TODAY

Rescuers halt operation off the coast with no survivors found, following a Black Sea attack that also damaged a second vessel.

Bulgarian authorities have ended search operations after confirming no survivors were found following a drone strike that sank a ship off the country’s coast.

Drones hit two commercial vessels early on Tuesday as attacks on Black Sea shipping increase amid an intensifying Russia-Ukraine war. One caught fire, and the other sank.

“There is no trace of the sailors,” Rumen Nikolov, the head of the country’s Maritime Search and Rescue Coordination Centre, told reporters on Wednesday.

The search stopped late on Tuesday and would not continue, he added.

Eighteen Turkish and Indian crew members were rescued from the ship that caught fire, but the crew members from the vessel that sank remain missing.

Authorities have not said how many people are missing, but according to the Maritime.bg specialised website, 10 people were on board the ship.

Nikolov said the ⁠incident occurred in a so-called “responsible search and rescue zone” and not in the country’s territorial waters, which extend to 12 nautical miles off the coast.

“What was found from the sunken ship was one overturned boat, three life rafts and debris from the ship’s equipment that was floating on the surface of the sea,” he said.

Asked whether any debris from the drones had been recovered, Nikolov said: “I have no information about drone debris.”

Prime Minister Rumen Radev has described the attack as “absolutely unacceptable”.

European Union chief Ursula von der Leyen has also condemned the incident.

Bulgarian authorities have said they are not yet able to determine the origin of the drones.

A distress beacon signal from the ship that sank was received at 2:54am on Tuesday (23:54 GMT on Monday), while the distress signal from the other ship was received at 3:23am (00:23 GMT), Nikolov said.

Both commercial ships were managed by Turkiye-based companies, according to the Equasis merchant shipping database.

They were hit about 80 nautical miles (150km) east of the Bulgarian coastal town of Byala.

The strikes came a day after another ship caught fire and sank off the Romanian coast on Monday, killing two people. Ukraine blamed Russia for the drone attack.

Rising energy costs are already affecting households across Northern Ireland.

The impact of the US-Israel war with Iran is one of the factors behind the increase.

The letter from the EA to head teachers said that “recent geopolitical events are expected to have a substantial impact on energy costs across the Education Authority (EA) during the 2026/27 financial year”.

It said that total school gas bills were expected to go up by 60% from £10.7m to £17m by March 2027.

Meanwhile, total school electricity bills are expected to rise by 5% from £23.8m to £25.1m by March 2027.

“Given the scale of the anticipated cost increases, we are asking all schools to review their energy usage and identify opportunities to reduce consumption wherever possible,” the EA said.

Among the measures the authority has suggested to schools are cutting heating use by an hour a day and switching off classroom lights to use natural daylight instead.

Staff and pupils have also been advised to “wear more clothes” rather than turn the heating thermostat up if it is cold.

But principals have told BBC News NI that it is not straightforward for schools to cut heating costs.

The principal of Tullygally Primary School in Craigavon, Kirsty Logan-Hall, said that the school was “committed to promoting responsible energy consumption and regularly reinforce good practice with staff and pupils”.

“However, our ability to achieve significant reductions in energy usage is constrained by the nature of our estate,” she said.

“The school operates from an older building which presents inherent energy efficiency challenges.

“In addition, our site is particularly spread out due to the accommodation and operational requirements associated with our specialist provision.

“This necessitates the heating, lighting and ongoing use of multiple areas across the site throughout the school day to ensure appropriate learning environments, accessibility and pupil welfare.

“It is important to recognise that there is limited scope for reducing energy consumption without adversely impacting the quality of provision, staff working conditions or the wellbeing of pupils, including those with additional needs.”

Emma Quinn from Rathcoole Primary told BBC Good Morning Ulster that the “lack of maintenance” has an impact on schools, adding that pupils have a right to come into a warm school after being outside.

“Putting this pressure onto us at the minute is ridiculous, when we are eco schools, we are doing all of these, we are turning off lights, but yet this lands in on our doorstep and we’re suddenly expected to jump and to fix a problem that is so systemic, it’s just not good enough.”

Al-Awsaj, occupied West Bank – On September 23, weeks before Israel’s parliamentary elections, ministers and lawmakers gathered on an occupied West Bank hilltop to inaugurate a new settlement, Metzoke Eretz, illegal under international law. Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich used the ceremony to salute the settler outpost that made the eventual settlement possible.

“The first pioneering settlers who were here on the farm… we will lift them up as our greatest joy,” Smotrich said. “It shows that the method works: establish a farm, seize the land, prepare it, turn it into a community, move to the next point. There are many, many such heroes – those who prove they are not doing real estate. They are doing Zionism.”

Metzoke Eretz was previously an outpost – the name given to the Jewish settlements illegal even under Israeli law – called Netzah Harel, established in 2023 in the middle of al-Muarrajat, a Bedouin community on private Palestinian land east of Ramallah. Alia Mleihat, 29, and others from the community remember those settlers well. “Of course, this outpost played a major role in displacing the Palestinian Bedouin communities in al-Muarrajat and the areas east of Ramallah,” said Alia, now living in a tent in al-Awsaj, a few kilometres away, after her forced displacement in July 2025. “[The Netzah Harel settlers] took part in every attack the settlers carried out on families, and confiscated sheep, under the protection of the Israeli police and army.”

Dror Etkes, founder of Israeli NGO Kerem Navot, said Smotrich’s description of his “method” was spot-on – except for one omission. “The political discourse skips the [Palestinian] expulsion chapter,” said Etkes, suggesting Smotrich and other politicians avoid doing so explicitly to avoid potential scrutiny from international criminal courts. “They want it to happen, and they know that it happens, and they let it happen.”

Haaretz reported that Metzoke Eretz is one of 19 outposts legalised by the Netanyahu government after nearby Palestinians were violently expelled.

‘Not a single moment of joy’

Jamal Mleihat, Alia’s 45-year-old uncle, sits with eight relatives nestled inside a bare concrete-block house on the ridge in al-Awsaj, with his daughter Sewar hanging off his lap.

Below the ridge, rows of young trees climb a cultivated slope towards a factory at the foot of the hills. The ridge itself is rock and dust, now home to about 25 families from al-Muarrajat, among others forcibly displaced in the past three years.

“Before October 7 [2023 Hamas attack on Israel, and Israel’s subsequent genocidal war on Gaza], we were in the pastures – no harassment, we moved around freely,” said Jamal, a father of seven. “We had healthcare. We had a school. We had water in the same encampment. Life was a million times better than this.”

Since October 7, the Israeli government has stepped up its raids on the occupied West Bank, while settlers have largely been given free rein to pursue a pogrom against Palestinians, with little pushback from within Israel.

Just below Jamal’s shelter, alone on a slope, Muhammad Ghawanmeh lives with his wife and seven children. His toilet does not work; he relies on water tanks and has almost no electricity. The rocky track to the Mleihats’ area is too steep to drive. He built a fence around the house after recent settler attacks, and now faces constant drone surveillance from Israeli settlers.

Ghawanmeh is from Ras Ein al-Auja, which had been the largest Bedouin community in the central Jordan Valley – so robust that humanitarian coordinators told Al Jazeera in October 2023 that the village’s displacement was unlikely. Instead, its more than 600 Palestinian inhabitants experienced the largest single-community expulsion of Bedouins in the last three years, after repeated attacks by settlers from four surrounding outposts.

“From my childhood, the land was open. The water was open. We were living happily. We’d graze 10 kilometres, 15 kilometres with the sheep, and come back,” he said. “Today we can’t go 500 metres from the house.”

His flock has shrunk from about 300 to roughly 100 physically thinning sheep, which he now must buy fodder for, instead of letting them graze on the land, which he now says is largely forbidden by Israeli settlers and the army.

‘Nothing was left except this’

A few hundred metres beyond Ghawanmeh’s fence, a white trailer and a few containers mark an Israeli outpost, established about six months ago on a hill overlooking Highway 90 and the displaced families along the ridge. Two months ago, Ghawanmeh said, soldiers came to his house and told him he could no longer pass to the highway. The settlers, he said, “are with the army”.

“You leave this place, go to another one, and it follows you – the same problem, unsolved,” Ghawanmeh said. “Every three months, there’s a displacement operation.”

Al-Awsaj barely existed as an inhabited place before, but Bedouin from different depopulated communities have now converged on this barren ridge, overlooking land largely declared – again – off-limits to grazing.

Allegra Pacheco, head of the West Bank Protection Consortium, calls al-Awsaj “basically a refugee camp, an internally displaced camp, that we see in other countries. But here, there’s no safe space. Wherever people like in al-Awsaj go, they’re chased by settlers or their tents are demolished by the Israelis.”

“It’s been very painful to get the authorities, the Palestinian authorities, the international leaders, to recognise that this is a mass displacement happening in front of us, and people have nowhere to go,” she said.

