampart was planned for October aboard a Mistral class ship during the French Navy’s Wildfire counter-drone exercise.
What makes Rampart unusual is its modular architecture. Rather than being built around one missile or rocket, the system uses interchangeable launch modules that can accommodate different weapons. This allows a ship to carry large numbers of relatively inexpensive guided rockets for counter-drone work while retaining the option of using larger and more capable short-range missiles against more challenging targets.
Because the launch modules are interchangeable, the mix can theoretically be changed as the mission or threat environment changes.
The approach is aimed squarely at a problem that has become increasingly important for naval forces: defending expensive ships against potentially large numbers of inexpensive uncrewed systems and missiles without relying exclusively on high-cost interceptors.
Rampart was previously known as the Multi-purpose and Modular Launching System (MPLS). Naval Group unveiled the concept in 2023 as a self-funded development effort and formally presented the Rampart earlier this year.
The launcher uses four interchangeable ammunition modules. Depending on the configuration, Naval Group says that the system can accommodate up to 80 Thales 68mm laser-guided rockets or 48 NATO-standard 70mm laser-guided rockets. Other configurations can carry smaller numbers of short-range missiles (four to six per module, depending on type) or other effectors, including decoys.
The system has already been demonstrated with guided rockets. A January 2026 test involved a Thales 68mm guided rocket, followed by a series of firings at the Canjuers range in southern France in May. Those trials, seen in the video below, included engagements against targets at roughly two miles and a five-rocket salvo.
The relatively small guided rockets are particularly relevant to counter-drone operations. They offer a way of engaging aerial targets with a weapon substantially smaller than a conventional surface-to-air missile, while still providing precision guidance.
As well as rockets, Naval Group has been working with Thales on the Lightweight Multirole Missile (LMM). Also known as Martlet, the LMM is intended to tackle a range of challenging airborne and surface targets, as you can read about here.
The company has also explored integration of loitering munitions and other missiles, while a separate agreement with the UAE-based EDGE Group covers trials of the SkyKnight surface-to-air missile.
The company has also pursued integration of Poland’s Piorun short-range air-defense missile. This may well be with a view to a potential Polish purchase of Rampart to arm its forthcoming frigates, which you can read about here.
This means the launcher is effectively being developed as an open weapons-integration platform, rather than as a dedicated launcher for one or a small set of particular munitions.
That openness could make Rampart attractive to a wide range of navies. Instead of requiring customers to adopt a completely new missile family, the launcher can potentially be configured around weapons already in their inventories or sourced from their domestic defense industries. A country could therefore buy the common Rampart launcher while retaining control over the effectors it wants to integrate, whether those are guided rockets, short-range missiles, loitering munitions or other systems. At the same time, when it comes to air threats, this is very much a point defense system for close-in engagements, and a last line of defense to complement longer-range and more capable systems.
Naval Group has described the system as capable of operating either autonomously or as part of a ship’s combat system, with a stabilized turret and integrated fire-control equipment.
That integration will be particularly important during the upcoming sea trials. A launcher that works against stationary or land-based targets still has to contend with ship motion, vibration, sea spray, sensor integration, and the compressed timelines involved in defending a moving vessel.
France operates three Mistral class amphibious assault ships, which serve as major aviation, command, and amphibious warfare platforms. Their size and mission make them high-value assets that could face a broad range of aerial threats during operations. Another two vessels were built to the same design for Russia, before being placed under embargo, and then sold to the Egyptian Navy.
Naval Group’s choice of a Mistral for the initial at-sea campaign provides an opportunity to test Rampart under realistic operational conditions while integrating it with an existing French naval combat system.
In its basic form, each Mistral is armed with a pair of Simbad launchers, each of which is fitted with two Mistral short-range surface-to-air missiles. In terms of guns, each of the vessels is armed with two 30mm and two 20mm cannons, two 7.62mm M134 Miniguns, and four 12.7mm machine guns. Adding even a single Rampart launcher provides considerably more options against aerial targets across a wide range of threats — depending on the effectors that are included.
Recent U.S. and allied operations in the Middle East have highlighted the problem of large-scale missile and drone attacks causing forces to expend substantial numbers of interceptors, raising concerns about both magazine depth and the cost of using high-end missiles against lower-cost threats. Directed-energy weapons could eventually provide a way out of that cost-exchange problem, but shipboard laser systems remain in the early stages of operational development. Navies cannot simply wait for them to mature, creating an immediate requirement for lower-cost, high-capacity kinetic options. Rampart’s large guided-rocket capacity and ability to mix different effectors are aimed at exactly that gap.
If Rampart can reliably engage drones with inexpensive guided rockets while retaining the ability to employ more capable missiles from the same launcher, it could offer navies an additional defensive layer between conventional guns and high-end surface-to-air missile systems.
Critically, new effectors could potentially also be integrated as they become available, allowing the system to evolve without replacing the entire turret.
Reflecting the urgency of the requirement, Naval Group’s development path for Rampart has been relatively rapid.
Naval Group has also demonstrated a ground-based Rampart, mounted on a high-mobility truck chassis. This configuration is intended for mobile air defense missions as well as protection of fixed sites, giving the system a role beyond ship self-defense. The truck-mounted version could provide a rapidly relocatable launcher for counter-drone and short-range air-defense missions, while retaining the same basic modular architecture and ability to employ different effectors.
Sur le stand John Cockerill, un châssis Zetros équipé du Rampart (ex lanceur modulaire polyvalent, ou LMP) de Naval Group. Avantage : un seul système de lancement pour des armements divers (roquettes, missiles, grenades, leurres, drones…) pic.twitter.com/6v4R93HGsj
— Vincent Lamigeon (@VincentLamigeon) June 16, 2026
The photographs from Toulon indicate that the Rampart concept is now moving from the range to the French fleet, albeit on an experimental basis. The forthcoming sea campaign will be an important milestone and should provide a better idea of how this system works at sea.
Contact the author: thomas@thewarzone.com
The post France’s Modular Rampart Point Defense Launcher Has Gone To Sea appeared first on TWZ.
A British Excalibur uncrewed underwater vehicle (UUV) has fired a U.S. Mk 48 heavyweight torpedo in what is said to be a first-of-its-kind test for both countries. Though just a proof-of-concept so far, this is a significant new step for the United States and the United Kingdom toward future operational fleets of armed UUVs.
The U.S. Navy and the Royal Navy conducted the armed UUV test at the British Underwater Test & Evaluation Center (BUTEC), a maritime test range in Scotland, on September 13. Personnel from the Pentagon’s Defense Innovation Unit (DIU) and the Naval Undersea Warfare Center Keyport Division (NUWC Keyport), as well as unspecified industry partners, also took part, per a U.S. Navy press release.
— Office of the Chief of Naval Operations (@USNavyCNO) September 22, 2026
The test was also carried out under the umbrella of Pillar 2 of the trilateral Australia-United Kingdom-United States (AUKUS) defense cooperation agreement, which was first announced in 2021. AUKUS’ Pillar 2 covers a wide range of advanced technology cooperation, with particular focus on uncrewed platforms and autonomy. Pillar 1 of the agreement centers on support for Australia’s establishment of a nuclear submarine force.
For the September 13 test, the Mk 48 torpedo was slung under the Excalibur UUV. The nearly 40-foot (12-meter) long, 19-metric-ton submersible drone has a large internal payload bay, but it is reportedly not large enough to accommodate the Mk 48, which is the standard heavyweight torpedo in U.S. Navy service today. The 19-foot-long, 21-inch-diameter weapon has been successively upgraded over the years to expand its capabilities and improve its resistance to enemy countermeasures.
The Royal Navy officially unveiled Excalibur, which was developed by U.K.-based MSubs under Project Cetus, last year. The external torpedo launch capability was the result of two additional efforts, called Project Broadsword and Trial Iron, according to the U.S. Navy release.
The September 13 test “successfully validated the mechanical, electrical, and software integration of a U.S. kinetic payload onto an allied autonomous vessel, proving that allied forces can rapidly achieve weapon interchangeability,” the Navy’s release adds. “Approved in February 2026 by the Department of the Navy Rapid Capabilities Office (DONRCO), the project was executed in less than seven months.”
How the Excalibur UUV was controlled during the test and whether the torpedo was launched at a test target of some kind are unknown. TWZ has reached out for more information.
