The Royal Air Force (RAF) is deploying one of its Voyager aerial refueling jets to help Saudi Arabia defend against ongoing attacks from the Iranian-backed Houthi rebels of Yemen. The decision marks the first publicly known international military assistance offered to Saudi Arabia specifically for its fight against the Houthis, which erupted over the summer. The move came hours before U.S. President Donald Trump told the United Nations General Assembly meeting that he believes a peace deal with Iran will be reached after the U.S. midterm elections in November.
The British action is significant because, while it involves just one tanker, other key Saudi allies have yet to heed the Kingdom’s request for military help specifically to battle the Houthis. Although it’s important to note some assets already deployed to defend against Iranian attacks could be helping with the Houthi threat now.
A Royal Air Force Typhoon FGR4 accompanies a Voyager tanker during a Quick Reaction Alert training scenario in March 2026. (Crown Copyright) Crown Copyright
Last week, Trump turned down a direct plea from Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the Kingdom’s de facto leader, to attack the Houthis. Meanwhile, Pakistan and Turkey, which signed the Mecca Joint Defense Agreement with Saudi Arabia, have yet to provide any direct military aid. The pact holds that an attack on one is considered an attack on all; however, it doesn’t stipulate exactly what actions should be taken.
At issue, beyond protecting the Saudis, is growing concern over the Bab al-Mandab Strait, a key chokepoint now largely controlled by the Houthis, who are preventing the Saudis from using it to ship oil.
Earlier this year, the Houthis imposed a blockade on the Strait, and began striking Saudi ships in the southern part of the Red Sea as well as critical energy terminals on that body of water. Iranian proxies have also struck the vital East-West pipeline that feeds oil to be transferred and shipped via the Red Sea in order to bypass the Strait of Hormuz, where Iran vastly curtailed shipping after the launch of Operation Epic Fury. The pipeline reportedly reopened today after being shut down following a long-range drone attack.
The stark reality is that if Saudi refineries are destroyed and the pipeline is shut down for months, if not longer, the last major lifeline from the region — and especially to Europe — would be closed off, sparking a deeper energy crisis.
Concern over these factors spurred Britain to act, the Ministry of Defense (MoD) noted. It said it was acting on a request from Saudi Arabia and that the jet would “support Saudi Arabia’s defensive operations in aid of the legitimate Yemeni government.”
“Escalating tensions in the Gulf could have negative consequences here in the UK—such as rising prices, disruptions to energy supplies, and increased costs for British businesses,” the ministry explained. “The Houthis pose a threat to stability in the Middle East; therefore, it is in the UK’s national interest—economically and in terms of security—that they do not succeed in their aims.”
“We unequivocally condemn Houthi attacks on Saudi Arabia, and our position is clear: both Saudi Arabia and the Yemeni government have the right to self-defense,” the ministry added.
The jet will operate from a U.K. air base in Cyprus and will begin air-to-air refueling operations in the coming days, the BBC reported.
The MoD said the Voyager will fly only in support of missions to shoot down missiles and drones, though Saudi aircraft are also bombing Houthi ground positions in Yemen, in part to get at drone and missile launchers and storage sites. Houthi officials have accused the Saudis of killing civilians in some of these attacks.
It should be noted that, more than a decade ago, the U.S. was supporting the Saudi coalition’s previous bombing campaign against the Houthis by providing aerial refueling and intelligence. However, then-Defense Secretary James Mattis ended that in 2018 during the first Trump presidency after growing concerns over the large number of civilian casualties.
The Voyager can only refuel the Royal Saudi Air Force Eurofighter Typhoons, Panavia Tornados, and Italian Air Force Typhoons that have been in the Kingdom since before the fighting with the Houthis broke out, as well as any other similarly equipped allied aircraft. That’s because the tanker only has probe-and-drogue aerial refueling, not the boom required for gassing up other receptacle-equipped aircraft. You can read more about this in our story here.
The view from the cockpit of an A400M during air-to-air refueling with a Voyager KC3 using its probe and drogue system, via the fuselage refueling unit. Crown Copyright
The Voyager will not be the first British asset to be sent to help Saudi Arabia since the launch of Epic Fury. In March, the U.K. sent its Sky Sabre air defense system and troops to the Kingdom to help defend against attacks from Iran.
The British Army Sky Sabre state-of-the-art intermediate air defence system. (Corporal Adam J Wakefield) Corporal Adam J Wakefield
“This support builds upon the UK’s existing military contribution to Saudi air defense, which includes the deployment of an air defense system and British personnel to help protect against missile and drone attacks,” the MoD pointed out on Tuesday. “Saudi Arabia and Yemen are steadfast partners of the UK and play a vital role in regional stability. It is in the UK’s interest to safeguard regional stability, protect vital trade and energy supplies, and encourage a diplomatic resolution to the conflict in Yemen.”
The civil war in Yemen erupted in 2014 and expanded a year later when a Saudi-led coalition joined forces with the government ousted by the Houthis. The fighting between Saudi-led forces and the Houthis largely abated after a tenuous ceasefire was signed in 2022. The Saudis held off on getting involved in the recent Red Sea conflict which saw the U.S. and coalition warships duking it out with the Houthis, and eventually led to a U.S.-led air campaign over Yemen. The United Kingdom was the other significant player in that air campaign.
Tensions, as we noted earlier in this story, reignited in recent weeks after the Houthis joined the U.S.-Iran conflict on the side of their major supporter.
On Tuesday, Houthi spokesman Brig. Gen. Yahya Sare’e claimed that Saudi Arabia conducted 19 airstrikes across rebel-held territory in Yemen that involved the latest round of civilian casualties. The Saudis have not directly responded.
Brig. Gen. Yahya Sare’e. (Houthi Telegram)
As we stated earlier in this story, hours after the U.K. announced it was sending a Voyager tanker to Saudi Arabia, Trump addressed the ongoing conflict with Iran during his speech to the U.N. General Assembly in New York.
The American leader called for international isolation of Iran and repeated his stance that he was at an inflection point on deciding what course to take moving forward. The situation has settled into an uneasy pause interrupted by sporadic Iranian attacks on shipping in the Strait of Hormuz. It has been weeks since the U.S. last struck Iranian targets.
“Will a deal be made with Iran that lets them rebuild and create a far greater country than it ever was before?” Trump asked rhetorically. “Or do I annihilate the Islamic Republic and do it quickly, never giving them a chance to kill and destroy people and countries again?”
Trump added that he believes he will make a peace deal with Iran after the upcoming U.S. midterm elections, which could decide which party controls Congress. With gasoline and diesel price increases damaging the economy, the war and Trump’s handling of it have been very unpopular with voters.
In a CNN and SSRS poll, released Tuesday, 64% of those responding said the U.S. is not winning the war in Iran, while 36% disagreed. In addition, 78% of participants said Trump is not doing enough to end the conflict with Iran and 22% said he was.
Trump to the UN: "Do I annihilate the Islamic Republic, and do it quickly? Do I drive them into hell?" pic.twitter.com/cIYBO1Mp3w
“They want to talk to us,” he said. “They have been talking to us, even today they’ve been talking to us, and the relationship is developing. But we can’t let them – and they understand that – we can’t let them have a nuclear weapon.”
A U.S. negotiating team, including Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, met with Iranian officials on the sidelines of Tuesday’s U.N. meeting. That sideline session lasted about three hours and went well, according to Trump, who offered no details on the discussions.
Trump: US officials met with the Iranian delegation for three hours – "it was a good meeting"
For their part, the Iranians said they are willing to negotiate, but on their terms.
“A senior Iranian official said Iran could reopen the Strait of Hormuz to Gulf shipping within seven days if the U.S. fulfilled Tehran’s demands to ease military pressure and lift an American blockade on Iranian ports,” Reuters reported. “The official added that Tehran had conveyed its latest proposal to Washington via mediators last week.”
Remnants claimed to be photographed in Iran have been identified as belonging to a Raytheon ADM-160 Miniature Air-Launched Decoy (MALD). The wreckage was reportedly recovered after an Iranian interception that occurred earlier in the day, although the exact location and circumstances remain unconfirmed and there is reason for caution. Iranian state and military media have a long record of presenting unverified or exaggerated claims, especially during periods of conflict, and imagery released through those channels warrants independent scrutiny. Still, the MALD identification appears credible based on the visible wreckage, but its provenance, location, and the circumstances of its loss have not yet been independently established. MALDs were likely used at least in the opening stages of Operation Epic Fury, as well.
With that being said, the showing off of the MALD wreckage, regardless of its original use case, is something of a reminder that U.S. and Israeli forces are continuing to evaluate Iran’s electronic order of battle, which can include probing activities that leverage deception and decoys to better understand the state of Iran’s air defenses and command and control architecture. This is critical information that needs to be constantly updated for contingency and future potential air campaign purposes.
Wreckage of the MALD. Iranian media
Iranian sources today reported the destruction of an Orbiter-type reconnaissance drone over the Strait of Hormuz, before the separate imagery emerged showing what appears to be the wreckage of a MALD. It is not yet clear whether the two reports refer to the same incident or separate losses.
A close-up of the wreckage of the MALD. Iranian media
The appearance of the wreckage could also shed a light on how the U.S. and Israel can conduct ongoing air operations against Iran, even if kinetic actions have largely slowed to a trickle.
15090 is the CAGE code for Raytheon, which is visible on the tail fins and other remnants.
MALD is an expendable store, launched from another aircraft. The ADM-160 family was developed to provide a flexible way of decoying and distracting an enemy’s air defenses, while also adding to the survivability of allied aircraft and standoff weapons. Raytheon won the U.S. Air Force development contract for the current-generation ADM-160B in 2003. The B design is significantly different from the initial A-model from Teledyne Ryan (later Northrop Grumman), the development of which had started in the late 1990s. The B also features a more powerful turbojet engine and possesses greater range.
MALDs being prepared for loading onto an aircraft. U.S. Air Force
The ADM-160B is approximately 6.5 feet long, has a wingspan of roughly 5.6 feet when deployed, and is powered by a small turbojet. It has an operational range of around 550 miles.
Rather than carrying a conventional warhead, the MALD carries equipment intended to reproduce the radar signature of specific aircraft or standoff weapons. It can therefore provide additional and often highly enticing tracks for an adversary’s radar operators and surface-to-air missile crews to respond to. It can be programmed to fly intricate routes to better rival the target it is emulating and to provoke the attention of air defenders.
The related ADM-160C MALD-J adds an electronic warfare capability, allowing it to perform stand-in jamming and other forms of active electronic attacks against enemy air defense nodes. Further improved variants of the MALD, which the U.S. Navy has also been acquiring, have since been developed as you can read more about here.
The exact variant involved in today’s incident cannot be established from all publicly available imagery at this stage.
An ADM-160B under the wing of a U.S. Air Force B-52 bomber. U.S. Air Force
The possibility that the United States had used MALDs against Iran had already attracted considerable attention following Operation Midnight Hammer, the U.S. strike against Iranian nuclear facilities in June 2025.
During the operation, U.S. officials described a complex deception plan involving aircraft and other decoy measures designed to prevent Iran from determining the true direction and composition of the attack.
This strongly pointed to MALD as one likely component of that deception architecture.
In the Strait of Hormuz context, the MALD could serve a dual purpose. It could act in its primary role, as a defensive measure for allied aircraft and standoff weapons, drawing Iranian air defense systems away from it and toward the decoy. It can also be used more independently, triggering Iranian defenses and revealing their locations and operating characteristics, as well as the state of Iran’s command and control for those assets. Surveillance platforms, especially those in the air, can then soak up all that signals data. This can then be used to generate intelligence for future operations, and all without putting a person or an expensive piece of equipment at risk.
The unique nature of the current state of the Iran conflict would allow for MALD to be used in this unique manner. While kinetic actions have become sporadic, they are still occurring, so firing a decoy that looks like something much more threatening to Iranian air defenders would not be an unprecedented escalation.
An ADM-160 MALD in flight. Raytheon
Iran has characterized the incident as a shoot-down. If Iranian forces did successfully engage the MALD, that would represent a real air defense interception of a U.S. deception system, although these are expendable by design. It is equally possible that the MALD malfunctioned or just flew its route and ran out of fuel and crashed, as designed.
The wreckage also does not, by itself, identify the aircraft that launched the MALD.
The system has been integrated with a broad range of U.S. aircraft. In the course of U.S. operations against Iran, we have notably seen Air Force A-10C Thunderbolt II attack jets returning from theater with markings depicting MALD missions.
An A-10 with mission marks showing a mix of weapons used against Iranian targets. They include MALDs, Small Diameter Bombs, GBU-12 Paveways, Advanced Precision Kill Weapon System (APKWS) laser-guided rockets, AGM-65 Maverick air-to-surface missiles, and generic bombs that probably signify Joint Direct Attack Munitions (JDAMs). Andrew McKelvey
It is also worth noting that the MALD wreckage has appeared at the same time as reports of unusual, UAP-like objects over Iran, with videos and eyewitness accounts circulating online. Their authenticity and nature remain unclear.
A number of videos are circulating showing an unidentified object in the skies above Tehran, Iran, it’s not immediately clear what is being filmed. pic.twitter.com/bHNAQGFPNv
Such reports come amid an increasingly sophisticated use of low-end drones, decoys, and other forms of deception. These kinds of systems can be employed not only to stimulate adversary air defenses, but also to distract populations and probe how information moves out of a denied area. In such an environment, unusual aerial sightings should be viewed with caution — but not necessarily dismissed as irrelevant. We have been talking about how new forms of misdirection and guile will leverage relatively low-end technologies in future conflicts for many years now. While it isn’t clear if this light show in the sky over Iran was such an activity, it is certainly a reminder to keep that possibility in mind.
