U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) said it would start the blockade at 10:00 a.m. ET, effectively taking control of all maritime traffic linked to Iran.

“The blockade will be enforced impartially against vessels of all nations entering or departing Iranian ports and coastal areas, including all Iranian ports on the Arabian Gulf and Gulf of Oman,” CENTCOM said. “CENTCOM forces will not impede freedom of navigation for vessels transiting the Strait of Hormuz to and from non-Iranian ports.”

Reuters reports that the U.S. military sent the following message to seafarers providing more details of the blockade:

“Any vessel entering or departing the blockaded area without authorization is subject to interception, diversion, and capture,” the note reportedly said. “The blockade will not impede neutral transit passage through the Strait of Hormuz to or from non-Iranian destinations.”

We have reached out to CENTCOM for more details about how this will be enforced and what assets will be involved. In the meantime, The Wall Street Journal reports that “more than 15 U.S. warships” are currently involved in the operation.

Meanwhile, the U.K. Maritime Trade Operations (UKMTO) center has issued the following guidelines to ships:

• The restrictions encompass the entirety of the Iranian coastline, including ports and energy
  infrastructure.
• Transit passage through the Strait of Hormuz to or from non-Iranian destinations is not
  reported to be impeded by these measures; however, vessels may encounter military
  presence, directed communications, or right-of-visit procedures during passage.
• Neutral vessels currently within Iranian ports have been granted a limited grace period to
  depart.

In a lengthy post on his Truth Social platform, Trump said Sunday that the U.S. Navy was going to start “BLOCKADING any and all Ships trying to enter, or leave, the Strait of Hormuz.”

“I have also instructed our Navy to seek and interdict every vessel in International Waters that has paid a toll to Iran. No one who pays an illegal toll will have safe passage on the high seas,” Trump said.

“Any Iranian who fires at us, or at peaceful vessels, will be BLOWN TO HELL!” he continued.

In a statement today, maritime data and intelligence company Lloyd’s List Intelligence said “all traffic” through the strait had indeed stopped after Trump announced the blockade. It added that two vessels that were leaving the strait turned around after the post.

There has been some movement of vessels through the strait since the ceasefire was announced, but this has been extremely limited, and these ships are still exposed to risk.

Referencing Iranian mines in these waters, Trump told Fox News Sunday that “it won’t take long to clean out the strait” and that “numerous countries are going to be helping us,” adding that the United Kingdom and other nations were sending minesweepers. At this stage, we are still awaiting confirmation of non-U.S. military participation in the blockade.

Last week, the Iranian Ports and Maritime Organization published a graphic instructing ships to follow designated entry and exit routes to transit the strait. The organization warned that ships ran the risk of hitting mines outside of these routes. A spokesperson from Lloyd’s List told the BBC: “We know Iran is essentially still in control of the strait, and the assumption is that ship owners will still need to seek permission from the IRGC… and how that’s going to work is still not clear.”

While Trump said the U.S. military would cooperate with other countries to halt maritime traffic through the strait, NATO allies said on Monday they would not take part in the blockade, Reuters reports. Instead, those countries have reportedly indicated they would only consider involvement after the fighting ends.

One country that stands behind the blockade is Israel. Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel’s prime minister, said on Monday that he supports Trump’s decision to impose a naval blockade on Iran and that Tel Aviv is coordinating with Washington on the situation.

“Iran violated the rules [of the peace talks in Pakistan], President Trump decided to impose a naval blockade,” Netanyahu said at a cabinet meeting, according to a video statement released by his office.

In response, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) warned that “approaching military vessels to the Strait of Hormuz is considered a violation of the ceasefire.”

An Iranian Armed Forces spokesperson said on Monday that restricting vessels in international waters was illegal and “amounts to piracy.”

Iran would decisively implement a “permanent mechanism” to control the Strait of Hormuz, the spokesman added.

“Security in the Persian Gulf and the Sea of Oman is either for everyone or for NO ONE,” the military said, according to the state broadcaster IRIB. “NO PORT in the region will be safe.”

While unclear at this point if related or not, the Ambrey maritime security firm told TWZ that a merchant vessel had sighted an explosion and a fire in the Fateh Oil Field, approximately 45 nautical miles northwest of the port of Jebel Ali, in the United Arab Emirates.

“Video footage and still imagery showed that the fire extended above the horizon to a significant altitude, Ambrey said. “The vessel did not report hearing any distress calls. At the time of writing, no casualties, damage to merchant vessels, or damage to port infrastructure had been reported,” the security firm added.

Iran’s parliamentary speaker, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, took to X with a message to the United States yesterday, posting a map showing gas prices in Washington, DC, and the words: “Enjoy the current pump figures. With the so-called ‘blockade’, soon you’ll be nostalgic for $4–$5 gas.”

Earlier, Ghalibaf said Trump’s new threats would not affect the Iranian nation: “If you fight, we will fight … We will not bow to any threats.”

Trump claims that the U.S. military has already “obliterated” 158 Iranian ships. “Iran’s navy is laying [sic] at the bottom of the sea,” he wrote on his social media platform Truth Social.

The Wall Street Journal previously warned that, while the United States and Israel have wiped out much of Iran’s conventional navy, the fleet of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, which Tehran relies on to exert control over the Strait of Hormuz, remains largely intact.

The paramilitary IRGC maintains a large fleet of smaller, more agile vessels built to dominate the strategic waterway using missiles, mines, and otherwise to harass commercial shipping.

Farzin Nadimi, an Iran-focused senior fellow with the Washington Institute, a U.S.-based think tank, told the WSJ that more than 60 percent of the IRGC’s fast-attack craft and speedboat fleet remains intact and that it continues to pose a threat.

Reflecting on Iran’s “fast attack ships,” Trump said they are not considered “much of a threat” to the blockade. He threatened to take down these ships using the same “system of kill” used against “drug dealers on boats,” a reference to U.S. military operations in the Caribbean.

Since the conflict began on February 28, the strait’s geography has enabled Iran to use it as a strategic lever, restricting access through the narrow passage and driving up oil prices as a result. Tehran has also been demanding large payments from some vessels for safe passage.

By enforcing the blockade, Trump could deprive the Iranian government of a key source of income, though it also runs the risk of pushing global oil and gas prices even higher.

This also ties in with reports that Trump and his advisers have received warnings from officials and corporate leaders about the potential hit on the U.S. economy from a prolonged war.

On the other hand, there remains a question about just how significant an effect on Iran a blockade of this kind will have.

According to Lars Jensen, the chief executive of analysts Vespucci Maritime, in the near term, the blockade of the strait will only halt “a very tiny trickle of vessels.” Meanwhile, any other ships paying tolls to Iran already face sanctions for funding the regime.

While the blockade is calculated to help pressure Iran into making a deal on American terms, Trump has said he is unconcerned about whether Tehran returns to negotiations. “I don’t care if they come back or not,” he said on Sunday. “If they don’t come back, I’m fine.”

China is becoming an increasing factor in the crisis in the Middle East. With each passing day, Beijing’s energy situation becomes more of a problem, with impacts from the strangulation of oil out of the Strait becoming more pronounced. Iran is a key supplier of oil to China.

In a statement yesterday, before the blockade came into force, the Chinese defense minister, Adm. Dong Jun, said that his country was “monitoring the situation in the Middle East. Our ships are moving in and out of the waters of the Strait of Hormuz,” he added. “We have trade and energy agreements with Iran. We will respect and honor them and expect others to not meddle in our affairs. Iran controls the Strait of Hormuz, and it is open for us.”

CENTCOM declined to respond to our questions about the current rules of engagement or what would happen should a Chinese vessel try to pass through the strait.

According to The Wall Street Journal, citing officials and people familiar with the situation, Trump and his advisers are looking at resuming limited military strikes in Iran in addition to the blockade of the strait. The same officials reportedly said that a full-fledged bombing campaign is considered less likely, “given the prospect of further destabilizing the region and the president’s aversion to prolonged military conflicts.”

UPDATES:

We have concluded our coverage for the day.

UPDATE: 6:25 PM EDT –

In an interview with Fox News this afternoon, Vance said there were some positives to be gleaned from the negotiations with Iran.

​​”I think it was the first time that you’d ever seen the Iranian government, the U.S. government meet at such a high level, maybe in the history of the current leadership of Iran. So that’s, I think, a positive—and again, we did make some progress in the negotiation,” the vice president proffered. “What the president of the United States has said is number one, Iran can never have a nuclear weapon. So, all of our red lines flow from that fundamental premise.”

USNI is reporting that the aircraft carrier USS George H.W. Bush did not transit the Strait of Gibralter, but is instead “operating off the coast of Namibia, as it sails around the African continent and is set to join a growing naval force in the Arabian Sea amid a U.S. blockade of the Strait of Hormuz…The path around Africa allows the carrier and its escorts to avoid transiting the Red Sea and the Bab el-Mandeb, which were both hubs of activity for the Houthis in their drone and missile attacks on U.S. and commercial shipping in 2024 and 2025.”

UPDATE: 5:00 PM EDT –

UN Secretary General António Guterres is pushing for the United States and Iran to resume negotiations that would end the conflict.

“After weeks of destruction & distress, it is clear that there is no military solution to the current conflict in the Middle East. I call for resumption of talks for an agreement to be reached,” Guterres said on X. “The ceasfire [sic] must absolutely be preserved. All violations must cease. All parties to the conflict must respect the freedom of navigation, including in the Strait of Hormuz, in line with international law.”

UPDATE: 4:40 PM EDT –

President Trump’s remarks on Iran during an impromptu White House press appearance on Monday appeared to dampen expectations for a swift diplomatic resolution to the conflict.

“They will never have a nuclear weapon,” Trump told reporters shortly after accepting a DoorDash delivery of McDonald’s, staged to highlight his tax policy eliminating levies on tips.

“If they don’t agree, there’s no deal. There’ll never be a deal. Iran will not have a nuclear weapon, and we’re going to get the dust back. We’ll get it back, either we’ll get it back from them, or we’ll take it.”

A U.S. official said “there is continued engagement between the U.S. and Iran and forward motion on trying to get an agreement,” multiple outlets reported.

CNN’s coverage of the ongoing U.S.-Iran conflict included a direct quote from the official, while a Reuters alert similarly referred to continued engagement, also attributing the information to an official.

UPDATE: 3:23 PM EDT –

AEI estimates Epic Fury costs between $25 and $35 billion.

UPDATE: 1:30 PM EDT –

The United States asked that Iran agree to a 20-year moratorium on uranium enrichment during talks in Pakistan this weekend, Axios reported Monday.

Citing a source familiar with the situation as well as a U.S. official, Axios said that Iran responded with a proposed “single-digit” timeframe.

Bloomberg reports that it is unclear where Trump got the figure of 34 ships passing through the strait yesterday, saying that it has a smaller figure.

Trump says Iran wants to make a deal and that he will not come to any agreement that allows Tehran to have a nuclear weapon.

He said that Iran had “called this morning” and that “they’d like to work a deal.”

The aircraft carrier USS George H.W. Bush has reportedly passed through the Strait of Gibraltar and is expected to arrive in the eastern Mediterranean before the end of the week. The carrier will take the place of the USS Gerald R. Ford, which suffered a fire while underway in the Middle East, and is now being repaired at Souda Bay in Crete. You can keep up to date on these movements using TWZ’s weekly carrier tracker monitoring America’s flattop fleet, including deployed Carrier Strike Groups and Amphibious Ready Groups, using publicly available open-source information.

U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer on Monday reaffirmed that Britain will not take part in any blockade of the Strait of Hormuz.

Speaking to the BBC, Starmer said the government’s priority is ensuring the strait is fully reopened.

“All the time the strait is shut or not free for navigation in the way it should be, that means oil and gas is not getting to market, that means the price is going up, and everybody listening to this is facing higher energy bills,” Starmer said. “I don’t want that to happen. I want their energy bills to be stabilized and lower.”

After the Islamabad talks, it is clear that the Iranian nuclear issue remains the top sticking point. In a cabinet meeting today, Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, said he had spoken to U.S. Vice President JD Vance about the negotiations. “The explosion came from the American side, which could not tolerate Iran’s blatant violation of the agreement to enter the negotiations,” Netanyahu said. “The agreement was that they would cease fire, and the Iranians would immediately open the gates. They did not do that. The Americans could not accept that. He also made it clear to me that the main issue on the agenda for President Trump and the United States is the removal of all enriched material, and ensuring that there is no more enrichment in the coming years, and that could be in decades, no enrichment within Iran.”

Again, on the nuclear issue, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on Monday that Russia is ready to take in Iran’s highly enriched uranium as part of a future peace deal with the United States.

Israel’s military announced on Monday that it has started what it described as targeted ground operations in the Bint Jbeil area of southern Lebanon.

Although Iran and Pakistan claim that the temporary ceasefire brokered by Pakistan last week also covers Lebanon, Netanyahu stated that there is “no ceasefire in Lebanon” and that Israel will continue to strike Hezbollah “with full force.”

David Ignatius, an associate editor and columnist for The Washington Post, has provided his prediction on what might happen after the failure to reach a deal in Islamabad over the weekend. Ignatius writes:

“After talking Sunday with people close to the negotiations, my sense is that the Islamabad impasse won’t necessarily mean a return to war. The blockade is a pressure tactic, to be sure, but not primarily a military one. Trump has no appetite for further armed conflict. He knows that the upsides are limited and the ‘tail risk,’ as financial traders like to say, is large. His aim instead is to put a severely battered Iran into an economic vise to see if its leaders will set a different course in a big, comprehensive deal.”

Meanwhile, citing a regional source and a U.S. official, Axios reports that Pakistani, Egyptian, and Turkish mediators will continue talks with the United States and Iran in the coming days, “in an effort to bridge the remaining gaps and reach a deal to end the war.”

Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif also indicated on Monday that efforts are still being made to resolve the conflict.

Trump launched a sharp attack on Pope Leo XIV over the weekend, calling him “weak on crime and terrible for foreign policy” and accusing him of harming the Catholic Church. “Leo should get his act together as Pope,” he wrote on Truth Social. The criticism came after Leo condemned the “delusion of omnipotence” as driving the U.S.-Israel war in Iran and urged political leaders to halt the fighting and pursue negotiations.

“I have no intention to debate with [Trump],” Leo said today. “The message is the same: to promote peace,” he added.

Contact the author: thomas@thewarzone.com

The post Naval Blockade Of Iran Now In Full Effect (Updated) appeared first on The War Zone.

While not specifically identified, the missile in question was included as part of an exhibition of Ukrainian-developed missiles, drones, missile-drone hybrids, and other uncrewed platforms, which were presented recently by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

Other weapons that were shown in the exhibition, which was staged to mark the holiday of the country’s defense industry workforce, included the Neptune ground-launched cruise missile, the Areion missile-drone that was developed from the existing Palianytsia, and the Vilkha guided artillery rocket.

While we cannot completely rule out that the new missile is something different, it certainly has some of the hallmarks of previous artist’s concepts and mockups of the Koral that we have seen in the past. We also cannot rule out the possibility that some features are added for counter-intelligence purposes.

Based on the external appearance of the missile, it looks to be a test round, or even a production weapon, rather than a mockup, but again, we cannot be entirely certain of this, either.

What we do know is that Ukraine has an active domestic air defense missile development program.

As long ago as 2021, before Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the Ukrainian Luch design bureau presented the Koral missile, intended to arm medium-range air defense systems.

Luch initially stated that the Koral would have a range of 30 to 50 kilometers (18 to 31 miles). By 2023, this had apparently been revised to 100 kilometers (62 miles), which would push it into the long-range class, albeit at the lower end of it.

Other specifications previously mentioned by Luch include a weight of 300 kilograms (661 pounds) with a 25-kilogram (55-pound) warhead, and a speed of 3,600 kilometers per hour (2,237 miles per hour).

“Koral should work against ballistic [missile] targets. Of course, not all classes, but it must work on ballistic targets,” Oleh Korostelev, the head of the Luch design bureau, said at the time.

Korostelev added that the missile would be equipped with an Onyx active radar-homing seeker from the Ukrainian company Radionix. He also said that development of the new missile was “70 percent complete.”

In late 2023, the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense identified air defense, including the continued development of the Koral surface-to-air missile, as one of its main priorities for 2024.

At that point, then-Deputy Defense Minister Ivan Havryliuk outlined the requirement for mobile surface-to-air missile systems with a range of more than a hundred kilometers. This was assumed to include the Koral.

Last month, it was reported that Ukraine had signed an agreement to cooperate with Spain on air defense capabilities, including missiles. Intriguingly, both Luch and Radionix were said to be involved in this effort, which teamed them with Spain’s Sener Group, which makes components for IRIS-T missiles. As well as being air-launched, the IRIS-T is used in short-range air defense systems and has also been supplied to Ukraine for use in that mode.

Other details about the Koral missile remain a closely guarded secret.

It is said to make extensive use of various pre-existing subsystems, some of which are already proven, likely including the motor, inertial navigation system, and the radio and/or laser proximity fuze.

It is expected that the Koral will use a gas-dynamic control system, with conventional control surfaces allied with thrust-vectoring vanes in the exhaust nozzle, to ensure ‘endgame’ maneuverability. This is necessary for intercepting highly agile targets and those at extreme altitudes. However, while the original Koral mockup had Patriot PAC-3-style thrusters mounted at the forward end of the body to achieve extreme precision during the terminal phase of interception, these have disappeared from the latest version, which also features revised guidance fins with greater surface area.

Even before the full-scale invasion, Ukraine had a need for a missile in this class.

For medium- and long-range surface-to-air missiles, Ukraine relied primarily on the Soviet-era S-300P (SA-10 Grumble), smaller numbers of the S-300V1 (SA-12 Gladiator/Giant) with an anti-ballistic missile capability, and the Buk-M1 (SA-11 Gadfly) mobile medium-range system. Of these, only a handful of surplus S-300Ps have been donated to Kyiv since the full-scale invasion. You can read about all these Soviet-era missiles here.

Ukraine has also received more capable Western surface-to-air missiles in this class, most prominently the U.S.-made Patriot, as well as the Franco-Italian SAMP/T. However, these are once again available only in limited numbers, and their respective effectors are notably expensive.

At one time, the Koral was also proposed as the main air defense weapon for the Ukrainian Navy’s two future Ada class corvettes being built in Turkey. However, the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense chose an MBDA alternative, and the future of those vessels remains questionable.

Regardless, Ukraine has an even greater demand for ground-based air defense systems than it did in the first weeks of the full-scale invasion, when we first looked at this issue in depth.

Since then, Russia has only stepped up its barrages of missile and drone attacks on Ukrainian cities and critical infrastructure, putting an enormous burden on the available ground-based air defenses.

To help make up the shortfall, Ukraine, with U.S. support, embarked on the ‘FrankenSAM’ program, in which it leveraged existing capabilities within the Ukrainian Armed Forces arsenal to help rapidly provide badly needed additional air defenses.

There is, meanwhile, a growing list of ground-based air defense systems that fire repurposed Soviet-era heat-seeking R-73 air-to-air missiles as interceptors.

Other efforts have combined the R-73 with Western-developed launchers and sensors, like the containerized Gravehawk system, which the United Kingdom and Denmark developed for Ukraine.

Ukraine has also fielded modified 9K33 Osa (SA-8 Gecko) wheeled air defense vehicles armed with R-73 missiles instead of their usual 9M33 interceptors. This is notable for being a domestic initiative combining a Soviet-era surface-to-air missile vehicle with Soviet-era air-to-air missiles.

The Ukrainian military has also introduced R-73-armed uncrewed surface vessels (USVs), an application known locally as the Sea Dragon.

The Koral missile differs, however, in that it should provide a much greater range than most of the currently fielded FrankenSAMs, as well as an anti-ballistic missile capability. If all goes to plan, this will provide a replacement for longer-ranged Soviet-era systems, as well as a supplement to the costly Patriot and SAMP/T, the reliable supply of which cannot be guaranteed, certainly not in the numbers Ukraine requires.

For now, the Koral program remains very much shrouded in secrecy. We don’t yet know if the missile has been tested, let alone whether it’s in series production. We also have no idea about what kind of launchers it will be compatible with. Based on the FrankenSAM concept, it is conceivable that it might find its way onto existing S-300 series or even Patriot launchers.

Speaking in 2025, Andriy Hyrtseniuk, the head of Ukraine’s Brave1 defense tech incubator, told TWZ that “multiple” homegrown missiles of different classes had already been tested on firing ranges and “in some cases on the battlefield.”

At the very least, the apparent inclusion of the Koral in the recent public exhibition underscores the fact that Ukraine is still badly in need of additional air defenses. The recent conflict in the Middle East makes it even harder for Kyiv’s Western allies to keep up the already modest deliveries of more capable air defense systems. Clearly, Ukraine needs a surface-to-air missile in the class of the Koral, and one that’s available in sufficient numbers to help offset the challenge of repeated Russian attacks.

Contact the author: thomas@thewarzone.com

The post This May Be Our Best Look At Ukraine’s Secretive New Surface-To-Air Missile appeared first on The War Zone.

Until last year, the Navy had four Avenger class ships forward-deployed in the Middle East for exactly this mission. A trio of Independence class Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) configured for minesweeping duties subsequently took their place. However, those ships were redeployed from Bahrain ahead of the latest conflict with Iran, and two of them then emerged unexpectedly in Southeast Asia last month. While getting them out of the Persian Gulf was a prudent security measure, it remains unclear why the decision was made to send them literally to the other side of the globe amid the obvious threat of Iran mining the highly strategic Strait of Hormuz. One of them, the USS Tulsa, was also recently spotted sailing west after weeks in port in Singapore.

The Avenger class USS Chief and USS Pioneer were spotted arriving in Singapore on April 8, and they were seen heading west on April 10. This represents half of the Avenger class ships still in Navy inventory, all of which are forward-deployed in Sasebo, Japan.

Online ship tracking site MarineTraffic subsequently showed both Avenger class ships heading northwest through the Strait of Malacca. There are unconfirmed reports that Chief and Pioneer arrived at Ao Makham port in Phuket, Thailand, earlier today. Their final destination is unknown, but USNI News had reported over the weekend that they had been “dispatched toward U.S. Central Command.”

USS Tulsa was also tracked sailing northwest in the Strait of Malacca on April 3, which we will come back to in a moment.

“U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) forces began setting conditions for clearing mines in the Strait of Hormuz,” the command had said in a press release on April 11. The Arleigh Burke class destroyers “USS Frank E. Peterson (DDG 121) and USS Michael Murphy (DDG 112) transited the Strait of Hormuz and operated in the Arabian Gulf as part of a broader mission to ensure the strait is fully clear of sea mines previously laid by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps.”

Questions have been raised about the exact purpose of sending USS Frank E. Peterson and USS Michael Murphy through the Strait, and whether either ship actually made a full transit. Michael Murphy was tracked online sailing on the Persian Gulf side, at least briefly. Neither of the destroyers are outfitted for mine clearance missions, though they do have powerful sonars that might be able to help spot mines.

“Additional U.S. forces, including underwater drones, will join the clearance effort in the coming days,” CENTCOM’s release over the weekend added, but did not further elaborate.

“We’re also bringing in more traditional minesweepers” as part of efforts to clear the Strait of Hormuz, President Trump told Fox News yesterday. He also said several times this weekend that mine-clearing operations were already underway in some form.

CENTCOM declined to comment when we reached out today for more details about the planned force package for the mine clearance mission. TWZ has also reached out to the Navy’s main headquarters in the Pacific for more information about the movement of the Avenger class ships.

Before the latest conflict with Iran broke out in February, the Navy had three Independence class LCSs outfitted for mine countermeasures missions – Tulsa and Santa Barbara, along with the USS Canberra – forward-deployed in Bahrain. The arrival of those ships last year was tied to the long-planned decommissioning of four Avenger class vessels that had been homeported in that Middle Eastern country for decades beforehand. It is unclear how many LCSs the Navy otherwise has that are currently configured for minesweeping missions.

As noted, Tulsa and Santa Barbara subsequently emerged in Southeast Asia, first in Malaysia and then in Singapore, last month. USS Canberra‘s location remains uncertain, but it was reported to be sailing in the Indian Ocean as of March 19.

It should also be stated that the Independence class LCS is a much more modern ship than the Avenger class. When configured for the minesweeping mission, the LCSs also bring new standoff mine countermeasures capabilities, including Common Unmanned Surface Vehicle (CUSV) drone boats and helicopter-borne systems. Still, questions continue to be raised about whether the Independence class vessels are adequate replacements for the older, but purpose-built Avengers. You can read more about this here.

It is possible that the USS Chief and the USS Pioneer are in Southeast Asia now for exercises or other reasons. Japan-based Avenger class ships have traveled to Thailand, specifically, as well as other countries across the Pacific, to train with allied and partner forces in the past.

That being said, the movements of Chief and Pioneer in the region, as well as Tulsa‘s departure from Singapore, did come right around CENTCOM’s explicit statement that more U.S. forces were heading to the Middle East to help with mine-clearing efforts. Furthermore, as already mentioned, the quartet of Avenger class ships in Japan, as well as LCSs that have been in Singapore recently, represent the bulk of vessels specifically outfitted for minesweeping duties that the Navy has available anywhere globally. Any mine-clearing operation in and around the Strait of Hormuz will include other naval vessels, as well.

As an aside, the Navy’s Lewis. B. Puller class Expeditionary Sea Base (ESB) ship USS John L. Canley, which is homeported in the U.S. Pacific territory of Saipan, was also spotted heading west past Singapore on March 23. That ship was subsequently tracked sailing in the Indian Ocean, raising questions about whether it might be headed to the Middle East, as well. None of the Navy’s three other ESBs have been observed heading toward that region recently.

A crisis scenario in and around the Persian Gulf, especially one involving Iran mining the Strait of Hormuz or otherwise threatening that critical waterway, was central to the Navy’s decision to acquire the ESBs in the first place. From the start, a key mission for the sea base ships has been serving, in part, as launch platforms for MH-53E Sea Dragon mine-hunting helicopters. At the same time, the Navy MH-53E fleet has dwindled in recent years to a single squadron, and the type is set to be completely retired by the end of 2027. Canley was seen with an apparent load of V-22 Osprey tiltrotors and MH-60 Seahawk helicopters on its deck as it passed by Singapore last month.

There has been talk in the past about ESBs acting as motherships for Avenger class mine-hunters. Canley used to launch and recover uncrewed surface vessels (USV) and uncrewed underwater vehicles (UUV) as part of minesweeping and other operations, as well. In the context of the current blockade of Iranian ports, the ship could have a separate role as a valuable platform for staging Visit, Board, Search, and Seizure (VBSS) operations and otherwise supporting the current blockade of Iranian ports.

When it comes to the mission to clear Iranian naval mines, additional warships, as well as aircraft, will be needed just to provide critical force protection. This was already underscored by CENTCOM sending the two Arleigh Burke class destroyers through the Strait of Hormuz over the weekend. In February, before the war with Iran erupted, TWZ also called attention to the importance of force protection in these operations after A-10 Warthog ground attack aircraft conducted an exercise with the USS Santa Barbara in the Persian Gulf. A-10s have been prowling the Strait of Hormuz as part of operations against Iran.

How many naval mines Iran has actually laid, and of what types, is murky. In March, CBS News reported Iranian forces had ceded a number of Maham 3 and Maham 7 mines in and around the Strait of Hormuz. The Maham 3 is a so-called “influence mine,” designed to be triggered by the acoustic and/or magnetic signatures of a passing vessel, and that is moored in place. The Maham 7 is also an influence mine, but that sits on the seabed, and is therefore intended to be employed in shallower waters where it can still be set off by a ship sailing above. Naval analyst H. I. Sutton has more details on these and other Iranian naval mines here. Last Friday, The New York Times reported that Iran had lost track of the disposition of at least some of the mines it had laid, and that this was hampering efforts to reopen the Strait, citing unnamed U.S. officials.

Sweeping for naval mines is a slow-going and complex affair, in general, that carries significant risks even in benign environments. The dangers in the case of the Strait of Hormuz are magnified now by the U.S. blockade of Iranian ports and the potential for the full resumption of hostilities with the regime in Tehran. U.S. and Iranian officials met this weekend in Pakistan following the announcement of a ceasefire last week. However, those talks ended after a day without any substantive progress toward a diplomatic resolution of the current conflict.

In the meantime, despite extensive U.S. and Israeli strikes over the past six weeks, Iran is still understood to have a significant array of capabilities, including anti-ship ballistic and cruise missiles, kamikaze drones, and uncrewed explosive-laden boats, that it could also use to turn the Strait of Hormuz into a super weapons engagement zone. TWZ previously explored these threats in greater detail in the context of past discussions about U.S. warships escorting commercial ships in and out of the Persian Gulf.

More about the mission to clear Iranian naval mines, including whether Japan-based Avenger class ships will take part and if the LCSs will finally return from the Pacific Theater, should become clearer in the coming days.

Contact the author: joe@twz.com

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The WIG drone uses a hydrofoil to get airborne and then cruise in the air at an altitude of about one wingspan above the water. These ground-effect flights are designed to take advantage of the cushion of thick air above the earth’s surface, providing a sweet spot of increased lift and reduced drag. In theory, this should provide the Squire with high-efficiency and relevant speed, all without needing to operate from a traditional runway.

Such over-the-water logistics, ISR and CSAR capabilities would be particularly valuable in a future conflict in the Pacific. A high-end fight with China would see U.S. forces greatly dispersed, including to more remote locations without well-established infrastructure, to reduce their own vulnerability to attack. Existing traditional airlift and sealift assets would be heavily tasked in general to support those distributed operations. In some circumstances, they could also be highly vulnerable to enemy attack.

The eight-engined USV-A recently had a test flight in Narragansett Bay, Rhode Island, according to the company. A video of the event shows a Squire scale model going through its three stages of flight, from floating to hydrofoiling through the water to taking to the air. In the video, the company states that the Squire was traveling at speeds of up to 40 knots. As it gained altitude, Squire’s two hydrofoils retracted. Two support boats were in pursuit as it became airborne for an unspecified distance.

According to the company, the Squire has a planned operational 50-pound payload with a range of up to 100 nautical miles at a top speed of about 80 knots.

“The internally mounted payload bay of the Squire model measures 14 inches in length, 12 inches in height, and 14 inches in width, providing a total internal payload volume of 2,400 cubic inches for logistics, ISR equipment, or mission-specific cargo,” the company told us. “We’re designing the payload interfaces so that a two-person crew with minimal specialized training can execute a reconfiguration as realities change and mission requirements adapt.”

The company claimed this USV-A concept “combines the speed and maneuverability of an aerial vehicle with the persistent presence and endurance of an unmanned surface vessel.”

Since the U.S. Coast Guard – the U.S. regulator for this type of vessel – cleared Squire for testing last year, the company said it “has been validating systems, controls, and operational envelopes step by step. Moving forward, Regent will continue to expand Squire performance, autonomy, and operational capabilities for mission-ready maritime operations.”

The Squire concept is one of several WIG craft that the U.S. military is considering to solve the problems of delivering troops and cargo quickly over vast bodies of water, while limiting their vulnerability to enemy weapon systems, the Marines told us.

The U.S. Marine Corps Warfighting Lab (MCWL) recently received additional funds “to continue our investigation into Hydrofoiling Wing-In-Ground (WIG) capabilities,” MCWL project manager Matthew Koch told us Monday morning. Last year, we reported on MCWL’s interest in another Regent WIG offering, a crewed variant called Viceroy, designed to carry 12 passengers or 3,500 pounds of cargo.

The U.S. military’s largest WIG program hit some serious headwinds before the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) killed it last year. This was the Liberty Lifter X-plane program. Its core goal was to produce a huge flying transport design that employs the WIG effect principle. You can read more about that program in our story here.

“Some 70% of programs don’t meet their metrics,” Stephen Winchell, director of DARPA, said at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s Global Aerospace Summit. “The idea there was to be able to move cargo quickly and securely across a vast theater with a lot of logistical challenges, and honestly, the manufacturing and a lot of the other parts of the program that needed to come together — we ended up finding out that it was harder than we thought.”

DARPA also stated that “instead of building a demonstrator aircraft, DARPA is working with industry and DOD stakeholders to accelerate transition of what we’ve learned to encourage rapid fielding of platforms leveraging the technologies developed at DARPA,” regarding the Liberty Lifter’s cancellation.

As we previously explained, the WIG principle is not new, but, as with Liberty Lifter, military applications have not seen much success. The Soviet Union remains the most notable operator of military WIG designs, known in Russian as ekranoplans – a term now widely used as a catch-all for WIG designs – but even their service was limited. Efforts to revive military ekranoplans in Russia in recent years have so far not produced any operational types.

The video below shows the only Project 903 Lun class ekranoplan, a cruise missile-armed design, that the Soviet Union ever completed being moved in the Caspian Sea in 2020 as part of a plan to put it on display.

Last year, we got our first full look at China’s WIG craft, loosely similar in scale to what we have seen of their new amphibious flying boat, the AG600, which is intended to perform resupply, search and rescue, and other missions, especially over the South China Sea. Though we noted that this WIG aircraft appears ideally suited for similar applications in the littorals, the status of its testing and whether it will ever be fielded remains unclear.

The Squire still has a long way to go before becoming an official program of record. The company is planning to demonstrate it at Silent Swarm 26, a two-week showcase for new and emerging technologies and conduct a full size test later this summer, Koch told us. He added that he will offer more insights into MCWL’s interests pending the outcome of those events.

“If the technology proves out in Silent Swarm this July and full-size flight in early August, I will have a statement on how the Marines intend to use it in the Pacific,” he explained.

There also appears to be interest in Regent’s WIG efforts from the Pentagon. In February, War Secretary Pete Hegseth visited the company’s headquarters as part of his efforts to spur technological innovation.

“We want capabilities that are driving what we are fielding and not the way it’s always been done,” Hegseth said during the encounter. “If you are able to show that you can fill a gap quickly with something that wasn’t already otherwise envisioned, you’re talking to the right kind of commander there who is going to say, ‘Okay, I am going to use that here.’”

