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The War Zone – South Korea has been eyeing nuclear-powered submarines for years, and hurdles could remain despite a new green light from Trump.
Breaking Defense – Experts warned that the move could spur China or Japan to accelerate their own nuclear sub programs in return.
Navy Lookout – Royal Fleet Auxiliary tanker Tidespring has completed her contribution to Operation Highmast, enabling HMS Prince of Wales and allied vessels to operate globally. Since leaving the UK in April, Tidespring has supplied over 30,000 cubic metres of diesel and 4,200 cubic metres of aviation fuel in 79 RAS serials.
The War Zone – According to the Russian leader, the test saw the mysterious weapon launched from a submarine and traveling under nuclear propulsion.
CIMSEC – China will likely test its military might in small wars before embarking on a larger one. The world should take note of China’s entry and actions during a small war. When the People’s Republic of China does engage in a small war, the world will know China is preparing for the forceful reunification of Taiwan.
Defense News – President Donald Trump’s decision to shift the nation’s most advanced aircraft carrier to South America in his campaign against drug cartels is pulling the ship out of the Mediterranean Sea at a time when a tenuous ceasefire between Israel and Hamas has been threatened by new strikes in Gaza.
Breaking Defense – President Donald Trump in a social media post Wednesday said the United States will share sensitive nuclear submarine propulsion technologies with South Korea, a major diplomatic step that the Biden administration had stopped short of granting its key Indo-Pacific ally.
Breaking Defense – Future operations in the Indo-Pacific will require persistent activity inside the enemy’s reach, according to a top naval commander.
USNI News – The U.S., under the direction of President Donald Trump, conducted three strikes on Monday against alleged drug trafficking vessels, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth announced via social media site X. The three strikes hit four vessels in the Eastern Pacific, Hegseth said in his Tuesday post. It is the first time that U.S. has hit multiple vessels during one operation.
USNI News – Philippine Marines deployed two small boats last week to escort a Chinese fishing boat that Manila claimed was illegally fishing at Second Thomas Shoal.
USNI News – The U.K. and Germany will dispatch P-8A Poseidon Maritime Patrol Aircraft (MPA) in the coming months for a joint surveillance mission to track Russian submarines in the North Atlantic, officials announced last week. U.K. Defense Secretary John Healey and German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius said Thursday that German Navy P-8 aircraft will operate from U.K.’s Lossiemouth Air Base, Scotland, “to help defend against Russian aggression,” flying alongside the Royal Air Force P-8 aircraft.
Defense One – Trump’s first shipbuilding deal must not derail America’s bipartisan strategy to revive the foundations of its seapower.
Defense News – France introduced a modernized version of its M51 submarine-launched strategic ballistic missile, a “major milestone” in the modernization of the country’s ocean-based nuclear deterrent, the Armed Forces Ministry said on Tuesday.
Naval News – Hidden beneath tarpaulins, an uncommon sight at Chinese shipyards, a new trimaran-hulled vessel appears to combine features of both surface ships and submarines. Satellite imagery suggests it may be uncrewed, designed for high-speed operations. Though its purpose remains unknown, the project reflects the accelerating pace and growing sophistication of China’s naval innovation.
The War Zone – The electromagnetic catapults and weapons elevators for Ford class carriers have historically been a headache, but changing now would create immense challenges.
The New Voice of Ukraine – A large Russian Navy landing ship has anchored off Germany’s Baltic coast, sparking concern among NATO states already wary of repeated Russian incursions into allied airspace, according to DW.
(Thanks to Alain)
Covert Shores – When China unveiled its first ever large displacement underwater drone for the Navy in 2019, the 5-meter long HSU001, it was as if China was only taking baby steps on the road to autonomous undersea warfare. At the time Beijing was clearly behind leading Western navies. In just 6 years since then the situation has flipped, and the HSU001 now appears toy-like compared to what has followed. China’s development of extra-large uncrewed underwater vehicles (XLUUVs) is now unmatched globally, and accelerating rapidly. No other nation is pursuing undersea autonomy at comparable scale, scope, or speed.
USNI News – Manila stood up its first Army unit dedicated to operating surface-to-surface missiles last week in an effort to strengthen Philippine forces’ long-range precision strike capabilities and contribute to the country’s territorial defense operations.
Defense News – The U.S. military is sending an aircraft carrier to the waters off South America, in the latest escalation and buildup of military forces in the region, the Pentagon announced Friday.
Navy Lookout – Discussion of Britain’s two aircraft carriers is primarily framed around the terms ‘Carrier Strike’ and ‘Carrier Enabled Power Projection’ (CEPP). While both are valid descriptors, they risk giving the impression that the ships exist solely to deliver ordnance against land targets. In reality, this is only one of their roles, and they are core to a much broader set of naval missions.
The Strategist – Bill Sweetman writes that they say you can’t get anything done by sitting on your rear end, but US autonomy and unmanned systems specialist Shield AI expects to prove that wrong as it enters the realm of large uncrewed combat air vehicles (UCAVs) with its X-BAT proposal.
Center for Maritime Strategy – In the early 2000s the Oakland A’s showed the baseball world you didn’t need superstar salaries to win games. A’s general manager Billy Beane built rosters around undervalued statistics instead of traditional and costly “five-tool” players, proving you can recreate excellence in aggregate. Today, the US Navy is finding its traditional and costlyships aren’t enough to meet the needs of the nation. Defense circles are looking to unmanned vehicles, attritable systems, artificial intelligence, and other non-traditional military technologies and concepts as new ways to generate combat power. Advocates see a coming revolution, skeptics offer notes of reasonable caution and some are pushing back on the promised capabilities and utility of these systems replacing the venerable ships and aircraft of the past. The way to frame these new technologies is the same way the A’s thought about their unconventional players, not as perfect replacements for Cruisers, Attack Submarines, and Multirole Aircraft, but as “Ships in Aggregate.”
Navy Lookout – HMS Stirling Castle sailed from Birkenhead on 22nd October to begin sea trials, four months after transferring from the RFA to the RN. The ship, which will be based in Portsmouth, is the first dedicated mothership designed to support autonomous mine countermeasures systems.
Navy Lookout – Having been inactive since June 2024, primarily due to the shortage of personnel, RFA Tiderace will soon return to active service.
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