I don’t know what this is, or if it’s legit BUT remember we are in a new age of misdirection, decoy and guile. Specifically using low end drone technology. There are more ways to stimulate an enemy air defense system, distract a populous, assess the flow of public info from a… https://t.co/wW7YVlbayB
Meanwhile, the prospect of renewed U.S. strikes is increasingly being raised on both sides. Iran’s central military command said Sunday that it had received information that Washington was preparing to resume attacks, while President Donald Trump toldFox News that he was in a “deciding mode” and was considering further military action alongside economic pressure and a deal.
Trump had also told Axioslast week that he was approaching a major decision on whether to resume large-scale military operations, with U.S. forces in the region being maintained at current levels through the end of the year.
Iranian officials have warned that a renewed U.S. attack would trigger retaliation against American forces and interests across the region. At the same time, Qatar and Pakistan are pursuing diplomatic efforts to restart negotiations.
This situation is exactly why keeping as detailed intelligence on the status of Iran’s air defense overlay would be so critical. Building a highly detailed electronic order of battle and maintaining it is critical to the effectiveness of future air operations. There is usually an observable burst of such activity prior to a major operation kicking off, as well. There are also many unseen assets that help with this, from those in space to those in the air and even those under the sea. There have been reports of Israel’s secretive RA-01 stealth flying wing drone being spotted over Iran and of course the U.S. has its own RQ-170 and RQ-180 aircraft, just to name a couple known penetrating assets that are likely highly capable of collecting this information.
Regardless, the U.S. and Israel will have a lot of ‘maintenance’ to do in order to roll back any air defense capabilities Iran has been able to reconstitute should hostilities break out in full again, and a lot of critical intelligence data will need to be up-to-date in order to support such an operation.
Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor find themselves at the center of a political clash involving the Israeli Prime Minister, two government ministers, and top intelligence officials. The catalyst is *Naza*, the documentary they presented at the 83rd Venice International Film Festival—a film that, in just a few days, transformed them from acclaimed filmmakers into targets of accusations of treason.
After declaring he would seek to revoke their Israeli citizenship, Israeli Culture Minister Miki Zohar made a fresh appeal to Shin Bet chief David Zini, urging him to investigate how various materials were obtained. The film features testimony from 24 anonymous Israeli intelligence soldiers denouncing the techniques used by the Israeli military to kill civilians in Gaza.
In a letter to Zini, Zohar asks the agency to investigate whether there was any illegal use of sensitive or classified information.
“When anonymous sources are used to spread serious, false accusations against the State of Israel and the IDF during wartime, it is imperative to establish who is behind these allegations,” Zohar stated. “I have asked the head of the Shin Bet to investigate the source of the material, who provided it, and whether hostile elements were involved,” the minister added.
Reactions from Israeli officials following the Venice screening
Immediately after the documentary film was presented in Venice, Culture Minister Miki Zohar called the film “vile” and announced plans to “act immediately” to revoke the Israeli citizenship of Abraham and Szor.
He accused them of “treason against the State” and of a “self-loathing” that drives them to harm their own homeland in order to garner applause from “antisemites around the world.” Zohar stated that he had contacted senior officials at the Ministry of the Interior and the Population Authority to evaluate revoking their citizenship on the grounds of a breach of loyalty to the country.
Joining the chorus of accusations were Army Chief of Staff Eyal Zamir—who claimed the film relied on “blood libels and deliberate distortions of reality”—and National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, who called on the pair to leave the country.
Finally, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu linked the case to broader “antisemitic incitement” and lashed out at opposition political forces.
The Israeli military largely rejected the documentary’s content, maintaining that it could not verify the identities or military roles of the anonymous sources and reiterating that it does everything possible to avoid civilian casualties.
IDF chief floats legal action against ‘NAZA’ film, orders probe of leaked material
IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir on Monday instructed the military’s top legal official to examine legal action against the film “NAZA” and those involved in it, saying it defamed the military, and separately ordered an investigation into the leaking of classified material used in its production.
His comments came shortly after IDF Spokesperson Brig. Gen. Effie Defrin issued a statement inviting the documentary’s filmmakers to allow military officials to view the film in full so that the IDF could respond in a “substantive manner.” So far, the military has only reacted to clips of the movie posted online, and has not yet seen the full documentary.
The 80-minute film by Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor — whose title is a Hebrew acronym meaning collateral damage — claims to explore AI-powered strikes by Israel in the Gaza Strip it alleges have led to civilian deaths, including testimonies from 24 purported Israeli intelligence soldiers.
The risks of returning to Israel
In the days following the award, Yuval Abraham recounted deleting his social media profiles after being inundated with offensive photomontages targeting both him and his mother; he openly admitted his fear: “Israel is my home… but now, obviously, I am afraid I won’t be able to return.” Abraham had also rejected the idea of positioning himself as a voice of moral superiority, explaining that, as Israelis, they all feel—to some extent—co-responsible for what occurred in Gaza.
The process of stripping Abraham and Szor of their Israeli citizenship—which they hold by birth—is neither swift nor within the sole authority of the Minister of Culture, who lacks the legal power to order it.
Under Israeli law, citizenship can only be revoked in limited cases involving a proven “breach of loyalty” to the State—as established by a 2022 Supreme Court ruling. The procedure requires the Minister of the Interior to submit a request to the Minister of Justice, followed by final approval from a panel of judges. It is, therefore, a lengthy and uncertain process—one that has never before been applied to a case involving journalism or filmmaking.
A more immediate prospect, at least from an investigative standpoint, is Zohar’s request for the Shin Bet to investigate the origins of the material used in the film.
Such an inquiry could lead to investigations into potential offenses related to the disclosure of classified information, carrying criminal consequences not only for the filmmakers but also for the military sources who collaborated anonymously.
Compounding this is the immediate concern for the two creators’ personal safety—a fear fueled by past incidents, such as the assault on Hamdan Ballal following the Oscar win for *No Other Land*.
Pakistan should honor its defense commitments to Saudi Arabia through strictly defensive cooperation and protection of maritime commerce, while avoiding offensive military action against the Houthis that could drag Islamabad into a wider Middle Eastern conflict, alienate Iran, and deepen its domestic and strategic vulnerabilities. The Makkah Joint Defense Agreement between Turkey, Pakistan, and Saudi […]
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.
A map of the 31st MEU’s deployment. (31st 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.
A Marine holding a Stinger missile launcher stands in front of a Combat Rubber Raiding Craft on Ukibaru Island off the coast of Okinawa during Exercise Hagatna Fury 21. (USMC) A Marine holding a Stinger missile launcher stands in front of a Combat Rubber Raiding Craft on Ukibaru Island off the coast of Okinawa during Exercise Hagatna Fury 21. USMC
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.
USS Tripoli. (Staff Sgt. Samuel Ruiz)
“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.”
“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.”
An F-35B Lightning II aircraft taxis to a forward arming and refueling point in the U.S. Central Command area of responsibility, May 26, 2026. (U.S. Marine Corps photo by Cpl. Maksim Masloboev) Cpl. Maksim Masloboev
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.
A Gray Eagle drone lands at a forward arming and refueling point in the U.S. Central Command area of responsibility, May 26, 2026. (U.S. Marine Corps photo by Cpl. Maksim Masloboev) Cpl. Maksim MasloboevU.S. Marines with the 31st Marine Expeditionary Unit transport AIM-120 AMRAAMs to a forward arming and refueling point in the U.S. Central Command area of responsibility, May 26, 2026. (U.S. Marine Corps photo by Cpl. Maksim Masloboev) Cpl. Maksim Masloboev
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.”
U.S. Marines with 12th Marine Regiment, 3rd Marine Division, prepare to set up a Ground/Air Task Oriented Radar (G/ATOR) system during a routine unit level training exercise on Iejima, Okinawa, Japan, July 15, 2023. (U.S. Marine Corps photo by Staff Sgt. Manuel A. Serrano) Gunnery Sgt. Manuel Serrano
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
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.
James Deboer
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.
The proposed deal, worth an estimated total cost of $24.3 billion, was announced as the Kingdom is in the midst of a fierce fight against the Houthi rebels of Yemen. It marks a major policy shift, with Washington previously being unwilling to export the advanced stealth fighters to Arab states and will likely serve as a reminder at a very challenging time for the Saudis of the unique security capabilities that only the U.S. can provide them.
In addition to the jets, which will be conventional takeoff and landing variants, Saudi Arabia has requested 49 Pratt & Whitney F135-PW-100 engines, support and other items.
Despite concerns from Israel that providing Saudi Arabia with the advanced fighters will tip the balance of power in the region, the proposed sale of this equipment and support “will not alter the military balance in the region,” the State Department noted.
The United States has a requirement to maintain Israel’s so-called qualitative military edge, which essentially guarantees that Israel will be prioritized for advanced U.S. weapons ahead of Arab states in the region. Among these advanced weapons, the stealthy F-35 is highly prominent.
You can read our past feature about the wide-ranging impacts of an F-35 sale to Saudi Arabia here.
Israeli Air Force F-35i fighters. (Israeli Air Force)
“This proposed sale will support the foreign policy and national security objectives of the United States by improving the security of a major non-NATO ally that is a force for political stability and economic progress in the Gulf region,” the State Department wrote. “The proposed sale will improve Saudi Arabia’s capability to deter current and future threats by strengthening its homeland defense, and improving interoperability with U.S. forces, and other regional and NATO forces. The proposed sale will also augment Saudi Arabia’s operational aircraft and enhance its air-to-air, and air-to-ground self-defense capability. The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia will have no difficulty absorbing this equipment and services into its armed forces.”
In November, “President Trump approved a major defense sale package, including future F-35 deliveries, which strengthens the U.S. defense industrial base and ensures Saudi Arabia continues to buy American,” according to the White House.
Trump has pushed for closer ties between Israel and Saudi Arabia and wants the Kingdom to join the Abraham Accords initiative. This is a set of agreements that establish normalized diplomatic relations between Israel and different Arab states. Doing so would be a major breakthrough, following the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Morocco, and others.
A Saudi F-35 deal was also discussed under the Biden administration, as part of a broader deal that sought to normalize the Kingdom’s relations with Israel.
The head of Air Mobility Command (AMC) on Wednesday offered some new details about what went into repairing a KC-135 Stratotanker riddled with shrapnel holes from an Iranian attack. We have previously written about a couple of these jets damaged during Operation Epic Fury (OEF) as they came through RAF Mildenhall in the U.K. on their way back to the U.S. for comprehensive repair work. We are also getting new information of how AMC kept its fleet operating at such a prolonged high-tempo ahead of and during OEF.
A U.S. Air Force maintainer performs preflight maintenance on a KC-135 Stratotanker refueling aircraft at a base in the Middle East, April 30, 2026. (U.S. Air Force photo by Master Sgt. James Cason) Master Sgt. James Cason
“A KC-135 ops crew is in the jet,” he said. “KC-135 maintenance team is about to launch this jet. Unexpected Alarm Red [an attack warning]. Everyone jumps in a bunker.”
After the barrage, the airmen emerged from their bunkers and checked out the plane.
“That aircraft is smoking,” Tulley said. “There are holes in it, and it’s a fully loaded KC-135. Two hundred thousand pounds of jet fuel. Took 48 hours for that [fuel] to be drained out of that aircraft. In the meantime, first on the scene was I think the pro super [production superintendent] and the expediter. They immediately began to collect the fuel… They start to patch the holes. They start to fix all the systems. Long story short, they were eventually able to get that plane to make a transoceanic flight back home to be fully repaired.”
Tulley did not say where the attack took place. However, as we have previously reported, five tankers were reportedly damaged in an Iranian long-range strike on Prince Sultan Air Base (PSAB) in Saudi Arabia on March 14. That was later confirmed in a Department of War Inspector General report released earlier this week.
You can see two of the shrapnel-damaged KC-135s as they passed through the UK on the way home in the following photographs shared with us by aviation photographer Andrew McKelvey. We do not know if either of these is the one discussed by Tulley.
(Andrew McKelvey) (Andrew McKelvey)
Lt. Gen. Linda Hurry, Commander of Air Force Materiel Command (AFMC), followed Tulley’s comments with additional details about the repair work.
“I’ll pick right up on that because it was our aircraft battle damage repair team that was actually able to patch their aircraft back together to get it back to Tinker [Air Force Base in Oklahoma] that can put it completely back where it needed to be,” she noted. Tinker is home to the Expeditionary Depot Maintenance (EDMX), which is “responsible for maintaining the Air Force’s sole source for Aircraft Battle Damage Repair (ABDR) rapid repair capabilities for the entire tanker and bomber fleets,” according to the Air Force.
“So with Operation Epic Fury, we’re asking those questions: What can we sustain for how long? And it begs a question about regeneration,” Tulley further explained. “You know, our new teammates have regeneration as part of their doctrine, so readiness in contact is the way we’re approaching this. What can we do to improve how we generate capability while under fire, in contact, persistently in an extended or protracted conflict? Lots of great examples of work being done to get after this. General Hurry’s team has brought a lot of capability forward at Mildenhall Air Base.”
One example of how this has worked has been repairing damaged aerial refueling booms in the U.K. instead of all the way back to the U.S., Tulley highlighted. The booms, which extend from the back of tankers so that receiving aircraft can get their gas, can be damaged by the process, especially during combat refueling.
“I think we turned 30 booms instead of bringing them all the way back to the states,” Tulley noted.