We have reached out to the Pentagon to gauge Hegseth’s current interest in the Squire project and see if there was any follow up activity from that meeting.

While still in the nascent phases, the WIG concept continues to draw interest from the U.S. military, though it has only invested a small amount of money in these projects. Given the challenges presented by a potential conflict with China, we will continue to monitor the progress of these efforts and provide updates when warranted.

Contact the author: howard@thewarzone.com

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The images, which show the aircraft dotted with the repairs from nose to tail, come to us from aviation photographer Andrew McKelvey. It is very likely this is one of the tankers damaged in the Iranian long-range strike on Prince Sultan Air Base in Saudi Arabia last month. The aircraft belongs to the Ohio Air National Guard’s 121st Air Refueling Wing.

While the attack on the base is said to have damaged five tankers, the full destruction inflicted by it and subsequent strikes on Prince Sultan Air Base remains murky, as do potential impacts to facilities and aircraft located across the region. The lack of regular satellite imagery from U.S. providers of the Middle East has made it harder to understand what has occurred, but as we state repeatedly, satellite images would not show more minor damage to aircraft, such as the shrapnel holes seen here.

You can get an idea of how many aircraft the U.S. has lost during Operation Epic Fury from our recent graphic linked here.

While all tankers are precious assets, at least to a degree, due to the high demand on the fleet and its cumulative age, in this case there may be at least one positive side effect from the damage. Executing a battle damage repair plan in the field to get a KC-135 back in the air is a good real-life exercise, one that could prove vital if a future conflict in the Pacific were to erupt. Lessons will certainly be learned on many levels from Operation Epic Fury. And some of these lessons came the hard way even though they really shouldn’t have.

Regardless, the fact that this Stratotanker is flying again is a good thing and a testament to the airmen in the field that made it happen.

We will likely be seeing more patched-up tankers in the coming days and weeks as similar repairs are made and they make their way back to the United States for much more repairs.

Contact the author: Tyler@twz.com

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President Trump declared this morning on Truth Social that the U.S. Navy “will begin the process of BLOCKADING any and all Ships trying to enter, or leave, the Strait of Hormuz,” which follows U.S. Central Command’s announcement yesterday that U.S. forces executed a mine clearance mission and asserted navigational rights and freedoms in the Strait. “Additional U.S. forces, including underwater drones, will join the clearance effort in the coming days,” the release concluded. It isn’t clear exactly what the destroyers did near the Strait or the details of their attempted transit.

Additional warships have arrived in Europe and the Middle East over the last week, and more are en route, as the U.S. takes advantage of the ceasefire to rearm, resupply, and reposition key assets across theaters. The first elements of the George H.W. Bush CSG transited the Strait of Gibraltar in early April, and the flagship with at least three escorts is expected to follow in the near term. The Gerald R. Ford CSG is on station in the eastern Mediterranean Sea, most recently conducting operations southwest of Cyprus, satellite imagery shows. The Boxer ARG, embarked with the 11th Marine Expeditionary Unit (MEU), departed Pearl Harbor and is transiting the Pacific Ocean westbound toward the Middle East, where the Tripoli ARG-31st MEU is currently operating.

For the latest on the status of the ceasefire and negotiations, follow our rolling coverage here and be sure to check TWZ.com daily for live updates.

Update: 6pm EDT on April 13 –

Following publication, USNI News reported that the George H.W. Bush CSG will be taking the long way to CENTCOM, transiting around the Horn of Africa en route to the Middle East.

Note: Positions are general approximations. Non-deployed LHA/LHD amphibious warships are not shown.

Contact the author: ian.ellis-jones@teamrecurrent.io

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The Carl M. Levin and its new launcher can be seen in the background of a picture that the U.S. Marine Corps released on April 8, which is seen in parts throughout this story. The image was taken on March 29 at Pearl Harbor in Hawaii. The Levin, also known by the hull number DDG-120, is homeported there. A Japanese-language blog called OSINFO was the first to notice the launcher in the image and posted it to social media.

The new launcher is seen installed on the deck at the aft end of the Levin’s superstructure, between the destroyer’s port-side torpedo tubes and its rear Mk 41 Vertical Launch System (VLS) array. From what we can see of the launcher itself, it appears to have multiple cells. Whether or not it can rotate or is fixed in place is not perfectly clear, but the latter seems likely, especially given what appears to be a circular mount. It looks like it would swivel upwards for firing.

What the launcher fires and what purpose it serves are unknown. It was not seen on Levin at least as of December 2025. A cursory search at the time of writing does not now show it on any other Burkes, and it is not known whether the Navy currently plans to field it more widely on that class or any others. TWZ has reached out to the Navy for more information.

One distinct possibility is that this is a launcher for the White Spike counter-drone interceptor from Zone 5 Technologies. The launcher that Zone 5 has shown so far for White Spike is a four-cell design that is different from the one now installed on the USS Carl M. Levin. At the same time, it is also very similar in many respects, both in terms of form and likely function. The trapezoidal shape of its front is an especially prominent similarity as well as its overall configuration.

White Spike has been under evaluation as part of a project called Counter Unmanned Aerial Systems – NEXT, or Counter-NEXT, which the Pentagon’s Defense Innovation Unit (DIU) has been running since 2024. Its appearance on a Navy destroyer now would make sense given that Counter-NEXT has had a particular eye toward naval applications.

Anduril’s Roadrunner-M counter-drone interceptor has also been under evaluation as part of Counter-NEXT. However, the launchers that Anduril has publicly shown so far for those interceptors do not align with what is seen on the Levin. Furthermore, Roadrunner-M is designed to be launched vertically and recovered in the same way for reuse if it does not actually prosecute a target in the course of a mission, as you can read more about here.

Last year, the U.S. Navy had said that it planned to integrate launchers for Anduril’s Roadrunner-M counter-drone interceptors, as well as Raytheon’s Coyote, on an unspecified number of Arleigh Burke class destroyers. As already noted, the launcher on Levin is in the same general spot as the Coyote launchers that have been installed on the USS Bainbridge and the USS Winston S. Churchill.

There is certainly demand from the Navy for more counter-drone capabilities for its ships, in general, which grew substantially in the wake of the service’s experiences during operations in and around the Red Sea in recent years. The latest conflict with Iran has only further underscored the still-expanding scope and scale of uncrewed aerial threats.

Lockheed Martin has also previously shown a concept for installing four-cell launchers capable of firing AGM-179 Joint Air-to-Ground Missiles (JAGM) in the same general location at the aft end of an Arleigh Burke class destroyer. As its name indicates, JAGM was originally developed for use against surface targets, but Lockheed Martin has been looking to evolve it into the counter-drone space. JAGM is derived from the AGM-114 Hellfire. The millimeter-wave radar-guided AGM-114L variant, in particular, has already emerged as a counter-drone weapon in recent years, including for shipboard use. JAGMs fired from warships could also be used for close-in defense against other targets, including swarms of small crewed or uncrewed boats.

There is still a possibility that the launcher now integrated on the USS Carl M. Levin could have other purposes beyond the counter-drone role.

A launcher for drones, including types configured as loitering munitions or decoys, could be another possibility. In recent years, the Navy has notably been experimenting with long-endurance drone-like decoys to help lure incoming anti-ship cruise missiles away from friendly ships and otherwise confuse opponents. In February, DIU put out a call for containerized drone launcher designs that could be employed at sea or on land. TWZ has previously laid out a detailed case for the many benefits that could come along with integrating launchers for swarms of drones configured to perform a variety of different tasks onto Navy ships.

Levin‘s new launcher could be used to fire shorter-range decoys and/or other kinds of countermeasures, as well.

Broadly speaking, the Navy has a long history of integrating new and improved capabilities, including weapon systems and countermeasures, on small numbers of Burkes. In some cases, those modifications have then begun to make their way onto more ships of the class, or have otherwise informed larger upgrade programs. The Arleigh Burke class is set to be the workhorse of the Navy’s surface fleets for years to come, and the ships will require continual updating as new threats and other developments emerge.

Whatever its purpose, the new launcher at the aft end of the USS Carl M. Levin is the latest example of how the capabilities of the Navy’s Burkes continue to evolve.

Contact the author: joe@twz.com

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This week’s second caption reads:

OFFUTT AIR FORCE BASE, Neb. – NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg receives a brief from U.S. Air Force Gen. John Hyten, commander of U.S. Strategic Command (USSTRATCOM), during an orientation of the command’s battle deck at Offutt Air Force Base, Neb., April 6, 2018. During his visit, Stoltenberg toured the command’s global operations center and participated in discussions with Hyten, other senior leaders and subject matter experts on the continuing U.S. commitment to supporting NATO and allies. (U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 1st Class Julie R. Matyascik)

Also, a reminder:

Prime Directives!

• If you want to talk politics, do so respectfully and know that there’s always somebody that isn’t going to agree with you. 
• If you have political differences, hash it out respectfully, stick to the facts, and no childish name-calling or personal attacks of any kind. If you can’t handle yourself in that manner, then please, discuss virtually anything else.
• No drive-by garbage political memes. No conspiracy theory rants. Links to crackpot sites will be axed, too. Trolling and shitposting will not be tolerated. No obsessive behavior about other users. Just don’t interact with folks you don’t like. 
• Do not be a sucker and feed trolls! That’s as much on you as on them. Use the mute button if you don’t like what you see.  
• So unless you have something of quality to say, know how to treat people with respect, understand that everyone isn’t going to subscribe to your exact same worldview, and have come to terms with the reality that there is no perfect solution when it comes to moderation of a community like this, it’s probably best to just move on. 
• Finally, as always, report offenders, please. This doesn’t mean reporting people who don’t share your political views, but we really need your help in this regard.

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While the militant Lebanese group has used FPV drones against Israel since 2024, it has ramped up these attacks for a couple of different reasons, according to Ryan Brobst, Deputy Director of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD)’s Center on Military and Political Power.

“The IDF is currently operating further north with more troops than in previous operations, which increases the number and proximity of targets for Hezbollah to strike,” Brobst told us. In addition, there are indications that the Iranian proxy has followed additional lessons from the Ukraine war using fiber optic cables to guide the drones. As we have frequently reported, fiber optic cables mitigate the effect of electronic warfare efforts to jam radio signals as well as some of the limitations imposed by geographical features that can impede the line-of-sight radio connection between drone and operator.

“One additional consideration may be the rising availability of fiber optic drones,” Brobst explained. “Just to be clear, I am not certain the extent to which Hezbollah has switched to fiber optics vs radio, or that radio models are totally ineffective. But it seems quite unlikely Hezbollah had significant numbers of fiber optics in 2024, given that Russia and Ukraine were just starting to deploy them that year. They are much more available now.”

Several videos recorded by Hezbollah recently have emerged on social media claiming to show its use of fiber optic-controlled FPV drones.

One video claims to show a compilation of Hezbollah FPV strikes that hit two Merkava Mk.4 main battle tanks, a D9 Caterpillar armored bulldozer, and what appears to be a Namer heavy infantry fighting vehicle (IFV).

The extent of the damage is not fully clear from these videos. The feeds end as soon as the drone strikes the target. Unlike both Ukraine and Russia, it would appear that Hezbollah does not have additional drones flying overhead to record the aftermath of these attacks, at least in select instances.

Another video shows claimed fiber-optic controlled FPV drone strikes on the open hatch of a Merkava as well as on an Eitan Armored Personnel Carrier parked behind a building. Again, there is no clear indication of any damage to either vehicle.

In a scene also reminiscent of the fight in Ukraine, Hezbollah used a fiber-optic controlled FPV drone to fly into a building. This is a tactic that both Ukrainian and Russian troops regularly train on and a skill they repeatedly hone.

While no cables are visible in the drones used in any of these videos, the lack of degradation in their video feeds, even as they approach low to the ground is a good indication of a fiber-optic connection.

It is difficult to know the full extent of Hezbollah’s use of FPV drones of any kind or what damage they are inflicting. Much of the evidence of the attacks, Brobst notes, comes from the release of Hezbollah videos.

“There is evidence that Hezbollah had used FPVs by at least 2024, but significantly fewer videos exist from that time period,” he explained. “If Hezbollah had conducted successful attacks previously, they would likely have been releasing videos of them for propaganda effect, as they are doing now.”

The following video shows one of those Hezbollah FPV drone attacks from September 2024.

Getting a full picture on the extent of the damage caused is difficult given the IDF’s strict censorship policies. 

“The IDF has not released hard numbers on this unfortunately,” Brobst stated.

While the IDF does not acknowledge these events, its operational updates for March 26 “include a reference to several soldiers of the 7th Brigade sustaining injuries, one of whom was killed,” FDD stated. “It is not clear whether these casualties were the result of a Hezbollah FPV attack, but their unit is an armored brigade known to operate Israel’s Merkava 4 tank.”

A senior IDF official told The War Zone these videos show Hezbollah using FPV drones “with accurate manual control and sensible targeting (top of vehicles, weak points), the clips do show genuine strike capability, and some hits are probably real.”

However, “the videos cannot prove actual damage to a Merkava Mark IV…Footage is selectively edited, so success rates are likely overstated.”

The bottom line, he added is that “FPVs are a credible and growing technical threat, but the clips are evidence of capability — not proof of consistent effectiveness or system failure.”

Israel does have some means of countering drone attacks on armor. In addition to fielding electronic warfare equipment designed to jam drone radio signals (which does not work against fiber optic FPVs), some Israeli military vehicles are equipped with the combat-proven Trophy active protection systems (APS). The system uses radar detect and trigger small hit-to-kill projectiles at incoming threats. It was built mainly to defeat anti-tank missiles and RPGs, but new upgrades of the system have counter-drone capabilities, as well. You can read more about this emerging feature set and its potential here. It is unclear if any of Israel’s armor in Lebanon have this newer active protection system enhancement or if upgrades to earlier systems can also provide some of this capability.

Israel is not alone in being with FPV drones fired by Iranian proxies. As we reported last month, FPV drones targeted a U.S. military Black Hawk helicopter and a critical air defense radar at an American base in Iraq. Khataib Hezbollah, a group separate from the similarly named Lebanese group, is suspected of being behind the attack. This was one of a number of FPV attacks in Arab countries where U.S. forces are based.

You can see one of the drones hit the Black Hawk in the following video.

The widespread use of FPV drones, both radio- and fiber-optic-controlled, has made maneuver warfare in Ukraine exceedingly difficult for either side. Meanwhile, both Russia and Ukraine have been making improvements to extend the range of their FPV drones, especially those controlled by fiber optic cables. This includes bigger spools allowing longer ranges as well as additions of things like wings to improve aerodynamics which also increases range. Both sides are also using a variety of drones as relays to increase the range of their radio-controlled drones.

You can see one example of a winged Ukrainian FPV drone in the video below.

At the moment, there is no indication that Israel has any plans to cease its invasion of southern Lebanon, which has emerged as a main sticking point in negotiations to end the war against Iran. On Thursday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced that there was no ceasefire with Hezbollah.

How Hezbollah’s FPV capabilities will impact Israeli operations isn’t clear at this time, but if anything else, they are another sign of the proliferation of these capabilities and the challenges of defending against them.

Contact the author: howard@thewarzone.com

The post Hezbollah Ramping Up FPV Drone Attacks On IDF In Lebanon appeared first on The War Zone.

Vance is leading the American delegation, joined by special envoy Steve Witkoff and Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner, both of whom participated in three rounds of indirect nuclear talks with Iranian negotiators in Oman before the United States and Israel launched strikes on Iran on February 28.

Boarding Air Force Two on his way to the Pakistani capital of Islamabad, the vice president said, “We’re looking forward to the negotiation. I think it’s gonna be positive. We’ll of course see.”

Vance also cited Trump, adding: “If the Iranians are willing to negotiate in good faith, we’re certainly willing to extend the open hand.”

But he said: “If they’re gonna try and play us, then they’re gonna find that the negotiating team is not that receptive.”

Iran’s parliament speaker, Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf, said on Friday that two previously agreed conditions — a ceasefire in Lebanon and the unfreezing of Iranian assets — must be fulfilled before any negotiations can begin.

Posting on X, he stated that these steps were part of mutual commitments between the parties and cautioned that talks should not proceed until they are implemented, as disagreements over ceasefire terms and ongoing fighting in Lebanon continue to escalate.

President Trump said that Iran has “no cards,” in a post on social media today.

Writing on Truth Social, he said: “The Iranians don’t seem to realize they have no cards, other than a short-term extortion of the World by using International Waterways. The only reason they are alive today is to negotiate!”

The New York Post reports that Trump is preparing military options in case talks with Iran fail. “We’re going to find out in about 24 hours. We’re going to know soon… We’re loading up the ships with the best weapons ever made, even at a higher level than we use to do a complete decimation.”

In regard to the upcoming discussions, the U.S. president had previously said that Iran’s leaders “talk much differently when you’re at a meeting than they do to the press. They’re much more reasonable,” echoing his administration’s view that Tehran’s private messaging differs from its public statements.

Meanwhile, U.S. military transport aircraft are already arriving in Pakistan ahead of the talks, including this Air Force C-17.

At the same time as U.S. negotiators were heading to Pakistan, multiple reports indicated that at least some of their Iranian counterparts were still to depart for the talks.

The delegation was expected to be led by the Iranian foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, and the parliament speaker, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf.

Ghalibaf had previously taken to social media to reiterate that Lebanon and the release of Iran’s blocked assets had been “mutually agreed upon between the parties” but are yet to be implemented. In a post on X, he said: “These two matters must be fulfilled before negotiations begin.”

UPDATES:

We have concluded coverage for the day.

UPDATE: 4:35 PM EDT –

Imagery released by Al Jazeera shows the wreckage of an Iranian Air Force Su-24MK Fencer strike aircraft that was shot down by the Qatar Emiri Air Force over the Persian Gulf while nearing Qatari airspace.

UPDATE: 4:25 PM EDT –

Within the last hour, Jennifer Jacobs, CBS News senior White House reporter, posted this photo to X, showing the aircraft carrying Vice President Vance about to touch down in Paris, en route to Pakistan.

Further to our previous reporting, France has released footage of its Tiger attack helicopters and Rafale fighters intercepting Iranian drones over the Middle East during the Iran war.

UPDATE: 4:20 PM EDT –

The Iranian delegation has reportedly now arrived in Islamabad. Iranian media reports that the Iranian negotiating delegation is led by Parliament Speaker Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf.

UPDATE: 3:30 PM EDT –

According to SPG Energy Oil data shared with NBC News, just two ships crossed the Strait of Hormuz today, the lowest daily total since Trump announced the Iran ceasefire on Tuesday. Prior to the conflict, 130 to 160 ships typically transited the waterway each day.

UPDATE: 3:20 PM EDT –

In a televised address, Pakistan Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif described upcoming U.S.-Iran talks as “a make-or-break moment.”

“I ask all of you to pray that these talks are successful and countless lives are saved and the world shall see peace,” he said.

UPDATE: 3:10 PM EDT –

President Trump is preparing a $98-billion supplemental spending request for U.S. military operations in Iran, a significantly lower figure than earlier Pentagon proposals, according to two people familiar with the administration’s plans, NOTUS reports.

Defense officials initially proposed packages nearing $250 billion to fund troop, ship, aircraft, and weapons deployments to the region and to speed munitions production — a top Pentagon priority. Estimates put the cost of Operation Epic Fury to date at $25 billion to $35 billion.

Joseph Haboush, Washington correspondent for Al Arabiya, writes that a first phone call between the Lebanese and Israeli ambassadors to the United States will take place imminently. This is expected to pave the way to direct negotiations next week.

Further strain on the current temporary ceasefire comes from continued Israeli strikes on Lebanon, which both Iran and Pakistan say breach the truce. Trump says that he believes Israel is now “scaling back” its operations in Lebanon.

Israel has carried out a new wave of strikes targeting what it described as “Hezbollah launch sites” in Lebanon, after the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) earlier urged residents to evacuate Beirut’s densely populated southern suburbs. Later, Hezbollah said it launched a barrage of rockets toward settlements in northern Israel.

According to the Israeli military, Hezbollah fired around 30 projectiles from Lebanon into Israel on Friday, causing some damage.

The IDF chief of staff, Eyal Zamir, said Israeli forces are continuing combat operations in southern Lebanon and are “not in a ceasefire” with Hezbollah. Zamir added: “The IDF is in a state of war; we are not in a ceasefire, we continue to fight here in this sector, this is our main fighting sector. In Iran, we are in a ceasefire, and we can return to fighting there at any moment, and in a very powerful manner.”

The IDF said in a statement that it has destroyed more than 200 rocket launchers, including approximately 1,300 launch tubes, belonging to the Iran-backed militant group since March 2.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he had directed his cabinet to begin direct negotiations with Lebanon focused on disarming Hezbollah, while maintaining that “there is no ceasefire” in Lebanon and that Israel will “continue to strike Hezbollah with force.”

Lebanon is now insisting on a ceasefire before direct negotiations with Israel can begin, with Lebanese President Joseph Aoun calling it “the only solution.” Beirut is also demanding that the United States serve as mediator and guarantor of any agreement. Those talks are scheduled for next week and will be hosted by the U.S. State Department in Washington.

In a social media post late Thursday, Trump said that Iran was doing a “very poor job” of allowing oil to go through the Strait of Hormuz. “That is not the agreement we have!” The U.S. leader also slammed Iran for reportedly charging tolls for the tankers that receive permission to transit the strait.

Iran is moving to further tighten its control over maritime traffic through the Strait of Hormuz in an effort to increase pressure on the United States, according to the think tank Institute for the Study of War (ISW).

ISW says the strategy is designed to keep oil prices elevated, giving Tehran greater leverage in upcoming negotiations with Washington and improving its ability to secure concessions.

According to the institute, Iranian officials have indicated that no more than 15 vessels per day will be allowed to transit the strait, down sharply from as many as 140 daily before the war. According to the ISW:

“The Iranian Ports and Maritime Organization published a graphic on April 8 instructing ships to follow designated entry and exit routes in coordination with the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) Navy to transit the strait. These routes move international maritime traffic into Iranian-controlled waters. The graphic warns that ships risk hitting mines outside of these routes.”

On Thursday, four tankers and three bulk carriers transited the strait, taking the total number of vessels passing through since the ceasefire to at least 12, according to data firm Kpler.

The Strait could be open, and the supply of oil can return to usual in the next two months, according to National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett.

“There are boats going through, but at about 10 percent of the normal pace,” Hassett told Fox Business.

IDF officials told a closed Knesset briefing that Iran’s new leadership is “more extreme than its predecessor,” amid ongoing regional tensions and uncertainty over the durability of the ceasefire. The remarks, first reported by i24NEWS Knesset correspondent Amiel Yarchi, come as Israeli officials assess both the outcome of recent operations and the risk of renewed conflict.

Kuwait has accused Iran and its proxies of carrying out drone attacks against its territory on Thursday, despite the ongoing two-week ceasefire in the Iran conflict.

The Kuwaiti foreign ministry said that drones “targeted some vital Kuwaiti facilities” on Thursday evening.

However, Iran’s Revolutionary Guard (IRGC) has denied launching any new strikes on Gulf states.

In a statement carried on Iran’s state-run IRNA news agency, the IRGC said: “If these reports published by the media are true, without a doubt it is the work of the Zionist enemy or America.”

Just before the ceasefire, the number of ballistic missile interceptors left in Israel’s arsenal had reportedly dwindled to “double digits,” according to a Trump administration source with knowledge of the situation.

The critical shortage had led Israeli military officials to be significantly more selective when confronting ballistic missile attacks from Iran as well as from Yemen. “They’re having to pick and choose what they shoot down,” the official told Drop Site.

Hezbollah claims it targeted Israel’s Ashdod naval base with missiles.

“In response to the enemy’s violation of the ceasefire and its repeated attacks on Beirut, and after the Resistance adhered to the ceasefire while the enemy did not, the fighters of the Islamic Resistance targeted… the naval base in the port of Ashdod with missiles,” the group said in a statement.

Volodymyr Zelensky has said that Ukrainian teams sent to the Middle East to strengthen regional air defenses have successfully shot down Iranian Shahed drones.

“We demonstrated to some countries how to work with interceptors,” the Ukrainian president said in a post on X.

“Did we destroy Iranian ‘Shaheds?’ Yes, we did. Did we do it in just one country? No, in several. And in my view, this is a success.”

Zelensky said Ukrainian forces participated in active operations using domestically produced, combat-tested interceptor drones.

“This was not about a training mission or exercises, but about support in building a modern air defense system that can actually work,” he added.

The Israeli military has accused Hezbollah of using ambulances for military purposes.

In a post on X, Avichay Adraee, the Arabic-language spokesperson for the IDF, claimed that the militant group has been making “extensive military use” of ambulances, without providing evidence.

The United Arab Emirates says it will reassess which regional partners it can “rely on” and review its national priorities after bearing the brunt of Iranian attacks during the conflict.

UAE presidential adviser Anwar Gargash said Abu Dhabi will “scrutinize” its “regional and international relationships” while strengthening an economic and financial system that boosts resilience.

The U.K. defense minister, Luke Pollard, has raised the possibility of Britain bringing allies and partners together to work out solutions to reopen the Strait of Hormuz. Pollard said that the United Kingdom can play a “unique convening role.”

He also hit back at Trump’s claims that the Royal Navy is “too old” and that its aircraft carriers “don’t work” and are “toys.” “We’ve got a strong Royal Navy,” he told the BBC. “We’ve got a globally deployed navy at the moment.”

Photos have been published online that claim to show the hulk of Iran’s sea base-like ship Shahid Mahdavi, a converted container ship that missiles and drones could be launched from. It was the target of U.S. airstrikes earlier in the conflict.

Reports out of France, citing French military officials, state that French Army Tiger helicopter gunships deployed in the United Arab Emirates have shot down their first Iranian drones, although when this happened is unclear. The helicopters used their 30mm cannons to bring down the Shahed-type drones, rather than Mistral air-to-air missiles. Meanwhile, the integration of laser-guided rockets for the counter-drone role is said to be making progress.

An intriguing photo of the aftermath of the attack on a U.S. command post in Kuwait that killed six American service members reveals a single Soviet-era free-fall aircraft bomb. This led to much speculation that it may have been dropped on the base by Iran, most likely using a Su-24 Fencer strike aircraft, two examples of which were shot down by Qatar.

Trevor Ball, a conflict researcher at Bellingcat, has got to the bottom of the story, namely that the bomb was an inert example that was placed outside the base as an ornament. The same weapon can also be seen in official photos of the base taken long before the conflict.

Contact the author: thomas@thewarzone.com

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America’s drone fleet absorbed the heaviest losses, accounting for more than 60% of total combat attrition. Up to 24 USAF MQ-9 Reaper drones were destroyed, according to the latest reporting from Jim LaPorta and CBS. Five fighters were downed while in the air, four F-15E Strike Eagles and one A-10 Warthog. An F-35A was hit over Iranian airspace, marking the first known combat damage to a 5th-generation fighter, but the pilot made an emergency landing safely. 20% of attrition was due to friendly fire, including three F-15Es shot down over Kuwait, or the deliberate destruction of assets to prevent capture during a combat search and rescue mission in Iranian territory. Some losses, however, will be felt more than others, such as the prized E-3G Sentry that was totally destroyed.

For the latest on Operation Epic Fury, read our rolling coverage here and check TWZ daily for live updates.

The post Operation Epic Fury U.S. Aircraft Losses Visualized appeared first on The War Zone.

The Navy announced its decision to inactivate Boise, which was first commissioned into service in 1992, earlier today.

“After a rigorous, data-driven analysis, we’ve made the tough but necessary decision to inactivate the USS Boise,” Navy Adm. Daryl Caudle, Chief of Naval Operations, the service’s top officer, said in a statement. “This strategic move allows us to reallocate America’s highly-skilled workforce to our highest priorities: delivering new Virginia and Columbia class submarines and improving the readiness of the current fleet. We owe it to our Sailors and the nation to make these tough calls to build a more capable and ready Navy.”

“The move is part of the Navy’s broader, data-driven initiative to optimize the fleet’s composition, ensuring that every dollar is invested in capabilities that directly contribute to maintaining a decisive warfighting advantage,” the service also said in a press release. “Funds and personnel associated with the planned overhaul of USS Boise will be redirected to support other Navy priorities, including the timely delivery of America’s submarine capability.”

To date, the Navy has spent approximately $800 million on Boise’s overhaul, which is still only 22 percent complete, the service separately told Semafor. The total estimated cost to complete the overhaul had risen to $3 billion, according to Fox News.

“At some point, you just cut your losses and move on,” Secretary of the Navy John Phelan also told Fox News in an interview ahead of today’s announcement. “The Boise represents 65% of the cost of a new Virginia class submarine, yet it only delivers 20% of the remaining service life.”

The Navy had originally planned for Boise to begin its overhaul in 2013, but the timetable was repeatedly delayed, primarily due to a lack of shipyard availability. The submarine has not been to sea since it returned from its last cruise in January 2015. The boat was deemed unable to conduct normal operations by 2016, and it formally lost its dive certification the following year.

The Navy moved Boise from its home port in Norfolk, Virginia, to Newport News Shipbuilding’s facilities in 2018. Newport News Shipbuilding is a division of Huntington Ingalls Industries (HII).

The submarine returned to Norfolk the following year amid competing funding priorities. It went back to Newport News in 2020, but did not actually enter a dry dock there until 2021, after which limited maintenance work began. The full overhaul was then further set back due to budgetary issues, with a formal contract only signed in 2024.

As of last year, the Navy was still pushing to complete Boise‘s overhaul and return it to the fleet, which was expected to occur in 2029. By that point, the submarine would have spent more than a third of its service life in port.

The overall size of the Navy’s Los Angeles attack submarine force has been steadily declining for years now already, as the service has acquired more modern and capable Virginia class types. The Navy commissioned 62 Los Angeles class boats between 1976 and 1996, and 23 remain in service today.

As noted, the Navy’s struggles with Boise are reflective of larger and more serious issues that have long challenged the service’s ability to meet even its peacetime operational demands. Back in 2018, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) published a report saying that the Navy had more than two decades’ worth of operational time across its submarine fleets due to maintenance shortfalls.

These are concerns that would only be magnified if a large-scale conflict, especially one with China in the Pacific, were to break out. For years now, TWZ has also been sounding the alarm on the interrelated issue of dwindling U.S. naval shipbuilding capacity, in general, where the disparity with Chinese state-run enterprises has become enormous.

The Navy, with support from Congress, has been trying to take steps in recent years to reverse these trends, including moving to increasingly leverage foreign shipyard capacity. The second Trump administration, through Navy Secretary Phelan, has been particularly open about its efforts to shake up how the service acquires and maintains ships, and otherwise does business across the board. This has notably already included the cancellation of the Constellation class frigate program, which had become beset by huge delays and ballooning costs, as you can read more about in detail here. The Navy has been touting efforts to try to avoid similar pitfalls with new shipbuilding programs like the FF(X) frigate and Medium Landing Ship.

“I think, by killing these programs, it’s sending a message that we’re not going to continue to send good money after bad investments, and that we’re going to try to make prudent economic decisions that are in the best interest of the fleet and the force,” Phelan said, speaking generally around today’s anouncement about Boise, according to Semafor.

How the Navy fares in its broader efforts to turn things around when it comes to shipbuilding and maintenance remains to be seen, but the USS Boise‘s increasingly sad story is now coming to an end.

UPDATE: 2:10 PM EDT –

Todd Corillo, an HII spokesperson for the Newport News Shipbuilding division, has now provided TWZ with the following statement:

“We have been notified of the U.S. Navy’s decision to discontinue engineered overhaul (EOH) work on USS Boise (SSN 764). We will work with the Navy to execute this decision in an efficient, cost-effective way. We anticipate there will be no impact to our workforce and will transition shipbuilders currently assigned to USS Boise to other work underway at Newport News Shipbuilding.”

“We understand the importance of a strong submarine force to our national security. While our work on USS Boise will end, our commitment to ensuring our nation maintains our undersea maritime supremacy will not.”

Contact the author: joe@twz.com

The post Navy Calls It Quits On Attack Submarine USS Boise’s Never Ending Overhaul appeared first on The War Zone.

In a social media post, below a photo of a Royal Bahrani Air Force (RBAF) F-16D Block 70, Lockheed Martin stated: “Proven in combat. Two hostile unmanned aerial vehicles eliminated.”

In another post on X, Lockheed Martin linked to an article from Aviation Week, which provides more details of the landmark air-to-air kill.

On April 1, the RBAF F-16 brought down a pair of Iranian drones after these had evaded intercept attempts by ground-based air defenses in the pre-dawn hours. The fact that the jet was scrambled to respond to drones that had leaked through ground-based air defenses points to the flexibility and rapid response time offered by crewed fighters in this kind of scenario.

The pilot fired single examples of the AIM-120 Advanced Medium-Range Air-to-Air Missiles (AMRAAM) and AIM-9X Sidewinder to take down the drones. For counter-drone work, the pilot can also call upon an internal 30mm M61 Vulcan rotary cannon, although safely engaging slow-flying drones with the gun is notoriously challenging.

It should be noted that using missile-armed fighters to shoot down low-cost drones has raised repeated concerns about the mismatch in cost between the target and the interceptor. For example, the latest variants of the AMRAAM cost around $1 million each, while current-generation AIM-9X Sidewinders each have a price tag of around $450,000. Air-to-air-optimized laser-guided rockets that are already equipping U.S. Air Force F-16s will help bring down this cost dramatically, although the capability is still young, and few F-16 operators have been equipped with it yet.

Regardless, the Block 70 version of the F-16 is especially well-equipped to tackle drones.

Its Northrop Grumman AN/APG-83 radar, also known as the Scalable Agile Beam Radar (SABR), uses an active electronically scanned array (AESA), which makes it especially suitable for working against drones and cruise missiles. These typically fly at low levels, which, combined with their small size, radar cross-section, and infrared signature, makes them inherently difficult for traditional mechanically scanned fighter radars to spot.