“BROADSWORD is a great example of how AUKUS Pillar II drives interoperability in across the alliance. Demonstrating the launch of a US torpedo from a UK extra-large unmanned underwater vehicle (XLUUV) is an important early step in developing lethality in our undersea autonomous systems,” U.S. Navy Vice Adm. Robert Gaucher, Director of Submarine Programs, did say in a statement. “We look forward to continuing to leverage the AUKUS partnership to keep pushing the potential warfighting advantages of unmanned undersea systems.”
“This successful test marks a historic first for allied undersea warfare,” U.S. Navy Adm. Daryl Caudle, Chief of Naval Operations, also said in a statement. “Proving that we can seamlessly launch a U.S. heavyweight torpedo from a Royal Navy autonomous underwater vehicle validates our shared vision for true interchangeability.
“This is a really important moment in our journey towards building a hybrid navy, which is where the Royal Navy will sail with crewed ships and submarines alongside uncrewed and autonomous vessels,” Luke Pollard, U.K. Minister of State for Defence Readiness and Industry, separately said in an interview with LBC radio. “It is a substantial increase in our lethality, to show that torpedoes can be fired not just by the Astute class hunter-killer submarines that we have in the Royal Navy, but also now by our uncrewed systems.”
The U.S. Navy and the Royal Navy employ various tiers of UUVs operationally today, but primarily for mine-sweeping and reconnaissance and surveillance missions. Future fleets of submersible drones capable of carrying out attacks on other vessels will create entirely new operational possibilities. Operated closely together with crewed surface warships and submarines, torpedo-toting UUVs could be sent ahead into riskier environments and offer an immediate option for engaging any threats they might find. Even a bigger UUV like Excalibur would also be more challenging for opponents to spot and track than a traditional attack submarine.
Excalibur is also in a category of larger and more capable submersible drones that offer significant endurance and higher degrees of autonomy. Adding in the ability to launch torpedoes, in turn, then opens the door to new concepts for employing these UUVs in groups more independently of crewed companions. In the future, for instance, armed Excaliburs or similar UUVs might be deployed to a particular maritime choke point to not just monitor for enemy movements, but actively hold them at risk.
In addition, in general, UUVs offer a way to expand total undersea warfare capacity in a more cost-effective manner compared to acquiring and fielding more traditional submarines. The ability to have more presence below the waves at a lower price point also translates to more persistence across large areas, something that could be especially valuable across the broad expanses of the Pacific, as well as other bodies of water globally. This presents additional targeting challenges and uncertainty for opponents.
“In securing the North Atlantic, especially against those nations that wish to do us harm, like Russia, the ability for us to now say it’s not just where our submarines are that you need to worry about – it is about how we create greater deterrence and question marks in the eyes of our adversary, with uncrewed systems there as well,” U.K. Minister Pollard said in speaking with LBC.
Pollard’s remarks here speak to particular considerations the British government is faced with just in its backyard. This includes the so-called Greenland-Iceland-United Kingdom (GIUK) Gap, which is the main path through which Russian Navy submarines transit to and from bases in the northwestern end of that country and the Atlantic proper. There is also the English Channel and the nearby Baltic Sea. The Royal Navy has limited capacity with its crewed submarines to monitor this and other critical regional chokepoints. UUVs could then help take pressure off its fleet of just five (of a planned seven) Astute class submarines, helping free those boats up for the myriad other missions they are tasked with, including carrier escort and special operations support.
“By converting commercial and allied uncrewed undersea hulls into high-end strike assets, the partnership drastically alters the cost-exchange ratio in contested maritime environments,” the U.S. Navy’s press release today notes, as well.
There are still many questions still to be answered about future larger UUV operations, including just how they will be deployed and recovered. Video the U.S. Navy released today shows that the torpedo-armed Excalibur was launched into the water in Scotland using a commercial truck-mounted crane. U.S. shipbuilders Huntington Ingalls Industries (HII) and General Dynamics National Steel and Shipbuilding Company (NASSCO), among others, have been working on new options for launching and retrieving larger drone submersibles from surface warships. External carriage on the hulls of ships and/or submarines might also be an option in the future.
Additional torpedo and other munition options for UUVs beyond the full-size Mk 48 could also be on the horizon. The U.S. Navy has invested heavily in compact and lightweight torpedo designs that could be well suited for employment from underwater drones like Excalibur.
The U.S. Navy says it is working with its international partners on another similar UUV capability demonstration, but this time involving an Anduril Dive-XL, under what is dubbed Project Cutlass. This effort “will tackle advanced payload integration data, command and control architectures, and tactical employment scenarios to further mature uncrewed undersea capabilities,” according to the U.S. Navy’s release.
The Royal Australian Navy is already in the process of acquiring and fielding a militarized version of the Dive-XL, called Ghost Shark. It’s also worth noting that the Dive-XL evolved from the earlier Dive-LD design. The Dive-LD is in at least limited operational U.S. Navy service now, a fact that was revealed by Iran’s capture of one of these submersible drones earlier this month, as you can read more about here.
The U.S. Navy is also continuing to push ahead with plans to field a force of Orca XLUUVs from Boeing. In August, the service announced that an Orca had conducted a 1,000-nautical-mile transit in the Pacific the preceding month as part of the ongoing development of that design.
Other countries are pursuing larger UUVs, as well. China has been making strides in this regard and is in some ways ahead of other competitors globally.
Excalibur’s ability to launch a standard Mk 48 heavyweight torpedo is already an important show of progress now toward a shared goal of a future underwater ecosystem that includes submersible drones that are able to attack other vessels.
Contact the author: joe@twz.com
The post Torpedo Fired From Uncrewed Submarine For The First Time By U.S., U.K. appeared first on TWZ.
Recent satellite imagery of a shipyard in northeastern China offers interesting new insights into the country’s next-generation submarine developments. The images notably show a pumpjet propulsor and other features worth examining on an example of what is generally described as a new class of nuclear-powered attack submarine, or SSN.
TWZ has obtained a new image taken on September 18 of the submarine in question, which is being built at the Bohai Shipyard in Huludao, from Vantor. Janes reported on this submarine earlier today, based on a separate Vantor image from September 1. The outlet also described the boat as a Type 095, a commonly used, but still unofficial designation. This is something we will come back to later on.
As mentioned, the pumpjet propulsor immediately stands out in both images. This is also understood to be a feature on the Type 093B nuclear-powered attack submarine, a significantly improved variation on that earlier design, which first emerged in the early 2020s. Compared to traditional exposed propellers and more basic shrouded types, pumpjets offer benefits for quieter operation and efficiencies, especially at higher submerged speeds.
The recent imagery also highlights the submarine’s X-shaped stern plane arrangement. This is not found on the Type 093B, which is considered to be something of a bridge between that class and the next-generation design. Broadly speaking, an X-shaped configuration offers advantages when it comes to enhanced maneuverability, efficiency, and safety, which can be particularly useful in littoral environments. It can also provide benefits when it comes to acoustic signature reductions across significant parts of the submarine’s operating envelope compared to the cruciform stern planes.
Another Chinese submarine design that emerged in 2024, currently referred to as the Type 041 or Zhou class, and that is understood to feature a hybrid nuclear/conventional propulsion system, also has an X-shaped stern configuration. The first known example of the Type 041 came to light after it appeared to have sunk in a shipyard.
An X-shaped stern arrangement also looks to be a feature on yet another new class of submarine that appeared at the JN (Jiangnan) Shipyard in Shanghai earlier this year. Initial reports also suggested that the design lacked a traditional sail. However, it has been confirmed that it has a sail, but that is very small proportionally to the overall size of the boat. Truncated sails can offer performance and other advantages, but there are trade-offs.
The image of the submarine that Janes obtained also notably shows an open rectangular-shaped section aft of the sail. The September 18 image that we received from Vantor shows a structure placed over that section of that submarine, obscuring ongoing work on that part of the boat. The Type 095 is widely expected to feature some type of vertical launch system (VLS) array able to accommodate a variety of anti-ship and land-attack cruise missiles, as well as potentially hypersonic types. The Type 095 is also sometimes referred to as a guided missile submarine, or SSGN, as a result. The open area seen in the September 1 shot could be where the VLS array is set to be fitted. It might also provide access to the reactor compartment or another area of the submarine.
The clearest photos we have on the Type 095 SSN!