A KC-135 refueling boom. (USAF)
Repairing battle damage is certainly a unique situation for AMC airman, but keeping hundreds of the command’s tankers and cargo aircraft moving at such a high rate prior to and during the war was a huge undertaking that was helped by new maintenance concepts. The Air Force sent maintainers and parts to bases in Europe to drastically speed up major maintenance that would have demanded the aircraft return stateside.
“We moved some maintenance actions forward, so they didn’t have to – the aircraft didn’t have to go all the way back to the states,” Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Kenneth S. Wilsbach said during his keynote speech earlier this week. “We put some of them in Europe, so they could get through some normal safety inspections that were either due or deferred. Got those done, and the aircraft doesn’t have to go all the way back to the states. They can go somewhere in Europe, get the thing done, and then get right back to the flight. And so, those measures by Air Mobility Command paid dividends in the readiness of our mobility fleet.”
Air Force Global Strike Command (AFGSC), which maintains the service’s fleet of strategic bombers and its ICBM force, did something similar at RAF Fairford in the U.K., AFGSC commander Gen. Stephen L. Davis explained.
“It’s a complex problem,” said Davis. “I would say in the past we probably didn’t do this the right way. When we thought a conflict was kicking off, the first thing we do is start sending bombers forward, and that actually consumes our readiness. So I think we got it right during OEF.”
“We pushed maintainers and support personnel forward to RAF Fairford, and then we actually took the bombers, we loaded them up in CONUS [Continental United States]. We took them to the Middle East. They actually did a mission. They employed, deployed, conducted a combat mission, and then landed at Fairford. And then for the next, well, I guess they’ve been there for now six-plus months.”
“They’ve been conducting nearly daily operations out of there,” Davis proffered. “When bombers are back at home base, they build readiness. When we deploy it forward, they consume readiness. And then, as [Gen. Hurry] said, we’re getting great support in terms of parts, in terms of supplies, and in terms of forward depot support. So that fleet remains healthy.”
A U.S. Air Force B-1B Lancer at RAF Fairford, England, July 15, 2025. (U.S. Air Force photo by Tech. Sgt. Robert M. Trujillo) Tech. Sgt. Robert Trujillo
Being able to do as much repair and maintenance work as close to the front lines as possible will be hugely important in any future fight against China, and, unfortunately, repairing battle damaged aircraft will be necessary too. Clearly, the Air Force has learned some very important lessons from Epic Fury.
Yemen’s Houthi movement, formally known as Ansar Allah, has released imagery that it says shows the downing of a Royal Saudi Air Force F-15 fighter over Marib governorate. The material includes photos of the wreckage of an F-15 on the ground. At this stage, the fate of the two crew members is unclear. The incident comes amid a major escalation in fighting between Saudi Arabia and the Iran-aligned Houthi movement.
A video of what Ansar Allah says is the successful shootdown of the F-15 shows the typical ground-based forward-looking infrared (FLIR) systems we have seen in use by air defenses in Yemen previously, and, more recently, in Iran.
Onboard footage of a Houthi SAM system shooting down a Saudi F-15 overnight over Yemen’s Marib province. pic.twitter.com/6mh23B2Ovu
After a period of relative calm following the 2022 truce, fighting has intensified in recent weeks, with Houthi forces making significant advances against Saudi-backed Yemeni government positions, including around the strategically important coastal areas of Marib and Taiz. The group has also stepped up missile and drone attacks against southern Saudi Arabia, targeting military and energy infrastructure while strangling the kingdom’s ability to move oil through the Red Sea. The Houthis have further declared the Bab el-Mandeb closed to Saudi oil traffic, directly challenging one of Riyadh’s key energy-export routes.
An aerial view of the apparent impact site. Houthi-controlled mediaThe impact site seen from the ground. Houthi-controlled media
Prior to the release of imagery, earlier today the Houthi military spokesman Brig. Gen. Yahya Saree claimed that Houthi forces had shot down a Saudi F-15 while it was conducting operations in support of Saudi-backed forces in Marib. Saree said the aircraft was engaged by a locally manufactured surface-to-air missile, although he did not identify the weapon. Reuters likewise reported that the Houthis had claimed the shootdown but that the claim had not been independently verified.
Saree also claimed that Houthi air defenses subsequently engaged formations of Saudi F-15s and Eurofighter Typhoons that entered the area while attempting to locate the downed aircraft. According to the Houthi account, those aircraft were forced to withdraw. That portion of the claim has likewise not been independently verified.
Saudi Arabia has not, at the time of writing, publicly acknowledged the loss of an F-15. Reutersreported that the Saudi-led campaign had intensified considerably in recent days, with Saudi aircraft striking targets across Yemen while the Houthis have launched missiles and drones toward Saudi territory.
The aircraft appears to be an F-15SA, the most advanced variant of the Eagle operated by the Royal Saudi Air Force. Specifically, it appears to be tail number 5539, assigned to the 55th Squadron based at King Khalid Air Base.
A close-up of one of the tailfins with the apparent tail number 5539. Houthi-controlled mediaAnother view of one of the tailfins. Houthi-controlled media
The Royal Saudi Air Force received 84 of the new-build F-15SA. Meanwhile, the 68-strong fleet of earlier F-15S aircraft has been upgraded locally to a similar standard, also known as F-15SR (for Saudi Retrofit). Aircraft 5539 is understood to be among the latter.
The reported shootdown highlights the continuing threat posed by Houthi air defenses, which have proven considerably more capable and difficult to suppress than their improvised appearance might suggest.
As TWZ has previously detailed, the Houthi air-defense network includes mobile surface-to-air missile systems, repurposed infrared-guided R-73 and R-27 air-to-air missiles, and Iranian-derived systems such as the Saqr/358.
Houthi Thaqib-1 surface-to-air missiles (repurposed R-73s) in front of Thaqib-2s (repurposed R-27). Other Houthi air defense missiles are also seen at the rear. Houthi-controlled media
Of particular concern is the group’s use of passive infrared sensors for detection, tracking, and missile cueing. Unlike conventional fire-control radars, these sensors do not provide an aircraft’s electronic-warfare systems with an early warning that it has been detected or targeted. TWZhas noted that this combination of mobility and passive sensing can create a difficult problem even for highly sophisticated combat aircraft, with the Houthis having previously demonstrated the ability to threaten U.S. crewed and uncrewed aircraft.
That capability does not mean that Houthi air defenses constitute a conventional, integrated air defense network comparable to those operated by major state militaries. However, they can still be effective through a combination of concealment, mobility, passive detection, unconventional employment of missiles, and the difficult operating environment over Yemen.
Previous Saudi aircraft losses attributed to Houthi air defenses during the Yemen war from 2015 to 2022 include several helicopters, fixed-wing aircraft, and drones. Total Saudi losses to all causes in the conflict amount to around a dozen helicopters, five jets, and as many as 30 drones. A Saudi F-15 crashed in the Red Sea at the start of the war in 2015 and Eagles were also reportedly engaged and damaged by Houthi surface-to-air missiles in 2018, although they returned safely.
Video footage that emerged in 2021 shows Saudi troops on the ground watching an F-15 swoop in a relatively low level to knock down a Houthi Qasef-series suicide drone:
In the past, Houthi forces have come close to engaging U.S. F-35s and have repeatedly demonstrated an ability to bring down MQ-9 Reaper drones. If the Saudi F-15 loss is ultimately confirmed, determining precisely how the aircraft was detected, tracked, engaged, and hit could therefore provide valuable insight into how this unusual air defense architecture is being employed against Saudi and other combat aircraft.
As we discussed at the time, the clear risk posed by Houthi air defenses is likely the main factor behind Saudi employment of a Chinese-made short-range ballistic missile (SRBM) in the current fighting with Yemen.
The timing of the reported shootdown is also notable. It comes amid a sharp escalation in the conflict, with Saudi Arabia conducting air operations against Houthi positions in Yemen and Ansar Allah launching missiles and drones toward targets inside Saudi Arabia. Reutersreported that the Houthis had attacked the Saudi Red Sea port of Yanbu and a southern airbase at Khamis Mushait, while Riyadh has reported intercepting Houthi drones.
The F-15 incident also follows a separate confrontation over an alleged Houthi drone attack near Mecca. Saudi authorities said their air defenses intercepted and destroyed a Houthi drone south of Mecca before it entered the restricted airspace over the city. The Houthis denied targeting the holy city.
Meanwhile, there are reports that U.S. officials met representatives of the Houthis in Oman over the weekend, with the Houthis apparently telling the U.S. officials that they had no intention of attacking American vessels and that they remained committed to the 2025 ceasefire with the United States unless they stepped in on behalf of Saudi Arabia. The Kingdom reportedly requested exactly this in recent weeks but was denied.
For the moment, the most that can be established from the available imagery is that a Saudi F-15 was destroyed, with Ansar Allah claiming responsibility.
This is a developing story and will be updated as additional imagery, official statements, or other independently verifiable information becomes available.
As American troops face renewed danger in the Middle East, with Iran striking U.S. positions across the region, President Donald Trump is busy contemplating something rather more personal: renaming the Strait of Hormuz the “Trump Strait.” Perhaps “The Trump Quagmire” would be more appropriate—not as a name for a body of water, but for a […]
Even as Americans commemorate the pain of the September 11 attacks, at the same time, the Houthis of Yemen, under coordination along the “axis of resistance,” are taking absolute control of the Bab el-Mandeb Strait and the entire Yemeni coast of the Red Sea. On Friday, September 11, 18 hours of warfare were enough to […]
The world is discovering that Iran and the Houthis do not need to control the world’s oil fields to exercise enormous influence over the global economy; they only need to control, or constrain access to, the narrow waterways through which that oil must pass. A War That Has Reached the Energy Arteries The Strait of […]
“Since becoming the chief, I’ve had the privilege of spending time with airmen throughout CENTCOM [U.S. Central Command],” said Wilsbach, who assumed the position in November. “I have walked flight lines, visited maintenance hangars, and stood inside operations centers where young Americans were managing missions overhead. Let me tell you about a few courageous airmen I met on my recent trip to the Middle East. They told me about their experience on the flight line during an attack.”
Burning Hangar
“As missiles were inbound, airmen sprinted toward bunkers,” the service chief said, without providing details about which base. “Moments later, a missile struck nearby in a hangar, and the aircraft inside burst into flames. The bunker withstood the blast, but the force of the impact damaged the door so badly it wouldn’t open, trapping the airmen inside.”
“Picture the scene,” Wilsbach explained. “Fire was spreading, an aircraft was burning only feet away, their teammates were trapped inside, and they had no way out. Despite the danger, airmen ran toward the flames.”
“A security forces NCO grabbed a pry bar and forced the door open,” he continued. “Calmly communicated with the airmen trapped inside. Seconds later, the ejection seat on the burning aircraft ignited, sending glass and metal fragments through the air. Finally, the door gave way, and the airmen escaped and ran for cover.”
“Wherever I went, I saw airmen with that steely-eyed look of warriors, determined to get the mission done and protect their fellow airmen,” the chief noted. “More than 30,000 airmen deployed in support of Epic Fury to a dozen locations. They served alongside soldiers, sailors, Marines, Guardians, and Coalition partners.”
Launching F-15Es Under Fire
“Operation Epic Fury will be studied for its scale, precision, and speed,” said Wilsbach. “Over 38 days of combat operations, the Joint Force struck more than 13,000 military objectives. Five hundred aircraft executed 10,000 sorties, an average of more than 250 sorties every day. Our airmen accomplished this through 1,200 alarm reds while executing 48 airfield repairs and completing more than 420 reportable explosive ordnance disposal, long lonely walks.”
“That walk is exactly what the name suggests,” Wilsbach proffered. “EOD technician leaving a place of relative safety and approaching a suspected bomb or unexploded munition to render it safe for everyone else.”
“Behind those numbers were thousands of decisions made by airmen who had to keep the mission moving while the enemy was actively trying to stop them,” Wilsbach stated. “One was Garrett, a staff sergeant F-15E crew chief from East Texas. He joined the Air Force to travel and see the world. We sure allowed him to achieve that goal, but I’m not sure the Middle East was exactly what he had in mind. On the second day of Epic Fury, Garrett was on the flight line launching four Strike Eagles when alarm red sounded. Airmen around him started running for shelter. Garrett’s adrenaline spiked. He knew exactly what that alarm meant. Danger was inbound, but his launch was not complete.”
A U.S. Air Force F-15E Strike Eagle in the CENTCOM region. (U.S. Air Force photo by Staff Sgt. Gerald R. Willis) Tech. Sgt. Gerald Willis
“A young airman was working with him, and Garrett sent him to the bunker,” the service chief continued. “Garrett stayed. The rest of the team was separated, so he armed the weapons and cleared the jet. Proceed… While everyone else ran for cover, he decided to stay. Garrett understood why those Strike Eagles were in theater. He knew they were one of their best lines of defense, so he stayed until the job was done. Only after the last fighter taxied out, Garrett finally took cover. Later, when someone asked why, his answer was simple: his fellow airmen needed those airplanes in the air.”
Swatting Down Drones Under Fire
“Hundreds of miles away, two senior airmen, Shanae and Nolan, tracked a swarm of enemy drones headed toward their base,” Wilsbach pointed out. “Shanae joined the Air Force to provide for her family. During the opening days of Epic Fury, she found herself protecting another family – the hundreds of airmen depending on her.”
“People sprinted for shelter as alarm red announced an incoming attack, but Shanae and Nolan stayed focused on the screens in front of them because every inbound track could be a weapon aimed at their teammates,” the general said. “Shanae is 27 years old, and Nolan is 21. Think about the responsibility we placed on these two airmen. Hundreds of lives depended on them to identify the threats and employ countermeasures. Every second mattered. The stakes were life and death. Together, Shanae and Nolan achieved more than 10 surface-to-air kills that night, defeating threat after threat before it could reach the airmen they were protecting. There were moments when they were afraid, and most people would be, but courage is not the absence of fear. Courage is overcoming it. They stayed locked on, trusted their training, and did the job everyone around them was counting on.”