The jets also carry an AN/AAQ-33 Sniper Advanced Targeting Pod, which can also be used to detect and identify aerial threats.

Bahrain was on the receiving end of constant barrages of Iranian missiles and drones after the conflict began on February 28.

According to the Bahrain Defense Force, its units intercepted 194 missiles and 515 drones headed toward the small island kingdom between the start of the conflict and the temporary ceasefire that was announced earlier this week.

Fittingly, for the first operator to claim an aerial kill with the F-16 Block 70, Bahrain was also the launch customer for this version of the jet. It placed an order for 16 examples in 2019, and the first of these arrived at Isa Air Base in Bahrain in 2024.

It is worth noting that, in addition to their air defense role, the Bahraini Block 70s are well equipped for offensive missions.

During weapons tests in the United States, we have seen the jets carrying 500-pound-class Joint Direct Attack Munition (JDAM) precision-guided bombs, including dual-mode GBU-54/B Laser JDAMs (LJDAM).

The U.S. government also approved the potential sale to Bahrain of a slew of other weapons to arm these jets. These included AGM-84 Harpoon anti-ship missiles, AGM-88 High-Speed Anti-Radiation Missiles (HARM), AGM-154 Joint Stand-off Weapon (JSOW) glide bombs, 250-pound-class GBU-39/B Small Diameter Bombs (SDB), 2,000-pound class JDAMs (including LJDAMs), and Paveway-series precision-guided bombs.

While the RBAF has not revealed further details of its recent combat missions, the Block 70 is clearly a significant part of the service’s capabilities.

The new Vipers are far more capable than the Block 40 versions that Bahrain originally acquired in the 1990s.

Under the Peace Crown I and II Foreign Military Sales (FMS) programs, Bahrain received 22 F-16C/D Block 40 aircraft in two tranches. Survivors remain in service today.

As well as an AESA radar and the aforementioned advanced weapons, the Block 70 has a 12,000-hour airframe life and a host of other major upgrades over older F-16s, such as cockpits with wide-panel digital displays and conformal fuel tanks. They also have improved mission computers that give the jets a new ‘digital backbone,” and more, as you can read about in detail here.

Since Bahrain ordered it, five more countries have signed up for the Block 70, creating an order book for 148 aircraft. These aircraft are being built at a new assembly line in Greenville, South Carolina, after production was relocated from Fort Worth, Texas, to make room for F-35 expansion.

Already, the new Block 70 versions have seen a surge in demand in recent years, providing the F-16 with a new lease of life. The fact that the type has now proven itself in aerial combat, against Iranian drones, is another significant milestone in the Viper story.

Contact the author: thomas@thewarzone.com

The post Bahrain First To Claim F-16 Block 70 Air-To-Air Kills appeared first on The War Zone.

Michael C. Horowitz served as Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense (DASD) for Force Development and Emerging Capabilities and Director of the Emerging Capabilities Policy Office in the Pentagon between 2022 and 2024 under the Biden administration. Now a senior fellow for technology and innovation at the Council on Foreign Relations and director of Perry World House and Richard Perry professor at the University of Pennsylvania, Horowitz spoke to us Wednesday. He provided unique insights into why it took so long for the U.S. to fully embrace the use of a weapon that has proved devastating in Ukraine and now across the Middle East, and how it could be used in the future against China.

Some of the questions and answers have been lightly edited for clarity.

Q: When did the U.S. first obtain a Shahed from Ukraine and what were your thoughts?

A: It was early 2024 essentially. One of the things my office did was look at what were the emerging capabilities that may be in the services and where there might be a lot of potential, but for whatever reason, weren’t getting the support that they needed. And in May 2024, the question of a potential for this came across my desk.

Q: How did Russia’s experience in Ukraine inform your decision about pursuing such a weapon at the time?

A: Given that we were in the era of precision mass and that the U.S. arsenal has been entirely made up of these exquisite, expensive, difficult to produce capabilities, there was interest in finding lower-cost alternatives – more attritable, more autonomous kinds of systems. And at that point, the world was now familiar with the capabilities of the Shaheds from the thousands that Russia had been launching against Ukraine. And Russia was starting to work on the capability that we now call the Geran-2, their version of the Shahed. The idea was that these should be a complement to the more exquisite, expensive, difficult-to-produce weapons. That this country should be producing these lower-end, precise mass systems for itself. The LUCAS, in some ways, was emblematic of that category, but not necessarily the only plausible example.

Q: What was your argument for using these weapons and what was the pushback, if any, and if so, from who?

A: I don’t think that there was pushback. Nobody looked at this and said ‘Oh, that’s a terrible idea.’ But this is just not something that the United States had done before. We were starting to see growing interest in this kind of thing, conceptually, through something like the Replicator initiative, which my office had also promoted. We were trying to push for funding and capabilities, but it was just a very different kind of thing. It wasn’t a ‘let’s produce the best version of something.’ It was ‘let’s invest in a very much lower-cost capability where the idea is that the quantity has quality of its own.’

Q: What did you think when you first saw the LUCAS concept?

A: I thought that this was exactly the kind of system that we had been looking for in a world where defense procurement needed to become more risk-acceptant and not let the perfect be the enemy of the good, given all of the well-known munitions shortages. Even the idea of reverse-engineering a Shahed seemed like an obviously good idea, in some ways, Iran had already perfected. What could we do?

Q: The Wall Street Journal reported that the LUCAS was a mock-up at the time it was selected over other more mature systems. Can you say why?

A: I don’t know the answer to that. As the DASD for Force Development and Emerging Capabilities, my job was to try to figure out, given the different strategies, what were capabilities that we should be pursuing. So something like the LUCAS was right in the wheelhouse that my office was looking for and trying to move money toward, but the specifics of the vendor and how all that was chosen, is a question for Research and Engineering (R&E).

Q: Who did you have to try to convince to pursue this?

A: The amount of money involved was really small given the scale of the Pentagon budget. But because it wasn’t anything that anybody had planned to spend money on, it involved having to go to [Pentagon] elements like R&E and the Defense Innovation Unit (DIU), and going to the military services, and making the case that this was an important capability that the joint force needed, and that could potentially be developed very quickly.

Q: How much money are you talking about? Millions? Tens of millions? Hundreds?

A: To the best of my recollection, it was tens of millions.

Q: Who in the Pentagon made the decision to push this forward while you were there?

A: Eventually, we successfully persuaded then-Deputy Secretary of Defense Kathleen Hicks that, especially at the price point, this was a risk worth taking.

By the way, just to be clear about one thing, [Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Prototyping and Experimentation] Alex Lovett is really the hero of this story in many ways. He both discovered the concept and moved it forward even after all of the original team that supported the LUCAS had left the government. He did incredible work in R&E in making the LUCAS a reality. The people who really deserve the credit are Alex, the CENTCOM team that accelerated it, and Arizona-based SpektreWorks, the company that made it.

Q: When the Biden administration left office, where was the LUCAS program?

A: It was moving forward, but not yet a fielded capability. The Trump team deserves credit for seeing the potential and moving this forward and getting it done.

Q: Why has the U.S. been so slow to adopt these types of weapons?

A: Because I think that the American military since the end of the Cold War was built on having the best capabilities. And the idea was that even if we have small numbers of systems, our systems are so good that it doesn’t matter. And it took a while to get the services out of that [mindset] and for people to embrace the idea that second-best military capabilities might have real value. Especially given the very real risk of major conflict.

Q: How could weapons like LUCAS fill in the U.S. magazine depth?

A: I think the math would suggest that building 400 Tomahawks would give you 46,000 LUCAS rounds. And so if you think about this range of capabilities that includes something like LUCAS and like other really super low-cost systems – up through the family of affordable mass missiles that the Air Force is working on – you’re just talking about like a whole new level of depth in the magazine for the American military.

This is absolutely necessary for the U.S. to continue to compete successfully in the Indo-Pacific in particular, but also in general, as we’re seeing in the Iran context. But the system had been designed for so long to only procure small numbers of the best systems, and it was challenging to [change that]. There’s now a lot of momentum behind that, but it was challenging to get things moving in the other direction.

Q: What was your reaction when CENTCOM first announced that it stood up a LUCAS drone unit and again, when they were first used in combat during Epic Fury.

A: CENTCOM has been on the leading edge of experimentation for years. I saw that firsthand when I was in the Pentagon and so I was not surprised that CENTCOM was leading the way in experimenting with and figuring out what the concepts for use would be for something like the LUCAS and I was not surprised to see CENTCOM figuring out how to apply it successfully in Epic Fury.

Q: What were your thoughts when they were first used in combat?

A: It was a great illustration of how the Pentagon can move fast in developing and fielding emerging military capabilities when it chooses to, but the incentives just haven’t been aligned to do it that way for decades.

Q:  CENTCOM commander Adm. Brad Cooper told me LUCAS drones were indispensable. How much do you know about how they were used in Epic Fury, and what are some of the target sets that you think they should be used against?

A: I genuinely don’t know the answer to that. I think someone inside the conflict would be in a better position to answer that.

Q: What would your recommendation be about how they should be used and against what kinds of targets?

A: These weapons are accurate. They’re just pretty easy to shoot down. So in some ways, you could either imagine using these against military targets in large volumes to try to overwhelm defenses, or you could use them in combination with more exquisite weapons to try to trick adversarial defenses and clear the path, in some ways, for more exquisite weapons.

Q: The Russians are doing that in Ukraine, both to overwhelm systems, but they’ve been a very effective strike weapon. If you were still at the Pentagon, how would you recommend they be used in a campaign like Epic Fury and across the military as a whole? And how widely should they be fielded, and what would be ideal numbers? 

A:  It would not be for somebody like me to decide given my role. But these are essentially inexpensive precision weapons, so any target you would be comfortable using a precision weapon against, in theory, you could use LUCAS against. What’s important is that any weapon has been through the testing and evaluation cycle so you can prove that it works effectively and reliably.

Q: Images released by CENTCOM show what appears to be a gimbaled camera system mounted on its nose and, most importantly, a miniature beyond-line-of-sight satellite datalink mounted on the spine of some LUCAS drones. Being able to be controlled dynamically after launch at great distances, do you see these as a strike weapon to hit moving targets, targets of opportunity and operate in swarms?

A: The missions you could use a weapon like LUCAS for is a software question as much as a hardware question. There’s no reason in principle it couldn’t be used to hit moving targets, or in coordination.

Q: How widely should they be fielded by the U.S. military? What are ideal numbers?

A: I think incredibly widely. This is whether it is LUCAS specifically, or related precision systems. I think if you are looking for the trade space to increase defense production short term – over a couple of years period, as opposed to a decade – [it is] in these lower-cost capabilities that you can scale through more commercial manufacturing. So I would think that there’s an opportunity to have tens of thousands to hundreds of thousands of these kinds of systems to complement exquisite capabilities like Tomahawk.

Q: With a far smaller warhead, they wouldn’t replace Tomahawk, though, right?

A: The LUCAS is a much smaller weapon than the Tomahawk, among other things. It’s not a replacement. What we need is a high-low mix with both types of systems.

Q: How would they be helpful in a fight against China?

A:  If you think about the potential range that LUCAS variants could get to – if you look at the max range of the Geran-2 or the Shahed – and then we could do better. I think that means that you now have new attack vectors and the ability to flood the space with munitions in a way that could substantially complicate Chinese defenses.

Q: The LUCAS drone used by CENTCOM was developed by SpektreWorks in cooperation with the U.S. military. Did you ever work with them?

A: No.

Q: SpektreWorks received a $30 million contract in Fiscal Year 2025 from the Accelerate the Procurement and Fielding of Innovative Technologies (APFIT) program to provide procurement funding for innovative projects that have completed development and are ready to transition into operational use. Is APFIT helpful in speeding up the procurement process for LUCAS-type drones?

A: APFIT is a bridge to production for capabilities that are ready to start scaling but not yet programs of record. So APFIT funding is a starting point not the end point.

Q: What are the bottlenecks for the production of LUCAS drones?

A: I think the supply chain issues for the LUCAS and other precise mass systems are different than those facing AGM-158C Long Range Anti-Ship Missiles (LRASM) OR AGM-158 Joint Air-To-Surface Standoff Missile (JASSM). That you can make them with modified commercial manufacturing means that the constraints are simply lower from a production perspective.

Q: What can the government do to speed up the process of  procuring LUCAS-type drones?

A:  The government should speed up the process by pursuing a Liberty Ship model. Since the government owns the IP, you can have lots of vendors produce the Lucas simultaneously and then increase orders with the vendors who excel the most.

Contact the author: howard@thewarzone.com

The post How America’s Shahed-136 Kamikaze Drone Clone Suddenly Became An “Indispensable” Weapon Of War appeared first on The War Zone.

Only one oil products tanker and five dry bulk carriers have passed through the Strait of Hormuz in the last 24 hours, according to ship-tracking data analysis, Reuters reports. Since the U.S.-Israeli war with Iran began on February 28, vessel traffic has averaged only a few ships per day, based on data from Kpler, Lloyd’s List Intelligence, and Signal Ocean. Prior to the conflict, an average of ⁠140 vessels transited daily through the strait.

According to data from Windward, a maritime intelligence firm that tracks international shipping, 11 vessels have been allowed transit through the strait in the 24 hours since the ceasefire. Four of these ships are Iranian, four are Greek, and one is Chinese.

Intelligence firm AXSMarine reports that two eastbound ships, the Oman-owned Lucia and Greek-owned Iolcos Destiny, were given passage from the Gulf in the early hours of Thursday morning despite the Iranian declaration that the strait was closed.

Windward said all vessels transiting the strait must still coordinate safe passage with Iranian authorities, who are requiring shippers to pay substantial tolls, reportedly as much as $1 per barrel for outbound oil, settled in cryptocurrency. For context, the largest supertankers can carry up to three million barrels of crude.

According to an unconfirmed report from Russia’s TASS news agency, quoting an unnamed senior Iranian source, Iran will allow no more than 15 vessels a day to pass through the strait under the ceasefire agreement.

Meanwhile, Iran’s deputy foreign minister, Saeed Khatibzadeh, claims that the strait has been mined, forcing all ships to use channels that are controlled by Iran.

There are still around 1,400 ships waiting at anchorages on both sides of the narrow passage.

Although the strait has remained effectively closed since the war began, Iran has granted limited exemptions to allies, including China, Russia, India, Iraq, and Pakistan, while some Malaysian and Thai vessels have also been permitted to transit following diplomatic negotiations in recent weeks.

Now, the Israeli campaign in Lebanon is being identified as a major sticking point in fully reopening the strait.

The United States and Israel maintain that the two-week ceasefire now in place does not apply to Lebanon, where the Israeli military carried out one of its heaviest waves of airstrikes yesterday.

Iran and Pakistan, which helped broker the ceasefire, insist that Lebanon is included in the agreement.

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian described Israel’s latest strikes on Lebanon as a “blatant violation” of the ceasefire agreement, and their continuation would “render negotiations meaningless.”

In a statement on X, Pezeshkian wrote, as per machine translation:

“Israel’s renewed incursion into Lebanon is a blatant violation of the initial ceasefire agreement. This is a dangerous sign of deception and lack of commitment to potential agreements. The continuation of these actions will render negotiations meaningless. Our fingers remain on the trigger. Iran will never abandon its Lebanese sisters and brothers.”

Deputy foreign minister Khatibzadeh accused Israel of carrying out a “surprise attack” on Lebanon, calling it a “serious violation” of the ceasefire agreement.

“It was a sort of genocide, you know, by the regime of Israel in Lebanon, just immediately after the ceasefire was accepted,” Khatibzadeh told the BBC. “It is a type of practice that the Israeli regime has always done: accepting ceasefire, then surprise attack, massacring.”

He added that the United States “must choose between war and ceasefire,” saying: “They cannot have both at the same time.”

Khatibzadeh continued: “If President Trump … is interested in peace for the whole Middle East, and since Iran is committed to that, we ask everybody in the Middle East to be abided by this agreement and this ceasefire that we reached with Americans, and we expect Americans do the same with its ally, the Israeli regime.”

The speaker of the Iranian parliament, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, reiterated that Lebanon forms “an inseparable part of the ceasefire” deal. In a post on X, he said, “There is no room for denial and backtracking.” Ghalibaf added: “Ceasefire violations carry explicit costs and STRONG responses. Extinguish the fire immediately.”

Ahead of expected U.S.-Iran talks in Islamabad tomorrow, Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif also condemned Israel’s “ongoing aggression against Lebanon.” Sharif’s office said in a statement: “The prime minister said that Pakistan was engaged in sincere efforts for regional peace, and it was in this spirit that the peace talks between Iran and the United States were being convened.”

Reports suggest that Trump has asked Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to scale back Israeli strikes on Lebanon, in an effort to keep the ceasefire on track.

According to NBC News, which cites a senior Trump official, the request came during a phone call yesterday, shortly after Netanyahu publicly vowed to continue striking Lebanon.

Nevertheless, in an interview with PBS News Hour yesterday, Trump had said Lebanon was not included in the ceasefire deal because of Hezbollah, the Iranian-backed militant group that operates in Lebanon.

“They were not included in the deal. That’ll get taken care of, too,” the president told the outlet. 

When asked by PBS if he was happy with Israel continuing to hit Lebanon, Trump said, “It’s part of the deal.”

“Everyone knows that,” he said. “That’s a separate skirmish.” 

Today, in a possible breakthrough, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu agreed to conduct direct talks with Lebanon, with a focus on disarming Hezbollah and establishing peaceful relations between the two countries.

UPDATES:

Alex Raufoglu, the senior Washington correspondent for Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, writes that the U.S. State Department confirms a meeting on Israel-Lebanon ceasefire talks will take place next week.

Raufoglu quotes a State Department official as saying: “We can confirm that the Department will host a meeting next week to discuss ongoing ceasefire negotiations with Israel and Lebanon.”

Iran will move the management of the strategic Strait of Hormuz into a new phase, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei said on Thursday in a written statement read out on state TV.

“Iran is not seeking war but will not forfeit its rights and considers all resistance fronts as a unified entity,” the statement added.

In a televised address this evening, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu confirmed that there is no ceasefire in Lebanon.

“We are continuing to strike Hezbollah with full force, and we will not stop until we restore your security,” he said.

We have concluded our coverage for the day.

UPDATE: 4:53 PM EDT –

In Pakistan, authorities were preparing for the first round of U.S.-Iran talks, locking down parts of the capital Islamabad, Reuters reported.

CBS News reported that multiple sources said “Trump had been told the ceasefire would apply to the Middle East region, and he agreed that included Lebanon.” “Mediators believed the ceasefire to include Lebanon, and Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif of Pakistan announced it did,” the network added. “Iran’s foreign minister also said it was included.”

On the day of the ceasefire, “a White House official told CBS News that Israel had also agreed with the terms of the deal that Pakistan had helped to broker,” the outlet noted. “However, the U.S. position shifted following a phone call between Netanyahu and Mr. Trump. Two sources familiar told CBS News that the changing U.S. positions and the disjointed regime in Iran are making the diplomacy highly complex.”

Ghalibaf issued a veiled threat in updating his earlier X post about a ceasefire in Lebanon.

“Time is running out,” he warned.

UPDATE: 4:00 PM EDT –

Kuwait has reported that it is now under drone attack.

A statement on X from the official spokesman of the Kuwait Ministry of Defense states that air defenses in the Kuwait Armed Forces are currently dealing with hostile attacks from drones that have penetrated the country’s airspace, targeting a number of vital facilities.

The Strait ‌of Hormuz is still closed and Iran must open it without conditions and be held accountable for damages after attacks on facilities, the CEO of the United Arab Emirates state oil giant ADNOC said today.

“Iran has made clear — through both its statements and actions — that ⁠passage is subject to permission, conditions, and political leverage. That is not freedom of navigation. That is coercion,” Sultan Al Jaber, ​also the UAE minister of industry and advanced technology, wrote.

Meanwhile, the official account of the Permanent Mission of the UAE to the UN on X provided the following statement:

“Freedom of navigation is a right for all under international law — not a privilege Iran can grant or withhold. The UAE will continue to engage in global efforts to ensure the Strait of Hormuz opens fully, unconditionally, and without restriction.”

Satellite imagery suggests that Iran has set up makeshift roadblocks outside the three tunnel entrances to the underground facility at the Esfahan Nuclear Complex, creating an added obstacle for any potential ground operation aimed at seizing the enriched uranium. While the roadblocks could be cleared, they would present an additional operational consideration if the United States or Israel were to plan such a mission, the realities of which we have discussed in the past.

UPDATE: 3:45 PM EDT –

Yuli Edelstein, a Likud member of the Knesset (the Israeli parliament) and former chair of its foreign affairs and defense committee, said recent Israeli strikes had significantly set back Iran’s capabilities but had not removed the long-term threat. He argued that Tehran could eventually rebuild unless the conflict ends either in regime change or in a binding agreement subject to monitoring.

Edelstein added that while Israel had pushed Iran’s program back by several years, it was still confronting a regional power whose ultimate objective remained the acquisition of nuclear weapons — something that Tehran has consistently denied.

UPDATE: 2:10 PM EDT –

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s long-running corruption trial is set to resume Sunday, according to a court spokesperson, just hours after Israel lifted the state of emergency imposed during its war with Iran.

“With the lifting of the state of emergency and the return of the judicial system to work, hearings will resume as usual,” a statement from the courts says, according to a report from The Times of Israel.

The Pentagon has lost eight MQ-9 Reaper drones in the Middle East since April 1, bringing the total number of such aircraft lost in the Iran war up to 24, according to two U.S. officials who spoke to CBS News under condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly.

Publicly available flight-tracking data indicates that U.S. transport aircraft are still shuttling between bases in Europe and the Middle East. Open-source accounts on X today reported at least nine Air Force cargo aircraft (eight C-17s and one C-5) all flying between U.S. bases in these regions earlier today.

There are also signs of a ramp-up in military aircraft activity over Pakistan today, thought to be a development connected with the arrival of the delegations for the scheduled U.S.-Iran talks tomorrow in Islamabad.

UPDATE: 2:00 PM EDT –

Journalist Neria Kraus says she spoke to Trump today, who told her that “Netanyahu is on board with the agreement.”

“We’re going to have a very successful agreement. It’s gonna be very good, everything’s gonna work out very good,” Trump reportedly added.

On the topic of Lebanon, Trump told Kraus, “Netanyahu is gonna be fine. He’s gonna low-key a little bit. He’s got a problem with Hezbollah. He’s gonna low-key a little bit, but he’s gonna be absolutely fine.”

The head of NATO, Mark Rutte, acknowledged that a number of allies were “a bit slow” to back the United States in its military actions against Iran, as the alliance faces growing criticism from Donald Trump. Speaking in Washington, Rutte commended Trump for his “bold leadership and vision” and said he could see why the president was frustrated with the transatlantic alliance.

Rutte also noted:

“What I see when I look across Europe today is allies providing a massive amount of support — basing, logistics, and other measures — to ensure the powerful U.S. military succeeds in denying Iran a nuclear weapon and degrading its capacity to export chaos.”

Meanwhile, there are unconfirmed reports that Trump is pushing NATO to commit to sending warships or other military capabilities to the Strait of Hormuz in the coming days. Rutte reportedly told this to German outlet Spiegel, after meeting with Trump.

With the ceasefire looking increasingly fragile, President Trump said U.S. ships, aircraft, and troops would remain positioned around Iran, warning that Washington would resume military action unless Tehran fully complies with the agreement reached with the United States.

“If for any reason it is not, which is highly unlikely, then the ‘Shootin’ Starts,’ bigger, and better, and stronger than anyone has ever seen before,” Trump wrote in a late-night Truth Social post.

There is also pushback from Iran on another key point that the ceasefire agreement should have cleared up, namely, U.S. and Israeli demands that Iran cease uranium enrichment.

Iran’s atomic energy chief, Mohammad Eslami, has said the United States will “not succeed in restricting Iran’s enrichment program.”

“The claims and demands of our enemies to restrict Iran’s enrichment program are merely wishes that will be buried,” Eslami was quoted as saying by Iran’s ISNA news agency.

Trump has demanded a total halt on enrichment and called for the removal of buried nuclear “dust” from Iran in exchange for sanctions relief.

The foreign ministers of Iran and Saudi Arabia spoke by phone today in what AFP reported was the first official contact between the two countries since the war began.

Saudi Arabia’s foreign ministry said in a statement on X that Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan received a call from his Iranian counterpart, Abbas Araghchi.

The statement said: “During the call, they reviewed the latest developments and discussed ways to reduce tensions to restore security and stability in the region.”

Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Qatar, and Oman have not reported any hostile aerial attacks today, marking the first prolonged halt in such strikes from Iran since the war began on February 28.

In a statement, the UAE’s Defence Ministry said its airspace remained free of any aerial threats today.

In a post on X, the ministry said: “UAE air defense systems did not detect any ballistic missiles, cruise missiles, or UAVs launched from Iran.”

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu confirmed that Israeli strikes in Lebanon killed the nephew and secretary of Hezbollah leader Naim Qassem.

In a statement on X, Netanyahu said Ali Yusuf Harshi was “one of the closest people” to the militant group’s leader. He added that the Israeli military will continue to strike Hezbollah “wherever necessary.”

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said it has killed “dozens” of Hezbollah fighters during its expanded ground operation in southern Lebanon over the past week.

In a series of posts on X, the military said its forces have established operational control over the area and will continue targeting what it described as Hezbollah infrastructure.

There is no sign of any let-up in the Israeli operations directed against Hezbollah.

Today, the IDF ordered people to flee their homes in Beirut as it warned of further strikes. “Urgent warning to residents of the southern suburbs of Beirut … The Israeli Army is continuing its operations and striking Hezbollah military infrastructure throughout the southern suburbs,” said Avichay Adraee, an Arabic-language spokesperson of the IDF.

Hezbollah said it fired rockets at northern Israel in its first attack on Israel since the ceasefire agreement with Iran. The group said the strike was in response to what it described as Israeli violations of the ceasefire.

Hezbollah has also released what it says is footage showing C-802/Noor-type anti-ship cruise missiles being prepared for an attempted attack on an Israeli Navy warship earlier this week.

In his latest situation report today, Adm. Brad Cooper, the commander of U.S. Central Command, described the U.S. military as having inflicted “a generational military defeat” on Iran.

CBS News reports that survivors of a deadly attack on a major U.S. base south of Kuwait City earlier on March 1 have disputed the Pentagon’s description of events. According to CBS News, members of the targeted unit felt their unit in Kuwait was left dangerously exposed in the face of the Iranian attack, which killed six service members and wounded more than 20.

“Painting a picture that ‘one squeaked through’ [as JD Vance had described the attack] is a falsehood,” one of the injured soldiers told CBS News. “I want people to know the unit … was unprepared to provide any defense for itself. It was not a fortified position.”

The report states that, although troops took cover only hours before the attack, when missile alarms signaled there was a ballistic missile overhead, an all-clear alert subsequently sounded. “Officers removed their helmets and returned to their desks in the wood and tin workspace,” after which the Iranian drone struck.

Citing people familiar with the talks, the Financial Times reports that the White House pushed the idea of a temporary ceasefire with Iran even as Trump escalated threats against the Islamic Republic. The article states:

For weeks, the Trump administration was leaning on Islamabad to convince the Iranians to agree to a pause in fighting where it would reopen the Strait of Hormuz, the people said. Pakistan’s crucial role, as a Muslim-majority neighbour and intermediary, was to sell it to Tehran.

Contact the author: thomas@thewarzone.com

The post Iran Ceasefire Hangs In Balance As Israel Bombards Lebanon (Updated) appeared first on The War Zone.

This is the U.S. Air Force’s only dedicated test tanker that’s instrumented to certify new aircraft types to tank from a flying-boom-equipped, in-flight refueling aircraft. It was recently seen conducting aerial refueling trials with the new B-21 Raider bomber.

Operated by the Air Force Reserve Command’s 370th Flight Test Squadron, this KC-135 is the Air Force Test Center’s flagship. It forms the centerpiece of an elite tanker test team at Edwards that performs a critical role in supporting a wide range of flight-testing.

Contact the host: Jamie.Hunter@teamrecurrent.io

The post Inside The Air Force’s Elite Ghost Tanker Unit appeared first on The War Zone.

Online flight tracking data shows the MQ-4C had just completed a roughly three-hour-long flight over the Persian Gulf and the Strait of Hormuz and appeared to be returning to base at Naval Air Station Sigonella in Italy. The online tracking shows the Triton had just crossed into Saudi Arabian airspace before making a sudden turn to the northeast in the direction of Iran. Available data also shows the drone rapidly descended from a typical cruising altitude of around 50,000 feet down to below 10,000 feet.

The MQ-4C’s transponder was broadcasting (or “squawking”) the code 7700, which is a general declaration of an in-flight emergency, at the time. The code, by itself, does not offer any indication of what that the emergency might be or how serious the situation is. There are also unconfirmed reports that the Triton initially sent out another code, 7400, which is used to declare a loss of connectivity between a drone and its controllers on the ground.

The MQ-4C had otherwise been publicly visible online from the moment it left Naval Air Station Sigonella in Italy. Tritons have been flying sorties over the Middle East, as well as other locales, from Sigonella regularly since 2024.

As of 2025, the Navy had 20 of these drones in service in total, with plans to acquire seven more. The service received funding to purchase the final pair of drones in Fiscal Year 2024, at which time the estimated unit cost for each one was pegged at just over $238 million.

When reached for more information by TWZ, the office of the Chief of Information (CHINFO), the U.S. Navy’s main public affairs office, declined to comment. We have also reached out to the U.S. Navy’s regional commands in the Middle East and Europe, as well as U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM).

At the time of writing, there does not appear to be any official comment about the MQ-4C from Iranian authorities.

The MQ-4C is a derivative of the RQ-4 Global Hawk surveillance drone optimized for long-duration overwater missions. The Navy actually operated a small number of RQ-4A drones in a service-specific configuration called the Broad Area Maritime Surveillance-Demonstrator (BAMS-D). When the program started in 2003, BAMS-D’s main task was to help pave the way for Triton’s arrival. However, the Navy ended up flying the drones operationally in the Middle East and out into the Indian Ocean for 13 years. Iran notably shot down a BAMS-D drone as it flew over the Gulf of Oman in 2019.

The Triton’s original sensor package was centered on an active electronically scanned array (AESA) radar with surface search and synthetic aperture modes. A synthetic aperture radar (SAR) capability allows for the capturing of satellite-like images, day or night, in virtually any atmospheric conditions, which is not possible with optical sensors. The drones do also have electro-optical and infrared video cameras in a turret under the nose, as well as electronic support measures systems for collecting electronic intelligence passively.

More recently, the Navy has been working with prime contractor Northrop Grumman to expand the MQ-4C’s electronic and signals intelligence (ELINT/SIGINT) capabilities.

The drones can work in concert with P-8A Poseidon crewed maritime patrol planes, which have their own extensive sensors and networking suites, and carrier strike groups down below.

Tritons are likely to play an especially important role in monitoring activity in and around the Persian Gulf amid the current ceasefire with Iran. As noted, the safe transit of commercial ships in and out of the Gulf through the Strait of Hormuz is a central factor in the continued stability of that arrangement. It is also expected to be a major topic of discussion in future diplomatic negotiations between the United States and Iran. So far, Iran is still severely throttling maritime traffic through this critical waterway.

As mentioned, MQ-4Cs have already been flying regular surveillance patrols in the region for years now. There were separate rumors of a Triton going down in the Gulf of Oman back on February 22. That also followed the disappearance of one of the drones from online flight tracking sites after squawking 7700. However, no rapid loss of altitude was recorded in that case.

A U.S. official subsequently told TWZ that reports of an MQ-4C loss on or about February 22 were “not true.” Open-source flight-tracking site Flightradar24 also posted a pointed statement on X on February 27 saying that they had tracked the Triton returning to a base in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). The very next day, U.S. and Israeli forces launched their combined operation against Iran.

Flightradar24’s post on February 27 also highlighted general gaps in tracking coverage in the region. Deliberate GPS jamming and other types of electronic interference are also common in the region, and even more so in the context of the latest conflict with Iran.

As noted, Iran has demonstrated an ability to target higher-flying U.S. drones in the past with the shootdown of the BAMS-D. That incident prompted significant questions about the survivability of Global Hawk and its derivatives, though these drones were never designed for missions into contested territory.

After some five weeks of U.S. and Israeli strikes, Iran’s air defense capabilities have been substantially degraded, but they do still present real threats, at least in certain envelopes. That being said, to be clear, there are no hard indications whatsoever that hostile fire was in any way a factor in whatever happened to the MQ-4C flying over the Persian Gulf today. The status of that drone, in general, remains unknown.

Still, incidents like this are likely to continue to draw immense attention, at least for the immediate future, amid the shaky ceasefire between the United States and Iran. That arrangement is currently set to remain in place for two weeks, and there is great uncertainty about what may happen afterward. Negotiations about a more lasting end to the recent hostilities are set to begin in Pakistan this weekend.

We will continue to provide more details about the fate of the MQ-4C if and when they become available.

Contact the author: joe@twz.com

The post Navy MQ-4C Triton’s Fate Unknown After Disappearing From Flight Tracking Over Persian Gulf appeared first on The War Zone.

Trump told AFP that the agreement last night marked a “total and complete victory” for the United States.

Iran also portrayed the ceasefire as a huge success, stating it had agreed to begin talks with Washington on Friday in Pakistan as part of efforts to bring the conflict to an end. Iran’s Supreme National Security Council conditionally accepted the two-week ceasefire if attacks against Iran are halted.

“The enemy has suffered an undeniable, historic and crushing defeat in its cowardly, illegal and criminal war against the Iranian nation,” said a statement from the Supreme National Security Council.

“Iran achieved a great victory.”

What is the Pentagon saying?

Secretary of War Pete Hegseth and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Dan Caine gave a press conference today.

Hegseth, who had previously described “a fragile truce,” says that Iran “begged for this ceasefire” and that Operation Epic Fury “decimated” Iran’s military.