— PLA Military Updates
As we can see, there is one confirmed chamber than could physically fit about 18-24 VLS Cells. There is a big chance that more than one VLS Chamber exists, with an estimate VLS count from 24-48+ VLS pic.twitter.com/0ZJ8gsl4su
Interestingly, the September 18 image also shows what look to be at least two relatively large circular openings, side-by-side, at the bow end of the submarine in front of the sail, the purpose of which is not immediately clear. There is a possibility these could also be for vertically launching munitions or other payloads. As a point of comparison, U.S. Virginia class nuclear attack submarines, starting with the Block III version, have two large-diameter Virginia Payload Tubes (VPT), one in front of the other, in the bow in front of their sails. At the same time, the openings on the submarine in Huludao also appear to be in a position that is very close to where the submarine’s main sonar array would be installed, and they could be tied to that aspect of the design, too.
“I think it’s too early to be sure about the VLS configuration from publicly available imagery. I realize people assume the large rectangular space halfway behind the sail is the VLS, but I am not sure this is the case and I’d caution to jump to conclusions. The space could also be related to work on the reactor compartment,” Alex Luck, a naval analyst who closely tracks submarine and Chinese navy developments, told TWZ. “With Type 093B, the VLS after launch was initially covered with a tarp, and then the installed launchers were readily visible quite quickly during the fitting-out process. The work process may change with these newer boats, but the different appearance during launch and fitting out needs to be considered in that regard.”
“I do expect Type 095 to have a VLS of some sort, but I am not sure as of yet what the configuration would look like, or where exactly it is located,” he added.
The bigger outstanding question may be exactly what type of submarine is currently being built now at the Bohai Shipyard. Based on a review of additional imagery from Planet Labs’ archive, the boat appears to be around 394 feet (120 meters) long. When the first example of what was assessed to be a Type 095 emerged in Huludao in February, it was estimated to have a length of roughly 361 feet (110 meters). The ‘small sail’ design that broke cover earlier this year in Shanghai is also estimated to be some 394 feet/120 meters long based on available imagery, but also looks to be narrower than the boat presumed to be a Type 095 in February.
“One significant question is the nature and difference between the boat launched by Bohai in February, and the two newer hulls launched in late May/early June both by Bohai and at Jiangnan in Shanghai,” Luck, the naval analyst, also told TWZ. “Specifically, we do not quite know whether they are for different operational roles, or rather a two step development for one final configuration of a new SSN. I think the latter is at least plausible.”
“A related question then is what boat we are looking at now with the new imagery, i.e. the February boat or the newer hull Bohai had launched,” he continued. “Without exact and reliable measurements that question for now is unresolved in the public discourse. For now we need more, and more detailed imagery, including of the different boats together, to clarify these aspects.”
“This [September 1] image reinforces my impression that the boat launched in February may have been a one off not including the full spec featured on the notional 095A launched by Bohai and Jiangnan in late May. We’ve already seen both versions side by side in Bohai,” Luck also wrote on X after Janes‘ published its report.
This image reinforces my impression that the boat launched in February may have been a one off not including the full spec featured on the notional 095A launched by Bohai and Jiangnan in late May. We've already seen both versions side by side in Bohai. https://t.co/wBMkB1gmSQ
— Alex Luck (@AlexLuck9) September 21, 2026
Regardless, the emergence in recent years of so many new, more modern submarines, and across what appear to be several distinct classes, is significant. It is no secret that China’s People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) is working to significantly expand the size and capabilities of its submarine force with a clear eye toward extending operations further and further out in the Pacific, at least. In the past, U.S. officials have publicly said the overall quality of newer Chinese submarines has been getting closer in parity to American designs.
“The PLA Navy is executing a significant strategic shift from diesel-electric to all-nuclear construction, representing a fundamental departure from historical construction patterns,” U.S. Navy Rear Adm. Mike Brookes, head of the Office of Naval Intelligence, wrote in prepared remarks ahead of a hearing before members of the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission in March.
In particular, the Type 095, as well as the new Type 096 nuclear-powered ballistic missile submarine, “represent next-generation platforms expected to enter service during the late 2020s through 2030s,” Brookes also wrote at that time. “These submarines will incorporate substantial advancements in nuclear reactor design, sensor performance, weapons integration, and noise quieting technologies.”
Submarine modernization efforts are just one aspect of a larger effort by the PLAN to expand its capabilities above and below the waves. Chinese shipyards have also been producing ever-more capable aircraft carriers, amphibious assault ships, destroyers, frigates, and more in recent years, as well. The pace of China’s construction of new surface ships and submarines has also been growing, creating a particularly significant and still-widening disparity in this regard with the U.S. Navy. This is something that has become increasingly concerning, as TWZ routinely highlights.
Work in Huludao, as well as shipyards elsewhere in China, is certainly already revealing interesting new insights into China’s next-generation submarine efforts.
Contact the author: joe@twz.com
The post Chinese Next-Generation Submarine Developments Spotted In New Satellite Imagery appeared first on TWZ.
Swedish and German forces are conducting what appears to be the first joint rehearsal of their rapid-reinforcement plans for the Baltic island of Gotland. The exercise is another step in Sweden’s defense planning for an island whose position in the middle of the Baltic gives it an outsized strategic importance for controlling access, protecting the Baltic states, and maintaining NATO’s freedom of movement in a region where Russian military activity remains a persistent concern.
The exercise, Silver Wotan 2026, running between September 14-23, brings together Swedish and German forces across the land, maritime, and air domains. The scenario is built around a Swedish request for allied assistance, with German forces moving personnel and equipment across the Baltic before integrating with Swedish units already defending the island. The operation is testing the entire process of getting allied combat power to Gotland, protecting it during the movement to Visby, and rapidly incorporating it into the island’s existing defensive network.
A video shows troops coming ashore on Swedish CB90 fast assault craft, a type that German soldiers are also trained to operate:
A rapid deployment of German and Swedish forces to Gotland island is being carried out today. Units from
— Försvarsmakten (@Forsvarsmakten) September 18, 2026
The strategic importance of Gotland has grown considerably following Sweden’s accession to NATO in March 2024, which was a direct response to the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Located approximately halfway between mainland Sweden and the Baltic states, the island occupies a central position in the Baltic Sea, close to the maritime approaches to the Gulf of Finland and within reach of the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad. Its location gives forces operating from Gotland a potentially significant position from which to conduct surveillance, air defense, and maritime operations, while also making the island an important part of the wider network connecting NATO’s northern and eastern members.
At the same time, Gotland sits within an extremely complex littoral environment, where shallow waters, islands, narrow maritime approaches, and the proximity of multiple states can make both offensive operations and defensive planning more difficult. The region has also been shaped by longstanding Swedish concerns about Russian clandestine activity, including intelligence gathering and other forms of covert or deniable activity. The complexity of the Baltic operating environment can make such activities harder to detect and attribute, adding another layer of uncertainty alongside the more conventional military challenges facing the region.
Geography has long made Gotland important to Swedish defense planning, but its significance has taken on a broader dimension since Sweden joined the alliance. NATO has described the island as strategically important to its freedom of maneuver in the Baltic, while Swedish officials have highlighted its potential role as a hub for military operations and logistics in the region.
The current exercise is designed around the practical difficulties of reinforcing such a position.
Military equipment is being transported by sea to Visby, Gotland’s principal port, including by commercial ferry. In Visby, Swedish and German personnel are securing the harbor and conducting the reception of the arriving force. Among the equipment being moved are air defense systems, while Swedish forces are also operating coastal defense systems armed with anti-ship missiles.
Meanwhile, publicly available flight-tracking data showed German Luftwaffe transport aircraft, including at least one Airbus A400M airlifter, apparently involved in the effort. The commercial airport at Visby has long also been used for military activities related to Gotland and the wider Baltic region.
”A rapid deployment of German and Swedish forces to Gotland island is being carried out today” https://t.co/z6oLs1LCT4 pic.twitter.com/n18MdST6r1
— Jamming (@balticjam) September 18, 2026
The movement is supported by Swedish and German naval forces and other aircraft, creating a scenario in which the maritime transit, protection of the port, air operations, and subsequent movement of troops and equipment ashore all form part of the same military problem. Once ashore, the arriving forces have to be moved into position and integrated with Swedish units already responsible for defending the island.
The Swedish Gotland Regiment, P 18, provides the core of the island’s permanent military presence. The regiment, Sweden’s youngest and smallest, has been rebuilding its capabilities since Sweden began expanding its military presence on Gotland. Its forces form the basis of the ground-defense structure into which allied reinforcements would be incorporated.
Swedish coastal defense capabilities are another important element of the drill. Land-based anti-ship missiles provide the island with a means of threatening hostile surface vessels operating in the surrounding waters, giving the defense of Gotland a direct connection to the wider maritime battle for the Baltic. During Silver Wotan, Swedish and German forces are also conducting anti-surface warfare activities alongside the broader reinforcement operation.