Project of forced transfer

In the West Bank, the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) counts at least 130 Palestinian communities fully or partly displaced by settler attacks and related restrictions since January 2023, and more than 6,400 people uprooted. According to the Palestinian Colonization and Wall Resistance Commission, since October 7, 2023 there have been almost 15,000 attacks by settlers, with 66 Palestinians killed by settlers. OCHA says the rate of settler attacks increased from about three a day before October 7, 2023, to almost seven per day this year.

The increase in displacement after October 2023 can also be seen in the numbers for that year. Nearly 80 percent of all Palestinians displaced by settler violence in 2023 were uprooted after October 7.

A report by Peace Now and Kerem Navot found that Israeli farm outposts had seized roughly 18 percent of the West Bank by the end of 2025. “We’re talking about a land area bigger than the size of the Gaza Strip altogether,” Pacheco said.

“What we’re seeing is a continuous, sustained project of forced transfer and mass destruction,” she said. “Israeli authority demolitions and destructions by the Israeli army, and Israeli civilians – armed groups – carrying out destructions and sowing fear to push people out.”

Israeli NGO B’Tselem’s September report, “The Elimination Project”, links this to Smotrich’s 2017 “Decisive Plan”, which offers Palestinians three choices: live under Jewish supremacy, leave, or face violent repression.

“The Smotrich Plan has been implemented,” Pacheco said. “He laid out exactly what is going on now, and he’s very proud of his success. He now wants to transfer that success to [other areas of the West Bank], and also in the Galilee [an area in Israel with a large population of Palestinian citizens of Israel]. Wherever there are Palestinians living, he wants to make life so difficult that they will leave.”

With Smotrich exercising broad powers over the West Bank through the Settlement Administration within the Ministry of Defence, and leaders in the Israeli West Bank military command increasingly coming from far-right, settler backgrounds themselves, Palestinians across the West Bank describe a deepening symbiosis of military, police, administration and settlers in exacting Palestinian dispossession. “They all work together, like a cell, one completing the other,” said Jamal Mleihat. “The army, the police, the settlers – they’re the ones who displace, they’re the ones who establish the settlement, they’re the ones who take part in the thefts, in everything. And the army covers for them.”

Al Jazeera has reached out to the Israeli authorities for comment on this piece, but has yet to receive a response.

Worse future

Smotrich has withheld part or all of the tax revenues Israel collects for the Palestinian Authority – roughly 60 percent of its income – for much of the past three years. The PA now struggles to provide the most basic of services. In al-Awsaj and elsewhere, that means classrooms that do not open. “The government school is shut down today, no salaries,” Ghawanmeh said.

There is no school bus; families pay for private transport, and “one day they study, one day they don’t, depending on the mood of the driver,” Jamal said. It has left the displaced alone on an inhospitable patch of rock.

“Palestinians have no protection in the West Bank,” said Pacheco. “They are completely vulnerable to assault, attempted murder, arson, invasion of their homes. The Israeli army is supposed to protect them and doesn’t. The Palestinian Authority can’t come in, and the international community is not protecting them.”

“We started to feel there’s no safety anywhere,” Ghawanmeh said. “Fear. Terror. Persecution. Ethnic cleansing. That’s what we feel.”

Amid the dispossession, Ghawanmeh looks out at the unwelcoming land he knows will not be his family’s refuge – only another transient stop. He sees his own brother now only once every month and a half or two. “The threats to Bedouin life have almost become extinction,” he said. “We now live in enclaves, separated.”

“For three years now, the day that’s passing is better than the one that’s coming,” Ghawanmeh said. “Yesterday is better than today. Today is better than tomorrow.”

Countries in Central Asia have begun buying oil from Iran as the Russian fuel supplies they have long depended on run dry amid Ukraine’s mounting attacks on Russian energy infrastructure to degrade Moscow’s war effort.

In August, Tajikistan announced it was receiving oil and petroleum products from Iran as Dushanbe faces uncertainty over its fuel supply from Russia. Tehran also agreed to establish a joint refinery in Kyrgyzstan in August, and supply the country with crude oil.

Moscow has been facing fuel shortages due to Ukrainian drone strikes on its refineries as Russia’s war on its neighbour continues to rage.

Can the Russian fuel crisis give Iran a new oil opening in Central Asia?

Here’s what we know:

Which Central Asian countries have been affected by Russia’s fuel crisis?

Ukraine’s offensive against Russian energy infrastructure has caused panic across Central Asian countries like Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan, which are dependent on Moscow for oil and petroleum products.

Tajikistan has traditionally sourced up to 80 percent of its petroleum products from Russia. Kyrgyzstan also relies on petroleum product imports, sourcing more than 90 percent of its petrol from Russia.

“They’ve been hurt the most,” Galiya Ibragimova, a Moldova-based expert on Central Asia with Carnegie Politika, which has its headquarters in Berlin, told Al Jazeera in an interview in August.

Kyrgyzstan is a member of the Eurasian Economic Union, the free trade bloc of five former Soviet nations dominated by Russia and the Kremlin’s political decisions.

Tajikistan is not a member of the group, but it bought discounted Russian fuel as “payment for political loyalty, not because [Russian President Vladimir] Putin is so kind”, Ibragimova added.

Kazakhstan, meanwhile, boasts three giant, Soviet-era oil refineries. Still, fuel prices in the country have increased by 15.6 percent this year, the UlusMedia website reported on July 10.

Uzbekistan, on the other hand, is less dependent on Russian energy, with domestic production capable of reaching 100,000 tonnes of petroleum products per month, satisfying most of the country’s needs. But due to the increase in oil demand from its regional neighbours, Uzbekistan has also been forced to diversify its imports and has begun striking deals with countries like Georgia and Iraq.

Why is there a fuel crisis in Russia?

Russia has been facing a severe fuel deficit as Kyiv’s drone strikes – launched in an effort to degrade Moscow’s ability to maintain its ongoing invasion of Ukraine – have knocked out an estimated quarter to half of its total oil refining capacity.

To tackle the problem, Russia has imposed fuel rationing. Sales are often limited to about 20-30 litres (about 5-8 US gallons) per vehicle, and drivers must pump fuel strictly into vehicle tanks. Filling jerry cans is largely prohibited.

Earlier, the government banned petrol and jet fuel exports. Officials are now weighing a ban on diesel exports, too. Authorities have loosened fuel-quality regulations, temporarily allowing lower-grade fuel for the domestic market.

A state of emergency has also been declared in Russian-occupied Crimea, which Moscow annexed from Ukraine in 2014. A Russian-owned oil firm in India, Nayara Energy, has reportedly sold petroleum to Russia.

While Russian President Putin acknowledges the crisis, he appears reluctant to end the war on Ukraine and insists the situation is under control.

“These attacks on our facilities certainly create problems – that is obvious. We are currently seeing a certain shortage, though I would say it is not critical,” he said earlier this year.

“First and foremost, we have to rapidly and significantly increase production of air defence systems that are most in demand. We must also continue to improve them… Repairs at refineries must be completed more quickly.”

So, how is Iran helping Central Asia?

Amid Russian fuel shortages, Central Asian countries like Tajikistan have begun striking deals with Iran.

In August, Tajikistan’s Energy and Water Resources Ministry told the Asia-Plus news agency that the country is receiving oil and petroleum products from Iran. The ministry has not disclosed the route used to transport the products, but Tajikistan expects to receive 2.55 million tonnes of oil and petroleum products from Iran.

Besides Tajikistan, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian welcomed a proposal from Kyrgyzstan in August to establish a joint refinery in the Central Asian country, according to a report by Iran’s Tasnim news agency,

Under the agreement, Pezeshkian said, “The crude oil needed by the refinery can be supplied by Iran, and the products can be divided between the two sides.”

Will exporting oil to Central Asian countries help Iran?

The United States and Israel’s war on Iran has affected Tehran’s oil revenues. Data released by the government-administered Statistical Center of Iran in September showed that gross domestic product (GDP) shrank by 10.1 percent year-on-year between March 21 and June 20, the first quarter of the Persian calendar.

Tehran’s ability to sell crude has also been dramatically curtailed by the US naval blockade of Iran’s ports, imposed for most of the war, which began in late February.

Iranian crude and condensate loadings collapsed from about two million barrels per day (bpd) in March to roughly 740,000bpd in July and just 220,000-255,000bpd in August, according to estimates from Kpler and Vortexa.

TankerTrackers.com told the Reuters news agency in September that 29 tankers, carrying 36.11 million barrels of crude, were trapped in the Strait of Hormuz. Meanwhile, Vortexa estimated that total Iranian crude afloat had fallen from 135 million barrels at the end of July to 107 million barrels by late August.

Amid these challenges, Iran has been scrambling to find new countries to trade oil with. Russian fuel shortages have opened up new opportunities for Iran in Central Asia, at least in the short term, according to analysts.

How does Iranian oil reach Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan?

Iran does not share a border with either country.