Picking Up The Pieces After An Attack
“Peter is a senior airman from New York who spent nine months in the Middle East as an air transportation airman,” Wilsbach said. “With his team, he moved heavy ordnance, prepared missile systems, and downloaded Patriot equipment, while ballistic missiles and attack drones repeatedly target their airfield.”
“One of those attacks became very personal,” the service chief noted. “Enemy fire destroyed Peter’s living quarters and nearly everything he had brought from home. Imagine coming back after a 12-hour shift to find the wreckage of your hooch. The few pieces of home he carried halfway around the world were gone. Peter’s response told me everything I needed to know about him. He said that his possessions could be replaced, but the mission could not.”
Keeping The Reapers Flying
“More than 4,000 dynamic targets had to be found, identified, validated, and engaged,” Wilsbach said. “Remotely piloted aircraft, airborne ISR platforms, cyber operators, space professionals, and countless others turn enormous amounts of data into intelligence commanders could use.”
“Suit is a first lieutenant with a family tradition of excellence,” Wilsbach said of one MQ-9 Reaper pilot. “Both of his grandfathers served in the Army. I’m sure they wanted a better life for their kids, which is why his parents chose the Air Force. Today, Suit flies the MQ-9 and carries his family tradition forward. He also scored a perfect 100 on its physical assessment this year, so apparently excellence runs in the family.”
MQ-9 Reaper (USAF)
“MQ-9s flown by pilots like Suit supplied critical ISR and kinetic strike capabilities, launching them from bases within range of enemy fires,” said Wilsbach. “Suit planned and launched an MQ-9 combat sortie during an active attack. While missiles hit the airfield, Suit taxied out and got his Reaper airborne. He handed off control to another crew, then switched to the ground control station to recover a different MQ-9. His crew destroyed a priority target and then turned their sensors back toward their own airfield to inspect the runway for damage and determine whether operations could continue.”
“The MQ-9 was a workhorse for combatant commanders during Epic Fury. It provided real-time intelligence, struck 860 targets, and gave our forces the edge while denying the enemy freedom of movement. Airmen-like Suit made sure this asset stayed in the fight and maximized its impact. The MQ-9 success demonstrates the need for a capable follow-on aircraft that achieves the same effects with greater survivability, adaptability, and at a lower cost.”
Rescuing An F-15E Crew Shot Down Over Iran
“Peaches is an air battle manager from Texas,” the chief stated. “During Epic Fury, she found herself in the middle of a story of her own her family will be telling for generations. Peaches led 134 joint and coalition operators responsible for command and control across a complex battle space. Her team supported operations involving more than 1,000 one-way attack drones and 1,200 enemy ballistic missile threats. Those numbers are difficult to comprehend, but for Peaches, command and control was not a collection of symbols moving across the screen.”
“Every symbol represented something real: an aircraft, a threat, a crew, an airman,” he explained. “It was during this time two of those airmen became isolated inside of Iran. What followed became one of the defining moments of the operation. Over 50 hours, Peaches was one of the many who coordinated the combat search and rescue effort, leading her team to integrate 176 aircraft, fighters, bombers, tankers, intelligence platforms, and Air Force Special Operations Command forces that converged on one objective: bringing those Americans home.”
“Think about the complexity of that problem,” Wilsbach noted. “Aircraft operating at different speeds, altitudes, fuel states, with different sensors, weapons, and responsibilities, while an adversary was actively trying to stop them. Maintenance teams generated additional fighters. Tanker crews extended the range and endurance of the force, intelligence professionals track the threats. AFSOC [Air Force Special Operations Command] airmen brought specialized capabilities need[ed] to reach out to our isolated teammates and get them out. Every one of those airmen was doing something different, yet all were contributing to the same mission.”
“The Dude 44 rescue demonstrates why integration matters,” Wilsbach added. “To someone outside of our profession, committing that much combat power to recover two people might appear extraordinary. To an airman, the reason is simple: we make a promise to one another in our Airman’s Creed. I will never leave an airman behind. If you are isolated, injured, or trapped behind enemy lines, we are coming to get you. The courage and performance displayed during that mission was so impressive that 10 airmen received battlefield promotions. I had the distinct honor of promoting six of those heroes, ranging from staff sergeant to chief master sergeant during a recent trip. Everyone understood that their success depended on someone else doing their job. That is how our air and space forces fight.”
Debris from a Chinese-made ballistic missile found in Yemen could have inadvertently revealed a previously undisclosed addition to Saudi Arabia’s secretive ballistic missile arsenal. Imagery circulating online appears to show the wreckage of a Chinese DF-15A short-range ballistic missile (SRBM), potentially marking the first known Saudi combat use of a weapon in this class, although both the identification and ownership remain unconfirmed.
The booster stage of a Chinese-made DF-15A (Dong Feng-15A) ballistic missile operated by Saudi Arabia fell in Raghwan District, Marib Governorate, northern Yemen. pic.twitter.com/dfSXMOiCzQ
It is also unclear what happened to the missile itself. The debris suggests a stage separation or the missile broke apart or crashed before reaching its target. The Houthis are not known to possess any weapons that could have intercepted it.
A screenshot from a video clearly shows the DF-15A name applied on the side of the missile. via X
The development comes amid a sharp escalation in the long-running Saudi-Houthi conflict. After years of relative de-escalation following the 2022 truce, fighting has intensified in recent weeks as Houthi forces have dramatically overrun Saudi-backed Yemeni government positions, including around strategically important Marib and Taiz. The Houthis have also escalated missile and drone attacks against southern Saudi Arabia, targeting military and energy infrastructure while threatening the kingdom’s ability to move oil through the Red Sea. The group has declared the Bab el-Mandeb closed to Saudi oil traffic, adding a direct threat to one of Riyadh’s critical energy-export routes.
You can catch up with our latest coverage of the fighting here.
As for the DF-15, also known by its NATO designation CSS-6, this is a road-mobile, solid-fueled SRBM developed by China during the 1980s. The system formed part of Beijing’s effort to develop a new generation of conventionally armed mobile ballistic missiles, including systems primarily intended for export.
As you can read about here, the DF-15 family has evolved through several variants, although open-source information concerning their capabilities remains inconsistent.
The DF-15A reportedly entered Chinese service in the mid-1990s. Estimates of these missiles’ maximum range vary substantially, from roughly 600 kilometers (373 miles) for the original DF-15 to as much as 900 kilometers (559 miles) for later versions.
Among the later versions of the DF-15 family is the DF-15B. A more substantial redesign, its most obvious external change is its triconic reentry vehicle fitted with control fins, a configuration widely interpreted as incorporating a maneuverable reentry vehicle (MaRV) warhead. Photo by GREG BAKER / AFP via Getty Images GREG BAKER
China is the only confirmed operator of the DF-15 family. There have been longstanding reports of Chinese transfers of the DF-15 or the related M-9 export version to Egypt, Iran, Pakistan, and Syria, but in each case, the export record is heavily disputed, with some reports likely conflating the DF-15 with the broadly similar DF-11.
While Saudi Arabia has never publicly acknowledged operating the DF-15 family, it has a well-established history of acquiring Chinese ballistic missiles.
In 2013, Prince Fahd bin Abdullah bin Mohammed, Deputy Minister of Defense, visited the Strategic Missile Forces of Saudi Arabia, and was given this model. YEARS of speculation on the smaller missiles (The large is DF-3). Now we know – they are DF-15 and DF-15A. pic.twitter.com/oOn8qiCgye
Saudi Arabia imported Chinese ballistic missiles to expand its long-range strike options. Its desire for a land-based strategic deterrent was initially driven by concerns over Iran, regional missile proliferation, and nuclear hedging. More recently, however, it shifted toward fielding more accurate, mobile systems with greater conventional military utility.
Riyadh secretly obtained DF-3A missiles from China beginning in the late 1980s, establishing a strategic ballistic-missile capability that remained largely outside public view.
The kingdom has also subsequently been linked to the DF-21 family. Satellite imagery and other open-source intelligence have provided evidence of Chinese-designed ballistic-missile infrastructure in Saudi Arabia.
While the Houthis have their own ballistic-missile arsenal, this is principally associated with Iranian technology, captured Yemeni systems, and locally produced or modified weapons.
Saudi employment of an SRBM in the current fighting would represent a notable expansion of the kingdom’s response options. If Saudi Arabia did indeed do this, its main advantage would be speed and responsiveness. A solid-fueled ballistic missile could reach targets deep inside Yemen within minutes while keeping Saudi aircraft and crews out of the immediate engagement area, providing Riyadh with a rapid strike option against fixed Houthi targets. That could be particularly valuable as the conflict expands and Saudi forces face pressure to respond quickly to Houthi attacks on military and energy infrastructure.
Previous losses at the hands of Houthi ground-based air defenses could also dissuade Riyadh from relying on crewed aircraft to strike targets on the ground deep inside Yemen. Houthi air defenses, while pathed together in many ways, are capable enough to give even U.S. airpower a serious run for their money.
At the same time, a conventional SRBM like the DF-15A can deliver a large warhead at very high speed, imparting significant kinetic energy, making it particularly useful against fixed, high-value, or hardened targets.
Use of an SRBM would also be in line with the current pattern of escalation, with the Houthis conducting missile and drone attacks against Saudi military and energy targets while Saudi-backed Yemeni forces are engaged in renewed ground fighting. Riyadh’s demonstration of an SRBM capability in this campaign would also signal that it is is willing to draw more heavily on its strategic missile inventory as the conflict intensifies, potentially further raising the stakes of the confrontation.
Such a move would carry a message beyond Yemen. Using a previously unacknowledged ballistic missile capability in combat would signal to Iran that Riyadh is now willing to employ this arsenal, after decades of keeping it very much in the shadows.
If the evidence ultimately points to a Saudi DF-15A launch, the discovery would offer a rare look at the operational use of an extremely secretive part of the kingdom’s arsenal, and add a significant new dimension to the rapidly escalating Saudi-Houthi war.
Saudi Arabia on Friday announced it had to temporarily shut down the key east-west pipeline after drone attacks on Thursday from an Iranian-backed militia group in Iraq. As we have explained in the past, the Kingdom has diverted millions of barrels of oil per day through pipelines to its Yanbu port on the Red Sea in an effort to minimize the energy shortages due to hostilities near the Persian Gulf that have closed the Strait of Hormuz.
The pipeline was shut down a day after the Houthi rebels of Yemen increased their control over the crucial Bab al-Mandab Strait (BAM), a narrow body of water separating the Red Sea from the Gulf of Aden. Combined with Iran vastly curtailing shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, this gives Tehran significant control over two of the world’s most crucial passageways for the flow of oil.
3. The Houthis have reportedly attempted to seize ROYG-controlled islands in the Red Sea from which Houthi fighters could launch attacks on international shipping. Houthi forces reportedly landed on the Hanish Islands in the southern Red Sea on the morning of September 10 after… pic.twitter.com/tiFPgNDOHZ
“The East-West pipeline, in the regions of Riyadh and Medina, was subjected to several attacks on Thursday morning, September 10, 2026,” Saudi Arabia’s Energy Ministry posted on X. “The line was shut down as a precaution. The attacks resulted in some injuries, and medical care has been provided to those injured.”
“Emergency teams and specialized technical teams began work immediately after the attacks occurred, and took the necessary measures to secure the line and verify its safety, in accordance with approved safety procedures and emergency plans, and in coordination with relevant authorities,” the ministry added. “Any updates will be announced in due course.”
A before and after of the East-West Pipeline pumping station showed that it wasn’t just “hit”, it was absolutely MANGLED.
The past 24 hours have been nothing short of catastrophic for the global energy markets, but the harsh reality?
Showing the complexity of this situation and the high degree of coordination among various Iranian-backed proxies, the Saudi Ministry of Foreign Affairs accused Iranian proxies in Iraq of carrying out the attack. The Kingdom subsequently said it would hold off on responding to “give the brotherly Iraqi government an opportunity to take the necessary measures to prevent attacks launched from Iraqi territory against the Kingdom and neighboring countries,” according to the Arab News.
Officials in Baghdad quickly responded to that request, firing a regional commander overseeing operations where the attack was launched from.
“The Prime Minister, the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces, Mr. Ali Falih Al-Zaidi, directed the formation of an investigative committee regarding the Maysan Operations Command,” the Iraqi Prime Minister’s Office announced on X. “His Excellency ordered the dismissal of the Operations Commander from his position, following confirmation that the attacks targeting the brothers in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia were launched from one of the sites within the province.”
وجّه رئيس مجلس الوزراء، القائد العام للقوات المسلحة، السيد علي فالح الزيدي بتشكيل مجلس تحقيقي بحق قيادة عمليات ميسان.
وأمر سيادته بإعفاء قائد العمليات من منصبه، على خلفية ثبوت انطلاق الاعتداءات التي طالت الأشقاء في المملكة العربية السعودية من أحد المواقع داخل المحافظة.…
On Friday, the Houthis acknowledged that they captured new stretches of Red Sea coast from the Saudi-backed factions they’ve been battling. This includes the port of Mokha and the key islands of Perim (also known as Mayun) and Zuqar.