Germany is contributing more than 500 troops to the exercise, part of approximately 2,000 Bundeswehr personnel involved, including elements from the army, navy, and air force. The German Luftwaffe has deployed Panavia Tornado aircraft for surveillance, while German naval forces are participating in the maritime component, and German ground personnel are involved in the reinforcement and security activities on Gotland.
The exercise scenario is particularly relevant against the backdrop of Russia’s continuing military presence in the Baltic region.
Russia maintains major military infrastructure in Kaliningrad, including naval, air, missile, and air defense capabilities, while the Russian Baltic Fleet operates from bases in the region. Kaliningrad’s position between Poland and Lithuania gives Moscow a significant military foothold inside the NATO area, while Russian forces and military infrastructure elsewhere along the Baltic add to the complexity of operating and reinforcing allied territory in the region.
The security environment around the Baltic has also deteriorated considerably since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. NATO has increased its surveillance and military activity in the region, including the launch of Baltic Sentry in January 2025 following a series of incidents involving critical undersea infrastructure. The alliance has subsequently expanded efforts to monitor maritime activity and protect infrastructure and sea lines of communication.
Swedish authorities have stressed that Silver Wotan was planned in advance and is not being conducted in response to a specific imminent Russian threat. The exercise nonetheless reflects the operational environment in which Swedish and NATO planners now have to consider the possibility that maritime and air movements across the Baltic could be monitored, disrupted, or contested.
The exercise also builds on a series of increasingly large Swedish-led activities designed to test the reception of allied forces on Swedish territory. During Aurora 26 earlier this year, more than 18,000 troops from 13 countries participated in operations across Sweden, including the deployment of allied forces to Gotland alongside the Gotland Regiment and Swedish Home Guard. NATO described that activity as an emergency deployment intended to test the reinforcement of the island.
Silver Wotan places a more concentrated emphasis on the Swedish-German relationship and on the movement of an allied force into the island’s existing defensive structure.
Germany’s participation is also consistent with its growing military role in the Baltic and along NATO’s northeastern flank. Berlin is already providing forces for NATO’s forward defense in Lithuania and has increasingly emphasized the ability to move German forces rapidly across northern Europe in support of allied operations.
For Sweden, meanwhile, Gotland has become one of the clearest examples of how NATO membership has changed the country’s defense planning. The island remains a Swedish responsibility, but its location means that what happens there has consequences well beyond Sweden’s territorial defense.
A defended and adequately supplied Gotland provides NATO with a strategically positioned base for surveillance and defensive operations in the Baltic, while the ability to reinforce it demonstrates that the alliance can maintain access to the island even as the surrounding maritime and air environment becomes more contested.
The exercise comes as European allies are being forced to plan for a NATO in which the United States may provide less of the conventional military weight it has supplied for decades. The Pentagon is reviewing the size and posture of U.S. forces in Europe, including the forces and capabilities Washington would make available in a European crisis, while NATO’s top commander has said further U.S. troop withdrawals should be expected as European allies build up their own conventional capabilities.
At the same time, the alliance now describes Russia as its most significant and direct security threat, citing military activity alongside airspace violations, sabotage, cyber operations, and other forms of hybrid pressure. There are also growing concerns that Russia could try something in the Baltics, while it continues to step up its gray-zone activities regardless. NATO officials have warned that Russia could rebuild enough military capacity to pose a more serious conventional challenge to the alliance before the end of the decade.
There are escalating warnings from Poland that Russia is preparing to widen its war against Ukraine, with "accidental" missile and drone strikes on NATO territory.
— Deborah Haynes (@haynesdeborah) September 18, 2026
Such a move – Russia falsely claiming air strikes that hit NATO allies happened by accident – would be designed to…
For Sweden and Germany, the Silver Wotan exercise is a practical test of how quickly European forces can reinforce and defend one of the Baltic’s most strategically important positions. As the security environment grows more contested and Europe prepares for a future in which U.S. forces may not be as readily available, the ability to move allied combat power across the region and integrate it into existing defenses is becoming an increasingly important part of NATO’s deterrence.
Contact the author: thomas@thewarzone.com
The post German Forces Surge Onto Baltic Island In First-Of-Its-Kind NATO Drill appeared first on TWZ.
The officer who led the 31st Marine Expeditionary Unit (MEU) on its recent combat deployment to the Middle East told us he needs his own uncrewed surface vessels (USVs) on future deployments. Operationalizing USVs is an area where the Marines are lagging behind. In particular, he wants the ability to send USVs forward to reconnoiter potential highly-contested beach landing areas, a mission largely assumed by the Navy.
As we have frequently reported, the military use of USVs is now proliferating around the globe at an increasing rate. Ukraine has employed sea drones to devastating effect against Russia’s Black Sea Fleet vessels and facilities, forcing the general evacuation of Russian naval assets from occupied Crimea to bases in Russia proper. During Operation Epic Fury, the U.S. used them for the first time in combat, as one-way attack weapons against Iranian targets, to hunt for mines, and for a search and rescue operation to locate the crew of an AH-64 Apache helicopter downed by Iran, as well as general broad-area surveillance and awareness. China is investing heavily in the space, as well, along with many other navies around the globe, both friend and foe.
The following video shows the first U.S. use of a USV as a kamikaze weapon.
Yesterday, using multiple one-way attack surface drones, CENTCOM forces successfully struck a submarine and ship maintenance facility in Iran. Three Corsair unmanned surface vessels hit the port at Bandar Abbas Naval Base, marking the first time American forces have employed sea… pic.twitter.com/bOM2kmgRxz
— U.S. Central Command (@CENTCOM) July 13, 2026
“There was a lot in theater that were being used, but it wasn’t something that we went out with,” Col. Chris P. Niedziocha told us when asked if the 31st MEU deployed with USVs. He then answered in the affirmative in response to a question about if MEUs need sea drones on future deployments. He said it is part of the “explosion in robotics and autonomy” being used in combat.
“These systems are incredibly useful and capable,” explained Niedziocha, now director of the USMC Expeditionary Warfare School. “And you say, ‘Hey, you know, [in] the next war, if the first thing you’re putting through the breach isn’t a robot, something’s wrong. You say never send a Marine someplace you haven’t sent a bullet. I think the new way is [you] never want to send a Marine someplace you haven’t already sent a robot. So yeah, we’re embracing [the technology] and we’re not leaders. We’re fast followers in that regime.”
Asked for specific use cases he sees for USVs, the colonel talked about using them before putting Marines ashore.
“I can tell you if you’re doing an amphibious operation, you want to understand what’s waiting beneath the surface in the water column,” Niedziocha noted. “So something can go either with a side-looking sonar array or even forward-looking to demonstrate that there’s nothing there, and the hydrography and bathymetry is what you… need for the operation to be successful.”
Hydrography measures “the shape and features of the shoreline; the characteristics of tides, currents, and waves; and the physical and chemical properties of the water itself,” according to NOAA. Bathymetry, which is part of that, focuses on mapping the depths and shapes of underwater terrain.
These functions are critical for mine detection and determining whether there are man-made or natural obstacles that would impede landing operations. While these missions are largely being performed by the Navy, including with USVs, the Marines are moving toward making that an organic capability. Recently, the Marines announced they were testing a counter-mine USV system. The evaluation was conducted late last month at Camp Pendleton by the Program Manager Combat Support Systems (PM CSS) Explosive Hazard Defeat Team.
The test of the USV was “in response to a littoral capability gap,” according to the media release. “The solution: seek a commercial USV solution that is equipped with integrated autonomous driving and payloads that consist of Sonar, Forward-Looking Infrared (FLIR) cameras, Line of Sight (LOS) Communications and Acoustic Communications (AComms).”
This was part of the overall effort to develop “solutions that enable increased standoff for Marines to detect, investigate and neutralize threats,” the release added. “The innovation of Explosive Ordnance Disposal (EOD) and Littoral Explosive Ordnance Neutralization (LEON) systems will provide Marine EOD Technicians with the confidence to operate in contested environments while preserving combat power, increasing operational reach, and minimizing exposure to explosive threats.”
LEON is a so-called system of systems, using a remotely operated vehicle, diver equipment, an unmanned underwater vehicle (UUV), a USV, and an Amphibious Unmanned Ground Vehicle to enable “EOD to confirm and mark hazards and obstacles from very shallow water to the beach zone,” the media release added.