To get to Tajikistan, Iranian “oil and refined products have to cross Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan by rail”, said Frederic Schneider, a nonresident senior fellow at the Middle East Council on Global Affairs.

To get to Kyrgyzstan, Iranian oil would also need to pass through Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan.

Is trading oil with Iran logistically sustainable for Central Asia?

It is unlikely, Schneider said.

“This opportunity [for Iran] depends on Ukraine continuing to hit Russian refineries, which seems unlikely, both given the waning of Ukraine’s strike capability and the US government’s demand to stop the attacks as they put too much strain on global oil markets,” he told Al Jazeera.

He noted that US President Donald Trump has pressed his Ukrainian counterpart, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, repeatedly in September for an “energy truce” with Russia, since diesel prices have become a political problem for Trump ahead of the November midterm elections in the US.

“Those truces have so far collapsed within hours, but the direction is clear. Once the strikes stop, or once Russia repairs its plants, Russian fuel will come back to Central Asia duty-free under Eurasian Economic Union arrangements, and Iran will struggle to compete on price,” he said.

Logistics also favour Russia with respect to importing oil to countries like Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan, he said.

Unlike Iran, Russia shares a border with both.

“Tajikistan’s own request [for oil] would need around 51,000 rail tank cars, and its main refinery at Dangara has never operated commercially at scale. Russia, by contrast, has decades’ worth of logistics infrastructure, pipelines, rail links, and supply contracts into the region,” Schneider said.

Is Central Asia a big enough market to compensate for Iran’s Hormuz losses?

No, according to Schneider.

Tajikistan’s total demand, Schneider said, was about 50,000bpd.

That is a drop in the ocean compared with the 1.7 million bpd Iran exported by sea a year ago. China reported $9.96bn in two-way trade with Iran in 2025, a figure that does not include some $31.2bn in Iranian oil shipments, according to the US-China Economic and Security Review Commission.

“This suggests that Central Asia can be a useful outlet for Iranian diesel and gasoline, but it cannot replace the Chinese market,” Schneider said.

For Tehran, Central Asia’s importance depends on how the US-Israel war on Iran develops, he said, adding that Tehran also needs to stay on good terms with Russia, with which it has a deep strategic partnership.

“Iran cannot afford to be seen as poaching Russian customers too aggressively, so it will present itself as a stopgap supplier, which, again, limits how much it can earn there,” he said.

What other risks does Central Asia face in buying Iranian oil?

Schneider warned that Central Asian nations could be hit with Washington’s secondary sanctions on Iran.

“Legally, US secondary sanctions apply to any foreign company or bank that conducts a significant transaction in Iranian petroleum, wherever it is based, and the Treasury expanded the list of sanctionable conduct in August. A Treasury official has already warned publicly that anyone in this trade ‘incurs that risk themselves’,” he noted.

But Schneider said that, politically, the US sanctioning Central Asian governments is unlikely.

“Central Asia is the arena of a new ‘Great Game’ between Russia, China and the United States, and Washington is courting the region harder than at any point since the 1990s, chiefly for its critical minerals. Kazakhstan alone holds about half of the minerals the US classifies as critical, including uranium and tungsten,” he said.

“Sanctioning a Central Asian government for buying fuel from Iran would push them straight back into closer ties to Russia and China,” he noted.

“What I would expect instead are targeted designations of individual traders, rail and logistics operators and smaller banks, combined with quiet pressure on the region’s correspondent banks. That alone is enough to raise the cost and slow the trade, but will come at the price of these countries redoubling their efforts to decouple economically and financially from the US.”

The United Kingdom could be heading toward its most significant expansion of ground-based air defense in generations, under a plan announced by the Conservative Party. For now, however, with the Conservatives in opposition, the proposed £10 billion (about $13.3 billion) “Britannia Shield” exists only as a policy commitment rather than an approved government program. At the same time, it highlights the seriousness of U.K. military deficiencies in this area, as the threat from the air continues to grow.

The proposal will move into the U.K. Ministry of Defense acquisition system if the party returns to government following the next general election and then follows through on the funding and procurement decisions required to turn the pledge into an operational capability. The party has proposed spreading the investment over a decade, with an initial capability intended to emerge during the first term of a future Conservative government and the wider network established after that.

Britannia Shield comes with the character of the air threat facing Europe having changed dramatically over the last decade. Russia’s war in Ukraine has demonstrated the scale at which relatively inexpensive drones can be employed alongside cruise and ballistic missiles, while recent fighting in the Middle East has clearly shown the costs involved in maintaining a sophisticated, layered air defense system under sustained attack. At the same time, the threat is no longer confined to weapons fielded by major state militaries. Small, widely available drone technologies can be weaponized with relative ease by non-state actors, providing a cheap and potentially highly scalable means of attack.

For Britain, which has traditionally relied heavily on fighter aircraft, naval air defense, and the protection provided by geography and NATO, it is increasingly doubtful whether those capabilities provide enough coverage for the infrastructure that would be most important to keep functioning during a major conflict.

While a party press release refers to it directly, Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch has made efforts to distinguish Britannia Shield from a British version of Israel’s Iron Dome.

Iron Dome has become one of the best-known elements of Israel’s layered air defense network, having been developed primarily to deal with short-range rockets, artillery, and mortar rounds threatening populated areas. The system has evolved, however, and newer configurations can also engage threats including cruise missiles and drones. Importantly, Israel’s Iron Dome systems protect a country a twelfth of the size of United Kingdom and deal with only a portion of the potential threats in critical areas.

Iron Dome

Mention should also be made of the U.S. Golden Dome missile defense initiative, which envisions integrating sensors, interceptors, and other defensive capabilities as part of an enormous architecture with a greater emphasis on protecting the U.S. against a range of aerial and missile threats, up to and including intercontinental ballistic missiles.

Talking to the BBC, Badenoch argued that Britain does not face the same kind of persistent rocket and missile threat as Israel and therefore does not require an equivalent level of coverage. Instead, the Conservative proposal is intended to combine improved radar, command and control, interceptor missiles, and counter-drone capabilities into an integrated network designed around the threats Britain is considered most likely to face.

Britain already has some of the components that such a system could leverage. Royal Navy Type 45 destroyers — when they are available — provide a highly capable long-range air-defense layer through Sea Viper missiles, while the Army’s Sky Sabre system uses CAMM missiles for shorter-range engagements. The RAF provides combat aircraft and airborne surveillance capabilities, and Britain is integrated into NATO’s wider air and missile defense architecture. The problem is that these capabilities were not designed to provide a dense, permanent defensive umbrella over critical infrastructure, and the ground-based component in particular remains relatively limited when compared with the scale of the potential target set. There is also the reality that these assets are required to defend locales far from the British Isles themselves.

The government’s own 2025 Strategic Defense Review acknowledged that changing threat environment, allocating up to £1 billion in new funding for homeland air and missile defense and calling for improvements to the United Kingdom’s wider integrated air and missile defense architecture. Britannia Shield would therefore be a much larger political commitment to expanding and integrating capabilities that already exist, while adding new layers intended to deal with the growing drone and missile threat.

The £10 billion figure provides little idea of the scope of capabilities. The scale of the proposed system will determine whether that additional money represents a major expansion or simply the beginning of a much larger requirement.

Gen. Sir Richard Barrons has previously estimated that an entry-level system of the kind outlined could cost around £80 billion over a decade, illustrating how quickly the cost can rise once the requirement expands from protecting selected sites to providing something approaching comprehensive national coverage.

2/ Estimates suggest north of £80bn for the full cost of a perfect system, so we almost certainly need to think differently than a “dome” solution. A layered air defence will include a number of elements, including the ability to deter and strike back at an adversary.

— Greg Bagwell (@gregbagwell) October 6, 2026

Badenoch’s description of the threat instead points toward a system in which Britain would identify the infrastructure and military facilities most important to national resilience and then build increasingly dense layers of protection around them. That would include major airbases, ports, energy infrastructure, communications facilities, and other critical nodes, rather than attempting to create a continuous defensive bubble over the entire country.

Such a system would also have to account for the fact that the location of the launch platform can be as critical as the weapon itself. Badenoch described a scenario in which an adversary could operate in the English Channel to launch drones or missiles against targets in Britain. The resulting reduction in warning time would place greater demands on sensors and command systems, but it would also mean that the defensive problem could begin well before an incoming weapon reached British airspace. Maritime surveillance, intelligence collection, fighter aircraft, and naval forces could all potentially contribute to detecting or disrupting a launch platform before it had the opportunity to fire.

That broader approach is particularly important because the economics of countering drones are fundamentally different from those associated with conventional air defense targets. A system that responds to inexpensive drones by firing a sophisticated interceptor costing hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars would rapidly become unsustainable during a large attack. Any serious British architecture would therefore need several layers, with electronic warfare, guns, low-cost interceptors, and other counter-drone systems, potentially including directed-energy weapons, dealing with the lower end of the threat wherever possible. Meanwhile, more expensive surface-to-air missiles would be preserved for cruise missiles, aircraft and other targets that cannot be economically engaged by cheaper means.