The Bab al-Mandab Strait and the islands of Perim (Mayun) and Zuqar. (Google Earth)
In a quick recap of what’s changed, the port provides a potential new surveillance and launching point for the Houthis. From here they can deploy mines, standoff weapons, as well as uncrewed surface vessels (USVs) that can be used to attack shipping. The islands give the Houthis a presence in the middle of shipping lanes. This is especially true for Perim, which sits in the narrowest part of the BAM, less than two miles west of Yemen and about 13 miles east of Djibouti, giving the Houthis a commanding presence at the mouth of the Red Sea. Its position could even allow Houthis to launch attacks on shipping using lower-end munitions, such as anti-tank guided missiles and even rocket artillery.
However, maintaining a major military presence on these islands would be a challenge logistically, especially should the U.S. or its allies attack positions there. You can read more about how the fall of the islands unfolded in our report here.
As they swept through the coastal region, the Houthis captured a treasure trove of U.S.-made Oshkosh M-ATV mine-resistant vehicles, pickup trucks mounted with heavy weapons, artillery pieces, and large quantities of ammunition and small arms abandoned by retreating National Resistance and Giants Brigade forces.
Videos show the scale of equipment the Houthis captured during the western coast offensive.
The "booty" footage from Mokha and surrounding positions includes U.S.-made Oshkosh M-ATV mine-resistant vehicles, pickup trucks mounted with heavy weapons (technicals), armored… pic.twitter.com/n3VPyoSmHk
Houthis Display Vehicles and Weapons Seized in Mocha
Yemen’s Houthis have displayed vehicles, weapons and military supplies they say they captured in the Red Sea port city of Mocha after Yemeni government forces backed by Saudi Arabia and its allies withdrew from the city.… pic.twitter.com/JmTMNY6wIS
Iran, which has held off on getting the Houthis directly involved during Epic Fury, has now played its hand and is putting the Houthis in a better position to close the strait than ever before. This was always a ‘sum of all fears’ scenario for oil exports from the Middle East and now Iran could put maximum pressure on the United States and the world to end the conflict in their favor, with oil potentially being cut off from both the Red Sea and the Persian Gulf.
Houthis are likely preparing to close the strait with a much better position than they had before. Having both straits closed has long been a 'sum of all fears' middle east energy crisis. Been writing about this exact scenario for over a decade. U.S. stretched thin, especially in…
Still, on Friday, the Houthis tried to allay those concerns, promising they would limit their control of the BAM to just Saudi vessels.
“The Yemeni armed forces confirm that maritime navigation is safe for all companies, except for Saudi Arabian ships, which have previously been placed under a ban,” Houthi spokesman Brig. Gen. Yahya Saree proclaimed. “We are continuing to uphold the equation of blockade with blockade, striking enemy Saudi Arabian troop concentrations, and escalating in response to their actions, until the aggression ceases and the blockade is lifted from our dear people.”
Houthi spokesman Brig. Gen. Yahya Saree. (Houthi Telegram)
Their rationale is that this campaign is all about defending against attacks by the Saudis and their proxies.
The conflict between Saudi Arabia and the Houthis grew out of a civil war in Yemen that erupted in 2014. It expanded a year later when a Saudi-led coalition joined forces with the government ousted by the Houthis and raged on until the parties reached a tenuous ceasefire in 2022. Tensions, however, reignited after that conflict ended when the Houthis joined the U.S.-Iran conflict on the side of their major supporter. In addition to a blockade on Saudi shipping, the Houthis began striking Saudi refineries and other oil infrastructure, including pipelines near the coast.
Houthi assurances about their intentions have meant little in the past. In 2023, when they launched their earlier campaign against Red Sea shipping, the Houthis also claimed a narrow rationale. They said they were doing so on behalf of Palestinians being killed during the Israel-Hamas war. The reality turned out to be that the Houthis were striking even ships not connected to Israel. This ultimately led to the U.S. and allies deploying warships to protect commercial vessels, battles with the rebel group on the water and a campaign of airstrikes on Houthi land targets.
It should be noted that the Saudis held off on getting involved that fight.
The Arleigh Burke class destroyer USS Carney fires a surface-to-air missile at Houthi threats on October 19, 2023. U.S. Navy
Amid all this, the per-barrel price of Brent crude rose to more than $109 yesterday, but was back down to $104 today, according to OilPrice.com.
We have long suggested that the U.S. could get pulled back into a new conflict with the Houthis. Now the rebel group’s rapid defeat of the Saudi-backed forces has reportedly already led to an American role in that fight.
“More than 100 US military advisers are on the ground in Saudi Arabia providing intelligence and targeting support to the Kingdom in its military campaign against the Iran-backed Houthis in Yemen,” CNN reported on Thursday, citing multiple sources familiar with the effort. “The US military personnel are working as part of a newly-established joint forces command, which was formed in recent weeks amid signs Iran was ramping up its own efforts to aid Houthi attacks against Saudi Arabia, one of the sources, a US official, said. That official put the total at roughly 200 troops.”
Still, there are limits on the U.S. role.
“The US is sharing intelligence with Saudi Arabia — as it routinely does already — but it is not participating directly in strikes,” CNN noted. “The US is also not helping refuel Saudi warplanes or providing other operational support, as it has in past fighting with the Houthis.”
CENTCOM commander Adm. Brad Cooper “flew to the kingdom overnight Thursday as Yemen’s Riyadh-backed forces crumbled in the face of a lightning Houthi offensive southward along Yemen’s western coast this week,” Al-Monitor reported. “He was expected to meet with top Saudi officials as they seek to consolidate the battered military effort by forces aligned with Yemen’s government.”
Trump, as we noted at the top of this story, has already declined to intervene kinetically.
“Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS) called President Trump twice Thursday, urging him to launch strikes against the Houthis as the Iran-backed group closed in on a vital Red Sea chokepoint,” Axios reported, citing two U.S. officials. “Trump declined, and U.S. officials stressed the administration has no plans to intervene directly against the Houthis for now.”
U.S. President Donald Trump (R) meets with Crown Prince and Prime Minister Mohammed bin Salman of Saudi Arabia during a bilateral meeting in the Oval Office of the White House on November 18, 2025 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images) Win McNamee
Asked if the U.S. would take direct military action against the Houthis, a senior White House official didn’t rule it out but said it is currently relying on regional partners to carry the burden.
“The United States is focused on protecting our core national security interests—such as ensuring freedom of navigation in the Red Sea—while empowering our regional partners to take the lead in managing and resolving regional security challenges,” the senior official told us. “We are in continuous dialogue with Saudi Arabia and the Republic of Yemen Government regarding regional stability.”
The war against Iran and the ongoing mission to try to protect freedom of navigation in the Strait of Hormuz have already strained the U.S. military. There have been 18 troops killed, more than 800 wounded and wide scale destruction of U.S. bases and equipment. U.S. commanders have warned that the ongoing conflict is unsustainable without deeply degrading America’s ability to respond to other contingencies. How much the U.S. could commit to a fight against the Houthis is an open question, especially if the Iran war spun-up again. During the Red Sea operation, at times two carrier strike groups and many other assets in the air and on the sea, were needed to sustain that operation.
“A second front potentially adds more U.S. military risk as we try to sustain a military that has been involved in a protracted deployment to support our economic pressure-focused strategy,” former CENTCOM commander Joseph Votel told us on Friday. “The U.S. can do just about anything, but it will be a choice that will impact sustainment, create longer-term deployments and impact other national security priorities.”
Earlier this year, an Iran-linked actor used Anthropic’s Claude artificial intelligence model to scrape and analyze data with the aim of helping target U.S. naval forces in the Middle East. A group in Yemen – very likely Iranian-backed Houthi militants – also used Claude to assist with work on guidance systems for ballistic and hypersonic missiles.
These are just some of the revelations about how adversaries and other malign actors have been using one of the premier pieces of AI software being developed in the United States that were contained in a new report Anthropic released late yesterday. The 154-page document also details instances where Claude was used directly and indirectly to support intelligence gathering and surveillance, cyberattacks, influence operations, and even worrisome biological research over the past eight months. In addition to Iran and Yemen, the human actors behind these activities were based in Russia, China, and a host of other countries.
Anthropic has shared details about what it calls the “misuse” of its models in the past, but describes the new report as its “most detailed” to date. The company has clearly been cataloging these case studies, and has assigned each one a control number. Though the entire contents of the report are cause for concern, the explicit attempt to use Claude to target American forces, as well as to develop new higher-end missiles and other military technology, are particular standouts and signs of what’s to come, as we will highlight below.
GTG-30005: Military reconnaissance
GTG-30005 is the case study dealing with the targeting of U.S. naval forces, and the summary is as follows:
“In another investigation, we identified and disrupted an Iran-nexus threat actor that used Claude to collect and analyze publicly accessible data to develop targeting recommendations against US naval forces in the region. The threat actor used Claude to compile targeting handbooks, through a Python pipeline the threat actor built with Claude’s assistance, to identify and track naval positions based on open-source information. The compiled material included a roster of US personnel scraped from captions on public military photographs; publicly accessible ship and aircraft transponder identifiers; commercial satellite-imagery query scripts; and an inventory of public websites that exposed US naval movements. The threat actor also directed Claude to compile vulnerability research on shipboard systems, cataloging known CVEs in maritime VSAT terminals, Cisco communications equipment, and industrial control products.”
“We banned the actor’s account, developed detections to reduce the risk of future misuse, and shared threat intelligence with government authorities to disrupt the threat.”
The Nimitz class aircraft carrier USS George H.W. Bush and several other US Navy warships sail together in the Arabian Sea in June 2026. CENTCOM
How exactly Anthropic defines the term “nexus” here is not immediately clear, and other entries in its new report also use “state-nexus” in addition to country-based variations. However, in this specific case, an addendum is added to the entry that explicitly says that the same account was separately tied to “domestic mass surveillance” software development work “for Iranian state systems,” clearly pointing to an actor directly linked to the regime in Tehran.
The use of AI technology by nation-state armed forces to develop target sets and engage them is already known to be growing globally. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) have been a pioneer in this regard, but the U.S. military, China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA), and others are also known to be developing and fielding these capabilities.
GTG-87001: Disrupting a Yemen-based guided weapons engineering cell using Claude to develop guidance software
Anthropic’s new report details an instance where an individual in Yemen used Claude as part of missile guidance work, which is given the control number GTG-87001.
“We identified a cell of threat actors based in northern Yemen running three weapons development programs: a guided rocket that used a commodity phone-class flight computer with final-phase homing guidance; a multi-stage ballistic missile with a stated range goal above 2,000 km; and a multi-variant missile (referred to as the “R2000” set) that included a hypersonic glide vehicle variant.”
“The actors used Claude Code in place of human software engineers to develop the guidance, navigation, and control (GNC) software that steers and stabilizes a flying vehicle. For example, they used Claude to integrate an open-source autopilot onto a phone-class flight computer, writing the control and position estimation software, tuning the control settings, running a firmware build pipeline, and performing a flight simulation. The actors managed several Claude instances at once, assigning each one a role, much as a lead would delegate work on a small engineering team: the actors tasked one instance with writing the code, another with research, and a third with reviewing the code the first instance produced.”
A graphic included in Anthropic’s new report summarizing the ways in which Claude was used by the actors in Yemen to support missile guidance system development. Anthropic
“Our safeguards blocked many of their requests, but not all of them. The actors used a variety of tactics to evade our safeguards, including hiding their goals and the products the software was meant for, and they split their work across multiple sessions so no single session revealed their full intent.”
“These actors carried out a sustained effort to develop guided weapons, including using Claude to design guidance software. We do not have evidence the actors succeeded in fielding an operational device; but they did test-fire a guided rocket. This field test appears to have failed: within hours, the actors returned to Claude to work out why it failed.”
“We identified this activity as part of our internal investigations into suspected weapons development. We banned accounts associated with the actors and shared threat information with public- and private-sector partners to mitigate risks posed by the actors. Nevertheless, we have evidence that the actors had already built an offline simulation toolkit that does not rely on Claude or other engineering computing environments such as MATLAB.”
As mentioned earlier, the report does not name the Houthis, but that group has historically been based primarily in the northern end of Yemen. It is also the only entity in the country known to have active missile development programs, which are conducted with critical support from Iran.
Whether this particular work directly resulted in any new capabilities is unknown. Anthropic notes that there looked to be at least one failed test launch before the accounts were banned, which would have occurred sometime after the beginning of this year, based on the stated cutoff dates for the report. By the end of 2025, the Houthis had already amassed a wide array of very real ballistic missiles, including types with at least claimed ranges of 2,000 kilometers (approximately 1,242 miles). The group also has a variety of cruise missiles and one-way attack drones that it has employed operationally.
An example of just one of the many types of ballistic missiles in the Houthis’ arsenal. Houthi-controlled media
Still, being able to leverage Claude could only have helped any domestic missile development efforts in Yemen, which might help reduce dependency on Iran, at least to a degree. Furthermore, developing functional hypersonic glide vehicles capable of prolonged stable flight has historically been notoriously difficult, even for entities with extensive relevant knowledge bases on an organizational level.
GTG-17001: Disrupting a China-based operation using Claude to draft a fire control specification and acquisition documents for undersea warfare
Use of Claude in foreign military endeavours goes beyond the Middle East, as evidenced by case study GTG-17001. This involved a Chinese actor conducting work related to a naval counter-torpedo defense system.
“We identified a China-based threat actor who used Claude to advance three parallel tracks of work on an anti-torpedo weapons system:”
“First, the actor used Claude to draft a Chinese-language specification for an anti-torpedo fire control system (the core logic that aims and times an anti-torpedo weapon’s response). The document was written to win approval from a Chinese defense manufacturer, which would move the work on to technical certification and operational testing.”