While unmanned systems have long been part of EOD operations, “we’re expanding that into maritime systems that allow more endurance and less risk for operators,” said Chief Warrant Officer 2 Alfredo Andrade, officer in charge, Explosive Ordnance Disposal Company, 7th Engineer Support Battalion (ESB). “Some of the conflicts that we are engaged in take a toll on the force, and surging in new forces is costly. It turns into a logistical problem. To preserve the safety and the health of the forces… the USV and the [LEON] program exist to ensure that we have readily available combat power.”
While Niedziocha didn’t address USVs for offensive combat roles, the Marines have evaluated them for that use as well as for logistics, among other functions.
Our Autonomous Low-Profile Vessel (ALPV) solicitation is now accepting submissions.
— Department of War Innovation Unit (@DIU_x) March 3, 2026
The @DeptofWar and the @USMC need to resupply units spread over wide distances in contested littoral environments. Increased all-domain threats targeting logistics capabilities, locations, and… pic.twitter.com/Af8v0DTRHS
There have been many other tests, as well. Including one just this summer at RIMPAC. These trials saw the launch and recovery of one of Splash Industries’ Typhoon USVs aboard the USS Essex. The ‘Gator Navy’ of amphibious assault vessels that haul Marines and their kit around the oceans is uniquely suited to act as USV motherships. Their well decks allow for easy deployment and recovery of USVs of many sizes and capabilities near seamlessly. So it won’t be surprising if these vessels and the Marines aboard them quickly become staples in the Pentagon’s USV playbook.
Watch us land one of our drone-boats inside a moving US Navy warship during RIMPAC. This world-first resupply mission was performed completely autonomously using a Splash Industries Typhoon USV. pic.twitter.com/AEzNzZjsL1
— Ivan Avanesov (@i_vanesov) July 14, 2026
Still, the Marines have a long way to go to catch up to how these systems are already being used.
The Houthi rebels of Yemen actually pioneered the operational use of kamikaze USVs years ago and Ukraine has led the way in advancements of these systems. They first employed them as kamikaze weapons, but then added machine guns and rockets and later missiles, which were used to shoot down Russian helicopters and jets. Ukraine has also used them to launch first-person view (FPV) and bomber drone attacks as well as deliver uncrewed ground vehicles (UGVs) into enemy territory. Last week, Ukraine claimed to have attacked a Russian USV with a USV, marking another first.
You can see that engagement in the following video.
Ukraine's Navy says a Sargan unmanned surface vessel destroyed a Russian unmanned boat with machine-gun fire in the Black Sea, the first-ever battle between unmanned surface vessels. Ukrainian Navy personnel operated in coordination with HUR. #Ukraine pic.twitter.com/Avg4ecz8m6
— NOELREPORTS
Having recently returned from a six-month deployment that saw the Marine Corps’ first use of its Expeditionary Advanced Base Operations (EABO) concept in a combat setting during the fight against Iran, Niedziocha has a good sense of the realities of modern warfare. His Marines operated forward arming and refueling points (FARPs) for various aircraft in combat for the first time and set up remote sensing locations.
That a commander like him sees value in USVs is a good sign for progress in the development of these systems.
Contact the author: howard@twz.com
The post Marine Colonel Who Led Mideast Combat Deployment Wants His Own Drone Boats appeared first on TWZ.
Japan has said it is keeping the door open to acquiring nuclear-powered submarines, a potentially major shift for a country whose submarine force has historically relied exclusively on conventional propulsion. Defense Minister Shinjiro Koizumi confirmed recently that Tokyo is not ruling out nuclear-powered submarines as it considers the future requirements of the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force (JMSDF).
Should Japan ultimately pursue the capability, it would join an exclusive group of nations operating nuclear-powered submarines. China, France, India, Russia, the United Kingdom, and the United States are currently the only countries with nuclear-powered submarines in active service. Brazil is already working to join the club, while Australian and South Korean nuclear-powered submarine plans are somewhat longer-term.
Japan’s submarine fleet is already regarded as among the most capable conventionally powered forces, and is very much at the forefront of advanced naval propulsion technologies. Even with that considerable expertise, however, developing and sustaining a nuclear propulsion capability would represent a huge challenge, requiring expertise and infrastructure far beyond those needed to build Japan’s existing conventionally powered submarines.
Koizumi’s comments do not represent a decision to acquire nuclear-powered submarines, nor do they indicate that Japan has begun a procurement program. They do, however, mark a significant evolution in the country’s public debate over submarine propulsion and point to a growing willingness within the Japanese defense establishment to consider capabilities that were previously largely outside the mainstream of defense planning.
Currently, Japan operates one of the world’s most capable conventional submarine fleets, centered on increasingly sophisticated diesel-electric boats equipped with air-independent propulsion and advanced lithium-ion batteries. These submarines are well suited to operations around Japan and the country’s surrounding waters.
The JMSDF currently operates 22 conventionally powered submarines, maintaining the force structure established in the 2010s while progressively replacing older boats with the more capable Taigei class. Five Taigei class submarines are now in JMSDF service, with additional boats in the pipeline.
Nuclear propulsion, however, would offer substantially greater endurance and sustained underwater speed, allowing Japanese submarines to conduct longer-range operations across the broader Western Pacific with minimal support. This is a requirement that is becoming increasingly relevant as Tokyo’s strategic focus expands beyond its immediate maritime approaches.
China’s rapidly expanding naval force, including its growing submarine fleet and increasingly distant maritime operations, is forcing Tokyo to consider how it would monitor and potentially counter Chinese forces farther from the Japanese archipelago. A nuclear-powered attack submarine could remain submerged for extended periods without the endurance limitations imposed by conventional propulsion, making it particularly useful for long-range surveillance, tracking, and sea-denial missions.
Japan’s debate is also unfolding alongside a significant development in neighboring South Korea. Seoul has confirmed plans to develop a new class of nuclear-powered submarines, a move that could add further momentum to an emerging undersea competition in Northeast Asia. South Korea’s decision is particularly relevant to Tokyo because it demonstrates that nuclear propulsion is no longer merely a theoretical capability for U.S. allies in the region. While the missions and strategic priorities of the Japanese and South Korean navies are different, both countries face the challenge of operating in waters increasingly contested by China and North Korea.
The development could also create new opportunities for Japan to work more closely with Australia and the other AUKUS partners. Australia is in the process of acquiring its own conventionally armed, nuclear-powered submarine capability under AUKUS Pillar I, with U.S. and U.K. nuclear-powered submarines also scheduled to operate from Australia. Japan has separately been identified as a potential partner for AUKUS Pillar II, which covers advanced capabilities and technology cooperation.
A Japanese decision to pursue SSNs could eventually create a much deeper basis for cooperation with Australia, including submarine interoperability, undersea warfare, workforce and technical expertise, infrastructure, sustainment, and potentially aspects of the industrial base. Analysts have already examined how Japan could fit into the wider AUKUS submarine ecosystem as Australia’s nuclear-submarine program develops.
A Japanese nuclear-powered submarine with a robust capacity to launch land attack cruise missiles would also be a powerful component in the country’s emerging “counterstrike” posture, which is increasingly centered on acquiring the ability to strike targets at longer ranges.
Japan has already begun deploying domestically developed long-range missile systems, including the Upgraded Type 12 surface-to-ship missile, while also acquiring the U.S.-made Tomahawk cruise missile.
An SSN would potentially add a highly survivable, mobile platform to this emerging strike architecture, allowing Japan to position long-range weapons farther from its home territory and complicating an adversary’s efforts to locate and neutralize them. That could be particularly valuable in a conflict in which Japanese air bases, missile batteries, and other fixed infrastructure were under attack.
The potential SSN requirement also fits with Japan’s expanding expeditionary ambitions. As the JMSDF converts its Izumo class helicopter destroyers to operate F-35B fighters, giving Japan a more credible carrier aviation capability, nuclear-powered attack submarines could provide a valuable escort for these increasingly important surface groups. Their speed, endurance, and ability to remain submerged for extended periods makes SSNs particularly well suited to accompanying carrier forces on longer-range deployments and supporting contingencies farther from Japanese waters.
Looking at the bigger picture, it is highly significant that nuclear propulsion was effectively excluded from Japan’s conventional defense debate for decades. More recently, however, Japanese defense officials and policymakers have begun examining whether future submarines will require a different propulsion system. The issue is now one that can be discussed openly at the ministerial level.
Nevertheless, pursuing a nuclear-powered submarine program would come with huge challenges.