The recent situation at RAF Fairford adds another dimension to that problem. The United States recently withdrew a dozen B-1 bombers from the Gloucestershire base amid reported concerns about a possible Iran-backed attack, after U.S. officials said commanders had received new information about a potential plot. British authorities maintained that the base was safe, while British sources reportedly questioned whether Iran could reproduce the kind of complex operation carried out by Ukraine against Russian airfields in 2025. The episode nevertheless demonstrated the degree to which even a major military installation can become a concern when an adversary is believed to be looking for unconventional ways to reach it.

That brings Operation Spiderweb into the discussion, although there is no public evidence that Iran is preparing a comparable operation against Britain. Ukraine’s June 2025 attack was prepared over roughly 18 months and involved small drones being moved deep into Russia inside containers carried by trucks before being launched remotely against military airfields. The operation illustrated that once relatively cheap drones have been positioned close to their targets, the defender may have little opportunity to intercept them through traditional long-range air defense means. This is exactly a scenario we have been warning of for many years.

Today, Ukrainian intelligence reportedly launched 117 attack drones from trucks that had been placed near Russian air bases. I tasked several collects this morning via @umbraspace and my first images have already started processing. What a remarkable success in a well-executed… pic.twitter.com/LzXulw8jnK

— Chris Biggers (@CSBiggers) June 2, 2025

For Britannia Shield, that means protecting an airbase such as RAF Fairford cannot simply be a matter of installing missile batteries. Physical security, counter-intelligence, surveillance of access routes, low-level drone detection, electronic warfare and the ability to identify suspicious activity before an attack begins would all become part of the same defensive problem. Hardened infrastructure would also be essential, helping to protect aircraft, fuel, munitions, command facilities and other critical assets from attacks that penetrate the outer layers of the defense. The distinction is increasingly important as military aircraft themselves become more valuable and as relatively inexpensive unmanned systems demonstrate their ability to threaten aircraft on the ground without ever having to penetrate the surrounding air defense network.

The new British proposal also becomes more complicated because its intended coverage extends beyond the British mainland. Badenoch has specifically referred to defending installations in Cyprus and the Falkland Islands, which introduces a very different set of operational and logistical requirements. A network supporting critical infrastructure in Britain can draw on dense communications infrastructure, nearby industrial support and the wider NATO system, whereas a defensive capability at RAF Akrotiri or in the Falklands requires its own radar coverage, launchers, personnel, ammunition stocks, and sustainment arrangements. Extending the same architecture across those locations would therefore consume considerably more resources.

A similar problem exists with ammunition stocks. Ukraine has repeatedly demonstrated that sophisticated air defenses can come under sustained pressure during large missile and drone attacks, while Western countries have struggled to replenish some categories of precision-guided weapons at anything approaching wartime consumption rates. A British system that looks impressive on paper but has only a small stockpile of interceptors would provide much less meaningful protection during a prolonged campaign, particularly if an adversary deliberately attempted to exhaust the defenses through repeated attacks using inexpensive drones.

Ukraine also offers lessons for how Britain could organize such a network. Mobile air defense teams, distributed sensors, acoustic detection systems, and digital applications that connect air defense operators with military units and civilian spotters have all become increasingly important in Ukraine, where defenders have had to detect and respond to large numbers of drones and missiles across a wide area. There are echoes here of the distributed air defense networks developed during World War II, when observers, radar operators, fighter controllers, and anti-aircraft units were linked together to provide early warning and direct defensive responses. As in 1940, Britain would need an air defense network that is distributed, mobile, and adaptable to new threats.

The most revealing details of Britannia Shield are yet to be provided. The number of defended sites, the types and numbers of radars, the number of launchers, the size of interceptor stocks, and the proportion of the budget devoted to counter-drone capabilities all remain unclear for now. The same applies to the money required for training, maintenance, software, communications, and replenishment across the life of the system.

There is also a straightforward political limitation to the proposal. The Conservatives have pledged to invest in Britannia Shield as part of a broader plan to increase defense spending, but that money is not currently sitting in a government procurement account waiting to be spent and defense budgets are increasingly stretched by other big-ticket programs. The Conservatives would first have to return to government, establish the program as a formal requirement, and then make the associated spending and procurement decisions. Even if those steps were taken quickly, the most capable elements of the system would take years to design, procure, integrate, and deploy.

Whether £10 billion would ultimately be sufficient depends on the mission the future government assigns to the system. If Britannia Shield were expected to provide nationwide protection against sustained attacks involving ballistic missiles, cruise missiles, and large numbers of drones, the budget would fall far short, particularly once interceptor stocks and long-term sustainment are included. If it is designed as a layered network protecting a defined group of critical infrastructure sites and military bases, integrated with the RAF, Royal Navy, Army, and NATO systems already in place, the proposal becomes more realistic, but it wouldn’t address higher-end threats, like longer-range ballistic missiles.

That limitation is particularly significant when considering Russia, which remains the most serious military threat to the United Kingdom and its European allies. From what we know so far, Britannia Shield is heavily focused on drones and shorter-range missile threats, but Russia possesses a much broader strike arsenal that includes ballistic missiles, cruise missiles, and hypersonic weapons. A British air defense program that concentrates primarily on the lower and middle tiers of the threat therefore leaves a significant gap at the upper end of the spectrum.

The United Kingdom is also not considering this problem in isolation. Across Europe, governments are increasingly pursuing multinational efforts to strengthen air and missile defenses, as the return of large-scale state-on-state warfare and the experience of the war in Ukraine have made the vulnerability of European infrastructure and military forces much more tangible. Nearly three decades after the end of the Cold War, ballistic and cruise missile defense has once again become a central European security requirement. Britannia Shield would therefore need to be considered not only as a national counter-drone and air-defense program, but as part of a much broader European effort to rebuild layered air and missile defenses against the full range of modern threats.

The experience of Ukraine and the Middle East suggests that Britain is unlikely to solve this problem simply by buying more surface-to-air missiles. Increasingly, air warfare relies on complex networks that find the attacker, identify the weapon, choose the appropriate response, and undertake this all at a cost that can be sustained throughout a conflict. That network also has to extend beyond the airspace itself, because the threat may involve a launch platform approaching the coast, a drone operator operating near a military installation, or small drones already hidden inside the defender’s security perimeter.

With their proposed reorientation of Britain’s air defense priorities, the Conservatives have put a financial value and a recognizable name around a capability gap that has become increasingly difficult to ignore. If they return to government, there will be many tougher questions to address, including which sites should receive protection, how many layers are required, how much ammunition must be held in reserve, and how the system can be sustained on a wartime footing.

The recent concerns surrounding RAF Fairford, together with the lessons of Operation Spiderweb, underline why that question is becoming more complicated. The next serious attack on a British military installation may not arrive as a large formation of aircraft or a visible wave of missiles crossing the Channel. It could involve a mixture of long-range weapons, cheap drones, electronic warfare, and hybrid warfare activity taking place much closer to the target. A future Britannia Shield would have to be designed around that reality, and would come with a price tag to match.

Contact the author: thomas@thewarzone.com

Aircraft carrier USS George H.W. Bush arrived in Phuket, Thailand, on Sunday for a scheduled port call after 188 days at sea, leaving just one carrier strike group, led by USS George Washington, in the Middle East for the first time in months. Across the Pacific, USS Abraham Lincoln, which Washington relieved in August, is holding off the west coast of California to disembark her air wing and offload ammunition ahead of a well-deserved homecoming this week. With several outlets now confirming that USS Theodore Roosevelt will deploy to the Middle East, there very well may be three flattops in the region again, but any overlap will be temporary given normal rotation schedules.

Here’s TWZ’s weekly carrier tracker monitoring America’s flattop fleet, including deployed Carrier Strike Groups (CSG) and Amphibious Ready Groups (ARG), using publicly available open-source information. Check out last week’s report here.

George H.W. Bush Drops Anchor Off Phuket For Liberty Port Call

USS George H.W. Bush arrived in Thailand on October 4 for a scheduled port visit, U.S. 7th Fleet announced. Guided-missile destroyer USS Delbert D. Black escorted the flattop from her previous station in the Arabian Sea and joined the call. Bush deployed from the continental U.S. on March 31 and took the long way to the Middle East, rounding the Cape of Good Hope to limit exposure to the treacherous Red Sea and Bab Al Mandeb Strait.

On October 3, Bush switched her Automatic Identification System (AIS) transponder on about 15 nautical miles southwest of Thailand, broadcasting her position publicly for the first time since April, based on data available via MarineTraffic. The carrier dropped anchor approximately two nautical miles off the coast of Phuket the following day.