“Second, the actor used Claude to produce a Chinese-language technical proposal of more than 200 pages, accompanied by an executive briefing deck.”
“Third, the actor used Claude to benchmark their own system against specific US anti-torpedo and anti-submarine programs based on publicly accessible information. They then generated a Chinese-language briefing on US Navy systems derived from open-source reporting.”
“The actor presented themselves as an original equipment manufacturer in the US defense sector. We assess the actor was associated with a Chinese defense industry manufacturer aiming to produce a weapons specification and acquisition proposal for the People’s Liberation Army Navy.”
This picture shows a test of an anti-torpedo system fitted experimentally to a Nimitz class aircraft carrier in the 2010s. USN
“The actor used Claude to write the acquisition proposal, refining it over many drafts. After each draft, the actor instructed Claude to role-play a hostile expert reviewer to critique the proposal, then used that feedback to sharpen the next version. In parallel, the actor used Claude to build pieces of the anti-torpedo weapons system’s fire control software and a test matrix to validate them.”
“The operational lift the actor achieved was a function of using Claude to automate complex technical outputs. The actor leveraged the model to compress the development timelines for the certification registry, compliance documentation, and automated fire control logic. The actor also accelerated the traditional human review cycle by having Claude critique the acquisition proposal across multiple rounds of review while role-playing a persona.”
“We uncovered this activity as part of our internal investigations into suspected weapons development. We cannot attribute the activity to a specific entity or actor. But we have banned the account for violating our Supported Regions Policy and our Usage Policy, which prohibits weapons design and development, and incorporated our investigative findings into our safeguards to mitigate the risk of future misuse.”
Anthropic’s report does not name the U.S. programs leveraged here, but does note the information in question was publicly available. Anti-torpedo systems for surface warships and submarines have been an area of significant interest for the U.S. Navy for years now. Those developments have also produced compact torpedo designs for use in other applications.
A Very Lightweight Torpedo (VLT), a compact torpedo design developed by Northrop Grumman. Northrop Grumman
The PLAN’s interest in these same kinds of capabilities is not at all surprising. Underwater threats and countermeasures to them, broadly speaking, would play a central and vital role in any future conflict between the United States and China across the broad expanses of the Pacific.
GTG-27005: Disrupting a Russia-based operation using Claude to engineer an autonomous military drone swarm
Another case study, GTG-27005, details the use of Claude by Russian actors working on drone swarming technology.
“We identified likely freelance Russia-based threat actors who set out to build a full-stack autonomous first-person-view (FPV) kamikaze drone swarm. The actors used Claude Code to write and test the code and save it directly into the actors’ own project files. In addition to Claude Code, the actors used a software-in-the-loop simulation stack and a rented graphics processing host for model training. They called the operation ‘DronDoc’ or ‘Serafim.'”
“The actors used Claude to build the core software system, including the drones’ shared swarm memory and fault-tolerant coordination logic (FTCL); an onboard small language model to govern attack, observe, and return-to-base behaviors; a terminal guidance software system to steer drones to their target (using the onboard camera) and issue the call to detonate; a control-link geolocation module to find opposing drone operators; a passive acoustic detection layer; and low-level logic for the drones’ programmable chips. The actors designed the platform for autonomous lethal engagement; the onboard model could select targets (including a ‘person’ target class) and issue detonation commands without a human in the loop. The actors’ activity—including flashing the low-level firmware to live development boards, provisioning single-board computers, and wiring up a simulation environment over a mesh network—confirmed that they were using real hardware-in-loop testing within their sessions.”
Many were surprised yesterday by the news that a Russian fiber-optic FPV drone flew into Kramatorsk and attacked a car.
But there is nothing surprising here. The war of 2025 is already very different from the war of 2024. From LBZ to Kram — 20 kilometers. Enemy FPVs can fly even… pic.twitter.com/hTfhJFPcxZ
“The actors trained a computer vision classifier on scraped Ukrainian combat footage, splitting the target classes into “enemy” and “friendly,” and allow-listing Russian systems. They also repeatedly used a fixed coordinate in Donetsk Oblast as the demonstration strike point, with front-line cities and corridors in Ukraine as the mission geography.”
“The actors created their accounts between late 2025 and early 2026 and started the operation in mid-May 2026. The actors circumvented our geographic access controls by routing traffic through commercial virtual private servers.”
“We assess the actors were a small, specialized freelance team doing a mix of civilian and military work, not a Russian state entity. We identified nine accounts associated with this group; eight were used only for ordinary freelance work, not weapons-related software development. Based on our investigation, we assess the actors had ties to a regional university with a federal research center associated with the Russian Academy of Sciences. The actors claimed to have received funding from Russia’s Advanced Research Foundation, National Technology Initiative, and Ministry of Defence, though we cannot verify those claims. We identified this activity as part of our internal investigations into suspected weapons development, we banned accounts associated with the actors, and have incorporated our investigative findings into safeguards to reduce the risk of future misuse.”
Anthropic’s report included a table, reproduced below, detailing different types of drones and other capabilities that were fed into the model as part of this work.
GTG-17002: Disrupting a China-based operation using Claude to build targeting software for electronic warfare and air defense suppression
The last case study in the Conventional Weapons section of Anthropic’s new report, GTG-17002, covers electronic warfare-related work by a Chinese actor, with a particular focus on potential air defense targets in Taiwan.
“We identified a China-based actor who used Claude’s chat, coding, and agentic work tools to design, build, and iterate on a Chinese-language suite of about 16 modules for electronic warfare, using the electromagnetic spectrum to detect, jam, or deceive an opponent’s radar and communications, and for suppressing an opponent’s air defenses.”
“The actor used Claude to build the software system, from the underlying logic to the user interface, and iterated through 12 versions. This included implementing and optimizing the system’s radar detection and jamming physics, generating a vulnerability analysis module, and drafting Chinese-language targeting instructions. The software suite the actor built analyzed an opponent’s radars, surface-to-air missile sites, command posts, and communications nodes, then computed their detection coverage, assessed the effectiveness of jamming, ranked targets by value and vulnerability, including which to suppress first, and determined how best to assign jammer sorties to targets across multi-day campaigns. The suite also ranked which of an opponent’s assets to suppress first, and modeled specific engagement envelopes, including those of Patriot and THAAD-class [Terminal High Altitude Area Defense] systems.”
“Mid-project, we observed the actor change the simulation’s default scenario to 12 targets in Taiwan. The targets included a command bunker in Taiwan, an early warning radar site, Patriot and Tien Kung [surface-to-air missile] batteries, major air bases, and a regional combatant command headquarters.”
“The actor also ran a self-hosted model on an internal network alongside Claude and connected the software suite to this model through a tool-use integration.”
“Based on our investigation, we assess the actor is a China-based defense and military-industrial researcher. Account-level metadata and content flagged by our safeguards indicated the actor was linked to PRC research institutions, including the PLA Academy of Military Sciences. We detected this activity as part of our internal investigations into suspected weapons development, we banned accounts linked to the actor, and have incorporated our investigative findings into our safeguards to reduce the risk of future misuse.”
An accompanying table, seen below, mentions several specific types of U.S.-made air defense radars, as well as the Link-16 datalink network, as having come up in the course of this work. Electronic warfare variants of the Chinese Y-8 and Y-9 aircraft, as well as the J-16D electronic warfare jet, and what appears to be a reference to the Golden Eagle drone helicopter, are also mentioned.
A Chinese Y-8GX-11, one of several electronic warfare variants of the Y-8/Y-9 design. Chinese internet via X
The suppression of enemy air defenses is an essential part of any modern air campaign, whether conducted independently or as a part of a larger operation. This would be no less critical in any military intervention against Taiwan from the mainland, or any other larger-scale conflict the PLA might find itself in.
Guardrails and ethics
Beyond the details in any of the specific case studies, Anthropic’s new report underscores growing broader concerns about guardrails for the use of AI and general ethics surrounding the technology. As noted in the instances above, Anthropic has also implemented various safeguards to try to block access to Claude from certain regions and/or to prevent the model from conducting certain types of work. At the same time, what the company has now shared makes clear that those protections can still be circumvented to a significant degree, at least for now.
TWZ has noted in the past that America’s adversaries are likely to be less worried about ethics, in general, when it comes to AI. Anthropic’s new report also shows there are few bounds to what state-aligned or even non-state actors might seek to use this technology for, including the development of potential weapons of mass destruction.
At the same time, AI models like Claude are not going away, and developments continue to advance at an ever-quickening pace, opening the door to further proliferation. Developments are rapidly intermingling globally, with companies in China notably leveraging models created in the U.S. to further their own work, which is then released publicly. The technology will increasingly become more integrated and critical to most aspects of military operations and weapons development, alongside its commercial and civilian applications. It is just as much a superweapon as anything else, and the country with the more capable models, and the willingness to deploy them, will have a major edge in future conflicts.
With all this in mind, it seems very plausible, if not probable, that the case studies described in Anthropic’s new report are just the tip of an approaching iceberg that will need a concerted effort to tackle.
The Western takeover of Syria, the weakening of Hezbollah, and now the capitulation of Hamas signal that Western/American/Israeli penetration of Iranian outer defenses is essentially complete. The only remaining coherent and unassailed bastion outside of Iran is found among the Houthi. There remains Iran itself, which has weathered six months of American and Israeli aggression. […]
In 2026, Lebanon finds itself at a historic crossroads. Fighting rages in the south, while political instability grips the north. The once “Switzerland of the Middle East” is enduring its most severe crisis since the 1975 civil war. Since the start of Israel’s large‑scale military offensive against Lebanon on March 2, about 3,700 people have […]
Work at a specialized underground weapons test site in New Mexico, contracted earlier this year, was linked to planning for a potential new operation targeting Iranian nuclear facilities, according to a report from CNN. The U.S. military has notably left Iran’s hardest-to-reach site under Pickaxe Mountain untouched so far, but President Donald Trump and other U.S. officials have been openly talking about striking it.
On February 27, the day before U.S. and Israeli forces launched their initial wave of strikes on Iran, the Pentagon’s Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA) quietly announced it had awarded a sole-source deal to Pate Construction Co., Inc., for new construction at the so-called Alternate Seismic Hardrock in Situ Test (ALT-SHIST) site. The work was needed to support an upcoming classified live-fire test. ALT-SHIST is situated within the White Sands Missile Range (WSMR), a sprawling U.S. Army-managed complex in New Mexico’s Jornada del Muerto desert basin. DTRA is a relatively small and obscure organization that plays a leading role in U.S. military efforts to develop new and improved ways to respond to Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) threats.
WSMR and DTRA have come up in discussions about strikes on Iran in the past. The U.S. military’s heaviest conventional air-dropped weapon, the 30,000-pound-class GBU-57/B Massive Ordnance Penetrator (MOP) bunker buster bomb, has been extensively tested at multiple sites there in the past. DTRA was also directly involved in its initial development. MOPs made their combat debut during U.S. strikes last year on underground Iranian nuclear facilities at Fordow and Natanz as part of Operation Midnight Hammer. The possibility has been raised that a different site within WSMR may have been used to test the plan of attack against Fordow, which involved two ventilation shafts being hit with six GBU-57/Bs each. The bombs were dropped in rapid succession, with each one burrowing deeper and deeper into the facility below. WSMR also happens to contain the site of the first atomic bomb test in 1945.
A map showing the general location of White Sands Missile Range, with an inset giving a better sense of how expansive it is. Holloman Air Force Base, which juts into the southern end of the range complex, is also highlighted. Google Maps
“The plans for the test [at ALT-SHIST] were connected to the Iran war,” CNN said in its story, published yesterday, citing unnamed sources “familiar with the matter.” Beyond that, the planned testing was tied to a “need to develop a way to target Iran’s deepest-buried underground facilities and, likely, simulate U.S. strikes against specific nuclear facilities.”
CNN said it was unable to independently verify whether or not the test in question had occurred.
A formal justification for the sole-source contract to Pate Construction that DTRA released in February did not mention Iran or elaborate on the need for the new testing at ALT-SHIST, but stressed there was an urgent requirement critical to U.S. national security.
“The services required are the immediate and mission-critical enabling services for a ‘real-world’ national security ordinance [sic; ordnance] test. This is not routine construction; it is the highly specialized remediation and operational preparation of a unique, subterranean test facility at White Sands Missile Range (WSMR),” according to the justification document, which DTRA officials had approved on February 24. “The work is a critical path dependency for a live-fire test designed to validate classified capabilities against rapidly emerging threats.”
“As the incumbent contractor for over a decade, Pate Construction Co., Inc. possesses unparalleled and non-transferable tacit knowledge of this specific subterranean test facility. This is a unique Government structure with complex geological and security considerations, and Pate Construction Co., Inc.’s direct, hands-on experience is a tangible asset that no other source possesses,” the document adds. “Pate Construction Co., Inc. is the only contractor that currently maintains a fully mobilized presence at WSMR with the specific heavy equipment and security-cleared operators required.”
CNN‘s piece says apparent work at ALT-SHIST was visible in satellite imagery of the site between mid-February and mid-March, but the outlet said it was unable to confirm whether or not this was related to the contract with Pate Construction.
We reviewed satellite imagery showing work at a remote DTRA/STRATCOM test site that coincided with this contracting action, but we couldn’t confirm its purpose.
The Pentagon didn’t respond to our questions regarding the test, and we couldn’t independently confirm it occurred. pic.twitter.com/k8zyvqWy56
ALT-SHIST is an active test site, and any work observed there earlier this year could well have been linked to other projects. For instance, additional publicly available DTRA contracting documents offer details about planned work on a specific part of the ALT-SHIST site, called Tunnel 7, tracing back to last year, as part of a project nicknamed Millstone Willemite 6 (MW-6).