He says the country’s missile program has been “functionally destroyed” and that Iran’s navy “is at the bottom of the sea.” Hegseth adds that “we [the US] own their skies.”

The U.S. military carried out 800 strikes on Tuesday night, Hegseth says, destroying Iran’s defense industrial base.

Should it be decided, the U.S. military is also ready to resume action against Iran.

In the statement on Truth Social, Trump said that the United States would be just “hangin’ around” in order to make sure everything goes well,” suggesting a continuing beefed-up military presence in the region. 

“Let us be clear, a ceasefire is a pause, and the joint force remains ready, if ordered or called upon,” Caine told the press conference today.

While the Israeli Channel 12 reported that U.S. Air Force KC-135 refueling tankers are starting to leave Ben Gurion International Airport in Tel Aviv, publicly available flight-tracking data suggested the aircraft took off and then returned to the same airport.

What are the Iranian demands?

Trump said that Iran had proposed a “workable” 10-point peace plan. According to Iranian state media, the 10-point proposal includes various conditions that the United States had rejected in the past.

Among the key Iranian demands are controlled transit through the Strait of Hormuz, coordinated with the Iranian military. The plan would also require the lifting of all primary and secondary sanctions, payment of full compensation to Iran, and release of all frozen Iranian assets. It is unclear if the United States will actually cede to any of these latter points.

Making matters more confusing, a U.S. official said today that the 10-point ceasefire plan published by Iran is not the same set of conditions that were agreed to by the White House for pausing the war.

“The document being reported by media outlets is not the working framework,” the senior official told AFP on condition of anonymity.

Since then, Trump has also emphasized the fact that the nature of the points in the agreement is a closely guarded secret, and published claims about them “have absolutely nothing to do with the negotiation.”

How real is the ceasefire?

After the ceasefire was announced, there were aid-raid warnings in Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and the United Arab Emirates.

Israel said it was also intercepting missiles and striking back at sites in Iran.

Kuwait, in particular, today reported a barrage of drone attacks targeting oil infrastructure, desalination facilities and power plants.

However, there are signs that some U.S. airstrikes may have been called off as soon as the ceasefire announcement was made, with at least one B-52 bomber returning to RAF Fairford, England, with weapons still loaded under the wings.

While it remains unclear to what degree Iran is taking the ceasefire seriously, there is also the reality that many Iranian military units have been fighting with a decentralized command and control in order to make its forces more resilient after lessons learned from the 12-Day War. Meanwhile, whatever ability to maintain oversight and authority over these units that is still in place has been significantly incapacitated in U.S.-Israeli airstrikes and by other means, as well as an internet blackout. Iran also mentioned yesterday that getting the word about the ceasefire agreement to military units will take time.

Meanwhile, the Financial Times reported today that Saudi Arabia’s critical East-West oil pipeline, which transports crude from the Gulf to the Red Sea for export, has been attacked. The newspaper cited two sources familiar with the incident, who said that a pumping station along the pipeline was struck around 1:00 p.m. local time today. The pipeline has become an absolutely crucial economic asset for the kingdom (and the world) amid disruptions to shipping through the Strait of Hormuz.

One source said the facility was targeted by a drone, and officials are currently assessing the extent of the damage.

The nuclear issue

At this point, Iranian officials have not fully confirmed all details of the reported agreement, so the status of the nuclear issue is unclear.

Iranian state media reports that the 10-point plan also requires Washington to accept its uranium enrichment program, a previous red line for the Trump administration, and one of the main reasons for the U.S. military operation in the first place.

On his Truth Social platform on Wednesday afternoon, Trump said he had rejected the Iranian demand for the right to enrich uranium.

He said the United States would “work closely” with Iran but “there will be no enrichment of uranium.”

Trump has also claimed that the United States will assist in recovering enriched uranium, at least some of which was buried during Operation Midnight Hammer airstrikes last summer. On Truth Social, he wrote:

“The United States will work closely with Iran, which we have determined has gone through what will be a very productive Regime Change! There will be no enrichment of Uranium, and the United States will, working with Iran, dig up and remove all of the deeply buried (B-2 Bombers) Nuclear ‘Dust.’ It is now, and has been, under very exacting Satellite Surveillance (Space Force!). Nothing has been touched from the date of attack.”

Speaking today, Hegseth said that Iran will give the United States its enriched uranium or else the U.S. will “take it out.”

Subsequently, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters that Iran has indicated it will turn over its stocks of enriched uranium.

The status of the Strait of Hormuz

Some of the first ships to sail through the strait since the ceasefire announcement have already been detected, according to tracking data analyst MarineTraffic.

In a post on X, MarineTraffic wrote:

“Early signs of vessel activity are emerging in the Strait of Hormuz following a ceasefire announcement, which includes a temporary reopening of the strategic waterway to allow for negotiations. According to MarineTraffic data, hundreds of vessels remain in the region, including 426 tankers, 34 LPG (liquefied petroleum gas) carriers, and 19 LNG (liquefied natural gas) vessels, many of which had been effectively stranded during the disruption.”

Subsequently, French global marine data tracker AXSMarine reported that 10 ships had passed through the Strait of Hormuz so far today, four of which are Iranian.

During peacetime, the strait saw between 50 and 100 ships passing in each direction daily.

Iran’s foreign minister said that passage through the Strait of Hormuz will be allowed for the next two weeks under Iranian military management.

Hamid Hosseini, a spokesperson for Iran’s Oil, Gas and Petrochemical Products Exporters’ Union, told the Financial Times today that Iran wanted to collect tolling fees from any tanker passing and to assess each ship.

“Iran needs to monitor what goes in and out of the strait to ensure these two weeks aren’t used for transferring weapons,” said Hosseini, whose industry association works closely with the country. “Everything can pass through, but the procedure will take time for each vessel, and Iran is not in a rush,” he added.

Iran has stated a tariff of $1 per barrel of oil, to be paid in cryptocurrency, adding that empty tankers can pass freely.

Trump today said he is considering the formation of a “joint venture” with Iran to set up tolls in the strait. This may well be related to Trump’s announcement that the United States will be “helping with the traffic buildup” in the strait, although no further details were provided.

There are also reports that the Iranian Navy said today it will destroy ships attempting to pass through the strait without Tehran’s permission, adding that transit through the waterway remains shut.

“Any vessel trying to travel into the sea … will be targeted and destroyed…” the reported message said.

British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said on Wednesday there was still a lot of work to do to reopen the strait, speaking during a visit to Saudi Arabia. “We now … have a ceasefire, but there’s a lot of work to do, as you will appreciate, a lot of work to make sure that that ceasefire becomes permanent and brings about the peace that we all want to see,” Starmer said. “But also a lot of work to do in relation to the Strait of Hormuz, which has an impact everywhere across the world.”

In a statement today, the Iranian news agency FARS said that the strait will remain blocked as long as Israel attacks Lebanon, suggesting another possible point of friction in the ceasefire.

Regardless of tolls and continued coercion, it is highly unlikely that energy prices will spring back to their pre-war levels any time soon. Despite the agreement on access to the strait, shipowners will probably remain cautious about re-entering the region when any resumption of hostilities could result in the loss of vessels or crew.

Overall, it will require a lasting ceasefire before there is more confidence in the oil market.

What will happen in Lebanon?

The White House says that Israel agreed to the ceasefire, but Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said it does not include Lebanon, where Israel continues to launch assaults and airstrikes in response to rocket fire by Iranian-backed Hezbollah.

The Pakistani prime minister, Shehbaz Sharif, had previously said the ceasefire extended over Lebanon, something that Trump refuted.

This was underscored by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) launching what it says is the largest wave of strikes across Lebanon since the current conflict began. The IDF claims it attacked 100 command centers and military infrastructure targets belonging to Hezbollah in 10 minutes.

“The IDF carried out a surprise strike on hundreds of Hezbollah terrorists at command centres across Lebanon. This is the largest concentrated blow Hezbollah has suffered since Operation Beepers,” Israeli Minister of Defense Israel Katz said in a video statement, referring to the 2024 operation against Hezbollah involving explosive pagers.

There is also a possibility that the continued Israeli campaign directed against Hezbollah could also draw Iran back into the conflict. Al Jazeera reports that a senior Iranian official told them that Iran “will punish Israel in response to the crime it committed in Lebanon,” which Tehran views as a violation of the ceasefire conditions.

What about peace talks?

Iranian state media said negotiations with the United States will be held in Islamabad, the Pakistani capital. Iran wants to see the details of a long-term peace agreement finalized, with the aim of “confirming Iran’s battlefield achievements.”

Talks are supposed to begin on Friday, April 10, but could be extended. This morning, Washington had yet to publicly accept an invitation to the talks, but Trump today told the New York Post that in-person talks with Iran will happen very soon.

Today, Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif took to X to condemn reported violations of the ceasefire at a “few places across the conflict zone, which undermine the spirit of the peace process.”

“I earnestly and sincerely urge all parties to exercise restraint and respect the ceasefire for two weeks, as agreed upon, so that diplomacy can take a lead role towards a peaceful settlement of the conflict,” he added.

This afternoon, the White House confirmed that JD Vance, plus Middle East envoys, Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff, would lead the U.S. negotiating team in Pakistan.

Has there been regime change?

Another early aim for Trump and Netanyahu when the war began was regime change in Iran.

While Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and other senior leaders have been killed, the degree to which the political landscape in Iran has actually changed is highly questionable.

Trump has repeatedly said that the new Iranian leadership is much more open to negotiation, but it remains the case that the new regime is essentially now centered around a hardline group dominated by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. Such an outcome is what we warned about prior to the conflict beginning.

There is also a question about the condition of the new Iranian supreme leader, Mojtaba Khamenei. Hegseth said again today that he is “wounded and disfigured,” presumably in U.S.-Israeli airstrikes.

Can Iran rearm?

The Iranian military was already reeling under the effects of years of sanctions and previous military operations directed against it by Israel and the United States.

Clearly, its capabilities have been severely degraded by the intense U.S./Israeli airstrikes over the last few weeks.

Efforts to rearm will be blocked by the United States, with Trump declaring that any country supplying weapons to Iran will be “immediately tariffed, on any and all goods sold to the United States of America, 50 percent, effective immediately. There will be no exclusions or exemptions!”

This is largely focused on the idea that a major player like China could execute a strategic partnership with wounded Iran in exchange for a part of the country’s oil reserves or at least a steadier supply of energy at a deeply discounted rate. This would also extend Beijing’s ability to wield power throughout the region, and especially over and around the critical Strait of Hormuz. The idea of the spigot being turned off for a prolonged period of time from this region is all too real now, and China’s demand for energy imports is very high.

Russia, to a lesser degree, could step in as well, but for different reasons, although it is not in a position to provide Iran with all the armament it needs as the war in Ukraine rages on. Still, Trump’s 50 percent tariffs would have far less of an impact on Russia than on China.

Iran’s manufacturing base has been largely destroyed, according to the IDF and Pentagon, which will make reconstituting its military capabilities with internal armaments much more challenging, at least in the near term.

The ability of Tehran to support its proxies abroad has also been severely impacted by this conflict. This is on top of years of those forces being targeted by Israel and the United States. Even Iran’s airlift capacity has been heavily impacted, with aircraft used to support its nefarious operations abroad being destroyed.

At the same time, reports as of last week suggested that the Trump administration may well have overestimated the losses inflicted on the Iranian military.

According to a report last week from CNN, which it says was based on recent U.S. intelligence assessments, roughly half of Iran’s missile launchers were still intact, and thousands of one-way attack drones remained in its arsenal.

“They are still very much poised to wreak absolute havoc throughout the entire region,” one source told CNN.

Also, Iran’s military personnel and internal security forces have lost some facilities and a limited number of people, but they remain largely intact.

What next for U.S. power in the Middle East?

Perhaps the question hardest to answer is how the war with Iran will affect U.S. influence in the Middle East.

Putting aside the more bombastic statements of victory from Iran, it is true to say that, while the Trump administration projected unmatched military power in Operation Epic Fury, its strategic effectiveness was more limited. This is something that has been picked up in Israel, too, with the outcome slammed by Israeli opposition leader Yair Lapid.

Iran’s military — and civilian populace — suffered very heavy blows under sustained U.S. and Israeli attacks, but Tehran also maintained control of the Strait of Hormuz and continued to hit back with drone and missile strikes across the Gulf, and even exacted a toll on U.S. military assets.

Ultimately, Washington was reluctant to deploy ground troops, which would have driven casualty numbers up much higher, but overall, key rivals such as China and Russia may view the conflict as evidence of declining U.S. military power.

During the conflict, Trump threatened to walk away from NATO and slammed most of its major allies around the globe for not coming to help the U.S. and its cause. This sent a shockwave through its alliances. Trump’s deadline threat of total war was also unprecedented and will have a lasting impact, regardless of whether it was just a negotiating tactic or not.

The U.S. has also worn down its arsenal of advanced weaponry even further in a very public manner. This is especially true for air defense capabilities. China is watching this and all other aspects of the operation regarding its future designs on Taiwan.

Meanwhile, the relationship between the U.S. and its allies in the Arabian Peninsula appears to have been strengthened, and those countries will likely see major changes in the force posture of their militaries and their capabilities from lessons learned during the war. But still, this could change based on the long-term outcome of this war.

Overall, it remains to be seen how America’s reputation will be seen after the war, and what kind of effect it will have on alliances in the region and beyond.

At the same time, Iran’s economy is in critical condition. The country has been bombed thousands of times over the last month. Its leadership has been patched together, and regardless of conflicting estimates of what systems remain intact, its military is a shell of its previous self, which wasn’t in great shape to begin with.

While the regime survived the fighting, how it will be able to navigate a positive future for the country and its citizens, many of whom wanted the regime to fall prior to this war, remains to be seen. Meanwhile, there are still very well-armed, fanatical forces that hold major sway in the country, specifically the hardline IRGC. As we stated before the war began, the regime would be more likely to fall to it than a foreign power or the masses.

UPDATES:

We have concluded our coverage for today.

In a post on X, Air Force Global Strike Command, which provides the strategic bombers used to attack Iran, highlighted comments made by Caine during this morning’s press conference.

“The Joint Force flew more than 10,000 missions, including 62 bomber missions, 18 of which flew round trip from the United States to deliver bombs on military targets,” the chairman noted. “Each of these missions was more than 30 hours in duration, and we did that 18 times. No other military in the world can do that. It’s a testament to the logistical force that quietly serves behind them.”

After meeting with Trump, NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte left the White House and the president held no post-meeting press conference. The White House called a “lid,” meaning Trump has no more scheduled public appearances today.

Before it took place, the Republican leaders of the Senate and House Armed Services committees issued a joint statement offering support for the alliance.

UPDATE: 6:31 PM EDT –

AFP is reporting on X that the UAE is seeking ‘clarifications’ about provisions ensuring Iran respects the truce and reopens Hormuz. The country is also demanding Iran be held “fully liable for damages and reparations” for its attacks on the Gulf, the outlet added.

UPDATE: 6:05 PM EDT –

The Trump administration is considering measures to penalize certain NATO allies that President Donald Trump believes failed to support the U.S. and Israel during the war with Iran, according to administration officials, cited in an article in the Wall Street Journal today.

As per the WSJ:

The proposal would involve moving U.S. troops out of North Atlantic Treaty Organization member countries deemed unhelpful to the Iran war effort and station them in countries that were more supportive of the U.S. military campaign. The proposal would fall far short of President Trump’s recent threats to fully withdraw the U.S. from the alliance, which by law he can’t do without Congress.

UPDATE: 6:00 PM EDT –

Reuters reports that the United Arab Emirates will seek clarification on the terms of the two-week ceasefire agreement to ensure Tehran’s full commitment to a cessation of attacks on the region and “unconditional reopening” of the Strait of Hormuz. 

Iran closed the Strait of Hormuz in response to Israel’s attacks on Lebanon today, despite the ceasefire, Iranian state media reports, with Iran’s authorities said to be treating the strait as still closed.

There have also been conflicting reports regarding the status of the strait. Washington said the waterway is open, noting an “uptick” in traffic and stating that Donald Trump expects it to remain accessible “without limitations.”

UPDATE: 5:45 PM EDT –

Speaking earlier today, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that Israel’s “finger remains on the trigger,” adding that “we are prepared to return to combat at any moment required.”

He said the campaign against Hezbollah in Lebanon would continue, reiterating that the ceasefire with Iran did not include the Lebanese armed group. “We continue to strike it with force,” he said.

Unverified footage, said to be taken this evening, shows F-15E Strike Eagles and H-60 Black Hawks reportedly operating at low level over the Iraqi capital, Baghdad.

UPDATE: 5:40 PM EDT –

JD Vance has commented on a claim from Iranian Parliament Speaker Ghalibaf that Iran refuses to give up the right to enrichment.

The U.S. vice-president provided the following analogy: “I thought to myself: my wife has the right to skydive, but she doesn’t jump out of an airplane because she and I have an agreement that she’s not going to do that.”

Vance reportedly also said that Israel has agreed to “check themselves” as regards its conduct in Lebanon.

UPDATE: 5:35 PM EDT –

The Turkish Ministry of Foreign Affairs also says it condemns “in the strongest terms Israel’s intensifying attacks on Lebanon, which have resulted in significant loss of life. These attacks are further exacerbating the humanitarian situation in the country.”

“Despite the recently achieved ceasefire in the region, the Netanyahu government continues to undermine international efforts aimed at establishing peace and stability,” the ministry adds.

UPDATE: 5:30 PM EDT –

The State of Qatar has condemned what it describes as “the series of heinous Israeli airstrikes that targeted wide areas in Lebanon and resulted in hundreds of deaths and injuries.”

In a post on X, the Qatari Ministry of Foreign Affairs said it considered the strikes “a serious escalation and a blatant violation of the sovereignty of the sisterly Republic of Lebanon, international humanitarian law, and United Nations Security Council Resolution 1701.”

UPDATE: 5:25 PM EDT –

Iran’s powerful parliament speaker, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, says that three key clauses of the hours-old ceasefire had been “openly and clearly violated” — including a ceasefire in Lebanon — ahead of planned negotiations, and described further talks as “unreasonable.”

In a statement on X, Ghalibaf said Iran’s “deep historical distrust” toward the United States stems from its “repeated violations of all forms of commitments — a pattern that has regrettably been repeated once again”.

The three violations, Ghalibaf said, were:

• Non-compliance with the first clause of the 10-point proposal regarding the ceasefire in Lebanon — a commitment which Pakistan’s prime minister Shehbaz Sharif has also explicitly referred to and declared as “an immediate ceasefire everywhere, including Lebanon and other regions, effective immediately.”
• The entry of an intruding drone into Iran’s airspace, which was destroyed in Lar, “in clear violation of the clause prohibiting any further violation of Iranian airspace.”
• Denial of Iran’s right to enrichment, which was included in the sixth clause of the framework.

Contact the author: thomas@thewarzone.com

The post Questions Loom Over Iran Ceasefire appeared first on The War Zone.

The White House and the Pentagon began releasing details about the proposed Fiscal Year 2027 defense budget last week. The $1.5 trillion “topline” request includes a base budget of $1.1 trillion and “$350 billion in additional mandatory resources through reconciliation,” per the Office of Management and Budget (OMB).

“The Budget builds upon the historic $1 trillion overall Defense topline for 2026,” according to an OMB fact sheet. “The mandatory funding protects key priorities such as providing flexibility in maturing technology for delivery and allowing for acquisition approaches for portfolios of capabilities that broaden opportunities for new entrants.”

It should be noted that the Pentagon has yet to release more granular documents for its Fiscal Year 2027 budget request, which often contain important additional context and nuance.

Still, there are already many significant takeaways about the proposed defense budget for the next fiscal cycle, which we will dive into below.

Aircraft

• The Pentagon continues to be all-in on the Air Force’s F-47 sixth-generation fighter, asking for another $5 billion in funding, $1.5 billion more than the program received in Fiscal Year 2026.
• In contrast, the proposed budget includes just over $140 million for the Navy’s F/A-XX next-generation carrier-based fighter program. The Pentagon wanted to effectively freeze F/A-XX last year, and it looks to remain in limbo despite pressure from Congress and the Navy’s very public advocacy for the effort.

• The latest budget request includes major Air Force funding related to Collaborative Combat Aircraft (CCA) drones, including nearly $1 billion in procurement money to actually begin buying them.
• There is also $822 million in a separate procurement line for “Collaborative Combat Aircraft Mods,” terminology that typically refers to planned upgrades and other work on tangential capabilities.
• The proposed budget includes almost $1.4 billion more for continued CCA research and development, as well.
• The Air Force is currently testing two designs, General Atomics’ YFQ-42A Dark Merlin and Anduril’s YFQ-44A Fury, under the first phase of its CCA program, and there continues to be a possibility that it could purchase production examples of both. The US Marine Corps and US Navy also have their own CCA programs, which are intertwined with each other, as well as the Air Force’s effort.

• The budget documents appear to show a year-over-year cut of more than $4.2 billion to the B-21 Raider bomber procurement account, but the reasons for this are unclear. How many B-21s the Air Force has ordered to date and what the current estimated unit cost of the aircraft is are unknown. In February, the Air Force announced plans to accelerate B-21 production, which may be further bolstered by the opening of a second production line, and said its target fleet size of at least 100 bombers remained unchanged.
• The Fiscal Year 2027 request for additional research and development funding through the Long Range Strike-Bomber (LRS-B) program account is largely unchanged from last year ($2.86 billion compared to $2.7 billion in Fiscal Year 2026).

• The 2027 Fiscal Year budget request also includes funding for the purchase of 85 F-35 Joint Strike Fighters (38 F-35As for the US Air Force, as well as 10 F-35B and 37 F-35Cs for the Marine Corps and the Navy). This is a notable uptick in planned F-35 acquisitions (47 F-35s of all types were funded in Fiscal Year 2026) amid worrisome delays in work on a new radar, as well as a host of other critical upgrades.

• The Air Force is also seeking funding for another 24 F-15EX Eagle II fighters, but there are no details as yet about whether there may be any new changes to the planned total fleet size for those aircraft.
• There are no requested funds for research and development or procurement related to the E-7 Wedgetail airborne early warning and control aircraft for the Air Force. Congress blocked a plan the Pentagon and the Air Force put forward last year to cancel the E-7 program and purchase more of the E-2D Hawkeye radar planes flown by the Navy in the interim, ahead of the fielding of future space-based capabilities, as you can read more about here.

• Another fight over the E-7, which had been set to replace at least a portion of the Air Force’s dwindling number of aging E-3 Sentry Airborne Warning and Control System (AWACS) aircraft, looks to be on the horizon. Any discussions about the E-7’s future will now also be influenced by the added strains on the E-3 fleet (and the loss of one of those jets) as a result of Operation Epic Fury against Iran.

• A previous budget line for the Air Force’s Next Generation Air-refueling System (NGAS) effort, which has been exploring stealthy tankers and other future aerial refueling capabilities, is notably closed out in the Fiscal Year 2027 proposal. Just over $13 million is included in what appears to be a new line for Advanced Tanker Systems, though how this relates to prior work on NGAS is unclear.
• The Army is seeking $2.14 billion for continued research and development of its new MV-75A tiltrotor, also known as the Future Long Range Assault Aircraft (FLRAA), a roughly $610 million year-over-year increase. The Army is currently rushing the type into operation on a very truncated timeline.

• Procurement funding is down for the Army’s AH-64 Apache ($361.7 million to $1.55 million), UH-60 Black Hawk ($913 million to $39.25 million), and CH-47 Chinook ($629 million to $210 million) helicopter programs, reflecting changes in the service’s overall aviation priorities in recent years.

Munitions

• The LGM-35A Sentinel intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) program’s engineering and manufacturing development (EMD) budget is cut by around $300 million in the new proposed spending plan. As of February, Sentinel was still in the midst of a years-long restructuring effort after suffering huge cost overruns and delays.

• The Air Force and Navy are collectively asking for nearly $2.94 billion in procurement funds for new AIM-260 air-to-air missiles, also known as Joint Advanced Tactical Missiles (JATM), up from $894 million in Fiscal Year 2026. This is a sign the missile is entering full production.
• There is a new Air Force line requesting nearly $404 million for the procurement of Hypersonic Attack Cruise Missiles (HACM).
• The service is also requesting $452 million to procure AGM-183A Air-Launched Rapid Response Weapons (ARRW), on top of just over $362 million received last year. ARRW is another hypersonic weapon that the Air Force had previously said it planned to cancel amid an initially checked test record.

• The Navy is also asking for funds to buy 12 Intermediate-Range Conventional Prompt Strike (IRCPS) hypersonic missiles, which the service is now integrating onto its Zumwalt class destroyers.
• The 2027 Fiscal Year budget includes requests for funding for significant increases in the procurement of key air and ballistic missile defense interceptors. This includes huge boosts in purchases of THAAD (857, up from 31 in Fiscal Year 2026), SM-3 Block IIA (136, up from 12), Patriot PAC-3 Missile Segment Enhancement (MSE) interceptors (3,163, up from 357). All of those interceptors have been heavily employed in support of Operation Epic Fury against Iran, as well as in the defense of Israel and other U.S. interests in the Middle East on several occasions last year. As a result, there have been major concerns about the depth of the remaining stocks.

• The PAC-3 MSE total includes Navy plans for a first-time procurement of 405 of those interceptors. This very likely points to movement forward on a new sea-based capability via the integration of those missiles into the Mk 41 Vertical Launch System.
• The proposed defense budget for the 2027 Fiscal Year includes notable increases in the procurement of various other missiles and munitions already in service.
• The Army is notably seeking funding to boost year-over-year purchases of Precision Strike Missile (PrSM) short-range ballistic missiles from 108 to 1,134. PrSM made its combat debut in recent operations against Iran.

• The budget request also includes substantial new planned purchases of Tomahawk cruise missiles (785, up from 55 in Fiscal Year 2026) and AGM-158 Joint Air-Surface Standoff Missile (JASSM) series air-launched cruise missiles (821, up from 381). Both weapons have been used very heavily in Epic Fury.

Shipbuilding

• The Navy is requesting approximately $65.8 billion to procure 34 ships in Fiscal Year 2027. This is the largest shipbuilding budget, when adjusted for inflation, since 1962, according to USNI News.
• This includes 18 so-called “Battle Force” ships, as well as 16 other vessels. In Navy parlance, the Battle Force refers collectively to the service’s fleets of aircraft carriers, submarines, major surface combatants, and amphibious warfare ships, as well as combat logistics vessels and some other types of auxiliaries.
• The Navy is seeking funds for the procurement of two Virginia class attack submarines and one Columbia class ballistic missile submarine.
• On the surface warfare front, funds for an Arleigh Burke class destroyer and the first new FF(X) frigate are included in the proposed budget for the 2027 Fiscal Year.

• One America class amphibious assault ship, one Flight II San Antonio class amphibious warfare ship, and six all-new Medium Landing Ships, are also part of the ship procurement plan for the next fiscal cycle.

• The proposed budget contains funding for a variety of other auxiliaries, including a pair of new AS(X) submarine tenders, an Explorer class T-AGOS ocean surveillance ship, an unspecified “special mission ship,” and five fireboats.
• The Navy is also asking for $1 billion to support advanced procurement of the first Trump class “battleship,” also known as the BBG(X), and set to be christened the USS Defiant.
• Beyond the Navy’s shipbuilding plans, there are requested funds for “five vessels for the Army and the Coast Guard,” according to an OMB fact sheet, further details about which are not immediately apparent.

Golden Dome and the push toward space

• The Fiscal Year 2027 budget proposal includes $17.5 billion in new funding for the Golden Dome missile defense initiative. Golden Dome is a very large effort with many different components, including planned new sensor architectures and space-based interceptors. The Missile Defense Agency has already established a contracting mechanism with a pool of more than 1,000 vendors to support work related to Golden Dome.

• The Space Force is a bigger winner in the new budget proposal, overall, with its topline rising nearly 80 percent, year-over-year, from $40 billion to $71.2 billion.
• The Space Force’s 2027 Fiscal Year budget request includes a new procurement line for Space-Based Air Moving Target Indicator (AMTI) capability, for which the service is seeking more than $7 billion.
• There is also just over $1 billion in requested procurement funds for Ground Moving Target Indicator (GMTI) capability.
• Space-based AMTI and GMTI sensor systems are chief among the surveillance capabilities the U.S. military wants to increasingly push into orbit, as you can read more about here. Historically, AMTI and GMTI coverage has been provided by aircraft, and space-based developments factor directly into the aforementioned discussion about the future of the E-7 Wedgetail.
• There is also an all-new procurement line item requesting $1.56 billion for Proliferated Low Earth Orbit Satellite Communications (SATCOM).

It should be stressed here that the Pentagon’s Fiscal Year 2027 budget request is just that. Members of Congress routinely intercede to add or remove funding for different programs, and it typically takes months for an annual defense spending plan to be passed and signed into law, and then even more time for money to be appropriated to pay for it. In addition, this latest proposed defense budget relies heavily on legislators signing off on additional funds through the reconciliation process.

The Trump administration is expected to also make a separate request for billions more in supplemental funding related to operations against Iran, including to restock key munitions. Officials originally expected to seek $200 billion for that purpose, but more recent reports say that figure could now be down to between $80 and $100 billion.

As already noted, our understanding just of different aspects of the defense budget proposal for the 2027 Fiscal Year itself will evolve in the coming weeks as more granular details are released.

Still, the $1.5 trillion defense spending plan the Trump administration has put forward already sets an important tone as it seeks to substantially increase funding for a host of key programs. At the same time, its unprecedented size could present challenges to getting it approved.

Contact the author: joe@twz.com

The post Here Is What Trump’s Gargantuan $1.5T Defense Budget Has In It appeared first on The War Zone.

BAE Systems, which makes the weapon and is the British partner in the Eurofighter consortium, said it conducted the trial on an unspecified date at its flight test development center in Warton, Lancashire. The sortie involved a RAF Typhoon test and evaluation aircraft launching “a successful strike on a ground-based target at a UK military testing range,” the company said in a statement.

After hitting a ground target with the APKWS, the next step for the Typhoon will be testing them on air-to-air targets, BAE noted. A special proximity fuzed FALCO version APKWS is used for engaging aerial drones, but it can also be used against ground targets. Typhoons are already equipped with targeting pods that can laser designate aerial and ground targets for APKWS.

“This trial with the APKWS laser-guidance kit on Typhoon demonstrates a game-changing capability and a cost-effective solution that would enhance Typhoon’s already impressive range of weapons capabilities,” Richard Hamilton, Managing Director – Air Operations at BAE Systems’ Air sector, said in a statement.

The announcement of the test firing comes after BAE confirmed last September that feasibility studies for the integration of APKWS on the Typhoon were underway. At the time, BAE was investigating how it could improve the Typhoon’s counter-drone role and what it would take to make the APKWS system work on the fighters.

Speaking at the 2025 Defense and Security Equipment International (DSEI) exhibition in London, Paul Smith, BAE Systems head of Typhoon Strategy Delivery, said the company was trying to ascertain the level of risk and integration maturity Typhoon customers want when adapting the jets for the counter drone role.

The proliferation of one-way attack drones, especially in the Ukraine war and in the Middle East, has sparked a mad dash to find cheaper ways for fighters to shoot them down. As we have frequently noted, there is a huge mismatch between the cost of the drones and the interceptors used to defeat them.

For example, the latest variants of the AIM-120 Advanced Medium-Range Air-to-Air Missile (AMRAAM), which also arm the Typhoon, cost around $1 million each, while current-generation AIM-9X Sidewinders each have a price tag around $450,000. The standard short-range missiles on the Typhoon — IRIS-T and ASRAAM — are similarly expensive.

In comparison, the unit cost for the standard APKWS II guidance section has typically been between $15,000 and $20,000. The 70mm rocket motors run in the $1,000 to $2,000 range. The price point for warheads fluctuates more widely, given the breadth of options available, as you can read about more here.

In addition to offering Eurofighters a cheaper option for countering drones, APKWS rockets would significantly increase each fighter’s magazine depth. The standard pod holds seven rockets. It would take the place of a weapons pylon that would otherwise normally be loaded with just one air-to-air missile.

An image shared by BAE shows two APKWS pods, one under each wing for a total of 14 rockets. The jet would still be able to carry six additional air-to-air missiles.

Air-to-air APKWS capability is being rapidly added to an increasing number of U.S. military aircraft. U.S. Air Force F-15E Strike Eagle, F-16C Viper, and A-10 Warthog combat jets are known to be cleared to employ the weapon. USMC’s F/A-18C/D Legacy Hornets will receive it too. As we have pointed out in the past, certain individual pylons on U.S. fighters, like the F-16C, F-15E, and A-10 can accommodate multiple pods at once. Meanwhile, Strike Eagle can notably carry up to 42 rockets in six pods on just two stations, and can still carry eight more air-to-air missiles, as can be seen below.

For the U.S., the rockets have been so successful that they are “our primary weapon against a drone,” Air Force Lt. Gen. Derek France, head of Air Forces Central (AFCENT), the service’s top command in the Middle East, told TWZ on the sidelines of the Air & Space Forces Association’s 2025 Air, Space, and Cyber Conference yesterday. “We’ve had multiple shoot-downs with it.”

The U.S. experience has played a key role in stoking RAF’s interest in the rockets, according to BAE. The Typhoon test firing will give the RAF more information about how these rockets could perform on its own fighters.

“This activity, supported by RAF, will provide valuable insights into how a low-cost precision weapon could be integrated in the aircraft, particularly counter UAS weapons, where affordable interception options are needed,” the company explained. “It also forms part of a range of capability enhancements planned for Typhoon to increase the aircraft’s potency in current and future combat air operations.”

Ukraine is also using APKWS with its F-16s in the air-to-air role as they grapple with the constant threat of long-range one-way attack munitions.

Typhoons have swatted down Iranian drones during the war with Iran. In addition to a joint RAF-Qatari unit, they are operated by Saudi Arabia, Oman and Kuwait, as well. Royal Air Force Typhoon and F-35 fighters, supported by military helicopters, shot down several Iranian drones targeting Middle Eastern countries, the United Kingdom‘s Defense Ministry (MoD) stated on X. 