Building and operating nuclear-powered submarines would require Japan to establish an entirely different industrial, regulatory, and training infrastructure. The vessels would also be considerably more expensive and complex to build and operate than Japan’s existing conventionally powered submarines. Tokyo would have to resolve questions involving nuclear regulation, reactor technology, maintenance facilities, crew training, and the handling of nuclear material.
There would also be a significant political dimension. Although naval nuclear propulsion is fundamentally different from possessing nuclear weapons, any move in that direction would inevitably receive scrutiny in a country whose postwar security policy has been shaped by its experience with nuclear weapons and its longstanding non-nuclear principles.
For those reasons, Koizumi’s statement should be viewed less as an announcement of a Japanese nuclear-submarine program than as evidence that the political barrier to discussing such a program is falling.
The next question is whether the Japanese government will move from keeping the option open to actually studying a nuclear-powered submarine design, propulsion technology, and acquisition pathway in detail.
If it does, the consequences could extend well beyond Japan’s submarine fleet. A Japanese nuclear-powered submarine capability would represent a major enhancement of Tokyo’s ability to operate across the Western Pacific and could alter the undersea balance between Japan, China, and the United States’ other regional allies. At the very least, the idea is one that is now part of wider discussions at the highest levels.
Contact the author: thomas@thewarzone.com
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The 31st Marine Expeditionary Unit’s (31st MEU) recent deployment to the Middle East marked the first time the United States Marine Corps (USMC) used its Expeditionary Advanced Base Operations (EABO) concept in a combat setting, the service confirmed to TWZ on Thursday. At its core, EABO involves relatively small groups of Marines quickly establishing bases of operation in forward areas, often within the enemy’s weapons range. During operations in the fight against Iran, Marines refueled and rearmed their own aircraft, as well as those from the joint force, at these austere locales. They also set up remote sensing locations, among other actions from the EABO playbook.
This employment of EABO for Epic Fury is a highly significant development. After years of progressively evolving the EABO playbook, it was no longer an experimental exercise. This meant that Marines were forward deployed in a contested area in a region where established bases were taking heavy fire from Iranian missile and drone barrages. Troops were killed in some of these attacks and U.S. aircraft, buildings and equipment were damaged and destroyed across the Middle East. Pushing aircraft from the MEU, as well as the joint force, to FARPs (forward arming and refueling point) would have been a relevant asset preservation tactic as well as one that would help accelerate combat operations, and it’s exactly what EABO is meant to do.
The 31st MEU’s six-month deployment began in January in the Pacific, before the unit was ordered to the Middle East in March, returning to Okinawa, Japan, in July. That’s where it is stationed as the USMC’s only continuously forward-based MEU.
“This was the first time we were able to implement EABO in combat operations since the concept was created for the force,” Capt. Steven J. Keenan, a USMC spokesperson, told us. “We have practiced it many times, but this was a first for supporting a Joint Force named operation with forward FARPs and forward bases that supported joint ops and combat power sustainment.”
EABO was first introduced in 2020 by then-Commandant Gen. David Berger in his Force Design 2030 plan for the future of the Corps. It was created with a fight against China in mind, especially utilizing small Pacific islands. The idea is to have highly mobile, low-signature forces deployed forward in austere, contested or potentially contested maritime locations. The mission is to “support sea control operation, conduct sea denial operations within the littorals, contribute to maritime domain awareness, provide forward command, control, communications, computers, combat systems, intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance, targeting, and counter-targeting capability and forward sustainment,” according to the Marines.
The news of the first activation of the EABO concept in combat came Wednesday during a media roundtable with Col. Chris P. Niedziocha, who commanded the 31st MEU during its deployment to the Middle East in support of Operation Epic Fury. Now director of the USMC Expeditionary Warfare School, Niedziocha discussed EABO and a range of other operations during that deployment, including boarding vessels during the blockade of Iranian ports.
The 31st MEU was embarked aboard the Tripoli Amphibious Ready Group (ARG), which consisted of the America class amphibious assault ship USS Tripoli, San Antonio class amphibious transport dock ship USS New Orleans, and Whidbey Island class dock landing ship USS Rushmore. You can read more about the ARG/MEU and its assets in our initial story about the deployment to the Middle East here.
“You’re starting to see this has been validated,” the colonel said of the EABO concept during the roundtable TWZ attended virtually. “It’s still nascent, but we actually, for the first time, demonstrated what we thought we were able to do, which I think is pretty exciting. And then things like forward arming and refueling to extend the operational reach of aircraft and expeditionary reloading, and then the ever-present logistic challenge of doing something like that. So that’s pretty significant.”
“We successfully implemented critical Expeditionary Advanced Base Operations (EABO), establishing sensor expeditionary advanced bases and forward arming and refueling points (FARPs) where none existed,” the colonel added. “Through our forward logistic elements, we proved that an agile Marine Air-Ground Task Force can sustain itself and generate ready, lethal power in contested maritime environments, directly setting the theater for follow-on joint forces.”
One of the objectives of the FARPs was to reduce reliance on the Marines’ fleet of KC-130 aerial refuelers and serve as jumping-off points for its F-35B Lightning II fighters.
“There was all manner of tankers all the time, but the FARP is to extend the operational reach, and if you can do it, you reduce the load on that,” Niedziocha noted. “Because there’s some aircraft that are basically for expeditionary austere operations, especially the F-35B,” the Marine Corps’ variant of the aircraft designed for short take off and vertical landing.
“There are some trade-offs associated with the Bravo,” Niedziocha pointed out, using a slang for the jets. “There’s less internal fuel, but you have the lift [system], which gives you the option to do these kinds of things. So, the goal there was to walk that fine line between providing the full sortie over wherever you needed it, and keeping the ships far enough away to make them as survivable as possible.”
In addition to the F-35Bs and other aircraft organic to the 31st MEU, the FARPs were also used by Army helicopters, Keenan told us. Imagery posted on the Pentagon’s image distribution site also showed U.S. Army Gray Eagle drones and Marine MV-22B Osprey tiltrotor aircraft were included.
Niedziocha did not provide details about where the FARPs were set up, but a U.S. defense official told us they were “disaggregated throughout the Middle East.” The official declined to provide further information, citing operational security concerns since they are still being used.
“Throughout the deployment, the Tripoli ARG and 31st MEU successfully conducted over 1,600 mishap-free flight hours of combat aviation missions, including precision strikes, transporting 800,000 pounds of cargo, and moving 5,000 personnel,” a 31st MEU overview of the deployment explained. “The units also provided sustained combat support to joint force operations by delivering critical intelligence and refueling over 300 aircraft ashore and underway.”
The colonel also didn’t provide details about the sensor expeditionary advanced bases. According to the Marines, “a sensing expeditionary advanced base (SEAB) brings together coastal surveillance radars, electronic sensors, and Marines ashore to extend maritime domain awareness, complementing the radars and sensors already at work aboard naval ships off the coast.”
“When SEAB systems identify surface vessels in nearby sea lanes, small unmanned aircraft system (sUAS) operators launch their platforms to visually identify and track the contacts,” the Marines added. “Sensor data and imagery are transmitted in real time across the blue-green command network to decision-makers.”
This capability could have been used to track Iran’s remaining fleet of small boats that it has used to harass shipping and mine the Strait of Hormuz, as well as larger vessels trying to transport oil. Other sensors, like radars and counter-drone systems, could also help identify incoming threats and provide general situational awareness. The EABO concept was employed as part of the 31st MEU’s larger role in supporting the blockade and mine clearance efforts.
The 31st MEU interdicted four vessels during the deployment, three of which led to boardings. On April 19, Marines boarded the MV Touska; on April 28, the MV Blue Star III; and on May 19, the MT Celestial Sea.
The Touska was boarded after USS Spruance fired multiple 5-inch rounds, targeting the engine room and disabling the vessel’s propulsion. The crew of the vessel was retained for about two weeks before being repatriated.
Niedziocha told us that none of the crews offered any resistance.
“At two in the morning, when 30 Force Reconnaissance Marines fast rope onto your vessel, [you are] just compliant with a capital C. They did exactly what they were directed to do. The overmatch that you put onto that vessel is pretty surprising. And then there’s overwatch provided by UAS and manned aircraft, so you create this bubble around the vessel. So yeah, they complied.”
You can see the Touska being boarded in the following video.