Bush had been operating in the U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) area of responsibility (AOR) since April, when the U.S. briefly had three carriers on station, in support of operations against Iran. “For the last six months, the strike group supported Operation Epic Fury and the U.S. naval blockade in the U.S. Central Command area of responsibility to secure maritime security and stability in the Middle East,” according to the 7th Fleet statement. That force posture was short-lived, however, as the USS Gerald R. Ford transited the Suez Canal northbound on May 1 and began her journey home not long after Bush arrived. Bush chopped into the U.S. Pacific Command (PACOM) AOR sometime over the past week while en route to Phuket, leaving a single CSG in CENTCOM.

The current composition of CSG-10 is USS Mason, USS Ross, and USS Donald Cook, but none of the destroyers joined the flagship in Thailand. Why Black escorted the carrier instead is unclear. Black departed Mayport, Florida, on January 3, 2026, for an independent deployment and is long overdue for a liberty call after nine months. Mason transited the Malacca Strait southbound on September 29, according to public AIS data, and is currently in Singapore; the purpose of the stop is unknown. Ross and Cook have not broadcast their positions in months, but were last operating in the Arabian Sea.

The Navy confirmed this was the first port visit for Bush since deploying, marking 188 consecutive days at sea (including the end date), which falls just short of the 200-plus days that USS Abraham Lincoln recently logged.

Abraham Lincoln Homecoming Imminent

The USS Abraham Lincoln reappeared on AIS on October 3, roughly 200 nautical miles southwest of her homeport at Naval Air Station (NAS) North Island in San Diego, after steaming east across the vast Pacific Ocean. However, instead of returning home, Lincoln is holding off the coast of California, disembarking Carrier Air Wing (CVW) 9 and offloading ammunition alongside Lewis and Clark class dry cargo ship USNS Washington Chambers.

Lincoln is expected to return home on Wednesday or Thursday. The carrier departed San Diego on November 21, 2025, and an arrival this week would close out a total deployment of 321 to 322 days, by our count. That’s just shy of the 326-day record USS Gerald R. Ford set in May, representing the second-longest deployment in the modern carrier era.

The marathon deployment drew scrutiny over the grueling conditions Sailors and Marines experienced aboard. In August, crew families described supply shortages and difficult living arrangements, as TWZ reported at the time. The accounts led to widespread media coverage, which Acting Secretary of the Navy Hung Cao called dishonest while also acknowledging that “a small number of mental health cases were treated with no loss of life, meal plans were adjusted when fresh resupply was unavailable, without a single meal being missed, calls home were limited when the operational threat was too high.” At least eight personnel across the strike group attempted suicide during the cruise, Cao wrote in a letter sent to Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand that was obtained by CNN.

Friends and family welcomed members of Helicopter Maritime Strike Squadron (HSM) 71 back to NAS North Island on Friday, according to a release from DVIDS, the military’s content-sharing portal. A Growler squadron from CVW 9 also recently returned to NAS Whidbey Island in Washington State.

Ronald Reagan Moves From Washington State To San Diego

The latest carrier to rejoin the fleet after completing an extended maintenance availability, USS Ronald Reagan, pulled into San Diego on Monday after departing Bremerton, Washington, on September 30, according to public AIS data. Reagan is currently berthed at Kilo Pier on Naval Air Station North Island, a spot now available after USS Theodore Roosevelt vacated it on September 27.

Imagery released by the Navy showed the flattop underway conducting routine operations in the U.S. 3rd Fleet area of operations on Sunday, October 4. Reagan reentered the fleet recently after completing a four-day sea trial and shakedown cruise that capped an extended 17-month Drydocking Planned Incremental Availability.

While docked at Puget Sound Naval Shipyard, she received several upgrades and enhancements, including an Unmanned Air Warfare Center (UAWC) to command and control the MQ-25 tanker drone. The MQ-25 will eventually take on the role of refueling carrier-based aircraft, held today by Super Hornets. The new UAWC makes her the second carrier to receive such an upgrade, following USS Theodore Roosevelt. The crew aboard Reagan has conducted pierside and at-sea testing of the new command center.

Dwight D. Eisenhower Returns To Homeport After Growler Mishap

Following an incident off the east coast that resulted in the loss of an EA-18G Growler electronic attack jet, the USS Dwight D. Eisenhower returned to Naval Station Norfolk on October 5 after an eight-day underway.

Prior to her return, the Navy told us the following, published in full: “The Nimitz-class aircraft carrier USS Dwight D. Eisenhower (CVN 69) will return to Naval Station Norfolk to allow for a comprehensive assessment of the ship’s aircraft launch and recovery equipment following the Sept. 28 aviation mishap. The decision reflects the Navy’s deliberate approach to flight safety and readiness. While the cause of the mishap remains under investigation, Navy technical experts will conduct a thorough assessment of the affected systems and complete any necessary maintenance before flight operations resume. USS Dwight D. Eisenhower remains capable of safely navigating and conducting shipboard operations.”

Eight Sailors were ultimately evaluated by medical personnel aboard the ship. The mishap was reportedly due to a failure of the arresting gear, which catches and stops the forward momentum of aircraft after landing, and the Growler was lost overboard. Both crew members safely ejected and were rescued by MH-60 Seahawk helicopters.

Harry S. Truman Moves Dead Stick For Mid-Life Nuclear Refueling Overhaul

USS Harry S. Truman left Naval Station Norfolk on September 30 and moved “dead stick” into Dry Dock 11 at Huntington Ingalls Industries’ (HII) Newport News Shipbuilding (NNS) facility the same day. The carrier will begin the lengthy process of a mid-life Refueling and Complex Overhaul (RCOH).

Truman is the eighth Nimitz class carrier to conduct an RCOH at NNS, according to HII, which won a $5.1 billion contract to complete the work. The overhaul accounts for about one-third of the maintenance and modernization work that a carrier will undergo over a 50-year service life and involves defueling and refueling her nuclear reactors, in addition to upgrades made to the ship’s propulsion plant and combat systems.

“Our team has been diligently working to get ahead on this critical engineering and construction project that will prepare USS Harry S. Truman for the second half of her service life,” Bryan Caccavale, the NNS vice president of program management, said in a statement. “When the ship arrives at NNS, we’ll apply that same diligence to working with our suppliers and Navy partners to ensure a successful recapitalization of CVN 75,” he added.

USS John C. Stennis is also currently completing RCOH at NNS, but there has been no announcement of a return to service, as of publication. Stennis began the overhaul in 2021, and budget documents point to an October 2026 redelivery date, but it’s unclear whether that timeline will hold.

Newest Ford Class Carrier, John F. Kennedy, Transits To Norfolk After Preliminary Acceptance

The Navy took “preliminary acceptance” of the future USS John F. Kennedy from NNS on September 29. The nation’s newest and second Ford class carrier completed acceptance trials in August.

“Achieving preliminary acceptance marks a new phase for the ship and her crew, allowing them to get more water under the keel as they test and train underway,” the Navy’s Program Manager for Gerald R. Ford-Class New Construction, Capt. Mark Johnson, said. “This milestone is a testament to the shared commitment of our sailors and our combined Navy-industry team, who remain laser-focused on completing the final stages of construction and test with precision and efficiency to deliver combat-ready lethality to the fleet.”

Kennedy is 99% finished, according to the Navy, with formal delivery planned for spring 2027. “All major systems are complete. The shipbuilder is currently completing final ship systems testing, including testing of the remaining four Advanced Weapons Elevators,” the release noted. On the same day as the announcement, September 29, the carrier departed the shipyard, and arrived at her new homeport of Naval Station Norfolk, moored at Pier 11N, on October 2.

Big Deck Fleet At A Glance

Overall, four U.S. carriers are deployed (with one returning home this week), three are working up in various states of readiness, three are in maintenance, one is being used primarily for training before deactivation next year, and another will be delivered in 2027. Two amphibious ready groups are deployed, one is forward-deployed, three are working up or in port, and three are in maintenance.

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

Contact the author: ian@twz.com or @ianellisjones

Two years ago, Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) relaunched Jaguar into a blizzard of controversy. Its bizarre teaser ad was described as “woke” and its “Barbie pink” concept car was ridiculed.

Now, the first of its new models has appeared in public for the first time. The all-electric Type 01, unveiled in New York, represents a radical new direction for the classic brand.

The car itself is an imposing four-door “Grand Tourer”, with a long bonnet that deliberately harks back to Jaguar’s emblematic 1960s E-Type.

But it marks a gamble for JLR, which has invested billions reinventing Jaguar and is facing mixed reactions over the new car’s design and the brand’s all-electric strategy.

The new model’s electric motors are potent, producing about 1000 horsepower and allowing it to accelerate from 0-62mph in 3.2 seconds. JLR says it has a range, at “sustained highway speed”, of up to 320 miles.

The company describes it as the “most technically advanced, powerful and aerodynamic Jaguar ever engineered”.

However, it comes at a hefty price tag, with a minimum cost of £130,000 ($172,426). In the US, the Type 01 has a starting price of $130,500.