“UK Typhoons and F-35 jets, supported by Voyager and Royal Navy Merlin and Wildcat helicopters, have continued their defensive missions over the Eastern Mediterranean, Jordan, Bahrain, and the UAE,” the MoD added. The RAF also deployed fighters to Cyprus to protect it from drone attacks.

As they have with the U.S., APKWS rockets could give all these Typhoon operators a cheaper option for countering drones compared to their current loadouts and greater magazine depth, allowing more engagements per sortie.

It is unclear how Germany, Italy and Spain – the other three Eurofighter partner nations that are responsible for developing, building, and sustaining the aircraft – view adding APKWS to its fighters. However, those discussions are apparently underway.

At the Paris Air Show last June, Eurofighter CEO Jorge Tamarit Degenhardt confirmed that the counter-drone mission was one of growing importance for Typhoon customers.

Since then, as we have seen in Ukraine and especially in the Middle East where Iran launched hundreds of drones prior to a ceasefire enacted yesterday, the need for affordable counter-drone systems is only going to increase.

Other air arms in Europe are following a similar path, including testing similar, locally produced laser-guided counter-drone rocket systems on their fighters.

With all this in mind, there is little doubt that laser-guided rockets adapted for the air-to-air role are quickly becoming the counter-drone weapon of choice for fighter inventories, a tactical shift that is likely to spread around the globe.

Contact the author: howard@thewarzone.com

The post Eurofighter Typhoon Test Fires Laser-Guided Counter-Drone Rockets appeared first on The War Zone.

Author’s note: Trump just took to Truth Social to announce “I agree to suspend the bombing and attack of Iran for a period of two weeks.” You can read more about that later in this story.

We also continue to update our coverage on the recovery of a U.S. Air Force F-15E Weapon Systems Officer (WSO) in this separate story.

Last night, President Trump had threatened that if Tehran did not meet his deadline of 8:00 pm ET tonight, “every bridge in Iran will be decimated” by midnight ET on Wednesday and “every power plant in Iran will be out of business, burning, exploding and never to be used again.”

In the face of repeated questions about whether such a wave of attacks would constitute a war crime, Trump said he was “not at all” concerned about that possibility. “You know what’s a war crime? Having a nuclear weapon,” he said.

Today, Trump told Fox News that he was pessimistic about negotiations with Iran making any progress and expected to move forward with the war plans he has outlined.

According to Iranian state television, “all diplomatic channels and indirect talks with the United States have been frozen” in response to these latest threats from Trump.

Speaking today, U.S. Vice President JD Vance claimed that the military objectives of the war have been completed and that the conclusion of the conflict will now depend on the Iranians.

At the same time, there have been conflicting reports about ongoing efforts to reach some sort of an agreement between the two parties.

With Trump’s deadline fast approaching, the two sides were engaged in urgent, last-minute discussions, according to Pakistani officials, who are serving as intermediaries for indirect negotiations between the United States and Iran.

Iran’s ambassador in Islamabad, Reza Amiri Moghadam, wrote on X: “Pakistan positive and productive endeavours in Good Will and Good Office to stop the war is approaching a critical, sensitive stage … Stay Tuned for more.”

As well as Pakistani diplomats, officials from Egypt and Turkey are also working to narrow the significant divide between the positions of Tehran and Washington.

It’s unclear if these last-ditch efforts are still underway or if Iran cut off all talks as it claims to have done.

Trump said on Monday that Iran’s latest proposal, which consists of a 10-point plan, showed some progress but was “not good enough” for him.

Meanwhile, Mojtaba Ferdousi Pour, the head of the Iranian diplomatic mission in Cairo, told the Associated Press: “We only accept an end of the war with guarantees that we won’t be attacked again.”

Iran’s official Islamic Republic News Agency reiterated that Tehran’s demands included “an end to conflicts in the region, a protocol for safe passage through the Strait of Hormuz, reconstruction, and the lifting of sanctions.”

The New York Times, citing two unnamed senior Iranian officials, reported that Tehran was also seeking assurances against future attacks and an end to Israeli strikes on its ally Hezbollah in southern Lebanon, something that Israel is extremely unlikely to yield to.

The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) warned today that it would “deprive the United States and its allies of the region’s oil and gas for years,” if Trump follows through with his threats to strike civilian infrastructure.

The IRGC also said that “Regional U.S. allies also need to know that, until today, Tehran has shown considerable restraint while taking certain restrictions on selecting retaliatory targets into account, but all these restrictions have now been lifted.”

The Iranian president, Masoud Pezeshkian, is also pushing a defiant line. On X, he wrote:

“Over 14 million proud Iranians have, up to this moment, declared their readiness to sacrifice their lives in defense of Iran. I too have been, am, and will be a sacrificer for Iran.”

A growing divide within Iran’s leadership, meanwhile, seems to have erupted into an unusually intense clash, with President Pezeshkian reportedly accusing senior IRGC commanders of acting independently in ways that have undermined ceasefire efforts and driven the country closer to catastrophe.

As the countdown to the deadline continues, Iranian citizens appear to have gathered on the White Bridge in Ahvaz, forming a human chain to protect key infrastructure in symbolic defiance of the U.S.-Israel threats.

UPDATES:

Our updates have concluded for the day.

UPDATE: 7:58 PM EDT –

Israel has agreed to the ceasefire as well, a White House official tells The War Zone. That confirms an earlier report by Reuters.

UPDATE: 7:43 PM EDT –

The ceasefire is in force and the U.S. has suspended strikes on Iran, a U.S. official told The War Zone.

That confirms an earlier a post on X, by Axios reporter Barak Ravid, that a “U.S. Defense official said ceasefire is in force and U.S. suspended strikes in Iran.” 

A “White House official says U.S. expects that it will take some time for orders to get down to lower ranks of IRGC,” he added, a likely indication of how badly Iran’s command and control systems are after more than a month of intense bombardment by the U.S. and Israel.

UPDATE: 7:34 PM EDT –

In an indication that Trump will not likely make any public appearance following his Truth Social post, the White House issued a “lid” about 12 minutes after the post went up.

While lids (announcements that there are no more scheduled public appearances by the president) can be lifted by the White House, that rarely happens, noted Steve Herman, Exec. Director, Jordan Center for Journalism Advocacy & Innovation / Asst. Professor of Practice at the University of Mississippi.

UPDATE: 7:26 PM EDT –

Iranian Foreign Minister Sayed Abbas Araghchi stated on X that Iran will agree to a ceasefire if it is no longer attacked.

“If attacks against Iran are halted, our Powerful Armed Forces will cease their defensive operations,” Araghchi stated. “For a period of two weeks, safe passage through the Strait of Hormuz will be possible via coordination with Iran’s Armed Forces and with due consideration of technical limitations.”

Araghchi did not elaborate on what those limitations are.

UPDATE: 6:43 PM EDT –

According to Reuters, “Iran says negotiations with U.S. will be held in Islamabad to finalize details, with the aim of confirming Iran’s battlefield achievements politically within maximum of 15 days.”

UPDATE: 6:43 EDT –

A little more than an hour before his proclaimed 8 p.m EDT deadline to unleash a major new attack on Iran, Trump took to his Truth Social network to declare “I agree to suspend the bombing and attack of Iran for a period of two weeks.”

“Based on conversations with Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and Field Marshal Asim Munir, of Pakistan, and wherein they requested that I hold off the destructive force being sent tonight to Iran, and subject to the Islamic Republic of Iran agreeing to the COMPLETE, IMMEDIATE, and SAFE OPENING of the Strait of Hormuz, I agree to suspend the bombing and attack of Iran for a period of two weeks,” Trump wrote. “This will be a double sided CEASEFIRE! The reason for doing so is that we have already met and exceeded all Military objectives, and are very far along with a definitive Agreement concerning Longterm PEACE with Iran, and PEACE in the Middle East. We received a 10 point proposal from Iran, and believe it is a workable basis on which to negotiate. Almost all of the various points of past contention have been agreed to between the United States and Iran, but a two week period will allow the Agreement to be finalized and consummated. On behalf of the United States of America, as President, and also representing the Countries of the Middle East, it is an Honor to have this Longterm problem close to resolution. Thank you for your attention to this matter! President DONALD J. TRUMP.”

UPDATE: 6:37 PM EDT –

Iran’s ambassador to Pakistan offered a cryptic update about ceasefire talks.

“As of now, a step forward from critical, sensitive stage,” Reza Amiri Moghadam said on X. “In the next stage, respect and comity should replace rethorics and redundancy.”

“Stay more tuned…”

UPDATE: 6:27 PM EDT –

CNN is reporting that “some good news is expected from both sides soon” after Pakistan requested Trump extend his deadline for Iran to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, and called for a two-week truce amid diplomatic negotiations.

The unnamed person told the network that it is expected that an agreement will be reached tonight.

These discussions are being directed by Pakistan’s army chief, Field Marshal Asim Munir, according to the source.

UPDATE: 6:10 PM EDT –

Asked why he posted on Truth Social that “a whole civilization will die tonight,” Trump offered a terse reply to NBC News.

“You’ll have to figure that out,” Trump told the network.

UPDATE: 6:02 PM EDT –

Reuters reporter Parisa Hafezi says she was told by a senior Iranian official that “Iran [is] positively reviewing [the] ceasefire request.”

UPDATE: 5:54 PM EDT –

Republican Senator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska took to X to push back against Trump’s threat that “a whole civilization will die tonight.”

“This type of rhetoric is an affront to the ideals our nation has sought to uphold and promote around the world for nearly 250 years,” she wrote. “It undermines our long-standing role as a global beacon of freedom and directly endangers Americans both abroad and at home.”

UPDATE: 5:46 PM EDT –

An image emerged on social media showing what could be remnants of a Stunner interceptor, fired by Israel’s David’s Sling air defense system, that landed in Beirut.

UPDATE: 4:55 PM EDT—

A video purportedly shows supporters of Iraq’s pro-Iranian Popular Mobilization Militias storming the Kuwaiti Consulate in Basra Province, Iraq, in protest against Kuwait’s role in the war with Iran.

UPDATE: 4:45 PM EDT—

Al Jazeera reports that three drones were intercepted by Iraqi air defences, and all fell into the Tigris River tonight, leaving two people injured.

Two rockets landed in the U.S. military’s Camp Victory military installation located by Baghdad International Airport, resulting in some fires, according to a security source.

In a brief phone call with NBC News, President Trump sharply criticized Iran’s call for young people to line up as human shields around power plants. 

“Totally illegal,” he said. “They’re not allowed to do that.”  

UPDATE: 4:35 PM EDT—

Iran’s Prince Reza Pahlavi, a well-known opponent of the Iranian government, urged the country’s national armed forces to rise up against both the regime and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.

“Before your very eyes, the Islamic Republic and its terrorist, repressive IRGC have slaughtered tens of thousands of the purest and bravest sons and daughters of this country, and each day send more to their deaths,” Pahlavi wrote on X.

Pahlavi, the son of the late deposed shah, has spent most of his life in the United States since the Iranian Revolution. He has indicated that he would consider serving as a transitional leader if the current regime were to collapse.

UPDATE: 4:25 PM EDT—

Jacqui Heinrich, the senior White House correspondent at Fox News, has just come off a phone call with Trump, who declined to say how he is feeling about negotiations: “I can’t tell you, because right now we’re in heated negotiations.”

He also declined to talk about Pakistan’s two-week deadline extension request, saying he’s about to be briefed fully on it, but said, “I can say this — that I know him very well. He’s a highly respected man, all over.”

UPDATE: 4:10 PM EDT—

Trump has been made aware of Pakistan’s request to extend his deadline by two weeks, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt has said.

“A response will come,” she said in a statement provided to the New York Times.

UPDATE: 4:00 PM EDT—

In a post on Telegram, the Israeli military has warned that “there may be increased firing towards the territory of the State of Israel in the coming hours.”

Pope Leo XIV has renewed his call for an end to the war.

Speaking to reporters as he left the papal retreat at Castel Gandolfo, outside Rome, he alluded to Trump’s threat against the Iranian people, calling it “truly unacceptable.”

UPDATE: 3:50 PM EDT—

Unverified footage shows the moment that an airstrike targets a bridge said to be to the west of Tehran.

U.S. Central Command said on X that American forces launched one-way attack drones into Iran last night. 

CENTCOM commander Adm. Brad Cooper noted that “hundreds of U.S. drones are fully integrated into offensive and defense operations against Iran,” and said that these “operate in the air, at sea, under the sea and on the ground in support of our military objectives.”

Adm. Cooper had previously told TWZ that the Low-Cost Uncrewed Combat Attack System (LUCAS) kamikaze drone, based on the Iranian Shahed-136, had proven indispensable in the opening salvos of Epic Fury.

UPDATE: 3:45 PM EDT—

Citing two U.S. officials, NBC News reports that the Pentagon has drawn up options for Trump that include targets that are used for both military and civilian purposes. This would help get around the fact that deliberately attacking civilian infrastructure indiscriminately would violate international law and could be prosecuted as a war crime.

NBC News reports: “Targeting infrastructure that is considered ‘dual use’ could allow the administration to argue the United States is hitting military targets and avoid the technical definition of a war crime.”

Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif has asked Donald Trump to extend to a deadline he imposed on Iran to end its blockade of Gulf oil by two weeks.

In a post on X, Sharif said: “Diplomatic efforts for peaceful settlement of the ongoing war in the Middle East are progressing steadily, strongly and powerfully with the potential to lead to substantive results in near future.

“To allow diplomacy to run its course, I earnestly request President Trump to extend the deadline for two weeks. Pakistan, in all sincerity, requests the Iranian brothers to open strait of Hormuz for a corresponding period of two weeks as a goodwill gesture.”

UPDATE: 3:35 PM EDT—

The Kuwaiti Ministry of Interior is urging all of its residents to stay home and avoid going out “except in cases of extreme necessity,” from midnight until tomorrow at 6 a.m. local time.

“This precautionary measure is taken to ensure everyone’s safety, enhance preventative measures, and enable security forces to perform their duties with high efficiency,” the ministry said.

Meanwhile, the U.S. government has urged American citizens to reconsider traveling to Saudi Arabia for the Hajj pilgrimage, citing Iranian missile and drone strikes that continue to threaten the region. Hajj takes place on May 24 this year.

If the U.S. military does attack power plants, as Trump has threatened, Iranian state media says that Tehran will target oil infrastructure across the Gulf, including the Saudi port of Yanbu, ARAMCO oil facilities, and the Fujairah oil pipeline.

UPDATE: 3:25 PM EDT—

The U.K. Royal Navy destroyer HMS Dragon, sent to the eastern Mediterranean to beef up British defensive capabilities there, has reportedly been forced to return to port due to problems with its freshwater supply. As TWZ noted at the time of the deployment, the Type 45 vessels have not been without problems:

More generally, there have long been questions about the availability of the Type 45s, despite their undoubted capabilities. These six vessels are still very modern, but they have spent a notably long time in maintenance. Typically, only two are actually available to deploy at any given time. With one of the warships normally earmarked for the North Atlantic and Russia, and another needed to escort one of the U.K. aircraft carriers when that is at sea, there is very little capacity left to play with.

UPDATE: 1:13 PM EDT—

Axios is reporting that there has been meaningful progress in negotiations to reach a ceasefire deal, but getting it done by tonight is still a reach.

Trump could extend the deadline again, although there are likely many pieces in motion already for executing whatever massive strikes they have planned for tonight.

Meanwhile, AFP reports that the White House denies it is going to use nuclear weapons on Iran, so there’s that!

UPDATE: 12:00 PM EDT—

In the meantime, U.S. and Israeli airstrikes on Iran are ongoing, while Iran has again responded with missile fire on Israel and its Gulf Arab neighbors.

Among the reported targets of U.S. strikes is Kharg Island in the Persian Gulf. A U.S. official told NBC News that the U.S. military struck dozens of military targets on the island overnight. Kharg Island, which handles around 90 percent of Iranian oil exports, has long been high on the list of targets for both Israel and the United States, but reports indicate that, on this occasion, no oil infrastructure was targeted. 

“The American-Zionist enemy has carried out several attacks on Kharg Island, and several explosions have been heard there,” Iran’s Mehr news agency reported.

As you can read about here, there has long been speculation that the U.S. military could invade the strategically vital Kharg Island.

According to the Iranian Red Crescent, the United States and Israel are already striking various civilian targets in Iran, with the organization reporting 17 such targets hit on Tuesday morning.

In a statement posted on X, the Iranian Red Crescent said that there is no justification for attacking defenseless civilians, and to do so was a war crime.

A spokesman for UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres told the Associated Press that international law bars the attacking of infrastructure such as bridges and power plants, as Trump has threatened. “Even if specific civilian infrastructure were to qualify as a military objective,” Stephane Dujarric said, an attack would still be prohibited if it risks “excessive incidental civilian harm.”

For its part, Israel has leveled a threat against Iran’s entire rail network, with reports that attacks against this infrastructure have already begun.

The Israeli Air Force has bombed around 10 key rail sections and bridges in Iran, according to reports from Israel, in a campaign that has been presented as part of an effort to prevent Iran from moving weapon systems.

Beyond the primary logistics railways provide, one possibility is that Israel is seeking to interdict Iranian ballistic missiles configured for launch from railcars, a concept that we have seen in North Korea, for example.

The Israeli military had earlier warned the people of Iran not to use trains, saying that doing so “endangers your life.” The Israeli military’s Farsi-language channel on X issued what it called an “urgent warning to users and train passengers in the country of Iran”:

“Dear Citizens, for the sake of your security, we kindly request that from this moment until 21:00 Iran time, you refrain from using and travelling by train throughout Iran. Your presence on trains and near railway lines endangers your life.”

Citing a new intelligence memo, The Times of London reports that Mojtaba Khamenei, the new Supreme Leader of Iran, is “unconscious” and currently incapable of running the country. Based on American and Israeli intelligence, the claim suggests that Mojtaba Khamenei is being treated for a “severe” unnamed medical condition in the religious city of Qom.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) today claimed it had struck a major petrochemical compound in Shiraz in southern Iran. According to the IDF, this facility was one of the last remaining facilities that produced critical chemical components for explosives and materials for ballistic missiles. The IDF said it also struck a large ballistic missile array site in northwestern Iran.

The IDF also released footage showing a strike on an apparent transporter-erector-launcher associated with a Russian-made S-300MPU-2 air defense system operated by Iran. While we cannot confirm the date of the strike, if recent, it would seem to point to the continued threat of Iranian air defense systems — including high-end ones.

Pakistan has indicated it would support Saudi Arabia under their mutual defense pact if the conflict with Iran intensifies further, a Pakistani security official told Reuters.

Israeli emergency services were responding today to a reported missile attack in central Israel. Footage from Israeli emergency service Magen David Adom showed an overturned car, but there were no immediate reports of injuries. The Times of Israel reports that the damage was caused by cluster submunitions from an Iranian ballistic missile. TWZ has previously examined how Iran has been using cluster warheads to consistently defeat terminal-phase ballistic missile defenses, especially Israel’s David’s Sling.

Iran’s latest barrage of drone and missile attacks against Gulf states saw Saudi Arabia’s air defenses pressed into action again. According to the Saudi Ministry of Defense, at least 18 drones were intercepted and destroyed over the past few hours. Before that, Saudi air defenses intercepted and destroyed seven ballistic missiles targeting the eastern region of the country, the defense ministry said. Debris reportedly fell in the area of some energy facilities, but damage is still being assessed.

The IDF struck more targets in southern Lebanon overnight. According to the state-run National News Agency, three people were killed in Maarakeh, one in Zebdine, one in Deir al-Zahrani, and three in Tayr Debba. Dozens more were wounded, including nine in Qatrani, the same source reported. The IDF had issued an alert on Monday, warning residents of a number of villages in the area that significant military action was planned.

A container ship south of Iran’s Kish Island was hit by an unidentified projectile, the U.K. Office of Maritime Trade Operations (UKMTO) said on Tuesday.

All crew members are reported safe, with no environmental damage detected. The incident is still being investigated, and it remains unclear who fired the projectile or whether the vessel was the intended target.

An article in The Financial Times provides estimates of the cost of the campaign against Iran as Operation Epic Fury reaches the five-week mark. The newspaper quotes Elaine McCusker, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) and a former senior Pentagon budget official, who puts the cost of the campaign as between $22.3 billion and $31 billion.

Her calculations include the cost of deploying additional U.S. assets to the Middle East since late December but do not include a full battle-damage assessment, which is unlikely to be clear before hostilities end.

A Wall Street Journal opinion piece notes that, with the notable exception of Spain, other European countries are quietly providing support for the U.S. military operation against Iran:

London, after some delay, authorized the use of British bases for U.S. strikes on Iranian missile sites targeting shipping in the Strait of Hormuz. Portugal reaffirmed its decision to allow the U.S. to use Lajes Air Base in the Azores. Germany has kept Ramstein Air Base available under standing agreements — a vital U.S. hub for logistics, force projection, and drone-linked operations beyond Europe — even as Berlin insists this isn’t NATO’s war.

The situation as regards the American use of British airbases for infrastructure attacks against Iran is a little less clear.

A report for the i suggested that the U.K. government will refuse to allow the use of RAF bases for any strikes on Iranian bridges or power plants. However, a spokesperson for the U.K. Prime Minister would not confirm or deny that, telling The Guardian that the government would not provide a “running commentary” on what the United States was doing, including its use of British bases.

Russian satellites have made dozens of detailed imagery surveys of military facilities and critical sites across the Middle East to help Iran strike U.S. forces ​and other targets, according to a Ukrainian intelligence assessment, reviewed by Reuters. The same assessment describes Russian and Iranian hackers collaborating in the cyber domain.

The U.S. military gym at Camp Buehring, Kuwait, known as The Diamond Mine, appears to have been the target of an Iranian attack, based on this before-and-after satellite imagery. Camp Buehring, in the northwestern region of Kuwait, was established in 2003, and is the primary location for the Middle Eastern Theater Reserve.

Contact the author: thomas@thewarzone.com

The post Trump Agrees To Ceasefire With Iran appeared first on The War Zone.

The very large and very stealthy flying wing-type drone was first spotted in the skies around Larissa Air Base, also known as Larissa National Airport, in the city of the same name in Greece, back on March 18. Local spotter Efthymios Siakaras shared two new video clips offering especially good views of the uncrewed aircraft in flight, one on Sunday and another on Monday, which our friends over at The Aviationist were first to report on. Similar to the stealthy RQ-170 Sentinel being dubbed the “Beast of Kandahar” after it was first spotted in Afghanistan in the late 2000s, many are now also calling this drone the “Lady of Larissa.”

Of the features visible in the latest footage of the Lady of Larissa, the most notable are a pair of large electro-optical sensor apertures underneath its central fuselage, right behind the main landing gear bay. The two windows are noticeably angled to the left and right. Behind those transparencies would be a large multi-spectral sensor system that can look down to the ground below and out at long slant angles towards the horizon from the aircraft’s very high perch. By having one window on each side, the RQ-180 could run racetrack patterns some distance from its target while providing continuous coverage. If a sensor is housed under each window, it could collect intelligence over much larger swathes of terrain at any given time.

As TWZ has noted for years, the RQ-180 would, with near certainty, carry a powerful radar with ground moving target indicator (GMTI) and synthetic aperture radar (SAR) modes as its primary sensor, along with electronic intelligence collection capabilities. Optical camera systems were always another possibility, one that seems to have proven true now.

As we wrote just yesterday:

“At its most basic, GMTI allows battle managers to see the enemy’s ground movements in real-time and then quickly adapt their game plan to counter those enemy forces before they can ever attack, or even pose a threat to friendly forces. GMTI is also a critical capability for detecting changes in force posture, establishing patterns of enemy movements over time, and identifying new targets of interest. Modern GMTI products can also be looped into a ‘kill web’ for rapid targeting purposes.“

“Some of this is also achieved through the aforementioned SAR mode, which basically provides a satellite-like image of a target area using radar. It also has the ability to see some things optical systems cannot, and, like GMTI, it can work under nearly all atmospheric conditions, day or night. When paired with GMTI, SAR can be used to help positively identify targets, as well as gain better situational awareness about the targets being tracked.“

“Passive electronic intelligence collection that allows for radiofrequency-emitters to be quickly detected and geolocated via onboard antennas and interferometry-based computing is another part of the equation. Long-range optical sensors can also provide higher-fidelity intelligence and spot movements of infrared signatures over large areas. You can imagine how fusing all these capabilities together, combined with advanced networking, on a single platform could be incredibly potent. Basically, detecting a target or target group of interest, and then training advanced sensors on it to rapidly build up a high-quality understanding of what is going on and even to provide real-time targeting data to ‘shooters’ would be this aircraft’s bread and butter.“

The drone’s electro-optical system and radar, together with the rest of its sensor suite, could offer a secondary air-to-air surveillance capability, as well.

As an interesting aside, Scaled Composites’ Proteus high-altitude test aircraft has previously been seen flying with an extremely similar-looking sensor suite with an oddly angled aperture housing. The high-flying Proteus has a long history of being used to test and evaluate new sensors and other advanced capabilities. Scaled Composites is also a wholly-owned subsidiary of Northrop Grumman, widely understood to be the prime contractor behind the RQ-180.

In addition, the underside of the drone’s central fuselage, which is where the main array for the aforementioned radar would go, has a very pronounced bulge. This would house a rotating radar or a two-sided one so that the aircraft can scan the same area while traveling in either direction. Supplemental conformal arrays, or even load-bearing ones, could also be positioned all around the aircraft, along with communications antennas, electronic warfare gear, and electronic surveillance measures hardware.

The new views of the drone flying around Larissa underscore just how widely positioned its tricycle landing gear is, along with its very broad wingspan. As we’ve noted previously, a landing gear configuration like this allows for a large volume for payload and good stability on the ground.

It is worth pointing out that there looks to be a foreign object debris (FOD) deflector fitted around the wheel of the nose landing gear. In general, the radar absorbent coatings and the composite skins of stealthy aircraft are very sensitive. What might look to be relatively minor surface damage at a casual glance can have significant negative impacts when it comes to radar cross-section, which is critical for the aircraft’s mission effectiveness and survival. From what we can see, the drone will be sitting very low on its gear when on the ground. This only increases the potential for foreign objects to get kicked up and hit its belly during takeoff and landing. This is especially true for the low-hanging ventral bulge where sensor apertures are, right behind the nose gear. So, this debris guard makes total sense.

The nose gear strut also has what is called a trailing link or trailing arm, a feature designed to help smooth the impact of landing.

The trailing-link style nose landing gear otherwise has a two-wheel configuration very much in line with that of the B-21 Raider bomber, but in a scaled-down form. This is not all that much of a surprise, as the B-21 shares a general planform with the RQ-180. The Raider’s development was likely heavily influenced by the RQ-180, or a progenitor of the flying wing uncrewed aircraft we are seeing today.

The drone’s main landing gear looks extremely similar to what is found on F-15 fighters. Borrowing existing, proven components for experimental or low-production aircraft like this is a time-honored tradition. The use of an F-15’s main landing gear points to a high gross takeoff weight. The maximum takeoff weight of the latest F-15EX variant is 81,000 pounds, according to Boeing, and the F-15 has a much smaller, single nose wheel. For comparison, the high-flying Global Hawk drone’s maximum takeoff weight is 32,250 pounds, per the U.S. Air Force, and it has distinctly less robust landing gear to match.

At the same time, the Lady of Larissa would not necessarily need to make use of all of that capacity, or it could even have a bit higher gross weight, and various additional factors could have influenced the choice of landing gear. The overall design is likely to be light for its overall size to maximize range, endurance, and high-altitude performance. With its reconnaissance and surveillance mission sets, there would be no need for a payload bay structure to carry heavy weapons. This, along with the lack of any need to support a crew, would allow the aircraft to be absolutely packed with fuel.

While its similarities to the B-21 are glaring, the Lady of Larissa is even more optimized for high-altitude flight than the Raider, which itself is a step beyond in altitude performance over the B-2. You can read all about this in our past feature here. The drone’s overall massive flying wing shape and its very clean, laminar flow-like sculpting, along with wings that look designed to allow the RQ-180 to loiter at relatively extreme altitudes, support its penetrating, persistent reconnaissance mission set.

Furthermore, the most recent videos of the Lady of Larissa offer new looks at the control surfaces in action. Like what is found on the B-21 and Northrop’s preceding B-2 Spirit bomber, the drone has flaperons along the trailing edges of the wings and along its diamond-like empennage. There may also be a central variable geometry ‘beaver tail’ section, something also found on the B-2, but not on the B-21, although this could just be the inboard flaps being slightly extended.

Much remains to be learned about the drone’s design and capabilities, as well as why it is operating out of Greece and how long it has used Larissa as a forward base. Why such a sensitive asset continues to be seen flying in the middle of the day is also curious. After the highly exotic uncrewed aircraft was first spotted at Larissa, reports said that it had landed there after experiencing some kind of technical issue, though this remains unconfirmed. The drone could have diverted there after taking off for a mission from another operating location, even one potentially inside the United States. All that being said, as we’ve noted in the past, Larissa does look to have unique facilities that seem very well suited for hosting an aircraft like this, and that were only built in recent years.

It may be that it simply has no place to hide any longer, and more flexibility is being exercised as to when it can and can’t depart and land from wherever it’s operating from. This could also mean the Pentagon may be more willing to acknowledge its existence in the not-so-distant future.

As mentioned at the start of this story, TWZ just yesterday laid out a detailed case for why the RQ-180 would be very relevant for helping hunt Iranian mobile missile launchers. That is a mission set that likely evolved from work on a previous secret Cold War-era stealthy drone program called the Advanced Airborne Reconnaissance System (AARS), also known by the codename Quartz. There are many other roles it could execute in relation to Operation Epic Fury, as well.

Overall, we have gotten our best look at the so-called RQ-180. We now know it is capable of radio-frequency and electro-optical sensing, and we have a bit better idea of its overall size and mass. This is a very large unmanned system that is smaller in size than the B-21, but far larger than RQ-170. A very cursory guess supports a wingspan of something on the order of 130 feet (possibly significantly larger), but again, that is just a guess. This aircraft is clearly optimized to fly at least at Global Hawk altitudes (upwards of 60,000 feet) and possibly higher, approaching that of the U-2, giving it a huge line of sight to target areas. Being such an efficient-looking design and being so large with so much internal volume, it likely measures its endurance in days, not hours.

The videos of the RQ-180 operating in the daytime also come as China is moving forward with its own very large unmanned stealth flying wing designs.

If the war with Iran continues, we will probably be seeing more of the Lady of Larissa, with its shyness appearing to be waning just a bit.

Contact the author: joe@twz.com

The post New Views Of Massive RQ-180 Stealth Drone Flying Over Greece appeared first on The War Zone.

A test A-10, looking like it borrowed its nose from an A-6 Intruder, flew for the first time equipped with a refueling probe in place of its nose-mounted aerial refueling receptacle earlier this week. The program has been ongoing for some time. Within days of that first flight, the test ‘Hog’ successfully plugged into a C-130 equipped with aerial refueling drogues. An image, circulating on social media, shows the A-10 in question connected to a drogue trailing behind a Hercules.

Author’s note: On April 7th, 2026, the Air Force released images of the test along with a written statement about it. You can read that statement at the bottom of this article. The images are posted below (all credited to SMSgt Charles Givens/USAF):

The implications of this test go beyond the A-10. We had previously made the case, in detail, how USAF fighters equipped with probes would be of extreme value during a crisis in the Pacific. We also have made the case for smaller tactical tankers supporting these operations and how they could be essential to the USAF’s success in such a conflict.

The ability for fighters to launch with heavy loads from short runways, even those that have been battle damaged, and immediately tank-up on gas before heading deeper into enemy territory would be a huge plus for the USAF. Currently, all of its tactical jets use the receptacle and boom mode of aerial refueling, where a jet tanker plugs into them, usually at high altitudes, for refueling. This makes the USAF’s Agile Combat Employment strategy, where fighters will hop from one austere forward airfield to another in order to stay ahead of the enemy’s targeting cycle, and stay within range of being combat relevant, somewhat problematic.

Jet tankers require long runways and do not refuel aircraft at very low altitudes. The ability for USAF fighters to utilize MC-130s and HC-130s, or even Marine KC-130s, as well as standard C-130Js modified for aerial refueling, would drastically change this equation, operating from shorter fields alongside fighters with far more flexibility.

In addition, refueling at altitude, even what is considered low altitude by special operations-focused jet tankers in the USAF’s inventory, which you can read all about here, still is many thousands of feet in the air. This leaves them and their ‘customers’ vulnerable to long-range detection and increasingly far reaching air defenses. This is especially true for an adversary like China, that is investing very heavily into its anti-access/area-denial strategy, which will make normal combat operations far more dangerous much farther from a tactical jet’s target area than in past conflicts. So getting much lower, below the radar horizon, for refueling would go a long way in mitigating this growing threat.

With this in mind, we will likely see aerial refueling by the USAF’s jet tankers, KC-135s and KC-46s, drop lower and new training and procedures will be needed to support this. Risks also increase at these lower altitudes, especially considering that weather can be far more of a factor and aircraft handling changes in the thick air. But even if the USAF adapts its existing jet tanker force to lower altitude refueling operations, they still will not be able to operate out of the airstrips that C-130s can. The USAF also already has many C-130s to leverage for this role, leaving the jet tankers for more traditional, longer-range support missions, which they will be overtaxed with during a major fight in the Pacific to begin with, before even having to support ACE operations.

Thus, giving the A-10, as well as other fighters, like F-16s and F-15s (and even F-35s), the ability to be equipped with a probe and pairing them with C-130 tankers, could drastically change the USAF’s ACE equation, and make it far more tactically relevant than it currently is. The C-130s could also work as transports to support small groups of fighters hopping around the Pacific, while also providing tanker support for kinetic sorties.