The U.S. just released a video of its forces boarding and seizing the Iranian container ship M/V Touska near the Hormuz Strait after it tried to break the U.S. naval blockade pic.twitter.com/FpB2obb3jY
— Visegrád 24 (@visegrad24) April 20, 2026
Two years ago, as the EABO concept was maturing, TWZ was invited to get an exclusive look at how an advanced EABO concept would be put into action, including how squadrons operated the F-35B out of an austere combat environment while generating combat sorties. It was an unprecedented and exclusive peek into the EABO playbook and what a real fight in the Pacific with the USMC’s most advanced fighter aircraft could actually look like. You can read about that in our story here. It appears the operations in the Middle East mirrored this exercise closely.
Now back in Japan, the ARG/MEU is getting ready for a new deployment, said the colonel.
“We got back to Okinawa, I think July 22nd, and they had already begun their workup cycle in earnest to be on the water in early January to go out and do another Iron Fist [training exercise] with the Japanese, and then long periods of a crisis response,” said Niedziocha, who relinquished command in August before moving on to his new role. “Just being there, present in the First Island Chain to partner with your allies, demonstrates the resolve and commitment to deter whatever needs deterring.”
As noted earlier in this story, the EABO concept was designed with a Pacific fight in mind. Its first combat employment in the Middle East clearly offers lessons that can now be adapted to enhance EABO operations globally.
Contact the author: howard@twz.com
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The U.S. military’s top officer on Wednesday talked about how AI is changing the character of warfare and offered two examples to illustrate his points. His comments included new insights into how two U.S. Army AH-64 Apache crew members were rescued after being shot down by an Iranian drone near the coast of Oman in June. The recovery effort involved America’s first known use of an uncrewed surface vessel (USV) executing a personnel recovery action as part of a military search and rescue operation.
“Information moves so fast that leader decision times have compressed from weeks down to days down to seconds,” explained Air Force Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, during his keynote speech at the Air & Space Forces Air, Space and Cyber Conference that TWZ is attending. “In the future fight, advantage will go to the side who can see first, who can understand first, decide first, and act first, and along the way, be a learning organization, and no factor is accelerating change as fast as artificial intelligence and advancing cyber capabilities.”
“AI is here now, and it’s already changing the way militaries see, sense, decide, and act across the joint force,” the chairman proclaimed.
The first example Caine used to highlight these changes took place on June 8. After the Apache went down, “U.S. CENTCOM launched a rapid, responsive joint search and rescue effort to recover the crew. That response drew on the totality of the joint force, and ultimately was required to use enabled unmanned vessels to participate in the rescue of downed U.S. service members for the first time ever.”
As we noted in our previous coverage, CENTCOM deployed “a U.S. Navy Corsair unmanned surface vessel,” the command’s spokesman told us at the time.
The ability to pull off that rescue mission “did not appear overnight,” Caine pointed out. “It came from the men and women of Task Force 59, CENTCOM’s forward-leaning unmanned joint maritime unit who spent the last several years testing, integrating, and operationalizing unmanned systems and AI in one of the most demanding and kinetic environments on Earth right now.”
“What helped make this possible was not a bunch of general officers and flag officers,” Caine continued. “What made this possible was a bunch of entrepreneurial sailors and members of the joint force on watch floors, at piers, managing networks of unmanned systems across thousands of miles of water, and using AI to turn massive amounts of data into a crisp, clear, perfect maritime picture that allowed us to go grab those two soldiers in the water.”
The second example Caine shared about the use of AI “points in the other direction, not how quickly we are using these tools, but how quickly these tools are changing the threat.”
In Ukraine, “we see first-person view drones operating in heavily contested EMI [electromagnetic interference] environments. Some now using AI-enabled computer vision to continue to drive towards targets, even when there’s no GPS or the links are cut. That gives small units affordable precision and shows how quickly software and autonomy are changing what is possible at the tactical edge, and the results are stark.”
The use of AI to enable lower-end drone warfare is a topic TWZ has been among the first to point out.
“In certain locations on the front line of troops right now, the life expectancy of a new Russian recruit arriving on the front lines is as little as 20 to 30 minutes,” Caine added. “Think about that. This is what happens when low-cost precision is fielded fast, adapted quickly, and scaled across the battlefield.”
“The price of lethal exchange is decreasing day over day,” the chairman noted. “One wonders what the future of close air support looks like, but I am comforted by the fact that each and every one of you are in this room thinking about that. Taken together, these examples from the Straits of Hormuz to the front lines in Ukraine show how quickly technology is changing the character of war, and this means our joint force needs to do two things at one time.”
“[W]e need to prepare the joint force to win in this kind of conflict,” the general stated. “We have to assume from now on that our formations will be hunted by autonomous systems, jammed across the spectrum, and tracked in real time, and we have to transition the joint force to be prepared to fight and win our future war by generating and delivering lethality at scale with an agile, optimized, high-low mix of combat capabilities to give the young members of the 2.8-million member all volunteer joint force the tools that they need before they need them.”
Contact the author: howard@twz.com
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As both the Navy and the USAF were racing to field a new generation of advanced tactical jets, the seagoing service’s program hit a wall. A major reason behind this from the Pentagon was concern that the U.S. industrial base could not handle simultaneous final development and production of two extremely complex new fighter aircraft. This was a controversial justification that many had a hard time swallowing. The Navy’s program, dubbed F/A-XX, is supposedly back on and a down-select on who will build it is coming soon, but that concern appears to linger among at least one of the Department of War’s top acquisition officials.
Though he remains confident that the U.S. Air Force F-47 sixth-generation fighter will fly in the next two years, Air Force Gen. Dale R. White, Director, Critical Major Weapon Systems — the service’s leading weapons procurement advisor — remains concerned about the overall capacity of industry to provide the military with the aircraft it needs, including two new fighters. His comments were in response to questions about the Navy’s challenges in building its own sixth-gen fighter alongside F-47.
The concerns are “not unique” to the F-47 or the Navy’s program but the problem exists to various degrees across the industrial base too, White told reporters Tuesday during a media roundtable at the Air & Space Forces’ Air, Space and Cyber Conference that TWZ is attending.
White has a dual-hatted role, serving as the Pentagon’s top weapons procurement officer and as the senior acquisition advisor to the Secretary of the Air Force for all acquisition matters.
“We’re seeing it in multiple platforms,” said White, who did not elaborate. “And so what we’re having to do is, at some point, we’re having to make some trade space in between some of these.”
“I see Boeing making smart investments,” White said of the prime contractor of the F-47, selected for the U.S. Air Force’s Next Generation Air Dominance (NGAD) ‘fighter’ initiative. “They have a lot of CAPEX [capital expenditure] that they’re pouring in, but we have to get through the process of the design piece, getting that completed and closed out. Then we all hit some major milestones with things like flight tests and software and those things.”
“Really, it’s just being able to manage the overall resourcing as it relates to number one, people resources,” the general added. “Number two, when you start getting into the production conversation, do we have enough capacity to be able to produce at that rate? And so, by and large, I have concerns. I have concerns about the capacity of our industrial base, but they are not unique to F-47 or to any program.”
As for the F-47, White said the program “continues to progress exceptionally well.”
“As you know, many, many years in tech maturation and risk reduction gave us a tremendous head start on this program,” White explained. “Extremely proud of what the team has done, what they continue to do each and every day. We are still absolutely on [the] path to be able to hit the mark of flying within this administration. So we see no issues in front of us right now.”
While the first example of the F-47 has been in production for about a year now, the Navy has yet to even select a prime contractor for its next generation fighter. The current competitors for the F/A-XX are Boeing and Northrop Grumman. A decision was supposed to have been made by last month.
“The F/A-XX program remains on track, and we have no further information to provide at this time,” a Navy official told us last week.
Despite intervention from Congress, the next-generation carrier-based fighter has remained in question since the Pentagon moved to effectively shelve the program last year.
In response to a question from TWZ earlier this year, the Chief of Naval Operations acknowledged the uncertainty over the F/A-XX program.
“One of the challenges we’re seeing is, not only [are] our peer competitors improving their capability for anti-air, either air-to-air or surface-to-air, but the lower cost of entry of very capable weapons is also making more players on the field in which that level of stealth and technology is required,” Adm. Daryl Caudle told us back in April at the Sea-Air-Space 2026 exposition. “So this is not about the need for a peer adversary. This is just having an aircraft that can operate with a level of uncertainty and with the acceptable level of risk.”
With Boeing as a finalist, it is also possible that F/A-XX could be a variant of the F-47. As we noted in a past story, the Boeing render for its F/A-XX concept is remarkably similar to artwork for its F-47.