“This task requires the construction contractor to repair and address the damage to Tunnel 7 caused by prior incidents, in accordance with government-provided designs, specifications, and other contract documents,” according to one contracting document dated September 15, 2025. “The contractor will also be responsible for providing support during testing activities, as well as safing after each test and general support between tests. All tunnel construction must be completed by 15 June 2027.”
“The contractor shall repair a D-shape tunnel and overburden using the D-shape of 20 feet depth and width, inside the tunnel. The contractor shall remove and repair any damage to the ribs, crown, and invert to Tunnel 7,” that same document continues. “After the repair of Tunnel 7, the contractor shall provide general construction support to instrument the tunnel in preparation for testing and then safe the tunnel for re-entry post-testing.”
The schedule for the MW-6-related work indicates that it is separate from what Pate Construction was hired to do at the site back in February.
A view out into a mountainous part of the White Sands Missile Range complex. USACE
ALT-SHIST, which was first established in 1995, is also not the only site DTRA makes use of within WSMR. As its name indicates, it is an alternate to the original SHIST site, use of which began in 1993.
“There was a small addition made to the SHIST site, but that area has been heavily used since 2007,” according to an environmental impact study the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) completed in 2015. “The granite bedrock at these sites has been fractured and damaged by extensive testing. There are no existing granite areas adjacent to those sites where similar testing can be performed.”
A map showing the relative locations of SHIST and ALT-SHIST, as well as other test sites, at the northern end of the WSMR complex. USACE
USACE conducted that study in support of the establishment of a new test site at WSMR, simply called the Granite Test Site, to succeed the original SHIST. The Granite Test Site is now in use. There are many more sites within the range complex designed to simulate underground and otherwise hardened targets. This is also just one aspect of the wide array of testing that occurs on a daily basis at WSMR.
All three also appear to have been involved in the testing and development of the Massive Ordnance Penetrator (MOP). 5/10 pic.twitter.com/3aWSYXIZln
However, the presence of large areas of undisturbed granite is a key factor here, as that is particularly relevant for testing weapons designed to penetrate into extremely deeply buried facilities. CNN‘s piece yesterday noted that Iran’s Pickaxe Mountain site is built underneath a granite mountain.
“The mountain in White Sands, they specifically picked mountainous areas that were solid rock, and they used state-of-the-art tunneling technology to make the kind of cavities in the mountain that you would put this kind of [Iranian nuclear] facility in,” Gary Stradling, a retired scientist who previously worked for the Department of Energy’s Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL), told TWZ in an interview last year. “I think that there is a lot of work that DOD has done in these kinds of facilities that is highly classified, and I couldn’t talk to you about it. This is very sophisticated work. It is not casual, and it’s not speculative. These are real experts who are doing the work. Careful, technical, quantitative work to be able to deliver this kind of war-fighting capability to the services.”
TWZ spoke to Stradling, who did work tied to earth-penetrating munitions at various points during his lengthy career, in the wake of Operation Midnight Hammer.
Me, standing at the edge of a MOP crater on a mountain top at White Sands Test Range, where detailed studies of massive earth penetrators were studied for effectiveness against deeply buried targets by the Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA) —formerly Defense Nuclear Agency.… pic.twitter.com/JYq1V2xO6q
The U.S. military notably did not strike Pickaxe Mountain, which is situated immediately to the southwest of Iran’s nuclear facility at Natanz, during Operation Midnight Hammer. The site also went untouched by Israel during last year’s 12 Day War. American and Israeli forces did not target it during major combat operations earlier this year, either. All of this underscores the targeting challenge the site presents, even for strikes using MOPs, which TWZ explored in detail earlier this year and that has continued to make it a point of particular discussion.
CNN‘s report yesterday was primarily focused on a new assessment of ongoing construction at Pickaxe Mountain from the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) think tank in Washington, D.C.
Satellite “images reveal more road activity at Pickaxe Mountain in 2026 than at any point in the site’s history,” according to a report CSIS published yesterday. “There is a clear surge in construction activity in 2026 that corresponds to the raising and hardening of the portal accesses, paving of the internal road network, reinforcement around access areas, and the flattening and removal of excavation spoil.”
“This assessment can neither refute nor substantiate the Israeli intelligence claim that Iran moved centrifuges into Pickaxe Mountain,” CSIS’s report also noted. “The continuous construction, the absence of an increased internal security posture, and the lack of observed nonconstruction vehicles and equipment suggest the underground facility is not yet capable of enrichment work, if that is the intended purpose. Further analysis of daily activity would be needed to establish the site’s pattern of life beyond its current construction footprint.”
This is in line with TWZ‘s own previous reporting on Pickaxe Mountain back in July, when there were already signs of growing activity following the establishment of a shaky ceasefire between the United States and Iran the preceding month. As we wrote at that time:
“As with the strikes on Fordow, multiple bombs could be dropped on the same impact point to try to penetrate further down into Pickaxe Mountain. Whether there might be similar ventilation shafts or other weak points that could be exploited at Pickaxe Mountain is unknown. …”
A graphic with details about the employment of MOPs on strikes at Fordow during Operation Midnight Hammer. DOD
“A strike ‘right in the front door’ on the tunnel entrances at Pickaxe Mountain would be another option to at least hamper access to the facility inside for a time. This could be combined with strikes aimed at sections of the tunnel networks that run deeper inside the facility, but that are still close enough to the surface to be reachable by available conventional munitions. For instance, MOPs may not be able to hit the main cavern areas, but they could possibly hit certain tunnels that might lead to them.”
“Even a combined strike on entrances and shallow tunnels at Pickaxe Mountain could still present certain challenges. Firm intelligence on exactly where the tunnels snake under the mountain could be limited, making it difficult to select the best impact points. This is exactly why the U.S. military has been investing heavily in advanced, void-sensing fuzes for MOP and other bunker buster bombs for decades now. These fuzes detect when a munition has penetrated into a sufficiently large space, such as a room or tunnel in an underground facility, to help maximize damage. Fuzes that can effectively ‘count’ floors also help to ensure the munition has burrowed sufficiently deep before detonating.”
…
“…the U.S. military could conduct follow-on strikes on the entry points at Pickaxe Mountain to disrupt any attempt to regain access, as well.”
“Destroying Pickaxe Mountain will be a scientific and targeting challenge,” CSIS also noted in its report yesterday. “It is an underground fortress buttressed by granite. It is one of the only facilities in Iran’s nuclear program that the United States has not yet struck. Structurally degrading Pickaxe Mountain requires more than just kinetic force – it takes actionable high-confidence intelligence and sophisticated mathematical modeling.”
With all this in mind, it is not at all hard to imagine how new testing at ALT-SHIST, as well as other sites, would be essential for exploring additional options for striking Pickaxe Mountain and/or other deeply-buried targets in Iran using MOPs and/or other munitions.
A US Air Force B-2 bomber drops a GBU-57/B MOP during a test. USAF
It’s also worth noting here that GBU-57/Bs are understood to be in relatively short supply, though it is unknown how many of them are currently in inventory. Furthermore, the U.S. Air Force’s B-2 Spirit bombers are currently the only aircraft certified to employ the huge MOPs operationally. There was a report in 2024 that prime contractor Boeing was working to expand its capacity to produce these bombs. A MOP successor, the GBU-76/B Next Generation Penetrator (NGP), is in development now, but prototyping work is expected to run through the end of Fiscal Year 2028.
President Donald Trump certainly has raised the prospect of a strike on Pickaxe Mountain publicly on several occasions since July. He has also repeatedly said that the site is being persistently surveilled, particularly from space.
“There’s another place called Pickaxe Mountain, another nice place. We may have to give them a shot there, too, because someone said there was a little movement at the site,” Trump said yesterday during a speech at a convention the Republican Party is hosting in Dallas, Texas, ahead of this year’s midterm elections. “We don’t need much. We see everything, you know, because of Space Force.”
“We may hit Pickaxe [Mountain] very soon,” the President also said while speaking to reporters at the White House last Friday.
Trump on Pickaxe Mountain: We may have to give them a shot there too. We see everything. We can the see tag on their coat. “Muhammad Al-Fayed” It’s never Muhammad Jones. pic.twitter.com/UQm939OruL
Whether growing activity at Pickaxe Mountain finally prompts a U.S. strike at the site, either alone or as part of a larger operation, remains to be seen. If and when such a mission is launched, past and future testing at sites like ALT-SHIST in New Mexico will all but certainly have played an important part.
“The Joint Forces have formed a command center south of the city of Mokha, following Houthi breakthroughs across various combat axes under heavy fire, in which the Houthis used various types of weapons,” Deputy Chairman of the Presidential Leadership Council (PLC), Lt. Gen. Tareq Saleh, said in his acknowledgment that his forces lost the port. The PLC was created in 2022 to represent the internationally recognized government of Yemen.
“The armed forces on the West Coast — the National Resistance, the Giants [Brigades], and the Homeland Shield — in addition to units of the Taiz axis west of the governorate, have paid a heavy price, martyrs and wounded, over the past days as they confronted the Houthi attack, which was planned by Iran, supported by it, and carried out with the participation of its various proxies/tools.”
“Thanks to God, our armed forces were able to repel an enemy combat formation a short time ago in the province of Taiz, forcing it to withdraw,” Houthi spokesman Brig. Gen. Yahya Saree proclaimed. “This was achieved by targeting it with a number of locally manufactured surface-to-air missiles.”
(Houthi Telegram channel)
Videos have emerged showing Houthi forces inside Mokha and its airport and a large amount of equipment being seized.
The people of the port city of Al-Mokha gave a warm reception to Yemeni armed forces fighters following the city's strategic liberation. pic.twitter.com/0XDrveJPxU
BREAKING: The Houthis have announced a Cessation of Combat Operations along the Coast of Bab al-Mandab Strait following the Collapse of Pro-Saudi Forces
The Core Military of the Houthis has entered the City of Mokha
Even before the capture of Mokha, the rebel group held the BAM under threat with its array of drones and missiles, some of which it launched from deeper in Yemen. In fact, the group became the first to fire anti-ship ballistic missiles (ASBM) at vessels during its campaign against Red Sea shipping.
Mokha, however, provides a potential new surveillance and launching point for the Houthis to deploy mines as well as aerial drones and uncrewed surface vessels (USVs) they can use to attack shipping. As we have reported previously, the rebel group pioneered the operational use of some of these weapons.
The Houthis “are determined to control the ports in order to use booby-trapped boats from areas close to shipping lanes,” Col. Abdul Basit Al-Baher, a Yemeni army officer and military analyst, told Arab News last month as the rebels were pushing closer to the port.
In addition to Mokha, the Houthis also reportedly captured two important islands that could also add to its control over shipping through the strait. However, TWZ cannot independently confirm this.
There are claims that the Houthis seized Perim Island, which sits right in the middle of the BAM. In 2021, satellite images we obtained showed completion of a new, approximately 6,150-foot-long runway on the island as well as hangars and other facilities. The installation was supposedly meant primarily to support drone operations and was built by the United Arab Emirates.
This strategically located island sits in the narrowest part of the BAM, less than two miles west of Yemen and about 13 miles east of Djibouti, giving the Houthis a commanding presence at the mouth of the Red Sea.
Zuqar Island, which was also reportedly captured, sits in the middle of the Red Sea about 80 miles north of Perim Island. In the custody of the Yemeni government since 1998, it was being “used by government forces to track shipping traffic, monitor movements by Houthi rebels and stop weapons smuggling in the Red Sea,” according to The National.
Last year, images emerged of construction of a runway on the island.
A closer look at the new 2.1 km runway on Yemen’s Jabal Zuqar Island in the southern Red Sea shows a small apron with one completed aircraft hangar and another likely under construction, plus a taxiway leading to two military emplacements, likely to shelter aircraft or UAVs. https://t.co/cnphe6yCeOpic.twitter.com/iOwr7C6I91
Zuqar Island sits about 7 km east of the northbound shipping lane in the Red Sea. Control over these two islands could allow the Houthis to mirror the pattern Iran established in the Strait of Hormuz by directing traffic to pass through a narrow passage between Qeshm and Larak islands.
The Iranian transit scheme for the Strait of Hormuz. (Iranian government)
The conflict between Saudi Arabia and the Houthis grew out of a civil war in Yemen that erupted in 2014. It expanded a year later when a Saudi-led coalition joined forces with the government ousted by the Houthis and raged on until the parties reached a tenuous ceasefire in 2022. The Saudis held off on getting involved in the recent Red Sea conflict which saw the U.S. and coalition warships duking it out with the Houthis, and eventually led to a U.S.-led air campaign over Yemen. Tensions, however, reignited after that conflict ended when the Houthis joined the U.S.-Iran conflict on the side of their major supporter. In addition to the aforementioned blockade, the Houthis began striking Saudi refineries.
The Houthis already control the port of Hodeidah, about 100 miles to the north. Capturing Mokha and the two islands extends their reach even closer to the BAM.
“On average, 273 ships sailed through the chokepoint each week between 27 July and 23 August,” the organization reported. “The naval ban on Saudi Arabia came into effect on 20 July, and the weekly average in the run up date was 319. Still, traffic remains above volumes seen before the crisis in the Middle East Gulf that led to a flurry of activity in the Red Sea as Saudi oil was redirected to Yanbu.”