It’s also worth noting that the USAF is now interested in the exact purpose-built aircraft we originally posited for this mission, but procuring an entirely new type, while sticking to the boom and receptacle concept, is a much bigger ask than adapting the force it already has. Arguably, there would be a place for both concepts in the USAF’s portfolio if it really doubles down on its ACE vision and the boom-equipped tactical tanker could also service probe-equipped fighter aircraft.

For the A-10, the addition of a probe makes even more sense, as these aircraft have the combat search and rescue ‘Sandy’ mission, where they directly escort and provide close air support for special operations helicopters working to pluck personnel out of highly contested territory. This same mission set has been highlighted incredibly well like nothing in recent memory just today over Iran. The HC-130s and MC-130s are already equipped to provide fuel to rotary-wing aircraft during these operations. They could also support A-10s with aerial refueling, as well. This would extend the endurance and range of the A-10’s Sandy mission set. It would also provide more flexibility as to who they can get gas from for other mission types.

It will be interesting to see if the program moves beyond this demonstration and if this capability gets eyed for more of the USAF’s tactical jet force. It was in the works for some time and appears to have been put into purgatory due to the A-10’s pending retirement, before being put back on a fast track recently. This is at least a sign that the USAF sees major merit in the concept.

As for how the USAF’s fighters could be equipped with a probe, multiple solutions exist, including installing them on drop tanks and conformal fuel tanks, to bolting them onto the empennages of the aircraft. Future F-35As could even be equipped with both a receptacle and a refueling probe as the latter option is installed on the B and C model.

Regardless of what’s to come, this is an encouraging sign that the USAF at least appears to be questioning its ACE dreams and trying to see how relatively simple alterations to it could make it more operationally realistic. If anything else, the Warthog getting this option could help enhance its CSAR capabilities and open the aperture to what tankers can provide gas to it for other operations. Considering the major challenges of future CSAR operations the USAF is facing, where range will be a huge problem, letting the A-10 tank from the same assets as their rotary-wing brethren would be a huge win.

UPDATE:

The USAF has put out a formal release on the test as well as images, the latter of which have been embedded in the article above.

Release and images:

The Air National Guard Air Force Reserve Command Test Center led a rapid multi-organization effort that delivered probe and drogue air refueling capability to the A-10 Thunderbolt II, responding to an urgent combatant command requirement. 

The Probe Refueling Adapter addresses operational availability of aerial refueling in theater, expanding refueling options for deployed A-10 units. 

The adapter fits into the air refueling receptacle on the nose of the A-10, converting the aircraft from its standard boom refueling configuration to a probe and drogue system. The modification allows A-10s to refuel from HC-130 tankers, significantly expanding refueling options for deployed units. 

The capability gap emerged from limited aerial refueling pairing options available to mission planners. With KC-10 tankers retired and KC-46 certification pending, A-10 units remained dependent on KC-135 aircraft for aerial refueling. The probe adapter enables A-10s to refuel from C-130 tankers, whose airspeeds and altitudes prove more compatible with A-10 operations and whose mission sets align more closely with close air support and combat search and rescue operations. 

AATC coordinated the effort across multiple organizations to compress development timelines. An industry partner developed and built the probe adapter while the A-10 System Program Office provided engineering oversight for aircraft integration. ARCWERX enabled rapid contract acquisition, and Luke Air Force Base fabricated supporting components to accelerate delivery. The 418th Flight Test Squadron provided the HC-130 tanker and crew for the first refueling mission. 

“Once the combatant command issued the requirement, all of the standard acquisition processes began immediately, but everyone involved understood the urgency,” said Lt. Col. Luke Haywas, A-10 Combined Test Force director. “The SPO, ARCWERX, industry partners, and supporting units each brought critical expertise to the effort. Nothing was shortcut or compromised from a technical or safety standpoint. We just accelerated every step we could.” 

The probe adapter represents a field-configurable solution designed for installation by operational flight line personnel. Units can install or remove the adapter in a matter of hours, allowing aircraft to be reconfigured between boom and probe refueling capability based on mission requirements. 

“This project demonstrates that AATC can serve as a rapid response mechanism when combatant commanders face urgent capability gaps,” said Col. Daniel Wittmer, AATC commander. “We maintained relationships with system program offices and industry partners, and we brought the test expertise needed to move from concept to fielded capability in weeks. That’s not a one-time accomplishment. It’s a model for how the Air Force can deliver operationally relevant capabilities to warfighters at the speed that modern conflict demands.” 

The compressed timeline reflects an operational reality where the speed of capability delivery increasingly determines whether the Air Force maintains its warfighting advantage. 

The Air National Guard Air Force Reserve Command Test Center is responsible for operational flight test, tactics development, and evaluation for all Air Reserve Component weapons systems. The organization is also chartered to modernize the Air Reserve Component’s Battlefield Airman Enterprise, which includes Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance, Cyber, Space, and all Combined Test Forces. 

Contact the author: Tyler@Twz.com

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These rescue missions involved hundreds of troops, scores of aircraft and diversion operations over more than a half dozen different parts of Iran. It required risking the lives of many of those personnel to recover the two airmen.

The WSO’s recovery occurred on Easter Sunday some 50 hours after being shot down. It all began in the early morning hours of April 3 in Iran. After the F-15E was shot down, officials at U.S. Central Command received a message that would kick-start the operation.

“A U.S. Air Force F-15E Strike Eagle, call sign DUDE44… was down in hostile Iranian territory, the pilot and weapon systems officer had both safely ejected and were isolated behind enemy lines,” Caine told reporters during a White House briefing. “Following confirmation of active rescue beacons, and on the direction of the Secretary [of War Pete Hegseth] and by order of the President, a rescue operation was launched with the stated purpose of bringing both Americans home safely.”

A U.S. Air Force combat search and rescue (CSAR) task force was quickly spun up, Caine explained. It included 10 A-10C Thunderbolt II close support jets, HC-130J Combat King CSAR planes, HH-60W Jolly Green II CSAR helicopters and Air Force special operations airmen.

“A package comprised of combat rescue officers and pararescuemen operators audaciously penetrated enemy territory in broad daylight to find, fix and recover DUDE44 Alpha from behind enemy lines,” Caine proffered.

As the CSAR package, protected by a fighter strike package, crossed into Iran, “A-10s and …drones and other tactical aircraft were violently suppressing and engaging the enemy in a close-in gunfight to keep them away from the front seater and allow the pickup force to get into the objective area,” Caine noted. During this engagement, one of the A-10s – “the one primarily responsible for communicating with the downed pilot, was hit by enemy fire,” said Caine. “This pilot continued to fight, continued the mission, and then upon exit, flew his aircraft into another country and determined that the airplane was not landable… The pilot then made the decision to eject over friendly territory, and was quickly and safely recovered and is doing fine.”

After picking up the F-15E pilot, the HH 60W Jolly Green “was engaged by every single person in Iran who had a small arms weapon, and one of the aircraft, the trailing aircraft, took several hits,” Caine told reporters. “The crew sustained minor injury, and they are going to be fine.”

“The A-10 force and the rescue force did a fantastic job rescuing DUDE44 Alpha,” Caine continued. “He was recovered Friday afternoon, as I said, and the nation needs to know this. This was an incredibly brave and courageous mission, and a testament to the courage, skill and tenacity of the joint force and our leaders, and especially a daylight option.”

Rescuing the pilot was only the first step. The WSO was still out there, alone and being hunted by the military and civilians. Officials in Tehran put out a large bounty for his recovery. If he was captured or killed, it would have been a tremendous propaganda coup for Iran and a huge problem for America.

“Meanwhile, the second crew member, the weapon system officer, a highly respected colonel, had landed a significant distance away from the pilot,” Trump explained. “When you’re going at those speeds, even if you go out two or three seconds later, it’s miles and miles away, because you’re going fast.”

The WSO “was injured quite badly and stranded in an area teeming with terrorists from the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, a rough group, as well as the Basij militia and local authorities,” recounted Trump, who was watching it all unfold in real time. “Despite the peril, the officer followed his training and climbed into the treacherous mountain terrain and started climbing toward a higher altitude, something they were trained to do in order to evade capture.”

“He scaled cliff faces bleeding rather profusely, treated his own wounds and contacted American forces to transmit his location,” the president continued. “They have a very sophisticated beeper type apparatus that is on them at all times.”

The WSO was located thanks in large measure to help from the CIA.

“As an agency, the CIA possesses unique capabilities that only the president can deploy,” said its director, John Ratcliffe, who also spoke at the presser. “Some of these capabilities fall under covert action authorities, and because covert means exactly that I’m not going to be able to tell you everything that you want to know. At the President’s direction, we deployed both human assets and exquisite technologies that no other intelligence service in the world possesses to a daunting challenge, comparable to hunting for a single grain of sand in the middle of a desert.”

Trump praised Ratcliffe and the agency.

“And John Ratcliffe was incredible,” the president proffered. “It was actually their genius that called us from – he was 40 miles away – and he said, ‘you know, we’re seeing something moving up in a mountain.’ It’s at night and they kept the camera on for 45 minutes. He wasn’t moving. And they said, ‘you know, probably wrong, but we’re seeing something moving.’ This is a vast mountain, vast, thick with bushes, trees. He said, ‘We see something moving 40 miles away…I’m telling you, it’s moving.’ And then all of a sudden, 45 minutes later, he moved a lot, stood up, and they said, ‘we have him.'”

“And that was really the beginning of something incredible,” Trump added. “We had an idea where he was, but not specifically. That’s [a] big mountain. So I want to thank the CIA too. I don’t think they get enough credit for the great job they’ve done.”

Once the WSO was located, “[w]e immediately mobilized a massive operation to retrieve him from the mountain,” Trump continued. “He kept going higher and higher. The mountain kept getting rougher and rougher, and was really, very, very hard to find. The second rescue mission involved 155 aircraft, including four bombers, 64 fighters, 48 refueling tankers, 13 rescue aircraft and more.”

All these assets, however, weren’t just for the spot where the WSO was located. Many of these aircraft were taking part in diversion efforts to throw Iranians off the trail. 

“We were bringing them all over, and a lot of it was subterfuge,” Trump stated. “We wanted to have them think he was in a different location, because they had a vast military force out there, thousands and thousands of people were looking. So we wanted them to look in different areas. So we were scattered all over, like we were right on top of them. We had seven different locations where they thought, and they were very confused. They said, ‘Well, wait a minute, they’ve got groups here. They’ve got groups there.’”

As the WSO hid, the military had created a forward arming and refueling point on a farm, Trump noted. You can read more about how the Air Force would set up and defend such a location in our interview with a former Air Force Special Tactics Squadron airman here.

That location, the president proffered, was less than ideal for such operations, which involved landing two heavily loaded MC-130J Commando II special operations cargo planes that included several H-6 Little Bird special operations helicopters among other equipment in their holds.

“This was not much of a runway,” the president stated, adding that the ground was wet and sandy, making landing, and especially takeoff, a challenge. “This was a farm, not a runway. It’s a farm. But it did the trick.”

After the wounded WSO was found, he was whisked back to the FARP, but getting him and the aircraft brought in to help find him was a tremendous challenge.

Trump said that with the MC-130s stuck in the wet, sandy soil, “we blew them up to smithereens.” The Little Birds were also blown up in place as well, because the aircraft that replaced the Commando IIs weren’t capable of exfilling them.

To replace the C-130s, “lighter, faster aircraft came in, and they took them out,” Trump said about the personnel and equipment. He was almost certainly referring to the CASA C-295W, a short take off and landing (STOL) twin turboprop that are modified for the special operations role.

A video has previously emerged said to show a C-295W flying at extremely low altitude in the general vicinity of the crash site. The U.S. Air Force operates a handful of these aircraft, likely assigned to the secretive 427th Special Operations Squadron. This unit is known to specialize in covert and clandestine infiltration and exfiltration missions, among other duties.

You can see that video below.

During the press conference, Trump pointed out not everyone in the military was in agreement that the U.S. should commit so many resources, human and equipment, to such a dangerous effort to rescue two men.

“There was military people, very professional, that preferred not doing it,” explained the president. “There were military people that said, ‘you just don’t do this. You don’t go into the heart of a very powerful military.'”

Trump of course listened instead to Caine and Hegseth, each of whom implored him to green light the missions.

Now with the official account of the mission behind us, here are some additional details about the rescue that were reported elsewhere.

The communication device the airmen used was the CSEL, or Combat Survivor Evader Locator, according to Ynet. The manufacturer, Boeing, describes it as being “like a global 911 emergency call system for downed personnel, providing U.S. forces with a tactical advantage.”

The CSEL system uses a flexible, modular communications architecture over multiple satellite links for secure communications and sends simple messages in bursts, with a low probability of intercept (LPI). These messages can include basic information about the status of the downed airman. It can then switch to a less stealthy line-of-sight radio when extraction forces are nearby.

Approximately 14 hours after the jet was hit, “U.S. officials got a lock on the weapons officer’s location via a beacon he was carrying.” According to The New York Times, in addition to the CSEL, the CIA “used a special piece of technology unique to the agency to locate the airman hiding in the mountain crevice and confirm his identity.”

Intelligence gathered by U.S. and Israeli officials was put together to determine if the airman was alone, surrounded by Iranians, or whether he had been captured, and this was an attempt to dupe them, The New York Times noted.

Prime Minister Netanyahu confirmed that Israel had assisted the U.S. military in the rescue, according to the Times of Israel. Netanyahu said he had spoken to President Trump and “congratulated him on his bold decision and a perfectly executed American mission.”

“The president expressed his appreciation for Israel’s help,” Netanyahu added. “I am deeply proud that our cooperation on and off the battlefield is unprecedented, and that Israel could contribute to saving a brave American warrior.”

To try and buy more time, the CIA put together a deception plan, throwing the Iranians off the scent by making it look as if the airman had been found and was being moved out of the country in a ground convoy, which would take them to the coast for a maritime exfiltration.

Meanwhile, one of several Iranian search parties had assembled at the base of the mountain where the WSO was hiding.

Forces deployed to the remote airstrip provided suppressive fire but did not engage in an actual firefight with the enemy. But the U.S. military took additional steps, “jamming electronics and bombing key roads around the location to prevent people from getting close,” in an area denial operation, Reuters reported, citing a U.S. source familiar with the planning . Satellite imagery shows roads approaching the landing area were cratered in a uniform fashion with precision munitions.

There are reports from Fox News, citing high-ranking U.S. sources, that B-2 bombers were using Massive Ordnance Penetrators to strike an IRGC underground headquarters outside of the Iranian capital, Tehran, while the rescue was ongoing.

This rescue operation was certainly a bright spot for a White House and Pentagon beleaguered by global criticism of an unpopular war that has dragged on for more than a month with no clear end in sight. It also highlights that, no matter how much damage the U.S. and Israel have done to the Islamic Republic’s air defense infrastructure through a devastating aerial campaign, Iran still presents a danger to the aircrews flying in its airspace. Above all else, it is a reminder of just how far the U.S. will go and what it is willing to sacrifice in terms of lives and material in order to get their people back.

UPDATE: 12:24 AM EDT—

Axios reports that the F-15E was shot down by a MANPADS, according to Trump. The report says the president stated “they got lucky.” If this is indeed how the incident began, it would mean the F-15E was flying inside the MANPADS envelope, which is roughly under 15,000 feet in most cases.

Editor’s note: We removed a section on how Israel’s units assisted with the raid until we can further confirm the associated reports. The removal did not further impact the totality of our report.

UPDATE: 11:11 AM EDT –

CBS News reported many new details about the rescue of both the pilot and WSO. Here are some of the highlights:

• U.S. forces fired 339 munitions over 50 hours of operations for both rescues.

• Other planned operations were halted as U.S. military power — and the president’s attention — pivoted to the combat rescue mission.

• The downed pilot, call sign Dude 44A, was saved within hours. He sustained serious injuries, and there was a time shortly after he ejected when Trump officials were worried he would not survive.

• At the Pentagon on Friday, the colonel was designated “DUSTWUN” — military speak for Duty Status — Whereabouts Unknown.

• U.S. Central Command and the Joint Special Operations Command received some messages from the missing officer. One was a four-digit number.

“We said, ‘What is he talking about?'” an official said.

They soon realized it was police code for an officer in distress or urgent assistance needed.

• The team could communicate with the colonel, so they asked him a question about his father that only he would know. The answer was correct. His identity was authenticated.

• U.S. intelligence had learned the Iranians had dogs sniff the F-15E’s ejection seats that were on the ground. This alarmed the president’s team, but it turned out the dogs weren’t effective at tracking the scent.

• The team was in touch with the weapon systems officer’s wife and read her in on the deception operation CIA and CENTCOM were running. To scatter militants in several directions, they worked to dupe them into thinking the weapons systems officer was on the move — heading toward the border with Afghanistan, or north to the Caspian Sea, or on a route south, out of Iran.

• The Pentagon planned at least four strategies for rescuing the officer — scenarios using rotary-wing and fixed-wing aircraft.

• Hegseth chose a fixed-wing option, using two MC-130 transport planes. U.S. intelligence indicated the Iranians thought that they would be coming via helicopter. Weather was also a factor – low cloud ceiling complicated a rotary-wing rescue. Planners studied two landing zones – one 17 miles from the stranded officer and one 10 miles from him. They chose the closer one, on farmland.

• U.S. intelligence showed Iran was searching at night, too, using smaller drones, but its forces lacked sophisticated night-vision capabilities.

• None of the intelligence hinted that the Iranian forces knew where the airman was, in a mountainous area south of Isfahan. At least half of Iran’s nuclear stockpile is believed to be stored at a facility nearby.

• The plan was to land the fixed-wing aircraft on the agricultural runway, secure the area, offload the helicopter in pieces from the MC-130s, and re-assemble them, which would take about 15 minutes. Aviators would fly the Little Bird MH-6 helicopters the seven minutes to the ridgeline where the weapon systems officer was located, and fly back another seven minutes to the landing strip.

Fox News is reporting that “both the pilot and WSO [the weapon systems officer]” are in Landstuhl [Regional Medical Center] in Germany. The facility, near Ramstein Air Base, is where many wounded troops are first sent before heading home. 

Both airmen ”will soon be en route to the United States,” Fox added. “The pilot is in good shape, and the second crew member is a bit more banged up, but will recover.”

TWZ deputy editor Joe Trevithick contributed to this report.

Contact the author: howard@thewarzone.com

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A video, seen below, began circulating on social media earlier today showing the THAAD seeker, as well as other portions of the interceptor, on the ground. The clip is said to have been shot in the vicinity of the Syrian city of Suwayda in the southwestern corner of the country, though TWZ cannot immediately verify this independently. However, Suwayda is some 25 miles north of the border with Jordan and around 55 miles to the east of Israel’s internationally recognized boundaries. The U.S. military is currently reported to have THAAD batteries in Israel and Jordan.

As its name indicates, THAAD is designed to intercept short, medium, and intermediate-range ballistic missiles in the terminal phase of flight. Depending on a variety of factors, including the physical position of the launcher relative to the threat, the system can attempt intercepts against targets just as they begin their descent into Earth’s atmosphere.

THAAD cues its interceptors before their launch, either using its own powerful AN/TPY-2 radar or via data from offboard sensors through the Command, Control, Battle Management and Communication (C2BMC) network.

After launch, the so-called “kill vehicle” at the front end detaches from the rocket booster at the rear. A shroud at the front, which covers the seeker and the rest of the kill vehicle, also breaks away.

Freed from the shroud, the kill vehicle uses its conformal infrared seeker to find and home in on the target missile. In general, infrared imaging has the benefit of being a passive guidance method that is immune to radiofrequency countermeasures, such as jamming or decoys designed to mimic the radar signature of a real threat.

THAAD’s interceptors are hit-to-kill types that are designed to destroy their targets through sheer force of impact. As such, the kill vehicles do not contain any kind of explosive warhead. Each one does have several small rocket motors that help it precisely maneuver into position to slam into the incoming missile. These are collectively known as the Divert and Attitude Control System (DACS).

“The unique DACS provides two kinds of propulsion: one for attitude control and another for kill-vehicle maneuvering. The DACS uses six thrusters to provide roll, pitch, and yaw control for the interceptor,” according to L3Harris, which supplies this component of the interceptor. “These thrusters work together to precisely stabilize the interceptor-seeker field of view for proper target visibility. The seeker’s target data are then converted into maneuvering or divert commands that actuate the other four DACS thrusters as required. The four divert thrusters provide short, forceful pulses to quickly and accurately position the THAAD kill vehicle for target intercept.”

In the video, the entire kill vehicle is intact enough that the ports for some of these rockets are plainly visible.

The exact circumstances that led to the kill vehicle coming down largely intact and what has since happened to the debris are not known.

Gaining access to a THAAD interceptor seeker, as well as the rest of the kill vehicle, would give an adversary new insights into its performance envelope and other capabilities. That information could then be used in the development of new countermeasures, as well as tactics, techniques, and procedures to reduce the interceptor’s effectiveness. This would be on top of what Iran, as well as countries like Russia and China, have already been gleaning just from observing THAAD’s performance in the current conflict, as well as prior engagements.

Deep intelligence exploitation of the physical design of the seeker and the kill vehicle, as well as the materials used to make them, could be beneficial for supporting other developments, as well. The kill vehicle and the systems within have to survive the stresses of traveling at hypersonic speeds, typically defined as anything above Mach 5, as it screams toward its target. Adversaries like China could leverage this information to improve their own anti-ballistic missile capabilities or attempt to clone THAAD more directly.

Employing highly advanced weaponry of any kind always carries at least a degree of risk of intelligence loss. Even just in the course of normal operations, the most reliable systems can still fail and fall into the wrong hands. This is not the first time TWZ has called attention to this reality, including in regard to the recovery of sensitive components of surface-to-air interceptors. The U.S. government, as well as China, Russia, and many other countries, have extensive foreign materiel exploitation programs poised to seize on any opportunity to acquire weapon systems and other equipment for extensive analysis, testing, and even reverse engineering.

Though we do not know what happened to the THAAD seeker and the rest of the kill vehicle seen in the video, this may not be the last time we see such debris in Syria or elsewhere in the region, given how extensively these interceptors are being used as Iranian ballistic missile attacks continue.

Editor’s note: The original version of this story talked about the interceptor’s nose shroud also being visible on the ground, separate from the seeker and the rest of the kill vehicle, but, upon closer review, it is just one piece. We have updated the post to reflect this.

Contact the author: joe@twz.com

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However, as we noted in our initial reporting, the current conflict with Iran would be a very relevant fit for what the RQ-180 was likely designed to do. Furthermore, a secretive late Cold War-era drone program known as Quartz, intended to persistently monitor mobile nuclear-tipped ballistic missiles deep within the Soviet Union, offers a window into exactly why the RQ-180 could be in high demand in the Middle East now. There is no higher-priority standing mission for Operation Epic Fury at this time than finding and destroying Iranian launchers.

In many ways, the shadowy Quartz program from decades ago was a progenitor for what became a very large flying wing uncrewed aircraft that shares the planform of the B-21 (and the original B-2 design) and is likely at least part of the RQ-180’s origin story.

Strange arrival over Greece

To recap quickly, on March 18, local Greek news website onlarissa.gr first published pictures of what it misidentified as a B-2 bomber landing at Larissa Air Base, also known as Larissa National Airport. The base, which belongs to the Hellenic Air Force, but is also known to host U.S. Air Force MQ-9 Reaper drones, is situated in the city of the same name.

Onlarissa.gr outlet followed up its initial reporting by posting a video of the drone, seen below. Additional and increasingly more detailed imagery has subsequently emerged.

Per onlarissa.gr, the highly exotic aircraft had landed at Larissa after experiencing some kind of technical issue, citing unnamed sources. This remains unconfirmed, but it would explain why the drone touched down in broad daylight, rather than coming in under the cover of darkness. It could also have diverted there with an emergency, while operating out of another location, even one in the continental United States. It is worth noting that Larissa Air Base appears to have unique facilities built in recent years that seem to be very well suited for housing an aircraft like this.

TWZ previously reached out to U.S. Air Forces in Europe (USAFE) and the Pentagon for comment, but has not received any responses as of the time of writing. In a story published on March 24, Air & Space Forces Magazine said U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) also declined to comment.

Attention was also subsequently called to U.S. Air Force cargo planes having been tracked making unusual flights from Edwards Air Force Base in California to Larissa recently. One of those flights came on February 25, while another one occurred on March 9. A C-5M also flew to Larissa from Tinker Air Force Base in Oklahoma on February 25, according to Aviation Week. Whether there is any connection between these flights and the drone spotted at the base has not been confirmed at this time. Edwards is the Air Force’s main hub for aviation test and evaluation efforts, and flight testing of the RQ-180 was reportedly at least managed from there in the 2010s. The Air Force could also have moved other assets to Larissa via Edwards.

The shadowy state of the ‘RQ-180’

The current state of the RQ-180, or any designs that have evolved from it, on a programmatic level, is very murky. In addition to testing at Edwards, past reports have said that a unit at Beale Air Force Base in California began flying the drones operationally, at least on a limited level, by 2019. There has been talk of a large flying wing aircraft similar in configuration to the B-21 Raider bomber flying out of Plant 42 in Palmdale, also in California, under the cover of darkness for years.

There are very strong indications that a photograph that appeared on Instagram in October 2020 of an unmanned aircraft flying in the skies over California’s Mojave Desert near Edwards Air Force Base was the first sighting of an RQ-180. That picture also notably showed a drone with an overall white paint scheme. That aligned with a report from Aviation Week that the design had gained the nicknames “Great White Bat” and “Shikaka.” The latter of these is the name of a fictional sacred white bat that is at the center of the plot of the 1995 Jim Carrey comedy Ace Ventura 2. The drone seen recently flying over Larissa has an overall black or otherwise dark-colored paint job. TWZ has noted previously that an overall white/cream/light pastel color scheme could help the drone to hide better at high altitudes during the day, but that a dark scheme would be more relevant at night. It is very possible, if not probable, that multiple schemes have been tested for a drone expected to fly sorties lasting multiple days.

It has long been thought that the RQ-180 could be a much-discussed, more survivable replacement for the non-stealthy RQ-4 Global Hawk drone, the vast majority of which are now retired. At the same time, the U.S. Air Force, now together with the U.S. Space Force, has been engaged in a major effort to push more surveillance capabilities, including exactly some of what the RQ-180 is likely intended to do, into space. This has led to public force structure changes and deferrals of traditional airborne sensing capabilities, and could have resulted in the stealthy high altitude, long-endurance (HALE) drone program being scaled back.

There certainly has been no clear evidence, at Beale or anywhere else, of the establishment of the kind of infrastructure that one would associate with the RQ-180 reaching a more advanced operational state and serial production. It is possible that the drone could share facilities with the B-21 under the larger umbrella of the Long Range Strike (LRS) family of systems. The RQ-180 is very likely intended, in part, to work in concert with the Raider, and there may even be some commonality between the two aircraft. The RQ-180 and/or related designs very likely played a direct role in risk reduction efforts that helped sell the Long Range Strike-Bomber (LRS-B) concept, and possibly the win by Northrop Grumman of that contract.

So, where the RQ-180 stands in terms of its overall capacity and its future remains unclear, but they are clearly being used on operational sorties, at least in a limited manner.

Iranian missile threats persist

After more than five weeks of fighting, the conflict with Iran is still grinding on. Despite the United States and Israel having substantially degraded the ability of Iranian forces to launch retaliatory missile and drone strikes, they have not stopped entirely. Iran has been digging out underground missile bases struck by American and Israeli forces and getting them back into operation, sometimes within hours, The New York Times reported just last Friday, citing U.S. intelligence reports. That followed other reports stating that Iran still retains a vast arsenal of missiles and drones, as well as a significant number of launchers to fire them.

In recent weeks, publicly available data from multiple sources has, at times, shown relatively small, but noticeable upticks in Iran’s launches. There are also signs that more of those threats are evading interception, though whether this has translated to more damage and/or casualties from impacts is unclear.

When it comes to launchers, Iran has invested heavily over the years in road mobile designs for firing ballistic and cruise missiles, as well as drones. This includes types that can be hard to distinguish from normal civilian trucks, especially those used for launching short-range ballistic missiles.

Iran also has extensive underground ‘missile cities’ and other hardened sites that launchers can sprint to and from, and even fire from within in some cases. Beyond the main missile storage and launch sites, Iranian authorities have clearly had plans to disperse these weapons across the country. Reports have said that more authority to employ them has been delegated to lower echelons of command to minimize the impacts of separate U.S. and Israeli strikes on command and control nodes, as well.

On top of all this, Iran still has longer-ranged ballistic missiles that it can fire from areas further to the east, where the volume of U.S. and Israeli strikes has only more recently begun to grow. What’s left of Iran’s air defenses, which presents a real threat, is therefore likely to be more intact in those regions. In general, many of Iran’s air defense systems are also road mobile and can pop-up suddenly. All of this creates challenges for finding and fixing Iran’s remaining launch capacity, let alone neutralizing it.

In this context, there is a clear need to be able to readily detect launchers, which can pop out suddenly and unexpectedly from cover, across vast areas. Known missile storage sites and launch areas around them also need to be persistently surveilled. The ability to find launchers faster opens up new options for striking them. Just tracking and recording their typical movements would also help further refine interdiction and intelligence-gathering strategies going forward.

As TWZ has previously explored in great depth, the RQ-180 is best understood as a very high-flying, very long-endurance, and very stealthy intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance platform that is capable of penetrating and persisting deep into enemy airspace. Its primary means of achieving that mission would be a radar with ground moving target indicator (GMTI) and synthetic aperture radar (SAR) capabilities, but radar would be just the primary component of a larger sensor package, which would likely include powerful electro-optical sensors and passive radiofrequency ones.

At its most basic, GMTI allows battle managers to see the enemy’s ground movements in real-time and then quickly adapt their game plan to counter those enemy forces before they can ever attack, or even pose a threat to friendly forces. GMTI is also a critical capability for detecting changes in force posture, establishing patterns of enemy movements over time, and identifying new targets of interest. Modern GMTI products can also be looped into a ‘kill web’ for rapid targeting purposes.

Some of this is also achieved through the aforementioned SAR mode, which basically provides a satellite-like image of a target area using radar. It also has the ability to see some things optical systems cannot, and, like GMTI, it can work under nearly all atmospheric conditions, day or night. When paired with GMTI, SAR can be used to help positively identify targets, as well as gain better situational awareness about the targets being tracked.

Passive electronic intelligence collection that allows for radiofrequency-emitters to be quickly detected and geolocated via onboard antennas and interferometry-based computing is another part of the equation. Long-range optical sensors can also provide higher-fidelity intelligence and spot movements of infrared signatures over large areas. You can imagine how fusing all these capabilities together, combined with advanced networking, on a single platform could be incredibly potent. Basically, detecting a target or target group of interest, and then training advanced sensors on it to rapidly build up a high-quality understanding of what is going on and even to provide real-time targeting data to ‘shooters’ would be this aircraft’s bread and butter.

All of these are capabilities that would be ideally suited to the very high-priority task at hand of searching for Iranian launchers across the country’s vast terrain.

This all brings us back to Quartz and the very specific mission set that drove that program. Quartz is the best-known codename for a drone conceived as part of what was officially dubbed the Advanced Airborne Reconnaissance System, or AARS program.

The lead-up to Quartz

AARS/Quartz was itself born out of a succession of earlier developments. Proving that using a stealth platform to penetrate enemy air defenses and to stay over contested territory for hours on end while transmitting data collected without being detected is one of the biggest revolutions in warfare of the 20th Century. This capability was demonstrated on the tactical side at the dawn of stealth technology by Northrop’s Tacit Blue. That aircraft was developed as part of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency’s (DARPA) highly classified Battlefield Surveillance Aircraft-Experimental (BSAX) program, which began in the late 1970s. 

Tacit Blue notably served as a periphery risk reduction effort for the Advanced Technology Bomber (ATB) program that would result in the B-2. However, its reason for being was to show that a stealthy aircraft carrying a huge radar can penetrate enemy air defenses and loiter for prolonged periods of time, collecting GMTI radar data and other intelligence information.

The radar for BSAX was a low probability of intercept design that had come from Pave Mover, another DARPA effort. Pave Mover ultimately led to the non-stealthy and now-retired E-8 Joint Surveillance Target Attack Radar System (JSTARS) aircraft, but offshoots of that radar technology did end up elsewhere, including on the B-2. Low probability of intercept/low probability of detection (LPI/LPD) radars and communications suites are now key tenets of stealth aircraft design, in general. Keeping signal emissions, which an enemy can use to spot and track threats, to a minimum is critical for low-observable (stealthy) aircraft designs. Pave Mover was also tied into DARPA’s Assault Breaker program, which focused on proving out various technologies to enable standoff targeting of enemy forces, especially large Soviet armored formations on the move, deep behind the front lines.

The famously ugly Tacit Blue, also nicknamed the “Whale,” produced results that were revolutionary, as you can read more about here. Even the most capable existing penetrating intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) aircraft available at the time, like the SR-71 Blackbird, could only take a snapshot in time of the enemy and its posture. Satellites were far more predictable and could only provide the same ‘moment in time’ intelligence, and in a much less flexible manner. Tacit Blue could watch for hours with the enemy not even knowing it was there.

This meant the quality of intelligence Tacit Blue was capable of collecting was of far greater value. Metaphorically speaking, the SR-71 was like documenting a wedding by loudly running through a crowd and snapping a few photos. Tacit Blue was like rolling hours of videotape at the same wedding by an invisible cameraman. It was an absolute game-changer. The information was also transmitted securely using a LPI data link in near-real-time so that it could be rapidly exploited, not once the aircraft returned to base.

A drone to hunt Soviet mobile ballistic missiles

AARS/Quartz can be seen as something of a strategic parallel to the more tactically-minded BSAX effort and the Tacit Blue demonstrator. It was conceived as a cooperative effort between the U.S. Air Force, the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO), and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). NRO, the very existence of which was only declassified in 1992, is and has historically been responsible primarily for intelligence-gathering via satellite. However, it was also involved in ISR drone operations in the 1960s and 1970s.