Under normal circumstances, the launch of a car like this might generate few headlines. But in this case the attention has been much greater, and for good reason.

Members of the Republican Party have joined Democrats in questioning remarks made by United States President Donald Trump about the California cities of Los Angeles and San Diego.

Much of the backlash came on Tuesday, a day after Trump told a midterm rally in Nebraska that Americans should be willing to make sacrifices to gain victory in the US-Israeli war against Iran.

Those sacrifices, he implied, could include the destruction of American cities, in case of an Iranian attack.

“It’s a small price to pay for keeping the world safe, keeping our country safe,” Trump said, seemingly in reference to the knock-on effects of the war, including rising fuel and fertiliser prices.

“They can take out a city. Let them take out Los Angeles. Let them take out San Diego. This is a very small price to pay, and it’s going to be over with very soon.”

Trump has downplayed the impact of the war – now in its eighth month – despite polling that shows the conflict is widely unpopular in the US. He has also repeatedly promised the war would end soon, though no lasting ceasefire has been reached so far.

The fallout from his Nebraska remarks was swift. Gavin Newsom, an outspoken critic of Trump and the Democratic governor of California, said the president was “deranged”.

“This is not only madness. This is dangerous,” Newsom said in a video on the social media platform X, in which he called for Congress to rein in Trump’s behaviour.

Newsom, a possible contender in the 2028 presidential race, has clashed repeatedly with Trump.

Last year, the two faced off over Trump’s decision to deploy federal troops to California, as part of an effort to support a crackdown on undocumented immigration in the Los Angeles area.

In December, a federal judge ruled that the deployment had been illegal and ordered its end. Newsom, who opposed the deployment, cited that conflict in his remarks about Trump’s Nebraska rally.

“The president of the United States – the same one who sent in the National Guard into Los Angeles, sent 700 active duty Marines to the second largest city in the United States of America – just invited Iran to take out Los Angeles and San Diego,” Newsom said.

He added that Trump’s remarks should convince those who “didn’t think the November election mattered” to vote in the upcoming midterms.

Some from Trump’s own party have also expressed shock at his remarks.

Jim Desmond, a Republican running in a competitive race for the House of Representatives near San Diego, was among those who distanced themselves from Trump’s statement.

“I vehemently disagree with President Trump’s comments. America must stand up to Iran and defend our interests, but the first responsibility of our Commander in Chief is to protect the American people and our homeland,” Desmond wrote on X.

“No American city is expendable, and no American family should ever be treated as collateral damage.”

US Representative Kevin Kiley, an independent who caucuses with Republicans and is running for re-election in northern California, also called Trump’s comments “unhelpful”.

But the White House has dismissed criticism of the remarks, calling it part of a “media freakout” that “is not rooted in reality”.

“He was clearly stating U.S. cities would have been threatened if a nuclear Iran hadn’t been stopped,” White House Director of Communications Steven Cheung wrote on social media.

“America is safer because of the President. Iran has no nuclear, no navy, no air force, and no money.”

California has the largest population and economy of any state in the US. Because of its population, it also has the most seats in the House of Representatives, at 52.

All 435 seats in the House of Representatives are up for grabs in November’s midterms, along with a third of the Senate. Also on the ballot are key state and local races.

With Republicans’ control of Congress on the line, the results of the midterms are expected to weigh heavily on the final two years of Trump’s second term.

Houthi military spokesperson Yahya Saree says the group has thwarted attempts by Yemeni government forces to advance toward the Bab al-Mandeb Strait.

The hum of the kidney dialysis machine that Onasis Munoz is connected to suddenly stops. The fluorescent lights overhead flicker out, and his room at a clinic in Valencia, Venezuela, is plunged into darkness.

It is not the first time a power cut has interrupted one of the three weekly sessions Munoz needs to do the work his failing kidneys can no longer do, filtering waste and excess fluid from his blood.

For years, electricity would go out every couple of days across parts of Venezuela’s Carabobo state.

But in recent months, Munoz said, the outages have grown to be daily, lasting around seven hours. The clinic’s emergency batteries have since been depleted, and its backup generator no longer works.

He explained that the frequent power failures have disrupted his treatment. His health has slumped as a result.

“I arrive home, exhausted, as if I had run a marathon,” the 34-year-old said.

But often there is no electricity there either, and recent weeks have been sweltering. “I can’t switch on the air conditioning. I cannot rest because of the heat and the mosquitoes. There’s no relief,” Munoz said.

Across Venezuela, the prolonged outages are riling locals, as the electricity supply to homes, businesses and essential services becomes unstable.

Some of the cuts are deliberate, as the government of interim President Delcy Rodriguez rations electricity.

The resulting frustration has spilled onto the streets, where demonstrators hold “cacerolazos” – a traditional form of protest that involves banging pots and pans.

Some have gone as far as blocking roadways and setting tyres on fire. The electricity crisis has also raised concerns about how the government is managing the country’s vast oil supply, a key source of income for the country.

“We are desperate. We cannot understand how a country so rich in resources can be practically left in the dark,” said Patricia Cueva, a lawyer from Maracaibo, the capital of oil-rich Zulia state.

“We cannot rest. We cannot work. Our children cry.”

Letter from progressive US representatives brings attention to Israeli abuse and detention of Palestinian medical workers.

A group of six progressive Congress members in the United States have released a statement condemning Israel’s abuse of Palestinian healthcare workers, including the Gaza doctor Hussam Abu Safia, who has been held in Israeli detention since 2024.

The Tuesday statement draws attention to Israeli attacks on Palestinian medical workers, who have been targeted and detained during the country’s genocidal war on Gaza.

It was signed by Representatives Rashida Tlaib, Ilhan Omar, Jesus “Chuy” Garcia, Summer Lee, Pramila Jayapal and Delia Ramirez.

“Over the last three years, the Israeli government has systematically destroyed the health system in Palestine, murdering at least 1,700 Palestinian doctors, nurses, paramedics, and other healthcare workers and destroying dozens of hospitals,” the statement reads.

“It has arrested and arbitrarily detained hundreds of Palestinian healthcare workers, including at least 16 physicians who continue to be held in inhumane conditions.”

Among those detained is Abu Safia, who lawyers say was subjected to abuses such as torture, sleep deprivation and beatings during his detention.

Israeli soldiers arrested Abu Safia in December 2024, after he and other medical workers reportedly refused to evacuate from Kamal Adwan Hospital, where they worked.

No charges have been filed against Abu Safia, and he has not had a trial.

Israeli attacks on health infrastructure in Gaza, including the destruction of nearly all of the strip’s hospitals and medical centres, are one component of what rights groups have depicted as an effort to deprive Palestinians of essential services such as food, water and medical treatment.

Tuesday’s statement argues that such efforts are part of an “intentional policy designed to further occupation, apartheid, and genocide against the Palestinian people”.

That assessment is shared by a growing number of rights organisations, scholars and United Nations officials, who have denounced Israeli actions in the Palestinian strip.

Israeli officials have stated that they target hospitals and medical facilities as part of an effort to attack the Palestinian armed groups that allegedly use such facilities to carry out and coordinate operations.

Such claims have often failed to withstand scrutiny. Israel admitted that its soldiers killed a group of 15 emergency workers in southern Gaza in March 2025, after initially stating that the ambulance convoy had approached soldiers “suspiciously” and claiming, without evidence, that several of those killed were linked to Hamas.

A report by the group Forensic Architecture and Earshot found that Israeli soldiers fired more than 900 bullets as they opened fire on a clearly marked ambulance convoy and killed some of the medics “execution-style” before burying their bodies and their vehicles.

Caracas, October 6, 2026 (venezuelanalysis.com) – The US Justice Department has urged New York District Judge Alvin Hellerstein to reject Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and First Lady Cilia Flores’ sovereign immunity claims amid their ongoing legal case.

In a court filing submitted on October 2, prosecutors told the court that Maduro and Flores’ motions to dismiss their indictments “should be denied.”

The Venezuelan president and first lady, who is also a legislator, were kidnapped in Caracas by US forces on January 3. They were charged with drug trafficking conspiracy and weapons possession, with Maduro additionally facing a “narco-terrorism” accusation.

The pair’s defense teams filed motions to dismiss the case in September, arguing that their respective positions in the Venezuelan government should make them immune to criminal prosecution in a third country.

In response, the Justice Department stated that the recognition of a foreign head of state is the exclusive competency of the executive branch, and that Washington has not recognized Maduro since 2019. Historically, US courts have deferred to the White House and State Department on foreign policy matters.

However, in the ongoing case, Justice Department officials sought to bolster their argument by stating that the Venezuelan government, led by Acting President Delcy Rodríguez, has declined to invoke immunity for Maduro and Flores.

“If Venezuela wished to assert its view that the defendants were entitled to immunity in this, it could have,“ the submitted document read. “The defendants’ attempt to claim the contrary is an admission that such silence is devastating to their claims.”