Saudi Arabia has increasingly sent oil to its port of Yanbu on the Red Sea. (Photo by Yasin Demirci/Anadolu via Getty Images) Anadolu
The biggest impact of the blockade, Lloyd’s List Intelligence notes, is that it is driving up the cost to deliver oil by forcing traffic north through the Suez Canal, “extending voyage times and tying up capacity. In the Middle East, rising use of Hormuz shuttle tankers and multiple STS transfers is creating delays and increasing vessel utilization. Combined, these rising inefficiencies have led to the third VLCC spot-rate spike since the beginning of the crisis in the Middle East Gulf.”
The Houthi strikes on Saudi’s oil infrastructure, including a Houthi missile and drone attack against the Saudi Aramco refinery at Jazan on the Red Sea earlier this week, add a further dilemma for Riyadh, making it harder to get its product to points of shipment.
Video of of the aftermath of those strikes, which you can see below, emerged on social media.
Following Houthi strikes, fires can be seen raging at the Jizan oil refinery in Saudi Arabia. pic.twitter.com/tAqOPlsmvS
All this is raising the specter of the U.S. having to get as involved as it did during the previous Houthi campaign against shipping that ended last September, which could pull resources away from Iranian-focused operations, if supporting such an operation is even possible at all at this point. The Navy, and other key elements of the U.S. military, is overstretched and worn down by continuous deployments for many months leading up to Venezuela and then Iran, and now six months after Operation Epic Fury.
U.S. forces in the Persian Gulf are under increasing pressure as tensions with Iran continue to simmer. On Tuesday, several U.S. Air Force jets were damaged in an Iranian missile barrage on Muwaffaq Salti Air Base in Jordan, according to CBS News. An A-10 Thunderbolt II close support jet lost a wing and about eight F-15E Strike Eagle multi-role fighters were slightly damaged and returned to service, the network noted.
There is also a report that Acting Navy Secretary Hung Cao said Iranian forces “blew the hell out of Bahrain” where the U.S. military has a number of key facilities, including the headquarters of the U.S. Fifth Fleet. The country has been the subject of frequent Iranian barrages since the U.S. and Israel first attacked on Feb. 28.
Cao’s assessment matches what we have seen and heard prior to his comments and raises anew the question of whether the U.S. will return to Bahrain and other bases in the region heavily attacked by Iran.
In an exclusive interview, Acting Navy Secretary Hung Cao told me that Iranian forces "blew the hell out of Bahrain."
While open-source analyses have long indicated that the U.S. Fifth Fleet Headquarters at Naval Support Activity Bahrain sustained extensive damage in the early…
“At least three times in the past week, Iranian forces have launched missiles at American warships, including an aircraft carrier, taking direct aim at the U.S. Navy in a way it hasn’t done since the start of the war,” the newspaper noted. “The attempted strikes on warships have led to much closer calls than previous attempts, with Iran using maneuverable warheads, people familiar with the attacks said.”
Amid this activity, traffic through the Strait remains suppressed.
“Vessel transits via the Strait of Hormuz fell on Wednesday to seven from 12 the previous day, preliminary ship-tracking data showed on Thursday, with levels also below the 10-day average of 14,” Reuters reported. “Out of these seven ships, four vessels exited and three entered, according to the data.”
However, an exact figure is hard to come by. Some vessels could be sailing through the waterway with their transponders turned off and would not be counted toward the totals, the outlet added.
Vessels transit the Hormuz Strait off the coast of Iran’s southern port city of Bandar Abbas on September 7, 2026. (Photo by ATTA KENARE / AFP) ATTA KENARE
As it is, oil prices are skyrocketing. As of noon Thursday, the per barrel price of Brent Crude exceeded $107, the highest price since July when it fell to just over $77 per barrel, according to OilPrice.com.
It will take some time before we get a better picture of how the Houthi seizure of the port of Mokha, and possibly Perim and Zuqar islands, will affect the global economy due to rising oil prices, either through reduced supply, increased cost of delivery or some combination of the two. With no end in sight to the U.S. conflict with Iran that helped to drive these actions, the Yemeni rebel group has incentives to inflict economic pain wherever it can.
The U.S. Navy has lost an advanced uncrewed underwater vehicle (UUV), and it is now in Iranian hands. Here’s what we know about the Dive-LD drone and its apparent seizure, and its implications.
Authorities in Iran said earlier today that they had retrieved a U.S. Dive-LD uncrewed underwater vehicle (UUV) largely intact near the Strait of Hormuz. The regime in Tehran subsequently released pictures and video clips of the UUV being lifted out of the water, seen at various points below. This looks to be the first known instance of an operational deployment of the Dive-LD. This is still a relatively new capability for the U.S. Navy that only began entering service a little more than a year and a half ago. American officials have previously confirmed the use of UUVs, in general, to help keep the Strait of Hormuz free of Iranian naval mines, one of many threats that have dramatically slowed maritime traffic through this critical waterway.
Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) “captured one of the most modern, unmanned, and smart submarines … at the entrance to the Strait of Hormuz in a complex intelligence and operational action at dawn today,” according to a statement shared earlier today via Iranian state media. The exact circumstances surrounding the seizure remain unconfirmed.
“An underwater drone operated by U.S. forces malfunctioned more than a day ago,” a U.S. official said in response to our queries about the Iranian claims. “It was surveying regional waters in support of ongoing operations. The defective drone was an older model that neither collected sensitive data nor carried any classified sonar or radar equipment. U.S. operations in area waters continue.”
A top-down look at the Dive-LD Iran said it recovered. Iranian quasi-state media via XAn image showing the Dive-LD UUV being hoisted out of the water. Iranian quasi-state media via XThe Dive-LD markings, with the “V” worn away, seen on the side of the UUV. Iranian quasi-state media via X
The official did not confirm or deny the type of UUV in question, or that Iran had retrieved it. They also did not elaborate on the nature of the malfunction. TWZ also reached out to Anduril, which initially deferred any questions to U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM). However, they subsequently confirmed the loss of a Dive-LD operating in the region.
“Dive-LD is an attritable autonomous system, meaning it is designed from the outset to operate in dangerous environments where loss of the vehicle is an expected possibility. Its purpose is to keep warfighters out of the most dangerous parts of the undersea mission,” an Anduril spokesperson told us in a statement. “This vehicle had already delivered significant value operating thousands of hours in months-long operations in CENTCOM.”
Categorized as a large UUV, the Dive-LD is 19 feet (approximately 5.8 meters) long, four feet (around 1.2 meters) in diameter, and has a gross weight of close to three tons. The design features a 3D-printed exterior, but is said to be capable of diving down to depths of some 19,685 feet (3.7 miles or 6,000 meters). The UUVs can also remain at sea for around 10 days at a time, depending on their exact configuration, and do so with a high degree of autonomy. Dive-LD was originally developed by U.S.-based Dive Technologies, which was founded in 2018 and then acquired by Anduril in 2022.
Anduril announced the delivery of the first Dive-LD to the U.S. Navy’s Unmanned Undersea Vehicle Group One (UUVGRU-1) in April 2025. The Navy had already released a picture of personnel training with one of these UUVs five months earlier. How many Dive-LDs are now in U.S. service is unclear.
Members of Unmanned Undersea Vehicle Group One (UUVGRU-1) and Undersea Vehicle Squadron Three (UUVRON-3) train with a Dive-LD UUV in December 2024. USN
The Dive-LD has a highly modular design. Anduril’s website says that the UUV can be configured for various military missions, including so-called intelligence preparation of the operational environment (IPOE); general intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR); mine warfare; and precision placement of objects underwater. IPOE refers to the collection of various types of intelligence on a specific area as part of planning for upcoming operations.
As mentioned, U.S. officials have previously stated that UUVs have been supporting mine-clearance operations in and around the Strait of Hormuz. Broadly speaking, uncrewed underwater platforms offer a way to find and record the location of naval mines using sonars, cameras, and other sensors, while helping keep friendly forces further away from potential threats. Afterward, depending on the type of mines that are found, various methods can be employed to neutralize them. Mine sweeping is time-consuming and dangerous, even in permissive environments, let alone when conducted under the threat of enemy attack.
This past weekend, the Financial Times newspaper in the United Kingdom published a story saying U.S. forces have been using UUVs in exactly this way to help clear Iranian mines, citing “people familiar with the operation.”
“Mostly at night, it [the U.S. military] sent Navy Seal [sic SEAL] divers, robot boats and specialised underwater craft into the perilous strait for a four-month mine-clearance mission,” according to FT‘s report. “U.S. Navy divers worked in small teams using inflatable-hulled craft. They located Iranian mines with the help of robot boats and submersibles – such as the U.S. Navy’s Common Uncrewed Surface Vessel – operating towed sonar arrays.”
The Common Uncrewed Surface Vessel (CUSV) is a speedboat-sized drone boat that has been in Navy inventory since the early 2020s, explicitly for counter-mine operations. FT‘s story does not say where any USVs, UUVs, and/or boats full of divers were launched from as part of these operations in and around the Strait of Hormuz, but it posited that the Navy’s Expeditionary Sea Base ship USS Miguel Keith could have been involved.
A stock picture of the US Navy’s Expeditionary Sea Base ship USS Miguel Keith. USMC/Sgt. Luis Agostini
A trio of Independence class Littoral Combat Ships specifically configured for mine-sweeping duties, including using CUSVs, had been forward deployed in Bahrain before the start of the conflict with Iran in February. At least two of those ships, USS Santa Fe and USS Tulsa, emerged thousands of miles away in Southeast Asia in March, something TWZ was the first to report on. At the time of writing, those ships currently appear to be in Singapore. The exact disposition of the third of these LCSs, the USS Canberra, is unclear, but USNI News reported today that it is sailing in the South China Sea.
The Navy has a host of other warships in the Middle East that could support counter-mine missions. With a 10-day endurance, Dive-LDs, specifically, could potentially have been launched from locations away from the Strait of Hormuz, including friendly ports.
Dive-LDs could also be used for other missions beyond mine clearance in the region. As mentioned, the U.S. official told TWZ the UUV had malfunctioned while “surveying regional waters.” While this would be a relevant task in the context of a larger mine-sweeping operation, underwater surveys would be valuable for other purposes, too. For months now, U.S. forces have been facilitating the movement of ships in and out of the Persian Gulf via a route that hugs the Omani coastline, keeping them as far from Iranian threats as possible. Having up-to-date and highly accurate maps of the seafloor in these areas would be critical to ensuring they are deep enough for large commercial vessels to pass through safely.
Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Daryl Caudle, at right, is shown a Dive-LD UUV during a visit to Naval Base Kitsap-Keyport, Washington, in June 2026. USN
IPOE and general ISR support, above and below the waves, would be part of any current or future U.S. activities in the region. This includes a new campaign of strikes targeting Iranian tanker ships that began last month and monitoring general port activity in Iran as part of the ongoing blockade.
Employing Dive-LDs in operations against Iran also provides a valuable real-world opportunity to prove out new UUV capabilities and associated tactics, techniques, and procedures, which could prove critical in a future high-end fight against a peer opponent like China. Dive-LD has been feeding into Anduril’s development of an even more capable large UUV called Ghost Shark, the first customer for which is the Royal Australian Navy. Ghost Shark is a militarized version of a design called the Dive-XL that followed the Dive-LD. In March, Anduril announced it was among those selected for the Combat Autonomous Maritime Platform Project (CAMP), an extra-large uncrewed underwater vehicle rapid prototyping effort being run by the Pentagon’s Defense Innovation Unit (DIU) and the Navy. Anduril did not say what platform it would be supplying for that project, but used a picture of Ghost Shark to illustrate the announcement.
The U.S. military is already known to have taken advantage of the ongoing conflict with Iran to demonstrate new weapon systems and other capabilities, including uncrewed maritime systems. In June, a Saronic Corsair drone boat conducted a first-of-its-kind at-sea rescue of the crew of a U.S. Army AH-64 Apache attack helicopter that had gone down in the Gulf of Oman. The following month, U.S. forces launched their first known kamikaze USV attack on Iran’s Bandar Abbas Naval Base using explosive-laden Corsairs.
With all this in mind, it is worth noting that the apparent loss of a Dive-LD intact to Iran is still significant, even if the core design is not brand new and if it does not have any especially sensitive mission systems onboard. It is not necessarily ‘exquisite,’ bleeding-edge technology as it is designed to be optionally attritable, but is still an advanced modern system in operational U.S. service now. Insights into its capabilities and limitations would certainly be of interest to Iran and others. What attempts the U.S. military made to recover the Dive-LD are also unknown. However, the fact that it was not destroyed before or while the Iranians were retrieving it points to American forces having completely lost any sense of its location beforehand.
For its part, Iran has long been a collector of foreign military hardware, primarily U.S. and Israeli, including drones of all types. The capture of a largely intact RQ-170 Sentinel in 2011 is the most famous (or infamous) example. The regime in Tehran also regularly works to reverse engineer what it recovers to varying degrees, and has promised to do the same with the Dive-LD. It could also share its latest prize with its own international partners, including Russia and China, for further analysis and exploitation. The Chinese People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) notably has its own very active UUV programs.
On top of all this, the seizure offers propaganda benefits for the Iranian government, which is already making heavy use of the information space to push back against U.S. military and economic pressure.
The current conflict with Iran has only further underscored the important roles that uncrewed maritime platforms are playing in U.S. operations now, which are only set to keep growing as time goes on. As those same operations expand, so will the risks of capture and other losses.
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BREAKING: The Houthis have announced a Cessation of Combat Operations along the Coast of Bab al-Mandab Strait following the Collapse of Pro-Saudi Forces
Jabal Zuqar Island in the southern Red Sea shows a small apron with one completed aircraft hangar and another likely under construction, plus a taxiway leading to two military emplacements, likely to shelter aircraft or UAVs. 
(@AfriMEOSINT) 
