By Pierre Tran Paris. KNDS, a Franco-German builder of land weapons, said July 1 it has suspended its announced flotation in Paris and Frankfurt, citing “market volatility” in the arms sector on European stock markets. The company told investors it was switching tracks just a week after launching a long-awaited…
By Robbin Laird On April 17–18, 2026, the high desert terrain around Twentynine Palms, California became the operational environment for Assault Support Tactics 3, one of the defining field evolutions of Weapons and Tactics Instructor Course 2-26. The photographs from those two days capture what WTI is at its best:…
By Robbin Laird In the early 2000s, a billion-dollar Predator drone circled over a combat zone, its high-definition cameras capturing perfect imagery of enemy positions below. On the ground, a Special Forces operator, weighted down with 80 pounds of gear and under enemy fire, was effectively blind. He knew the…
By Robbin Laird When visiting Bahrain some years ago, I made a point of seeing the Portuguese fort. Standing inside those ancient walls, looking at the stonework — Arab foundations overlaid with Portuguese military engineering — I was struck by a simple but powerful thought: the strategic logic that drove…
By Robbin Laird In the clear desert night over Arizona, a CH-53K King Stallion slid into position behind the tanker, its rotors biting into thin air as the crew prepared to take the hose once more. Below, the Sonoran Desert stretched away in darkness. Above and around, the aircraft was…
When I worked on German reunification in the 1980s, one of the core concerns was not simply whether the two German states could be brought together institutionally, but whether the deep historical and cultural gap between East and West Germany could be bridged in any meaningful way. The question was…
Energy security is a key challenge facing Australia as an island continent at the bottom of the Asia Pacific region. According to the Australian Defence Minister. “It is an area of enabling capability within Defence that has been significantly underfunded in recent years, and it is one which this white…
Recently, our partner defenceWeb looked at the evolving challenges of maritime defense and security seen from South Africa.