The prosecutors pointed to an ongoing civil lawsuit in Florida against Maduro, Rodríguez, and other defendants, where the Venezuelan government, through its US embassy, requested that the Trump administration communicate to the respective court that the acting president should “enjoy absolute immunity from judicial proceedings in foreign domestic courts.”

The State Department sent a letter in June calling on the Florida district court to “promptly dismiss the proceedings.” The White House likewise communicated to the court that all claims against Rodríguez should be “dismissed without prejudice.”

In August 2025, three US nationals who were imprisoned in Venezuela sued Maduro, Rodríguez, and several other current and former state officials. The plaintiffs claimed to have suffered “torture” and to have been used in “hostage diplomacy.” The judge issued a default ruling after Maduro and other defendants failed to show and awarded $314 million in damages to the plaintiffs.

“Venezuela did not request immunity in this case, despite every opportunity to do so. Indeed, there is no doubt that the current Venezuelan government knows how to request immunity,” the Justice Department’s recent filing continued.

Prosecutors went on to claim that the Trump administration’s foreign policy views, coupled with the Venezuelan government not explicitly invoking immunity, should outweigh the defense’s assertion that the United Nations recognized Maduro’s presidency.

Hellerstein is scheduled to hear oral arguments on the pre-trial motions to dismiss on November 17 before issuing a ruling. If the trial goes forward, it will begin on June 1, 2027.

Caracas has not commented on the latest developments in Maduro and Flores’ legal case. In recent months, Venezuelan officials have occasionally expressed hope that the two will eventually return to the country but without demanding their immediate release.

Rodríguez made no mention of Maduro and Flores’ kidnapping and prosecution during her recent trip to New York for the 81st session of the UN General Assembly. In a July interview, she claimed that Maduro has the right to “demonstrate the truth” before the US Justice system but did not call for his liberation.

The Venezuelan government is covering the pair’s legal defense costs after the US Treasury Department lifted restrictions blocking it.

In his UN speech on September 22, Trump celebrated the military operation that led to the abduction of Maduro, whom he called an “outlaw dictator.” Trump and Rodríguez met on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly, with the Venezuelan leader thanking the US president for supporting “Venezuela’s reinsertion into multilateral spaces.”

Edited by Lucas Koerner in Philadelphia, USA.

As part of its overall effort to boost America’s flagging shipbuilding capacity, the Trump administration on Tuesday announced that Anduril is building a new two-million-square-foot facility in Baltimore designed to help speed up the production of Virginia class nuclear-powered attack submarines. The plant, dubbed Arsenal-2, will eventually produce components like torpedo tubes and spherical air flasks, which will then be sent to the two shipyards that build nuclear submarines, General Dynamics Electric Boat and Huntington Ingalls Industries’ Newport News Shipbuilding. Anduril’s plan to build complex submarine components is a huge leap for a company with a shipbuilding portfolio consisting of a limited number of smaller craft.

The submarine component plant announcement was made as the Navy is struggling to keep up with its goal of producing two of these boats per year amid a wider issue of construction and delivery delays across the service. However, it will be years before the first Anduril-produced components are placed on a submarine, with no specific timelines for that effort yet established, an industry official told us. We will discuss that in greater detail later in this story.

“Today’s $6.6 billion investment represents the president’s commitment to restoring American maritime dominance by constructing new vessels in communities like Baltimore and across the country,” White House spokesperson Anna Kelly told a group of reporters, including from TWZ, at a Tuesday morning press conference.

Those funds include a $3.7 billion investment from Anduril to build and staff the new facility and a contract worth up to $2.9 billion awarded to Anduril by the Navy to produce the components.

“The Virginia class submarine program is one of the most critical warfighting capabilities that our nation has that guarantees deterrence every single day,” Anduril President and Chief Strategy Officer Chris Brose stated. “It is also a program that has been challenged in terms of the ability to meet the Navy’s requirements. So we’re, as a nation, not necessarily where we need to be, and that’s not because of our shipyard workers.”

The Navy currently has 26 Virginia class boats, with two more expected to be commissioned next spring, a senior administration official told reporters on Tuesday. Another 31 vessels are still needed to meet the Navy’s overall plan to have 59 Virginia class boats.

However, while the Navy has been buying them at a rate of two per year from Fiscal Year 2011 through Fiscal Year 2024, “the actual Virginia class production rate has never reached 2.0 boats per year, and since 2022 has been limited by shipyard and supplier firm workforce and supply chain challenges to about 1.1 to 1.2 boats per year, resulting in a growing backlog of boats procured but not yet built,” according to a Congressional Research Service (CRS) report published in January. “Key drivers of the drop in production include workforce challenges, first-time quality, material and supplier delays, and lead ship issues associated with the Virginia Payload Module [VPM] variant. The Navy is working closely with the shipbuilders to drive improvement throughout the Virginia enterprise.”

The VPM is an 84-foot hull extension that contains four additional large vertical tubes designed to launch Tomahawk land-attack cruise missiles, Intermediate-Range Conventional Prompt Strike (IRCPS) hypersonic missiles, and other payloads. You can read more about the Navy’s VPM plans in our story here.

Adding to the strain on production and delivery, Australia is set to get one new-build Virginia class boat and two from the U.S. Navy’s fleet under the 2021 trilateral AUKUS nuclear submarine acquisition deal with the United States and the United Kingdom.

In May, Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Daryl Caudle told Congress that the service would meet its two-boat-a-year delivery rate by 2032.

During Tuesday’s press conference, officials laid out claims that the new Anduril plant will address several of the issues that have slowed down the construction and delivery of these submarines.

“If you look at this in terms of capacity, the potential based on the area and what Anduril plans to do is to add about 9 million hours of labor a year at this facility,” stated a senior administration official, who, like others on Tuesday spoke on condition of anonymity. “That would be the equivalent of about a 15% increase, and so that would be directly translatable to Virginia class submarine production. So having those torpedo tubes earlier would let us move production of current Virginia submarines under construction faster.”

In addition, Anduril plans to draw on a huge potential workforce to staff the plant.

“If you basically draw like a one-hour radius around the Baltimore County area, there are millions and millions of people who could potentially contribute and work at this shipyard, and that is a huge selling point for us,” an industry official suggested.

Beyond producing components like torpedo tubes, Anduril aspires to eventually build “full ship sections, bows, sterns, etc.” at Arsenal-2, the industry official added.

Anduril said Arsenal-2 will be “purpose-built” for the “high-volume, high-precision production of undersea naval capabilities.”

“The shipyard’s layout is optimized for production,” the company stated in a media release. “Reduced distances between fabrication, assembly, testing, and integration areas eliminate the staging bottlenecks that slow conventional yards.”

“A functional 1,200-foot graving dock and multimodal road and rail access support large-scale component movement,” Anduril added. “High-bay assembly halls, adjacent fabrication areas, and reconfigurable production lines allow the yard to shift rapidly as Navy requirements evolve.”

ArsenalOS, Anduril’s industrial software platform, “will provide the digital backbone for the yard and its production systems,” the company further pointed out. “It will connect fabrication workflows, outfitting sequences, material movement, inspection protocols, and documentation requirements in a single system, giving workers and managers real-time visibility into the state of production. Digital work instructions, embedded quality controls, modern sensing, and automation will support the expertise of welders, pipefitters, electricians, shipfitters, inspectors, and other skilled trades.”

ArsenalOS™: The Digital Backbone of Modern Defense Manufacturing

Anduril claims the project “will create 3,100 direct jobs and support more than 11,000 indirect jobs. The site will drive $2 billion in annual economic output, including an estimated $312 million in wages each year.”

Before Arsenal-2 is up and running, Anduril said it plans to “manufacture critical Virginia class submarine components at a new 160,000-square-foot facility in Orange County, California, purpose-built to support key submarine construction processes and SUBSAFE-qualified production qualification [efforts].”

The Orange County facility will give Anduril “a two-year operational head start to develop and validate manufacturing methods, production workflows, and quality systems before  Arsenal-2 comes online,” the company noted. “It will support prototyping and production of Virginia-class test assets and critical maritime components, including torpedo tubes, while allowing Anduril to recruit and train the early workforce on the systems and standards that will ultimately scale at Arsenal-2. Once Arsenal-2 comes online, the Orange County facility will continue supporting broader maritime manufacturing efforts across Anduril’s industrial network.”

Newly built Virginia-class submarine #Massachusetts launches for the first time #shorts

As we noted earlier in this piece, it will be years before anything produced by Anduril winds up on a sub. In addition to recruiting and training a workforce to build the components and ensuring the production system can meet goals, the parts then have to be tested to ensure they are safe enough to place on boats.

The industry official told TWZ that there is no schedule yet for when that will happen.

“We are starting this work now,” the industry official said. “We’re going to be working quickly. There’s a lot we’re going to have to do to prove the ability to produce the initial components – the torpedo tubes. We’re going to have to work with our partners in industry and partners in government on the certification. So it’s really not possible to put a time stamp on it as much as I’d like to.”

