The Trump administration reached a deal April 30 with Ukraine giving the U.S. access to its mineral wealth, overcoming last-minute haggling that had held up an agreement President Trump had sought to compensate the U.S. for helping Ukraine fight off Russia’s invasion.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth threatened Iran over its support for Yemen’s Houthi militants, telling the country that it “will pay the consequence.” “Message to IRAN: We see your LETHAL support to The Houthis. We know exactly what you are doing. You know very well what the U.S. Military is capable of — and you were warned. You will pay the CONSEQUENCE at the time and place of our choosing,” the Defense secretary said in a post on the social platform X late April 30.
The Justice Department has begun the first criminal prosecutions of migrants who breach a newly expanded military zone at the southern border that is patrolled by U.S. troops, threatening people with additional penalties for crossing the U.S.-Mexico border illegally.
The U.S. military’s fleet of V-22 Ospreys won’t be able to fly without restrictions until 2026—about a year later than originally planned—as officials work to upgrade flawed gearboxes that have caused several mishaps.
The Marines are closing in on their goal of having a full, fifth-generation fighter jet fleet. However, those new jets are still equipped with 1980s-era weapons technology. That’s an area Marine aviation leaders such as Lt. Gen. Bradford Gering, deputy commandant for aviation, and Col. Derek Brannon, director of the Cunningham Group, are looking to industry for help.
“Antique cars are defined as being at least 25 years old; by that definition, our Air Force, with aircraft that have an average age of 30 years, is an antique force. To recover from years of neglect, the Air Force must rebuild both its capability and capacity to fight. This can only be accomplished by the administration prioritizing it and Congress providing it the resources to immediately increase the number of new aircraft it buys each year,” write retired Lt. Gen. David A. Deptula, dean of the Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies, and retired Col. Mark A. Gunzinger, the Mitchell Institute’s director of future concepts and capability assessments.
“The ‘neighborhood watch’ concept is one with which most Americans are familiar. A group of neighbors works together to combat crime and promote safety by being vigilant in reporting suspicious activity and maintaining consistent communication with law enforcement and each other. It’s time the United States and our Western Hemisphere partners adopt this simple model. But this only works if it's a collective effort. It requires all invested parties to commit and participate actively,” writes Rep. Rick Crawford (R-Ark.), chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence.
High school students whose campuses do not have a Junior Reserve Officers’ Training Corps program would be able to join units at another school under a bill being introduced in Congress. The expansion of the JROTC program is part of a broader bill being introduced by Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, intended to build on recent momentum in recruiting by expanding the military's access to high schools.
True Anomaly, a defense-focused aerospace startup developing spacecraft and software for U.S. national security missions, has raised $260 million in fresh capital to fund a slate of space missions and scale its operations.
Ensuring future Collaborative Combat Aircraft (CCA) drones can fly in close proximity to friendly crewed aircraft without colliding with each other remains a major challenge, according to the U.S. Marine Corps. This is just one of many basic operational problems facing the Marines, as well as the U.S. Air Force and the U.S. Navy, when it comes to how future CCAs will be deployed, launched, recovered, supported, and otherwise operated, let alone employed tactically.
Pilots at Langley Air Force Base, Va., reached back to a tradition born in the early decades of combat flying to pay tribute to a stunt pilot who died at the base. Flyers and other personnel gathered at sunset on Friday, April 25, to burn a piano, a tradition among fighter pilots that dates at least to World War II, in tribute to stunt pilot Rob Holland, who died in a crash on the base the day before.