Likely a navalized F-47 variant as expected. https://t.co/4lZkpUjqfz
— Tyler Rogoway (@Aviation_Intel) August 28, 2025
Last year, Steve Parker, Boeing Defense and Space CEO, said he didn’t see a problem with his company building both jets stating that this had been part of the strategy all along.
If this is the case, the company’s claim that it would not have a problem building both the Navy and Air Force next-generation fighters would make more sense. There are a number of advantages when it comes to establishing a high-degree of commonality between F/A-XX and F-47, although there would also be challenges, especially when it comes to getting the most out of a design that was not meant to operate from a carrier deck and scaling production up for both services. There is already significant sharing of elements of both the Navy’s and Air Force’s sixth-generation fighter programs. So commonality in some subsystems and interoperability are already baked in.
We should hopefully finally get a clearer picture in the coming weeks about the status of the F/A-XX and possibly the answer to who will actually build it, which will give us a better idea of what the industrial base impact actually will be.
Contact the author: howard@twz.com
The post Industrial Base Concerns Over Building F/A-XX And F-47 Remain: Top Pentagon Procurement Officer appeared first on TWZ.
The Ukrainian Navy is claiming one of its uncrewed surface vessels (USV) sank a Russian USV, marking the first time one of these weapons, also known as drone boats, destroyed another. The engagement is the latest iteration in the use of combat drone boats, which Ukraine has employed to devastating effect against Russia’s Black Sea Fleet vessels and facilities, forcing the general evacuation of Russian naval assets from occupied Crimea to bases in Russia proper. The use of weaponized USVs is now proliferating around the globe at an increasing rate.
The incident took place somewhere in the Black Sea, said the Ukrainian Navy, which provided no details about when it happened or exactly where. TWZ cannot independently verify this claim; however, we cannot find any evidence of a drone boat killing another drone boat in the past.
“Units of the Main Intelligence Directorate (GUR) detected the target,” the Ukrainian Navy stated on Telegram. “The Ukrainian Navy’s ‘Sargan 3000’ unmanned boat, equipped with a remotely operated weapon station (RWS) Protector 12.7 mm, successfully destroyed it. This is the first naval battle in history between unmanned boats.”
An 81-second video released by the Ukrainian Navy opens with a view from the Sargan 3000’s onboard camera. It shows the Ukrainian USV acquiring, then engaging the Russian USV with its machine gun. It then cuts to a closer view of the Protector gun system firing at the Russian drone boat. At about the 30-second mark, the view switches to a feed from an aerial platform, though it is unclear if it is piloted or a drone. The video continues with the Sargan 3000 raking the Russian USV with its heavy machine gun until pieces start flying off and it eventually sinks, stern first.
Ukraine's Navy says a Sargan unmanned surface vessel destroyed a Russian unmanned boat with machine-gun fire in the Black Sea, the first-ever battle between unmanned surface vessels. Ukrainian Navy personnel operated in coordination with HUR. #Ukraine pic.twitter.com/Avg4ecz8m6
— NOELREPORTS
The Sargan 3000 (the name means needlefish in Ukrainian) was first introduced by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in April as a “multi-purpose platform that has undergone testing and entered service with the Ukrainian Navy. These uncrewed vessels are highly maneuverable and capable of carrying out strike missions.”
Though initially designed as a kamikaze weapon, it evolved into a platform for remote-controlled weapons, according to the Russian AmalNews outlet.
“The maritime drone features a specialized low-profile hull with distinctive hydrodynamic lines and is constructed from materials that reduce its radar signature,” the publication explained. “The Sargan-3000 USV is equipped with a waterjet propulsion system (presumably powered by a diesel or hybrid engine to ensure a long operational range).”
AmalNews states that the Sargan 3000 is 6.9 meters (about 22.6 feet) long, 2.2 meters (about 7.2 feet) wide, with an operational radius of up to 1,600 km (about 994 miles) and can carry a payload of 450 kg (about 992 pounds). It travels at an estimated speed range of 40-55 knots.
During operations, the Sargan 3000 connects to Ukraine’s Delta situational awareness system, “enabling the real-time transmission of target data, video feeds, and telemetry to operators,” AmalNews noted. “It features multi-channel control capabilities, including redundant satellite communication terminals (utilizing secure Western commercial networks and NATO military networks).”
It is also equipped with “an autonomous inertial and optical navigation system to ensure operation in the event of GPS jamming, and it incorporates electronic countermeasures (ECM) modules.”
There are several variants of this USV. They include those equipped with machine guns; rockets; FPV drones; an electronic warfare version and one that lays mines, the publication added.
Ukraine’s Sargan-3000 naval drone was presented in an FPV drone carrier variant, additionally fitted with a remote weapon station. The type first appeared in combat conditions in early June, when one washed ashore and detonated in the waters of Romania’s Constanța port. #Ukraine pic.twitter.com/QyKnyJFqUq
— NOELREPORTS
The Sargan 3000’s Protector remote weapon station is made by Kongsberg.
The drone boat’s first publicly known combat engagement took place in July, when one “destroyed the Russian Federation’s FSB border guard ship Izumrud,” the Ukrainian Navy stated at the time.
“Ukrainian naval sailors sank the border guard ship of the 2nd rank with the Sargan-3000 maritime unmanned complex near Novorossiysk,” the Ukrainian Navy claimed on Facebook. “Among the crew of the ship are dead and wounded.”
It is unclear whether the USV acted as a kamikaze vessel or a weapons platform, although the former is most likely.
“It was Izumrud that on November 25, 2018, participated in the attack on the ships of the Ukrainian Navy in the Kerch Strait,” the service added. “Revenge is inevitable.”
Ukraine's Navy has sunk the Russian FSB Border Guard patrol ship Izumrud near Novorossiysk using the Sargan-3000 unmanned maritime system.
— SPRAVDI — Stratcom Centre (@StratcomCentre) July 14, 2026
The vessel, a Rank 2 patrol ship, reportedly sustained catastrophic damage, with casualties and injuries among its crew.
The Izumrud was… pic.twitter.com/7VjKDH2ReD
One sea drone killing another is a notable development given the damage these systems can inflict and the challenge of locating and destroying them on open waters. Being able to operate on the water over long distances and timeframes, they can be used to hunt down other drone boats, as what appears to have taken place in this engagement, or serve as a picket line of sorts to protect harbors, vessels and other targets that have been attacked by USVs in the past.
The Russian drone boat, which is not identified, did not appear to be armed.
The Houthi rebels of Yemen actually pioneered the operational use of kamikaze USVs years ago. We first reported about this capability in January 2017, when an explosive-laden Houthi USV struck a Saudi frigate. Before that, Iran developed various crude kamikaze USVs and those capabilities soon migrated to its Houthi proxies, which put them to use in the Red Sea for the first time.
Ukraine has led the way in advancements of these systems, first employing them as kamikaze weapons, but then adding machine guns and rockets and later missiles, which were used to shoot down Russian helicopters and jets. Ukraine has also used these to launch FPV and bomber drone attacks as well as deliver uncrewed ground vehicles (UGV) into enemy territory.
You can see that delivery in the following video.
No soldiers. Just machines.
— Ivan Khomenko (@KhomenkoIv60065) July 13, 2026
Ukraine has carried out the world's first known combat mission in which a sea drone transported and deployed an armed ground robot behind Russian lines on the occupied Kinburn Spit. pic.twitter.com/zyJdFXWxVb
In the wake of the Ukrainian success with these weapons, Russia developed its own drone boats, and in August 2025, launched its first attack on a Ukrainian vessel.
The U.S. used drone boats as kamikaze weapons for the first time in July, during an attack “on a submarine and ship maintenance facility in Iran,” U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) announced on X at the time.
Yesterday, using multiple one-way attack surface drones, CENTCOM forces successfully struck a submarine and ship maintenance facility in Iran. Three Corsair unmanned surface vessels hit the port at Bandar Abbas Naval Base, marking the first time American forces have employed sea… pic.twitter.com/bOM2kmgRxz
— U.S. Central Command (@CENTCOM) July 13, 2026
Regardless, it looks like history was made with this incident in the Black Sea. But this involved a sea drone hunting down and destroying another that couldn’t fight back. Given the rapid pace of weapons development by both sides in the Ukraine war, it seems inevitable that a duel between two armed drones boats could soon follow.
Contact the author: howard@twz.com
The post First-Ever Kill Of A Drone Boat By Another Drone Boat Claimed By Ukraine appeared first on TWZ.
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