The world is entering a “third nuclear age,” the head of the British armed forces has warned, with world-ending weapons once again spreading globally and international agreements to control them collapsing. Adm. Tony Radakin, chief of the defense staff in the United Kingdom, on Dec. 4 accused Russia of issuing “wild threats of tactical nuclear use” and “simulated attacks against NATO countries.”
Ukrainian officials are visiting the United States this week to seek continued American support, and met with members of Donald J. Trump’s transition team to appeal to a president-elect who has pledged to bring a quick end to Ukraine’s war with Russia.
Eight Republican senators sent a letter to the top negotiators for the annual defense bill asking them to take out a provision that would require women to register for the Selective Service System (SSS), which compiles a registry that can be used to draft Americans if authorized by Congress or the president in a state of war or other emergency.
Slightly more than half of Americans have a “great deal of confidence” in the U.S. military, an increase from a year ago after several years of sharp drops, a national survey found. However, the level of trust between Americans and their military is still far below where it was during years of active combat in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Muon Space, a startup specializing in small satellites for Earth climate monitoring, has been awarded a $2.9 million contract by the U.S. Space Force to evaluate its satellite technology for military applications. The Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase 2 agreement, announced Dec. 5, aims to assess whether Muon’s instruments can provide high-resolution imagery of cloud cover and weather conditions critical for military and intelligence operations.
Part of the Air Force's mobility fleet will be tapped to receive a fresh connectivity suite, dubbed the Global Transport Platform-as-a-Service, as early as the end of calendar year 2024 or spring 2025, Inside Defense has learned. Air Mobility Command at the end of September finalized a yearlong contract with an unnamed manufacturer to provide a “one-stop-shop” for “peer-to-peer communication at the tactical edge” by enabling real-time access to commercial, unclassified and secret networks even when forward deployed.
Bell has released a rendering showing updated design concepts for vertical takeoff and landing-capable crewed and uncrewed aircraft that feature proprotors that fold away during cruise. The company is working toward building a flying demonstrator using this technology as part of a program intended to present options for a potential future high-speed, runway-independent special operations airlifter.
Training models and simulations need to “move beyond the physical domains” to keep pace with global threats, said Adm. Christopher Grady, vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin signed off on a classified strategy for countering drone threats in an effort to unify the military’s approach to protecting its facilities and personnel from weaponized unmanned aerial systems. “Unmanned systems pose both an urgent and enduring threat to U.S. personnel, facilities, and assets overseas,” the Pentagon said in a statement Dec. 5 announcing the strategy.
The Pentagon’s unexplainable phenomena-investigation hub—the All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office—has officially reached full operational capability, DefenseScoop exclusively confirmed on Dec. 5. This news comes as AARO’s new chief Jon Kosloski prepares to participate in a classified briefing with House Oversight and Accountability Committee members on Dec. 6.
NATO has been “looking at” overcoming Russian or Chinese GPS jamming by relaying satellite signals through ultra-high-flying aircraft, a NATO official told Breaking Defense. “These are big, high-altitude planes that can stay for weeks in the air based on solar energy, and they can capture the GPS signal and send it down to earth with much more power that is more difficult to jam,” Brig. Gen. Sam Raeves, who serves as the assistant chief of staff of J6 Cyberspace at NATO, said in an interview on the sidelines of the NATO Edge conference.
Air Force families with children in youth programs throughout the service ... were shocked this month by mistaken bank charges for hundreds of dollars. The error was traced to an Air Force Services Center contractor who pushed a scheduled, routine update patch to the Child and Youth Management System on Nov. 30, Deborah Aragon, spokeswoman for the Air Force Installation and Mission Support Center, said by email. As a result, extra charges were deducted from the accounts of about 4,000 families enrolled in Air Force children and youth programs, she said.
Department of Defense civilian employees can shop at 16 commissaries during a pilot program for the next 120 days. The select stores, all located in the continental United States, will be open to all DOD civilian employees, both appropriated fund and nonappropriated fund employees. The DOD pilot program is testing the feasibility of expanding the commissary benefit to DOD civilians at all stateside commissaries, Defense Commissary Agency officials said in an announcement of the test, which begins Dec. 5.
