By Robbin Laird Six photographs taken through night vision devices on April 6, 2026, at Marine Corps Logistics Base Barstow, California, document one of the most operationally consequential integration exercises in WTI 2-26: the nighttime off-load of an M142 High Mobility Artillery Rocket System from a KC-130J Hercules. The photographs…
Thirteen photographs from April 7, 2026, document a full operational day for the UH-1Y Venom near Yuma, Arizona, as part of Weapons and Tactics Instructor Course 2-26. The day moves from the MCAS Yuma ramp through rappelling operations in the rocky desert mountains, a hot-pad turnaround at a forward site,…
By Pasquale Preziosa In June 2026, the world watched with concern as the crisis in the Strait of Hormuz unfolded. Once again, a stretch of sea just a few dozen kilometers wide proved capable of influencing energy markets, military strategies, and political decisions of powers thousands of kilometers away. During…
By Robbin Laird Nine photographs from April 4, 2026, at Yuma Proving Ground, Arizona, document the UAS tactics exercise conducted as part of Weapons and Tactics Instructor Course 2-26. The subject is the MQ-9A Reaper, operated in Marine Corps service by MAWTS-1, and the Ground Control Station from which its…
By Robbin Laird A light rain fell over the parade field at Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Point on the morning of June 16, 2026, but it did nothing to slow the proceedings. Under a covered pavilion ringed with the stadium-style red seats that mark official functions on the station,…
By Pierre Tran Paris – Germany pulled out of building a new generation fighter (NGF) with France, with Chancellor Friedrich Merz June 10 recasting cooperation around developing a combat cloud for command and control over air, land, sea, and space. “This presents a great opportunity for a central Franco-German defense…
Three days after Marines with Marine Wing Support Squadron 373 laid AM-2 aluminum matting at Auxiliary Airfield II near Yuma, Arizona, a new team returned to the same site to build the next layer of the expeditionary airfield. On March 17, 2026, personnel conducting the Forward Arming and Refueling Point…
By Robbin Laird I came to the Coast Guard through an unusual door. In the late 1990s I was working with a maritime security company focused on port vulnerabilities, and the observation that shaped everything that followed was straightforward: bad actors could reach into the commercial technology market far more…