In the 1980s, the Reagan Administration grew concerned about a gap in reconnaissance assets, in the air and in space, to persistently track and monitor Soviet mobile nuclear-armed intermediate-range and intercontinental ballistic missiles.

“As spy satellite systems came on line in the 1960s, they shared the same fundamental operational scheme as the SR-71. Both conducted reconnaissance with relative impunity but were so fast that they only provided episodic coverage. The Soviet system of fixed air bases, missile silos, and command centers of the Cold War’s first 30 years favored ‘fast pass’ reconnaissance, however, so its weaknesses were not evident until the strategic equation shifted in the late 1970s,” Thomas Ehrhard wrote in a monograph, titled Air Force UAVs: The Secret History, which the Mitchell Institute for Airpower Studies published in 2010. “Soviet mobile missiles (both nuclear and air-to-air) and the advance of aviation technology opened the door for a true loitering surveillance UAV called AARS.”

Ehrhard pointed to three missiles as particular drivers behind the AARS program. The first of these was the road-mobile RSD-10 Pioneer, known in the West as the SS-20 Saber, a nuclear-armed intermediate-range ballistic missile (IRBM) with three warheads in a multiple independently targetable reentry vehicle (MIRV) configuration. The SS-20 had an immensely destabilizing impact on the security environment in Europe. Its appearance was a central factor in the United States and the Soviet Union ultimately signing the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty in 1987.

Contemporary reports said that the Soviets were also looking into an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) based on the SS-20, which itself may have been the result of an abortive ICBM program. After the Soviet Union fell, Russia subsequently developed the RS-26 Rubezh, which it described as an ICBM, but many believed it to actually be an IRBM akin to the SS-20. The INF treaty ultimately collapsed in 2019, rendering the issue moot. Five years later, a new Russian intermediate-range missile, called Oreshnik, emerged after one was fired at Ukraine. The U.S. government has assessed Oreshnik to be based on the RS-26.

The other Soviet missiles that helped make the case for AARS/Quartz were two ICBMs, the rail-mobile RT-23 Molodets (SS-24 Scalpel) and the road-mobile RT-2PM/RS-12M Topol (SS-25 Sickle).

In his 2010 monograph, Ehrhard describes the Reagan-era view of the resulting problem set as follows:

“The technological problem of holding these mobile missiles at risk, one that NATO had never solved with the SS-20, now became vastly more complex [with the inclusion of the SS-24 and SS-25]. U.S. forces had to constantly monitor their movement and electronic emissions, something neither fast-pass satellites, U-2s, nor the SR-71 could accomplish. The mission also entailed breaking the over two decade-long declaratory policy of not overflying the Soviet Union, a prospect the Reagan Administration apparently felt was worth the gain. To complicate matters further, they needed a platform that could track those missiles in a nuclear detonation environment while flying from remote bases in the continental US. Operating and receiving imagery from such a craft beyond line-of-sight using space relays would prove daunting. The political and design challenges loomed large, but in the end the Air Force/NRO/CIA consortium opted for a leap-ahead system.”

With all this in mind, AARS/Quartz was seen as a national imperative. The very long-endurance drone, penetrating deep into Soviet airspace, would be able to locate many of these threats, allowing them to be targeted during the opening throes of a potential apocalypse – something we will come back to later on.

By the mid-1980s, contracts were doled out to Lockheed and Boeing to develop what at the time could be seen as the most ambitious ‘silver bullet’ aerospace program of its time, albeit one that had very few eyes on it as it was deeply buried in the classified realm. Ehrhard writes:

“To accomplish the loitering surveillance mission, this UAV needed autonomous (i.e., not remote controlled), highly reliable flight controls, and a design capable of intercontinental ranges from bases in the US zone of the interior with extreme high altitude capability (long wingspan with sailplane-type lift and multi-engine propulsion to reach altitudes more than 70,000 feet). Moreover, it had to carry an array of high-resolution sensors, high-capacity satellite communications capabilities, and various antennas—all in a package that was stealthy to the point of being covert. The cost of developing each technology piece alone would be staggering, but integrating them presented an even greater challenge – thus the project became a magnet for the best and most starry-eyed technologists in the black world. As one CIA engineer said in an anonymous interview, this project was ‘the cat’s pajamas,’ and ‘the single most fun project I ever worked on’ because it stretched every conceivable technology area.”

Ehrhard does not elaborate on the expected sensor package, but an LPI/LPD radar with GMTI and SAR modes, as well as other sensors, would have been needed for a stealthy platform tasked with this mission set. As noted earlier, electronic emissions, which can be detected passively, were also seen at this time as a key way to spot and track mobile missile launchers.

A highly ambitious undertaking

By all indications, AARS/Quartz was seen as a very ambitious effort from the start, but one that could yield impressive capabilities needed to address a mission requirement critical to national security. It should be noted that the U.S. military was pursuing a host of advanced stealth aviation technology programs at around the same time. Many of the efforts would go on to produce real results, if they hadn’t already by the mid-1980s, and this is just based on what is known publicly. Northrop’s stealthy Tacit Blue demonstrator flew for the first time in 1982. Lockheed’s F-117 Nighthawk reached an initial operational capability the following year. The Advanced Technology Bomber (ATB) program that would lead to the B-2 was well underway by this time, too.

In the end, AARS/Quartz did not fare as well as many of its contemporaries, at least from what we know. The program ran through the end of the Reagan years and into the 1990s under the administration of President George H.W. Bush. It morphed and changed hands considerably from a smaller ‘bleeding-edge’ NRO-led program into one that was integrated into a new national unmanned aircraft strategy. This, in turn, caused its mission set to balloon as a maelstrom of stakeholders demanded many capabilities out of a single platform that was already beyond the available technology of the era.

Ehrhard’s 2010 monograph sums up just how bloated AARS became by the 1990s:

“[David A.] Kier[, NRO’s Deputy Director from 1997 to 2001] said the large version of AARS, which according to some reports had a wingspan of 250 feet, cost less than a B-2, but more than $1 billion a copy. Reportedly, the production plan called for only eight vehicles at a cost of $10 billion, each of the vehicles capable of an amazing 40 hours on station after flying to the area of interest.”

“Air Force officials were so leery of the UAV’s autonomous flight concept (no pilot had moment-to-moment control) that they reportedly insisted the flying prototype carry a pilot to handle in-flight anomalies and that the final design include a modular, two-place cockpit insert to make it optionally piloted. ‘By the time everyone got their wishes included,’ Kier said, ‘it [AARS] had to do everything but milk the cow and communicate with the world while doing it.'”

“With all of AARS’s leading-edge sensors and communications links, each of which posed substantial technical challenges in its own right, flight reliability quickly became the biggest design hurdle, according to Kier. The technologies were so secret, and the value of the payload and the air vehicle was so great that its loss over unfriendly territory was unthinkable. One defense official remarked, ‘If one had crashed, it would have been so classified we would have had to bomb it to ensure it was destroyed.'”

“Sailing along on the glut of black money in the late 1980s, AARS kept moving forward despite its continually expanding, problematic requirements list. As happened with [the] D-21 and Compass Arrow [drone programs] in the early 1970s, however, AARS was about to have its most vital mission curtailed.”

“The end of the Cold War brought the expensive program to a halt. An Air Force general familiar with the project said: ‘When AARS was invented, there was more money than they [the NRO] could spend. After the Cold War, the money went away and projects like that could not possibly survive.’ Like predators stalking a wounded animal, manned alternatives to AARS emerged. One proposal would put a sophisticated target acquisition system on the B-2 stealth bomber – the so-called RB-2 configuration. The proposal had value as a terminal tracking system, but the RB-2 lacked a method of off-board cueing to direct it to a search area.”

…

“As it turned out, none of the alternative programs made the cut, for not only was the Cold War officially over with the dissolution of the Soviet Union, but the venerable Strategic Air Command was disbanded in June 1992. With that move, AARS lost its primary military constituent and the AARS alliance began to crumble.”

“…The Air Force pulled funding on AARS, and it was terminated in December 1992 by the intelligence community hierarchy just as it was to enter full scale development. AARS was, in the final analysis, a misfit. It was a major aircraft program backed by a satellite organization (the NRO), and a risky unmanned surveillance platform slated for a combat pilot-led Air Force—hardly an edifice solid enough to survive the removal of its strategic underpinnings. No one organization provided focus or advocacy for the program. As a result, the “perfect” surveillance UAV faded away even as the ultimate Cold War satellite system, Milstar, and the equally exotic B-2 stealth bomber managed to survive, backed as they were by one service, and powerful sub-groups within that service, who were culturally and operationally attuned to those configurations.”

By 1990, Lockheed and Boeing are also said to have been directed to combine their previously separate work on AARS/Quartz.

Kier, who Ehrhard also identifies as the last AARS program manager, says the drone’s design ultimately evolved into something that “resembled a substantially scaled-up version of DARPA’s DarkStar.” Lockheed’s DarkStar, which eventually received the designation RQ-3, was a stealthy tailless design with an ovoid central fuselage and with very long, slender, and straight main wings. Boeing was also a major subcontractor for the RQ-3.

DarkStar was also referred to as “Tier III-minus,” a moniker that reflected the requirements for the drone, which were truncated compared to a planned Tier III type. Tier III was a more direct follow-on to AARS, but was already envisioned as a smaller and less capable, and one would imagine less expensive, uncrewed aircraft. There were also additional lower capability tiers, one of which ultimately led to the RQ-4 Global Hawk. Ehrhard says some members of Congress and of industry did attempt to drum up support for a true successor to AARS/Quartz, unofficially referred to as Tier IV, but without success.

With regard to the RQ-3, at least two flying examples were built, the first of which crashed in 1996 after suffering a control system malfunction. DarkStar had vanished completely from the public eye by 1999, but it has since emerged that a direct line can be traced between it and the stealthy RQ-170 Sentinel via another secretive drone called the X-44A, which TWZ was first to report on back in 2019.

When it comes to AARS/Quartz, the full scale and scope of what exactly came out of the hundreds of millions, and possibly billions, spent on the program over at least a decade, remains unclear. Clearly, major leaps were made in the critical communications, command and control, structural, and sensor technologies needed to make the system a reality. There are rumors that sub-scale risk-reduction test articles were flown, but details surrounding the program remain highly secretive. 

A mission requirement that rhymes

As we noted earlier, many questions remain about the RQ-180, as well as the overall status of that program. At the same time, fast forward some three decades or so from the end of AARS (and its immediate successors), and there are now echoes of the Cold War mission requirements that prompted that program, including in the current conflict with Iran.

The Iranian arsenal of conventionally-armed missiles is not anywhere near the same kind of threat as Soviet nuclear-tipped IRBMs and ICBMs. Still, they do present very real threats, especially for strikes on large critical infrastructure targets and as terror weapons when loaded with cluster munition payloads. The current conflict has demonstrated that strategy also puts immense strain on Israeli missile defenses, which could have broader ramifications, as you can read more about here. Iran’s short-range ballistic missiles offer additional flexibility against targets on land or at sea. In addition, it has been clear for years now that Iran is very willing to launch conventional ballistic missile attacks.

As already noted, the launchers for these missiles are mobile, and some are configured to look like typical civilian-style trucks at a casual glance. Some operate from hardened and underground bases. A number of those facilities were even built with ports that allow missiles to be fired from within, though it is unclear how extensively Iran has made use of that capability in the current conflict. These apertures have likely been repeatedly struck by the U.S. and Israel.

The underlying challenge of finding Iran’s ballistic missiles, and doing so with enough time to attempt to strike them before they launch, has clear similarities to the mission that drove AARS/Quartz. The Iranian case is perhaps more complex in certain respects, given the larger number of smaller missiles, many of which could be dispersed over a broad area. Still, the long-range weapons that threaten Israel are clearly the top priority and would be the easiest to spot for an asset like the RQ-180.

Furthermore, Iran’s air defenses have been significantly degraded after some five weeks of U.S. and Israeli strikes, on top of the losses during the 12 Day War last year, but threats remain. As noted, the northeastern end of the country has seen fewer strikes compared to other areas, overall. Total air supremacy over Iran has yet to be achieved.

This is not a hypothetical assessment either, as underscored by the recent loss of a U.S. Air Force F-15E Strike Eagle. In the ensuing efforts to recover the F-15E’s crew, an A-10 Warthog crashed after being hit by hostile fire and two rescue helicopters were also damaged. American forces deliberately destroyed additional aircraft – reportedly two MC-130J special operations tanker transports and four Little Bird helicopters – inside Iran to prevent the capture of sensitive material. This came after the MC-130Js had become disabled after touching down at an austere operating location during the final mission to retrieve the downed Strike Eagle’s Weapon System Officer.

Last month, a U.S. Air Force F-35A fighter also had to make an emergency landing after reportedly being hit by an Iranian surface-to-air missile. In addition to damage to the aircraft, there are reports that the pilot suffered shrapnel wounds, as well. There have been reports of other close calls since the conflict began.

This is exactly the environment where a very high-flying, extremely long-endurance, and very stealthy drone, like the RQ-180, would be valuable, if not critical, to perform the aforementioned mission. The drone would simply fly outside the range of Iranian defenses if need be and likely fly nearly directly over most of them without fear of being shot down. From that perch, which could be far above where normal jet aircraft fly (60,000-70,000+ feet is possible) it would be able to monitor massive swathes of Iranian territory for movement of launchers and indications of launches, especially around known launch areas and storage sites.

It is also important to note here that much has changed in the past 20 years, let alone the past 40, which makes a successor to the AARS/Quartz concept more viable now, in general. Massive leaps have been made in every single relevant technological area. Examples include the fielding of operational semi-autonomous high-altitude, long-endurance drones, huge breakthroughs in composite structures and satellite data links, and the miniaturization of highly-powerful sensor systems. Just the available satellite bandwidth alone and the increases in onboard computing power were so far advanced by the mid-2000s already compared to the 1980s. Added to that now is the ability to crunch through all the data collected onboard using artificial intelligence and machine learning technologies, which further helps make use of the bandwidth available..

AARS/Quartz was never intended to exist in a vacuum. It was explicitly seen as a part of an ecosystem that also included the B-2 bomber (to strike the targets the drone found) and the Milstar communications satellite constellation (to help transmit relevant data). The B-2 and Milstar did enter service, although the former did so on a very truncated level due to post-Cold War drawdowns. The U.S. military has made further investments since then in advanced networking capabilities as part of integrated kill web architectures. The B-2 and other relevant capabilities that could directly tie in with the RQ-180 are being employed publicly in the current conflict with Iran. It is possible, if not highly plausible, that this integration has already existed for years, in part as a result of the development of the LRS family of systems.

There is a degree of precedent here already, with regard to Iran specifically, with the RQ-170 Sentinel. RQ-170s are understood to have conducted extensive flights over Iran in the 2000s and into the very early 2010s, particularly to provide persistent monitoring of nuclear sites. Those missions were thrust into the public eye in 2011, when an RQ-170 went down in Iran and was captured largely intact.

The fact that the Sentinel has been flying operationally for nearly two decades, at least, also just underscores the degree to which stealthy, persistent drone surveillance capabilities had already advanced decades ago. That being said, the RQ-170 is a medium-altitude platform that was developed as a more tactical-level asset for surveillance of smaller areas. It does not fulfill the continued requirements for something like the RQ-180, able to fly at much higher altitudes over far greater distances for much longer periods of time, while carrying huge sensors, and was never intended to do so.

It’s also worth noting here that any decision to employ a highly secretive and sensitive asset like the RQ-180 over Iran would still carry major risks. Stealth aircraft aren’t invisible or completely immune to threats, and accidents do happen. As noted earlier, a technical issue of some kind may well be the only reason why we got a clear look at the drone during the day at Larissa in Greece, to begin with. At the same time, there is something of a precedent for taking these kinds of risks with regard to Iran, specifically, even outside of the demands of open conflict. After the RQ-170 went down in Iran, it is very likely that Russia and China had opportunities to analyze the drone in detail. But the technologies in the RQ-170, and its very design, are understood to be far less exquisite than what would be found in the RQ-180.

But even as an RQ-180 would have an even more pressing use case against a peer competitor like China, which is drastically expanding its nuclear arsenal and has thousands of road-mobile ballistic missiles, risking such a sensitive asset over Iran is paired with the high stakes involved with this operation, especially in regard to Israel. Iran’s massive and rapidly growing number of long-range missiles were a stated reason Trump decided he had to act now. The administration has said that soon Iran would be able to oversaturate any defenses if action wasn’t taken. It is this same threat that would be a major factor in using such a prized asset for Epic Fury, to do whatever possible to limit the damage to Israel, and to America’s Arab allies as well.

When the secretive drone first emerged at Larissa, comparisons were also drawn to an Israeli design referred to as the RA-01. That uncrewed stealth aircraft has a roughly similar planform, but is a smaller overall design that likely falls between the RQ-170 and the RQ-180. It has been very active during the conflict, being seen in videos. It would be of no surprise if it were tasked with hunting Iranian missile launchers, as well.

It should be stressed that we still do not know for sure why the secretive drone is at Larissa and what operations it might have been conducting, or still is, from the Greek base. As mentioned at the start of this piece, U.S. authorities have, so far, declined to comment on the uncrewed aircraft’s presence there at all.

At the same time, its emergence does come at a time when the capabilities of the RQ-180, or an evolution thereof, would be in extremely high demand to support current operations over Iran, and specifically to address the urgent need to counter Iran’s long-range weapons, just as the progenitor of the concept was meant to do nearly four decades ago.

UPDATE: 4/7/2026 —

Additional videos of the ‘RQ-180’ flying over Larissa in Greece have offered new insights into its design and capabilities, as you can read more about here.

Contact the author: joe@twz.com

The post RQ-180’s Likely Role Over Iran Foreshadowed By Secret Cold War Stealth Drone Program appeared first on The War Zone.

To get more insights about how such a FARP would be set up and operated, we reached out to Kyle Rempfer, a former Special Tactics Squadron (STS) airman who served in Afghanistan and Iraq. STS units are an elite cadre of operators who work to control aircraft in the air, including from airfields they establish deep inside contested territory, and direct airpower onto the enemy, among other duties, including rescuing personnel trapped behind enemy lines. They are often paired with special operations units, such as SEALs, Delta Force and Rangers, to bring their unique skills to their missions.

Rempfer, a journalist and former colleague of the author at Military Times, offered unique insights into the process as someone who trained for these missions.

Some of the questions and answers have been lightly edited for clarity.

Q: What happens at the Special Tactics Squadron level when the word comes out that there’s an aircraft down deep into enemy territory? 

A: By this point in the campaign, Air Force Special Tactics teams – which are made up of combat controllers (CCTs) and pararescue jumpers (PJs) – would have surveyed or identified scores of Iranian runways and austere airfields that can be used for landing zones or drop zones down the line. Even if CCTs hadn’t set foot on these sites, they’d have pulled imagery of the locations and started using tools like AutoCAD, a surveying and mapping software, to sketch out the dimensions of an airfield and identify what type of aircraft could land there. Is this a site that could only work for a light short take off and landing (STOL) aircraft, or could we land something bigger like a C-17? Those types of questions are on their minds. And since this event appears to have happened near the Isfahan nuclear facility, it can be assumed that Special Tactics has been scoping out landing zones in that area since at least this war started, maybe far earlier. 

For this mission, the Special Tactics team just needed someplace to land a couple of MC-130J Commando IIs. Those are designed to infiltrate and exfiltrate special operations troops into and out of the hinterlands, so an agricultural runway intended for crop-spraying planes would fit the bill in terms of dimensions. But on the ground, the soil strength might not hold up for repeat landings, or perhaps the recent weather has eroded the area or left it muddy. That can have an impact, and there are tools like dynamic cone penetrometers that Special Tactics teams use to assess soil strength. They’ve used those and a host of other tools to scout airfields all around potential conflict zones in Africa, northern Iraq, Syria, etc., but given the tight security in Iran, that probably was not feasible to do in advance here. So the soil strength might have been a known-unknown going in. 

Q: What would happen once the FARP is set up?

A: They can do these fast. Everything is prestaged, even inside the MC-130. AH-6 Little Bird helicopters were probably offloaded and taking off within minutes, not hours, and beaming toward the WSO’s beacon. At that point, the team at the FARP site is pulling security and talking to all the aircraft overhead. Those pilots and aircrews are using sensors to monitor all the roadways that plausibly lead to the site, and potentially even putting warheads on those roadways to make them unusable. We know there were some diversionary bomb drops as part of the rescue, so they could also take that time to put big potholes in the roads.

Q: Can you talk about what systems, personnel and equipment would have secured the site?

A: The people who are surveying and setting up the landing zone and FARP are probably CCTs [Combat Control Teams] from the 24th Special Tactics Squadron. They would have had imagery to look at ahead of the mission, but you might not know what level of stress the ground can take until you physically get there. CCTs are trained to inspect that, blow up obstacles on the runway if needed, scan enemy activity around the landing site, etc., and then set up the austere airfield to start accepting planes and helos. They might not have had time to do a full-on reconnaissance mission, of course. 

CCTs have dirt bikes, something like a Kawasaki KLR 250, that they can drive up and down the airstrip for quickly setting up lights and visually inspecting the terrain. The lights they’d use to create the airstrip would be set up to infrared mode so only people with night vision devices can see them. This isn’t the early days of Afghanistan, though, and night vision devices have proliferated to such a degree that infrared lights are no longer the game changer they once were. However, it still prevents civilians from seeing the operation at night, and that is important given reports that Iranian state media was mobilizing the population to look for the downed airman. 

Q: Who would be brought in for force protection?

A: The CCTs of course are not alone at the landing zone. They had DEVGRU (SEAL Team 6) for security and dozens of aircraft backing them up with an absolutely jarring amount of aerial firepower. CCTs are usually also certified JTACs so they can manage the aircraft stacks not just for landing the MC-130s and AH-6s returning from the WSO rescue, but also the dozens of aircraft overhead that can fire at targets as necessary.

Q: Reports indicate that the WSO climbed up a 7,000 foot crevice and hid out there with intermittent communications while the Iranians were looking for him. How does that complicate things? And what would the team on the ground be doing?

A: I imagine that all the communications would have been encrypted – not anything that the Iranians could listen in on. For the guys on the ground, the biggest situation is monitoring to make sure that other forces aren’t approaching the area and protecting that forward arming and refueling site, because while it’s not a base, for all intents and purposes it is the center of mass of the most U.S. forces, the safest zone you have. So basically probably just protected that site. 

Q: What would be happening in the air?

A: You would have ISR assets that would be scanning the area, and not just the immediate area, but probably any roads and highways leading up to where that FARP site was set up. They would be watching anyone who could possibly be approaching. 

That whole area would just be soaked with ISR assets, and I know the Iranians knocked out two Reaper drones during the operation. So presumably, there was plenty of ISR. 

There would be a mix of attack and surveillance aircraft. There would be dozens of aircraft available for this mission. That is great for the team on the ground, but just like an air traffic control tower at Ronald Reagan Airport in DC can be overburdened, so will the JTAC who’s on the ground controlling all these different pilots and aircrews calling in to report threats they’ve spotted, relay their fuel or munitions status, report radio chatter they’re picking up from the ground, etc. This could require multiple JTACs on the ground, and probably also pilots in A-10s or F-35s who can act as an extra layer of forward air control in the sky, handling aircraft check-ins and keeping track of specific assets so the JTACs on the ground aren’t losing their minds handling a massive air stack behind enemy lines. 

Most CCTs also have a JTAC certification, so they can help call in airstrikes as needed to protect the FARP site. And attack aircraft, like A-10s, or multi-role fighters, like F-35s, also have pilots who are certified as Forward Air Controller (Airborne) — or FAC(A). The E-3 can also provide a command and control function to help manage this complex battlespace. 

Q: How difficult is a mission like this? What are the dangers?

A: This would have been a hot refueling site, with engines running refueling, and you’re doing all that blacked out, and you have to probably keep the amount of radio chatter on the ground to a minimum because you don’t know if maybe Iran does have something where they can break through the encryption. 

So I would imagine that the danger is even more than just the IRGC coming in and shooting at you. The danger is the technicalities that you’re dealing with, with the forward arming and refueling sites and all these aircraft moving around under night vision in blacked out conditions in a tight area. It’s a small airfield, you have to keep your signature low.

 Thankfully, they were able to get more aircraft in to usher everyone out. But that just shows how even what they were dealing with, the runway probably wasn’t built to handle these kinds of aircraft, or not maintained. 

Clearly this kind of operation – where you’re coming in, setting up an airfield, whether it’s for a follow-on parachute jump or even just air landing more troops and supplies – would be repeated in most of the other scenarios people are talking about. For instance, going in and digging out Iran’s enriched uranium. I think it would have to be pretty similar. You would send in a special tactics team with some Ranger recce guys, and the Ranger reconnaissance company would maybe parachute in, and check out the airfield, and they would start bringing in the MC-130s. It’s going to be a remote, austere airfield. It’s not going to be easy to land aircraft there, it’s not going to be well maintained, and you’re going to run into a lot of problems on the ground with aircraft. 

In addition to the fixed-wing planes, the U.S. also destroyed a reported four Little Birds on the way out. Imagine if you’re trying to do sustained operations bringing aircraft in, that all those aircraft are wearing down that obscure runway as you’re coming in, and you’re having more and more troops flow in. Your signature is going to be bigger and it’s going to be there for a longer time. 

So this is how you create a window into a country to conduct follow-on operations. In this case, it was just to look for one guy and pick him up. But, they’re obviously looking at runways and airfields all across the country, whether they’re actual runways that are in use by the Iranian government or municipal governments, or if they’re just like roads that they can use or dirt fields that they think they can land on. So this rescue mission was probably a snapshot into larger operational planning.

Q: After the rescue of the pilot, the search for the WSO seemed to turn fairly quickly from a traditional PJ mission to a Tier One rescue operation. Can you talk about that transition and how those two fit together?

A: That’s right. From my understanding, there were two missions. The first was a traditional CSAR mission that was launched in daylight immediately after the F-15E went down. This likely involved the PJs from a rescue squadron that was on standby. They were aboard HH-60W Jolly Greens and had refueling support from an HC-130J. That mission is obviously very risky and time sensitive. They’re flying low and slow, in daylight, and vulnerable to ground fire. We saw people shooting at them with small arms, which probably won’t do much barring really lucky shots, but the crews are still exposed to man portable air defense systems (MANPADS).

You can see Iranians firing small arms at the CSAR aircraft in the following video.

This initial CSAR package successfully recovered the F-15E pilot, who would have had a beacon and survival radio. But obviously the WSO was still at large. Perhaps they knew his location but couldn’t get to him before the region came alive like a bees’ nest – with everyone from locals to actual security forces scouring the scene. At that point, it appears the mission shifted from a more traditional CSAR operation conducted by a rescue squadron to something we’re actually more familiar with from Afghanistan and Iraq – Tier One raids into denied territory. This makes sense to me because this was the single most important mission going on, and it makes sense to flood this with assets to successfully pull off a second pick up. In a bigger war, I doubt downed aircrew can expect JSOC rescue parties every time one of them goes down. 

A lot of people were surprised that MC-130s and AH-6s were used for this, but it actually reminds me a lot of the early Afghanistan missions Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) conducted in fall 2001, before the Taliban fell. At least one of these involved Air Force Special Tactics CCTs parachuting into a remote part of Afghanistan, setting up a dirt airstrip, landing two MC-130s, off-loading a couple of Little Birds and then flying those around all night striking Taliban targets.

This rescue raid isn’t too different. It sounds like Air Force Special Tactics CCTs surveyed the airfield in advance – maybe in person, maybe just using satellite imagery – and then brought in the MC-130s that held the AH-6s to actually conduct the rescue that grabbed the WSO. This sort of scheme makes sense given the distance inside Iran. The MC-130s can bring extra fuel and ammunition to set up a mini-special ops refueling and re-arming site.

One thing to note here is why the commandos reportedly blew up the MC-130s on the way out. If the government’s version of events is accurate, this might have been because the runway was not suitable for the MC-130s and those planes got stuck or damaged landing there. The CCTs may have known this was a possibility but determined it was the least bad option. There’s also the possibility the aircraft were more damaged by enemy fire than we’ve been told. We may never know. 

Q: What would be the biggest danger from the Iranians? Indirect fire like artillery? Drones?

A: Hard for me to say. If the team had the element of surprise, which it seemed to, then the Iranians would have been caught off guard enough that they didn’t have time to stage artillery or have drones already scanning the area. In that case, I could see the biggest threat being local police or civilians stumbling upon the site early in the mission. As the operation gets underway, the noise signature would probably attract more and more attention. And then you have IRGC teams speeding to the scene. If they’re moving fast, they might only have small arms, maybe some belt-fed machine guns, small caliber mortars, and potentially MANPADs. The longer the U.S. team was on the ground, the more time Iran had to rush forces to the scene and that’s when things appeared to get dicey, the Army’s Delta Force reportedly had to blow in place the MC-130s and call in a quick reaction force (QRF) for pickup. 

This is also why having so many aircraft overhead would be useful. Not only are those planes there to strike targets, they can listen to enemy communications and local civilian radio chatter, they can use their sensors to scan all the routes leading up to the airfield, and they can use jamming and spoofing to befuddle the Iranian response. All that helps buy time. 

Q: What kinds of geospatial tools would have been used to find and prep the site and carry out the mission?

A: I imagine in advance of this mission the airfields and runways in this area were pre-scouted using satellite imagery. I’m probably too out of date to go into specifics even if I wanted to, but we have very high resolution satellite imagery that’s available in the commercial space and is very impressive. Additionally, aircraft can fly over sites and scan the terrain using LIDAR to build 3D maps of the environment. Suffice to say, the CCTs would have a great picture of the environment before going in, but being physically on the ground shows new problems — can the soil hold up to landing an MC-130? How fine is the sand? When the AH-6s take off, are they creating a brown-out environment? 

In an ideal scenario, the CCTs could parachute in before the main mission, conducting a high-altitude, high-opening (HAHO) jump and then confirming on the ground that the site will work to land an MC-130. We don’t know if that’s what happened, but if the reporting is accurate that an MC-130 got stuck and had to be blown up in place, then perhaps they made a mistake or – my bet – they knew the runway was rough and accepted the risk.

Contact the author: howard@thewarzone.com

The post How A Dusty Strip Deep In Iran Can Be Turned Into A U.S. Special Operations Base In Hours appeared first on The War Zone.

According to the official IRNA news agency, Iran delivered its response to the U.S. proposal via Pakistan, rejecting the idea of a ceasefire and underscoring the need for a permanent conclusion to the war.

The response outlined 10 provisions, including ending regional hostilities, lifting sanctions, and supporting reconstruction efforts, IRNA reported.

According to a report from Axios that cites “four U.S., Israeli, and regional sources with knowledge of the talks,” the two-tier plan was to start with a 45-day ceasefire, planned to lead into a longer-term peace deal.

A senior Iranian official confirmed to the Reuters news agency that Tehran had received the ceasefire plan from Pakistan.

Pakistan has been playing a leading role in negotiations, with its Army chief, Field Marshal Asim Munir, reportedly in contact throughout the night with U.S. Vice President JD Vance, special envoy Steve Witkoff, and Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi.

One major sticking point appears to be Iran’s refusal to reopen the Strait of Hormuz in exchange for a “temporary ceasefire.” Around a fifth of the world’s oil supply usually passes through the strait, which Iran has effectively blocked.

The same Iranian official told Reuters that the United States is not ready for a permanent ceasefire. Tehran will not be pressured into accepting deadlines and making a decision, the official added.

Over the weekend, U.S. President Donald Trump threatened to obliterate Iranian power plants and bridges if it doesn’t agree to fully reopen the Strait of Hormuz by 8:00 p.m. Tuesday (U.S. Eastern Time). “If they don’t come through, if they want to keep it closed, they’re going to lose every power plant and every other plant they have in the whole country,” Trump said in an eight-minute interview with The Wall Street Journal on Sunday. 

Today, Trump reiterated that the Tuesday deadline is final.

Trump also issued an expletive-laden warning on his Truth Social website: “Tuesday will be Power Plant Day, and Bridge Day, all wrapped up in one, in Iran. There will be nothing like it!!! Open the Fuckin’ Strait, you crazy bastards, or you’ll be living in Hell – JUST WATCH! Praise be to Allah. President DONALD J. TRUMP.”

Iran’s parliament speaker responded with a warning that the US president’s “reckless moves” would mean “our whole region is going to burn”.

Iran’s deputy foreign minister said that those threats could amount to war crimes. “The American president, as the highest official of his country, has publicly threatened to commit war crimes,” Kazem Gharibabadi said on X, citing provisions of international law.

“The threat to attack power plants and bridges (civilian infrastructure) is a war crime under Article 8(2)(b) of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court,” he said, cited by AFP. Gharibabadi also warned that Iran would “deliver a decisive, immediate and regret-inducing response to any aggression or imminent threat.”

Iran has itself attacked civilian infrastructure on the Arabian Peninsula, including desalination plants critical to providing water to people living there.

Iran’s parliamentary speaker, Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf, condemned Trump’s threats and argued that he was being misled by Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. “Your reckless moves are dragging the United States into a living HELL for every single family, and our whole region is going to burn because you insist on following Netanyahu’s commands,” Qalibaf posted on X.

Iran’s central military command also responded to the latest threats, promising “much more devastating” retaliation if the U.S. military starts to hit civilian targets.

According to Barak Ravid, global affairs correspondent for Axios, the 45-day ceasefire is “one of many more ideas” being discussed.

UPDATES:

We have concluded updates for the day.

UPDATE: 6:05 PM EDT –

A nighttime Iranian drone strike on Ali Al Salem Air Base in Kuwait wounded 15 Americans, two U.S. officials told CBS News.

Most of those injured have since returned to duty, one official said.

Altogether, 373 U.S. service members have been hurt since the US-Israeli war with Iran began, including 330 who have resumed duty and five who remain seriously wounded, according to a US Central Command spokesperson speaking to the outlet.

UPDATE: 6:00 PM EDT –

There are reports from Fox News, citing high-ranking U.S. sources, that B-2 stealth bombers were using Massive Ordnance Penetrators (MOP) to strike an IRGC underground headquarters outside of the Iranian capital, Tehran, while the F-15E WSO rescue was ongoing.

UPDATE: 5:45 PM EDT –

A spokesperson for Iran’s top joint military command has described Trump’s latest threats as “delusional.”

In a statement reported by state media and cited by Al Jazeera, the spokesperson for Khatam al-Anbiya Central Headquarters added that such threats will not make up for the United States’ “disgrace and humiliation” in the region.

UPDATE: 4:15 PM EDT –

A recent post on X by the U.S. Central Command shows U.S. Marines preparing an example of the M142 High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS) during Operation Epic Fury.

UPDATE: 4:10 PM EDT –

Reuters reports that four Iranian army ground force officers were killed on Sunday during an operation to counter U.S. aircraft in Isfahan, citing the semi-official Fars news agency. It is unclear if this is connected to the F-15E WSO recovery operation, which was taking place in the same region at that time.

UPDATE: 4:00 PM EDT –

Temporary markings in the form of Easter eggs appeared on the nose of this U.S. Air Force U-2S spy plane, seen departing RAF Fairford, in England, for a mission this morning.

U.S. Secretary of War Pete Hegseth says the United States will step up its strikes on Iran under Trump’s orders.

“Per the president’s direction, today will be the largest volume of strikes since day one of this operation. Tomorrow, even more than today. And then Iran has a choice.”

UPDATE: 3:40 PM EDT –

Trump today repeated his familiar assertions about the success of the war and the performance of the U.S. military (it has performed “unbelievably well,” he said), while also praising the “very historic” rescue of the second crew member from the Air Force F-15E shot down over Iran last week.

Shifting to his latest deadline for Tehran to reopen the Strait of Hormuz (8:00 p.m. ET on Tuesday), he added:

“The entire country can be taken out in one night, and that night might be tomorrow night.”

Trump warned that if Iran failed to meet his deadline, it would be left with “no bridges” and “no power plants,” saying the country would be reduced to “the Stone Ages,” reiterating his previous threat to send Iran “back to the Stone Ages.”

He later reinforced that warning, saying strikes on Iran’s bridges and power plants could begin from 8:00 p.m. ET tomorrow and suggesting the operation could be completed in as little as four hours.

“Every power plant in Iran will be out of business, burning, exploding, and never to be used again … I mean complete demolition by 12 o’clock. And it will happen over a period of four hours if we wanted to. We don’t want that to happen.”

UPDATE: 3:45 PM EDT –

In a surprising disclosure, Trump today suggested that Washington armed (Kurdish) Iranian opposition groups during the January demonstrations.

“President Trump told me the United States sent guns to the Iranian protesters,” Trump told Trey Yingst on the Fox News channel.

“He told me, ‘We sent them a lot of guns. We sent them to the Kurds.’ And the president says he thinks the Kurds kept them. He went on to say. ‘We sent guns to the protesters, a lot of them.’”

As well as lending credence to Iran’s claims that the protests were foreign-inspired, the disclosure would appear to put Kurds in an even more dangerous position. For their part, Kurdish groups have denied the claims.

UPDATE: 3:50 PM EDT –

Trump today implied that the widening rift between the United States and NATO began when he floated the idea of taking over Greenland.

“It all began with, if you want to know the truth, Greenland. We want Greenland. They don’t want to give it to us. And I said, ‘bye, bye.’”

He made the comments ahead of a scheduled visit to the White House later this week by NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte — whom Trump, for what it’s worth, describes as a “wonderful guy” and a “great person.”

“NATO is a paper tiger. We didn’t need them, obviously, because they haven’t helped at all.”

Earlier today, U.S.-Israeli strikes killed the intelligence chief of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, according to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).

“Major General Majid Khademi, the powerful and educated head of the Intelligence Organisation of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, was martyred in the criminal terrorist attack by the American-Zionist enemy… at dawn today,” said the Guards in a post on their Telegram channel.

The IDF has continued airstrikes against Iranian targets, including further attacks on Mehrabad International Airport in Tehran, a major hub for commercial flights, which is also used by the government of Iran, and is one of the bases of the Islamic Republic of Iran Air Force (IRIAF). A video released by the IDF shows multiple Mi-8/17 Hip-series helicopters being targeted on the ground at Mehrabad. The IDF claims that “dozens” of aircraft were hit.

U.S. forces located on Bubiyan ​Island, Kuwait, were targeted by ‌Iran, Ebrahim Zolfaghari, the spokesperson of Iran’s Khatam al-Anbiya Central Headquarters, said ​in a video ​statement shared by state media ⁠on Monday. Bubiyan is the largest of Kuwait’s coastal island chain, located in the northwest of the Gulf. Zolfaghari said that Iran targeted satellite equipment and munitions on the island with drones, adding that U.S. forces had relocated there from Arifjan camp in Kuwait after that base was repeatedly struck by Iran.

Israeli rescue teams were searching through debris on Monday for two people still missing after a missile strike in the northern city of Haifa, authorities said. The projectile, reportedly launched from Iran, hit a residential building, killing two people.

Officials said the direct impact on the seven-storey structure caused severe damage, leaving parts of it partially collapsed. Videos showed rescuers combing through the rubble with flashlights, navigating broken concrete and debris as the search continued.

“We have a major destruction site,” said Elad Edri, chief of staff of Israel’s home front command. Israel’s fire and rescue services said later that two of four people trapped under the rubble had been found dead.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has warned that strikes near Iran’s Bushehr nuclear power plant pose a serious risk to nuclear safety and must cease.

Located in the country’s south, the facility, which is home to a 1,000-megawatt reactor, has reportedly been targeted four times since the start of the latest conflict.

Rafael Grossi, director of the IAEA, said that any strikes around the area “could cause a severe radiological accident with harmful consequences for people and the environment in Iran and beyond.” He added that one strike hit just 250 feet from the plant perimeter. “A nuclear facility and surrounding areas should never be struck,” he said.

Israel has struck a major petrochemical facility at Iran’s massive South Pars natural gas field, according to multiple news agencies.

Israel’s defence minister, Israel Katz, confirmed what he described as “a powerful strike on the largest petrochemical facility in Iran,” which accounts for roughly half of the country’s petrochemical output. Meanwhile, Israeli military spokesperson Lt. Col. Nadav Shoshani said there would be “no immunity” for Iran as negotiations continue.

Katz’s remarks followed an earlier report from the Fars News Agency stating that “several explosions” were heard at the South Pars petrochemical complex in Asaluyeh.

The development raises doubts about ongoing efforts to secure a ceasefire between the United States and Iran. The field, which Iran shares with Qatar, is the largest natural gas reserve in the world and lies beneath the Persian Gulf. The latest strikes come just weeks after widespread international criticism of Israel’s March 18 attack on the same South Pars gas field.

Iran widened its attacks on Gulf energy infrastructure over the weekend, carrying out drone and missile strikes on petrochemical sites in Kuwait, Bahrain, and the United Arab Emirates. The Revolutionary Guards also said they had targeted an Israeli-linked vessel at Dubai’s Jebel Ali port.

Authorities in the emirate of Sharjah said on Sunday that they were responding to an incident involving Khor Fakkan Port, one of the United Arab Emirates’ largest container hubs. No injuries were reported, and officials provided no additional details in a statement released by the Sharjah media office.

Earlier, the United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations (UKMTO) reported that the captain of a container ship at the port had observed several splashes from unidentified projectiles landing close to the vessel.

An Indian-flagged, Japan-owned tanker has crossed the Strait of Hormuz. A spokeswoman for Mitsui O.S.K. Lines told AFP that the Green Asha, owned by its subsidiary, had passed through the strait and was en route to India. The vessel, a liquefied petroleum gas tanker, is the third Japan-linked ship to transit the strait. “Both the crew and the cargo are safe,” the spokeswoman said.

North Korea appears to be stepping back from its longstanding ties with Iran and is carefully shaping its public messaging to keep open the possibility of improved relations with the United States after the Iran conflict, South Korean lawmakers told Reuters on Monday, citing intelligence officials.

There are unconfirmed reports, based on publicly available flight-tracking data, that a U.S. Air Force F-35 fighter flying in an area in southern Iraq, close to the Kuwaiti border, has squawked 7700. This is the universal, international transponder code used by aircraft to immediately alert Air Traffic Control (ATC) of a general emergency.

While we had previously seen Iranian satellite imagery that purported to show the extent of the Iranian attack on Prince Sultan Air Base in Saudi Arabia that occurred on March 27, the destruction of an aircraft maintenance shelter now appears to have been verified by commercially available Sentinel-2L imagery. The attack also destroyed a prized E-3 Sentry Airborne Warning and Control System (AWACS) as well as damaging other aircraft and injuring several American service members, as you can read more about here.

An IDF spokesperson disclosed recently that an Iranian underground complex used for storing ballistic missiles had been targeted.

Based on open-source intelligence, this appears to have been a relatively new and sizable missile base, constructed within the past two years along the Tehran–Qazvin road. It features at least five large access points designed for missile transporters and launch systems.

It also seems that the site was put into operation before construction was fully completed.

In recent days, imagery has emerged showing the reported aftermath of an Iranian drone strike on Camp Buehring in Kuwait, which appears to have destroyed at least one U.S. Army CH-47F Chinook helicopter.

Further signs of an attack on Camp Buehring are provided by infrared imagery from the NASA FIRMS portal.

More evidence has emerged of the use of cluster bombs in U.S. airstrikes on Iran. Last week, photos appeared showing Israeli Air Force F-16I Sufa fighters apparently carrying cluster munitions. Now, U.S. Air Force F-16s have also been photographed with cluster bomb units underwing. The kinds of submunitions that might be inside remain unknown. However, Iranian officials previously accused the United States of employing air-dropped BLU-91/B anti-tank mines, which are delivered via cluster bomb. This seems most likely to be part of a limited-use area denial strategy to contain long-range missile launches, as you can read about in our previous reporting here.

Contact the author: thomas@thewarzone.com

The post Iran Rejects Ceasefire Deal (Updated) appeared first on The War Zone.

As is typically the case, the images of the crash site look authentic after a cursory examination, but that could change in the future.

These helicopters, if in AH-6 configuration, were likely delivered to the landing site to provide close air support and force protection for the larger force deployed there. Reports now state that there may not have been a major firefight on the ground as originally reported, but Iranians were fired upon from the air when trying to approach the base. Video supposedly showing one of these engagements does look like the firing aircraft could be an AH-6.

The Little Birds could have also been used to help find and support the extraction of the pilot if in MH-6 configuration. Little Birds can be configured in the AH-6 attack and MH-6 assault configurations.

The force protection role for exactly this kind of mission is a key one for the AH-6. Night Stalker AH-6 crews train heavily for it. The Little Birds can be rapidly delivered to forward locations aboard aircraft as small as a C-130, but it’s their ability to be rolled out and flying in mere minutes that suits them so well for this mission set. The MC-130 can act as transport, weapons hauler and a gas station on the ground for the Little Birds.

You can read all about the Little Bird’s ability to be rapidly deployed virtually anywhere in our past feature linked here.

The Little Birds could possibly have flown directly to the site, and then refueled from the MC-130J on the ground and operated out of the makeshift base, although the range on these aircraft is limited, even with auxiliary fuel tanks. Even flying from Kuwait or a commercial ship in the northern Persian Gulf, a direct flight over Iranian airspace would have been very risky and required much of the Little Bird’s range. Overall, this option seems very likely.

As to why the Little Birds were destroyed in place, that isn’t clear. Extracting the force was likely done in a big hurry, especially due to the immobilization of two C-130s. If the Little Birds flew in aboard them, there may have been no time (or room) to load them onto the replacement aircraft. They could have also been damaged by enemy fire. If they flew in directly themselves, the mission may not have gone as planned and they could not be fueled while on the ground by the stricken MC-130s. There are many possibilities.

Destroying stranded special operations aircraft is absolutely critical as they are packed with sensitive sensors, communications, defensive systems and more.

Regardless, the inclusion of the Little Birds is another indication of just how complex this mission, which was thrown together in just a matter of hours, was. It’s also a reminder of just how versatile and forward deployable the MH/AH-6s truly are.

UPDATE: 6:02 AM PDT—

The landing zone has been geolocated to just south of Isfahan. This puts it about 200 miles from the Iranian coastline and roughly 230 miles from a land border. It is very unlikely the Little Birds made this trip on their own (can rule it out almost entirely) beyond the tactical issues with doing so.

Contact the author: Tyler@twz.com

The post Night Stalker AH-6 Little Bird Helicopters Destroyed At Forward Landing Site In Iran appeared first on The War Zone.

President Trump took to Truth Social confirming multiple reports that the WSO was safely in American hands.

WE GOT HIM! My fellow Americans, over the past several hours, the United States Military pulled off one of the most daring Search and Rescue Operations in U.S. History, for one of our incredible Crew Member Officers, who also happens to be a highly respected Colonel, and who I am thrilled to let you know is now SAFE and SOUND! This brave Warrior was behind enemy lines in the treacherous mountains of Iran, being hunted down by our enemies, who were getting closer and closer by the hour, but was never truly alone because his Commander in Chief, Secretary of War, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and fellow Warfighters were monitoring his location 24 hours a day, and diligently planning for his rescue. At my direction, the U.S. Military sent dozens of aircraft, armed with the most lethal weapons in the World, to retrieve him. He sustained injuries, but he will be just fine. This miraculous Search and Rescue Operation comes in addition to a successful rescue of another brave Pilot, yesterday, which we did not confirm, because we did not want to jeopardize our second rescue operation. This is the first time in military memory that two U.S. Pilots have been rescued, separately, deep in Enemy Territory. WE WILL NEVER LEAVE AN AMERICAN WARFIGHTER BEHIND! The fact that we were able to pull off both of these operations, without a SINGLE American killed, or even wounded, just proves once again, that we have achieved overwhelming Air Dominance and Superiority over the Iranian skies. This is a moment that ALL Americans, Republican, Democrat, and everyone else, should be proud of and united around. We truly have the best, most professional, and lethal Military in the History of the World. GOD BLESS AMERICA, GOD BLESS OUR TROOPS, AND HAPPY EASTER TO ALL!

“U.S. special forces rescued the second crew member of the F-15 fighter jet that was shot down over Iran,” Axios reported prior to Trump’s posting, citing three U.S. officials. “Saturday’s operation was conducted by a specialized commando unit with a high volume of air cover…the U.S. forces unleashed a hail of heavy fire, and that all of the forces were now out of Iran.”

Videos emerged from the scene showing what appears to be missile strikes, with the sounds of gunfire and explosions being heard.

Another video purports to show Iranian citizens in the area, searching for the pilot. Tehran has offered a large reward for the WSO’s capture. Seizing the airman, or killing them, would have provided an enormous public relations windfall for Tehran and embarrassment for Washington.

Earlier Saturday evening, the Instagram account for U.S. Air Force Special Warfare Recruiting said the WSO was rescued.

“BREAKING: The missing F-15E weapons systems officer that was shot down in Iran yesterday was recovered alive by American Special Operations with Air Force Special Warfare attachments inside contested enemy area in Iran.

Special operators willingly put their lives on the line to rescue the fallen, engaged in a ‘massive firefight’ at the extraction site, and fought with all they had ‘so that others may live.’

What a win for America, and the WSO who paid attention in SERE training. What a win for the Air Force Special Warfare community. If you are looking to join America’s best and bravest that bring our fellow Americans home on their worst days, contact your local Air Force Recruiter today!

F-15 WSO recovered alive. Was escaping and evading. Massive fire fight on tgt. Iranians were actively looking for him in the area.”

In addition, journalist and former Green Beret Jack Murphy stated on X that they were rescued before reports began to hit online.

Since the shootdown, the U.S. has deployed a rescue packages including fighters for top cover, the HH-60W Jolly Green II helicopters and HC-130J Combat King CSAR planes, surveillance jets and drones, among many other assets. You can read more about what goes into a CSAR package in our previous reporting here. As the U.S. search continued Saturday for the WSO, a large firefight reportedly broke out in the southern area of Iran near where the crash took place.

As we have frequently noted, CSAR operations are among the most dangerous and complex missions U.S. troops perform, penetrating into potentially highly defended territory where, in this case, one of America’s most capable combat aircraft did not survive. All this is taking place with the Iranians on the highest alert and very active with their own hunt for the WSO. The fact that the operation was launched in broad daylight soon after the F-15E went down shows the stunning amount of risk U.S. personnel took on in order to save one of their own.

After the crash, videos emerged of the rescue efforts.

One showed a Combat King flying low over the Iranian countryside.

A rescue helicopter can be seen coming under Iranian fire in the following video.

You can see a Combat King trailed by two Jolly Green IIs in this next video.

In addition to the F-15E that was shot down and the two rescue helicopters damaged by Iranian fire, an A-10C Thunderbolt II close support jet crashed after being hit, with the pilot bailing out. Another A-10 may have been damaged during the search effort as well.

The reality is that this was one of the most daring combined arms operations in years and the whole story as to how it all went down successfully is sure to be of huge interest in the coming days and weeks. As always with this type of operation and the initial reporting surrounding, details are bound to change as a clearer picture of what happened and what didn’t happen comes to light.

UPDATE: 12:57 AM EDT—

NYT reports that the operation involved landing multiple transport aircraft inside enemy territory. Two of the aircraft (likely MC-130Js) got stuck at the forward airfield and three more aircraft had to come and pickup the U.S. forces now stranded there. The aircraft were demolished in place in order for them not to fall into enemy hands.

So this went far beyond a heliborne rescue operation and according to the report, fixed-wing aircraft landed in enemy territory that was hot with activity. Of course, there are shades of the disastrous Operation Eagle Claw here, but this time, the end result was very different.

Iranian semi-state media has posted an image that appears to show two C-130s on the ground and another that shows a thick plume of black smoke at their location.

This appears to have been a stunning display of USAF/special operations joint forcible entry capability.

UPDATE: 1:47AM EDT—

There are reports that the CIA used highly unique capabilities to locate the WSO and executed an elaborate ‘deception campaign’ targeting Iranian forces in order to allow U.S. aircraft to make it to their forward location to execute the rescue.

Jennifer Griffin writes:

According to a senior administration official: Prior to locating the WSO (Weapons System Officer) and the US military’s daring rescue, the CIA first launched a deception campaign spreading word inside Iran that U.S. forces had already found him and were moving him on the ground for exfiltration out of the country. While the Iranians were confused and uncertain of what was happening, the Agency used its unique, exquisite capabilities to search for — and find — the American airman. This was the ultimate “needle in a haystack,” but in this case it was a brave American soul inside a mountain crevice, invisible but for CIA’s capabilities. The CIA immediately shared the WSO’s exact location with the Pentagon and The White House. The President ordered an immediate rescue mission, which CENTCOM executed with boldness and precision, with CIA continuing to provide real time information.

UPDATE: 5:52 AM EDT—

We are now getting images from the landing site, which include burned out MH-6/AH-6 Little Bird helicopters. Read our new report here.

The landing site was just south of Isfahan:

Contact the author: howard@thewarzone.com

The post F-15E Weapon Systems Officer Shot Down Over Iran Has Been Rescued (Updated) appeared first on The War Zone.

The gap that the Iranians are leveraging with these cluster munition missile attacks goes beyond just bypassing terminal defenses. It, by extension, puts greater pressure on diminishing stocks of prized mid-course interceptors to try to defeat these incoming threats before they release their payloads. With all this in mind, what we are seeing with Iran’s attacks on Israel using ballistic missiles with cluster warheads could have even greater implications for future conflicts elsewhere, particularly in the Pacific region.

In some five weeks of fighting, Iran had launched more than 500 ballistic missiles at Israel, with at least 30 of those having carried cluster munition payloads (likely many more), according to the Times of Israel. Iran had fired ballistic missiles with cluster warheads in anger for the first time in attacks on Israel during last year’s 12 Day War.

Iran has developed multiple types of submunitions that can be dispersed via different ballistic missiles in its inventory during the terminal phases of their flight. Ballistic missiles typically fly along roughly parabolic trajectories to their targets. The arc is generally broken down into three main sections: the boost phase right after launch, the terminal phase as the missile comes back down at the end, and the mid-course phase in between. During the mid-course phase, the missiles leave the Earth’s atmosphere, with larger types spending more time in space in the middle of their flight. You can learn more about the complexities of intercepting a target in the mid-course phase in our past report here.

A typical Iranian cluster warhead reportedly contains between 20 and 30 submunitions. However, larger missiles, like members of the Khorramshahr family, are said to be able to carry up to 80. Reports also state that the cluster munitions can contain anywhere between four and 11 pounds of explosives. The damage they can cause is further magnified by the high speed with which they impact the ground.

“Iran has shown pictures in the past of triconic warheads [for ballistic missiles] equipped with at least four different sizes and types of bomblets,” Behnam Ben Taleblu, a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD) think tank, told TWZ. “So Iran calls these warheads ‘raining warheads,’ because these different bomblets will be showered on a wider geographic target set than if it was just the traditional unitary high explosive warhead. How many depends on what kind of configuration of bomblets they can actually choose to put in, but it can be easily a dozen-plus to two dozen to three dozen, depending on the size of the bomblets.”

“Most importantly, in this conflict, the regime is using the Khorramshahr ballistic missile, which is a threshold medium-range ballistic missile modified from an intermediate-range ballistic missile that can carry the heaviest reported warhead weight,” he added. “So, the regime is basically filling a large conical warhead with lots of bomblets and cluster munitions that basically fuse and disperse upon re-entry into the atmosphere, posing a real challenge, even for integrated air and missile defense systems like what the Israelis have, and causing quite a bit of damage and civilian harm.”

Differentiating between missiles carrying cluster warheads and those with unitary ones is likely to be difficult, if not impossible, before any release of submunitions occurs. This creates further challenges for defenders, as we will come back to later on.

In terms of dispersion, when Iran first fired cluster munition-laden ballistic missiles at Israel last year, authorities in the latter country said the weapons had released their payloads at an altitude of approximately 23,000 feet (seven kilometers). The submunitions were scattered across an area approximately 10 miles (16 kilometers) in diameter. This is in line with a report last month from CNN, where that outlet assessed two separate Iranian cluster missile attacks to have dropped submunitions across areas in Israel between roughly seven and eight miles (approximately 11 to 13 kilometers) long.

Israel’s Haaretz has also previously reported an instance where submunitions, apparently all from one missile, hit seven populated areas within a zone measuring nearly 17 miles (27 kilometers) across. This would point to a higher release altitude than the other cases.

A higher-altitude release earlier in the terminal phase of a missile’s flight inherently presents greater challenges for defenders trying to intercept the warhead before submunition release. Once the payload is dispersed, one larger target suddenly becomes dozens of smaller ones.

The David’s Sling system’s Stunner interceptors have a reported maximum engagement altitude of around nine miles (15 kilometers). However, various factors, especially the position of the launcher in relation to the target’s flight path, would impact the circumstances in which they would be able to reach the upper end of their envelope.

There are terminal missile defense systems with greater reach, such as the U.S. Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system and the ship-launched Standard Missile-6 (SM-6), but their engagement envelopes still face positional constraints. THAAD would likely have the best chance as its interceptors can reach higher altitudes, in some circumstances, near the end of the transition from the mid-course to the terminal stage of flight.

As with Stunner, releases at very high altitudes would preclude intercept attempts by lower-tier terminal defenses like Patriot entirely.

All of this combines to creates a situation in which mid-course intercept attempts are critical for catching cluster munition-laden missiles before they release their payloads. However, inventories of relevant interceptors to defend targets in Israel have reportedly been dwindling after weeks of persistent Iranian ballistic missile attacks. Mid-course interceptors, like the U.S. Standard Missile-3 (SM-3) and the Israeli Arrow 3, are precious munitions that have generally been stockpiled at lower levels, to begin with. They also take years to procure and cost many millions of dollars each.

Retired Army Col. David Shank echoed much of this when speaking to TWZ about the challenges and complexities of responding to Iranian long-range ballistic missiles with cluster munition payloads. Shank, who served as Commandant of the Air Defense Artillery School at Fort Sill, Oklahoma, and as the 10th Army Air Missile Defense Commander in Europe, also highlighted that this threat would require the use of higher-end systems to attempt intercepts, either inside or outside of the Earth’s atmosphere, before any submunition payload is released.

“We talk endo/exo-atmospheric. We’re talking THAAD capability, [and] SM-6/SM-3-capable systems,” Shank explained. “And so we’re really talking upper-tier in order to defeat that type of target once it is launched.”

The video below shows THAAD interceptors being fired at incoming Iranian threats in the course of the current conflict.

“Obviously, the goal is to kill it before they even launch it through a variety of means to do that,” he continued. “But if you can’t do that, and there is some type of air launch. And the next step is that upper-tier capability, coupled with other domains.”

In terms of other domains, “let’s just talk space real quick,” he added. “Sensing that launch and detecting it and then passing that information over a network, ultimately to what we’re talking about now,” systems like THAAD and ships armed with SM-3s and SM-6s that are “capable of defeating that threat with endo- and exo-atmosphere capabilities I mentioned.”

Shank underscored the importance of trying to intercept ballistic missiles with cluster warheads at as high altitudes as possible before they can release their payloads.

“Once it hits that point where bomblets are released, so a mechanism within the platform that releases the bomblets, instead of now having one aerial threat, now you obviously have many,” he said. “So, very difficult now to engage multiple aerial threats at one time.”

Shank told us that watching videos of submunitions being dispersed from Iranian ballistic missiles reminded him of past modeling and simulation of such attacks he observed during his time in the Army.

“I’ve seen modeling and simulation, when I was still in uniform years ago, of how we would fight against those types of early-release munitions,” he said. “They had different names then, but it’s very similar to what we’re seeing now in real time.”

That modeling and simulation “would show that overmatch” and that “need to defeat that capability before it does disperse those early-release munitions or those bomblets,” he added.

The retired Army air defense officer noted that the ballistic missile threat ecosystem in the Middle East, in general, is made more complicated by the relatively short distances those weapons travel from launch points in Iran to their targets.

“In the scenario that’s playing out real time, potentially, if they’re launched out of southwestern Iran at the GCCs [Gulf Cooperation Council states on the Arabian Peninsula] – they’re the closest – so minutes, two, three, four minutes,” said Shank.

The time to react is further compressed when facing missiles carrying scatterable payloads. “You’re down to a minute or two.”

Attempts can still be made to intercept submunitions after they are released. At the same time, in addition to the challenge of trying to prioritize and engage dozens of smaller targets, intercept attempts against individual submunitions also impose different costs on the defender. These are targets that are likely to be cheap even compared to lower-cost interceptors. Trying to shoot them down with something like Patriot would create an even more lopsided exchange ratio. Also their singular destructive power is far less than a unitary payload.

“What’s the cost curve look like?” Shank said, speaking generally about how expensive this proposition could become.

“I talk cost curve a lot, [but] you got to recognize the boots and the people that are on the ground on the other end of that, and other national assets and capabilities,” Shank noted. “What is a Soldier’s life worth? … What is an E-3 AWACS aircraft that is high-demand, low-density – what value do you put on something like that, or even a Patriot radar?”

Overall, Iran’s use of ballistic missiles with cluster munition warheads highlights a “very big challenge in front of us, and so when I say in front of us, obviously in front of the warfighters. It’s a lot,” Shank said, highlighting the broader ramifications. “From an operator perspective, you have to discern which target is which, which one should be the priority to defeat first, how many of those bomblets are possibly going to impact dirt and not be a threat, and which ones will be the threat. You’ve got to discern [that] fairly quickly, and then pass on those engagement authorities to the shooters.”

As noted earlier, it is likely that defenders would be challenged to differentiate between missiles carrying submunitions and those with unitary payloads until a release occurs. This can only make it more difficult to prioritize intercept attempts against missiles with cluster munition warheads, especially in the mid-course phase of flight, when it would be most ideal. This could then contribute to a further wearing down of stocks of critical mid-course interceptors.

Shank stressed that this is not an entirely new problem set for the U.S. military, citing the aforementioned modeling and simulations.

“It helped drive discussions on increased [force] structure, increased requirements. It helped recognize, in this scenario [including missiles with cluster munition warheads], adversarial capabilities with regards to munitions,” he explained. “The results, or the findings, personally, were somewhat laughable.”

“We would run a scenario, not necessarily the Middle East, but we’d run a general scenario, and the outcomes would be, well, we need 48 Patriot battalions, as an example. And then that’s a hypothetical number, but it was a very large number,” Shank said. “And, so, when you think through this, at the time, I think the U.S. Army had 14 Patriot battalions. And this was a 2030-2035 scenario, which we’re a lot closer to today, and we have 16 Patriot battalions. And so even if you factored in – which we were not during that modeling and simulation period, or exercise – but even if you factored in our allies and partners, I’m not sure we have 48 Patriot battalions on planet earth.”

TWZ has written on several occasions in the past about the strains on the U.S. Army’s Patriot force, which is inadequate to meet current demands. This is reflective of broader air and missile defense capacity limitations across the U.S. military, despite efforts in recent years to change that paradigm. This has been highlighted again in the course of the current conflict with Iran, and would be an even bigger issue should a high-end fight, such as one in the Pacific against China, erupt.

As an aside to all this, Shank pointed to the importance of so-called “left-of-launch” operations to neutralize threats before they are even launched.

“Within the U.S. Army, we had four ‘pillars’ within integrated air and missile defense. It’s attack operations. It’s active air defense, passive air defense, and command and control,” he noted. “And so the attack operations piece is that left of launch piece. And I would also tie [in] today some of our offensive cyber capabilities as part of attack operations.”

“Again, if we can prevent an adversary from launching or from getting to the launch pad,” he added. “So, whether it’s a supply chain disruption, whether it’s a special operations force with eyes on a target forward on a battlefield, or what we possess now [with] some of our surface-to-surface precision munitions, that can influence and defeat those capabilities before they launch.”

In recent years, the Army and other elements of the U.S. military have also pointed to the value of a similar breadth of left-of-launch activities for disrupting and defeating drone attacks, as you can read more about here.

It should be stressed here that, at least from what has been observed so far, Iran has been using ballistic missiles with cluster munition warheads primarily as terror weapons against population centers in Israel. The high-altitude releases have certainly helped those weapons get around terminal defenses like David’s Sling, but have also limited their ability to focus their effects on specific points on the ground. For vengeance attacks that also wear down the supply of mid-course interceptors, this is likely deemed adequate, and even less accurate cluster attacks still put military targets under threat.

However, Iran’s demonstration of how this tactic can strain on an opponent’s layered defenses does have serious implications beyond the current conflict and the Middle East. Independent reports have previously highlighted the vulnerability of key U.S. air bases, especially in the Pacific, to attacks by cluster munition-laden ballistic missiles. Aircraft parked in the open and thin-skinned fuel storage sites are at particular risk from such strikes. This ties into a separate and increasingly heated debate about the value of investing in new hardened infrastructure, which TWZ continues to follow closely.

Those assessments are based on lower-altitude releases where submunitions can be more focused on particular target areas. However, high-altitude releases could still be focused, at least to a general degree, on saturating very large area targets, including sprawling established air bases. As an example, the two main runways at the U.S. Air Force’s highly strategic Andersen Air Force Base on Guam, are roughly two miles long. They have taxiways and numerous open parking aprons attached to them. There are many other sprawling facilities on the island, too.

For an adversary like China, a barrage of missiles designed to scatter submunitions across larger areas could be relevant in striking a target like Andersen, or anything similarly large. Those weapons could also be used to help overwhelm defenses, eat up valuable interceptors, and otherwise sow chaos as part of layered strikes that also include more precise missiles, as well as drones. Even dispersing submunitions at lower altitudes to achieve better accuracy, but still relatively high within a system like Patriot’s interception envelope, would give a much smaller window to destroy the missile than compared to a traditional unitary warhead. In a future high-end fight in the Pacific, Chinese forces could also choose to employ this capability to attack large population centers, especially in Japan and elsewhere in the First Island Chain, similar to Iran’s attacks against Israel now.

The development of precision-guided submunitions capable of being released via ballistic missile would further change the equation. In 2024, the Guangdong Aerodynamic Research Academy (GARA) in China notably put forward a tangential concept for a hypersonic boost-glide vehicle carrying different kinds of scatterable payloads, including miniature missiles and drones. Ballistic missiles often also reach hypersonic speeds, generally defined as anything above Mach 5, in the terminal phase of flight, and any submunitions they release have to be able to withstand similar stresses.

There is no doubt that China, in particular, has been keenly watching the outcomes of Iranian missile and drone attacks on Israel, as well as other countries in the region. Israel’s integrated air and missile defense network has long been touted as the best in the world. The Gulf Arab states have also spent billions of dollars over the past decade or so to bolster their capabilities and overall capacity with this exact scenario top of mind. The U.S. military’s higher-end ballistic missile defense posture in the Pacific remains relatively limited, and focused largely on very particular regions, despite years now of efforts to dramatically expand that architecture.

Iran’s ability to launch retaliatory attacks has been significantly degraded over the past five weeks, but it has been able to keep up a persistent tempo regardless. China has a broader array of far more capable ballistic missiles, as well as other stand-off strike weapons, that it would bring to bear en masse in any future high-end fight in the Pacific.

Other countries, such as Russia or North Korea, could look to capitalize on what Iran has demonstrated with its cluster munition missile attack, as well. There has been a burst in the development and proliferation of ballistic missiles, in general, including to non-state actors, globally, in recent years.

If anything, application of these tactics by Iran help make the case for the Trump administration’s highly ambitious and expensive Golden Dome missile defense network, which will put a much higher-focus on mid-course intercept. This includes stationing interceptors in space.

Overall, while Iran has been using high-altitude releases of submunitions from ballistic missiles to help ensure it can continue executing successful attacks on Israel, it is a tactic that could have significant implications in other contexts in conflicts well beyond the Middle East.

Contact the author: howard@thewarzone.com

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