“I think our goal, and I know this is shared by the administration, is to go as fast as possible while keeping the bar of safety as high as it needs to be, and try to get these systems certified so that they go into the production of boats… and solve the critical limiting factor currently in our supply chain, and help our industry partners produce more submarines.”

Arsenal-2 follows the development of Anduril’s Arsenal-1 plant in Ohio, first announced two years ago. That five-million-square-foot facility, once fully up and running, will be able to “produce tens of thousands of autonomous weapons systems addressing the urgent needs of the United States and our allies,” the company said at the time.

Arsenal-1, however, remains a work in progress, with more construction work yet to be done. Still, Anduril’s first product from that plant, the U.S. Air Force’s Collaborative Combat Aircraft (CCA) known as the YFQ-44A Fury, rolled off the assembly line there in July. That milestone met the company’s initial production schedule announced in January 2025, according to JobsOhio, the state’s business development arm.

Anduril, which also produces systems like the Ghost Shark extra-large autonomous undersea vehicle (in partnership with Australia), the Roadrunner reusable missile-like air vehicle, the Iris family of passive infrared sensors, and a wide range of other items, is playing a growing role in the Trump administration’s weapons development efforts.

Last month, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth announced that Anduril co-founder Palmer Luckey, who made a name for himself and his fortune in the virtual reality space with Meta, will help lead a new program dubbed Project Meridian. The goal, according to a Pentagon memo, is to “map the trajectory of future warfare, identify critical capability gaps, and propose actionable solutions in furtherance of the identified goals in the 2026 National Security Science and Technology Strategy.”

The Pentagon’s Chief Technology Officer, Emil Michael, has been directed to set up this project. SpaceX founder Elon Musk and Newt Gingrich are other key members.

From our story about Project Meridian and the Pentagon’s overall effort to boost its autonomous warfare capabilities:

“The inclusion of Musk and Luckey does raise ethical questions, as they both lead companies with major U.S. government contracts already, and which could be in line to see more opportunities based on Project Meridian’s findings. What guardrails might be put in place to prevent conflicts of interest is unclear.”

Regardless of any such concerns, today’s shipyard announcement is a clear indication that the Trump administration and the Pentagon see Anduril as a major player across its weapons manufacturing industrial base. It’s also a reminder of just how challenging it is to actually expand America’s ability to build fighting vessels.

Contact the author: howard@twz.com

Novac Djokovic won 102nd match of his career, while ATP 500 tournament victory was Carlos Alcaraz’s third of the year.

Novak Djokovic won the China Open after his opponent Alex de Minaur retired from the final with injury, while Spaniard Carlos Alcaraz retained his Japan Open crown to continue his resurgence after a lengthy wrist injury layoff.

The 39-year-old Serbian won the first set in the tie-break 7-6 (7-3) and was down a game in the second set when the Australian ended the match with retirement on Tuesday.

Djokovic extended an astonishing unbeaten streak in Beijing and winning the 102nd title of his career.

De Minaur left the court for a medical timeout after losing the first-set tie break but played on with his left thigh heavily bandaged. However, he had to stop after winning the first game of the second set, leaving him trailing 7-6(3) 0-1.

“I don’t feel great … I want to say sorry to all the amazing fans,” de Minaur said at the trophy presentation.

“I didn’t want to finish like this … hopefully see you next year,” added the 27-year-old fifth seed.

Alcaraz retains Japan Open crown

Alcaraz made another slow start before cruising past unseeded Czech Jiri Lehecka 7-6(4) 6-4 in the Japan Open final on Tuesday.

The ATP 500 tournament victory is Alcaraz’s third of the year after the Australian Open and Qatar Open, before the 23-year-old was sidelined by an injury for nearly five months and returned at the US Open in late August.

“I’m really happy to be able to lift a trophy again,” Alcaraz said. “It’s been a while and obviously it’s extra special after my injury and my comeback, in the second tournament that I’m playing.

“It was a really tough week and I didn’t play my best tennis and my best level but I did find good solutions and that’s what matters in the end.”

Alcaraz became the first man to go back-to-back in Tokyo since American Pete Sampras won the men’s title in both 1993 and 1994.

The world number three started shakily, dropping serve in the first game, but soon recovered and dialled up the intensity to break world number 19 Lehecka’s serve with a scorching backhand to level at 3-3.

More uncharacteristic errors from Alcaraz gave Lehecka hope in the tiebreak, but the Spaniard unleashed a sublime drop-shot en route to clinching the opening set to lay the platform for his 27th title overall.

Alcaraz says he ‘trusted’ himself

The seven-time Grand Slam champion took control midway through the second set, breaking to claim a 4-3 lead before sealing victory by forcing an error on match point and then celebrating wildly with his team courtside.

Alcaraz said his triumph helped erase the doubts that he faced during his injury break.

“A lot of negative thoughts come to your mind,” Alcaraz added: “If you’re going to come back healthy, if you’re going to come back the same as you were before, if I will be able to hit the ball normally without pain. I trusted myself and it worked out.”

Alcaraz will return to action at the Shanghai Masters where he will take on Argentina’s Juan Manuel Cerundolo or a qualifier first. The main draw of the ATP 1000 event begins on Wednesday.

After Israeli soldiers stormed Birzeit University near Ramallah to demolish a stone memorial dedicated to dead students, Rania Washaha, 47, felt the pain of bereavement again.

Her brother, Fadi, 34, was shot in the head by an Israeli soldier near the northern entrance to el-Bireh in the central West Bank in May 2021.

His name was among the 38 students from the university killed by Israel and listed on the stone pillar known as the Martyrs’ Monument.

Israeli soldiers raided the university campus at dawn on Monday, accompanied by 10 military vehicles. A bulldozer demolished the pillar, and soldiers took away the marble stone. In its place, the Israelis left a planter containing a fig sapling, bearing the inscription: “Water it twice.”

Targeting the University

This raid marks the fifth Israeli incursion into the campus since the beginning of 2026 and the 28th since 2002.

Birzeit University’s administration condemned the recent raid, describing the destruction of the Martyrs’ Monument as a violation of international law and an attack on education and national memory.

“Bulldozers won’t erase the memory of the martyrs, military vehicles won’t extinguish the light of knowledge, and these assaults won’t break the university’s resolve to pursue its academic and national mission,” a statement by the university pledged.

It came 10 days after another incursion by Israeli forces during the daytime, a day before the start of the new fall semester.

Nardeen al-Memi, the university’s public relations and media officer, told Al Jazeera in the brief minutes of their incursion, Israeli soldiers approached the monument for the first time and photographed it.

The Martyrs’ Monument was erected between 1994 and 1996, bearing the names of students and alumni at Birzeit killed by Israeli forces. The list starts with Sharaf al-Tayyibi, who was shot dead by Israeli forces on the campus in 1984. The names of other students and alumni were added during the years that followed.

“The last name inscribed on the monument was that of student Omar al-Naasan, whom soldiers killed in al-Mughayyir east of Ramallah on September 2 while he was confronting settler incursions,” said Nardeen. “Days after his death, his father came and personally wrote his son’s name on the monument.”

University students organised a protest at the site of the destroyed memorial on Tuesday afternoon, most viewing it as an Israeli attempt to intimidate them.

Sami Adel, a Birzeit student who wanted to use a pseudonym due to his fear of being detained, told Al Jazeera the memorial holds a place in the heart of everyone who has attended the university since the 1990s.

In recent years, Israel has tried to suppress any student activity dedicated to commemorating the martyrs, he said.

“Soldiers detained me for several hours three weeks ago and threatened that if I participated in any political student activity on campus, I would face a long and harsh detention,” he added.

Erasing memory

The removal of the memorial is part of a broader Israeli policy targeting memorials dedicated to Palestinians killed by Israel in the occupied West Bank.

The Israeli far-right has made the issue part of its campaign to erase markers of Palestinian identity.

Zvi Sukkot, a member of the Knesset from the Religious Zionism Party, destroyed one such memorial in the village of Madama, south of Nablus, with a sledgehammer in August. The Israeli military later said that it routinely removes “symbols of incitement”.

Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich submitted a list of approximately 40 Palestinian memorials, proposing their destruction, to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

There has been a wider targeting of civic and cultural symbols across the West Bank, particularly in Jenin, by Israeli authorities.

“Jenin Horse”, a monument constructed from the wreckage left behind by an Israeli incursion into the city, was removed. A memorial dedicated to Al Jazeera journalist Shireen Abu Akleh in Jenin was also targeted in 2023.

A cemetery containing the bodies of Iraqi soldiers killed during the 1948 war, also located in Jenin, has been raided by Israelis from illegal settlements.

Other landmarks embedded in the city’s collective memory, including the “Watermelon Roundabout”, have also been targeted.

Crushing resistance

Israel’s targeting of Palestine’s collective memory has coincided with a wider campaign of suppression in the occupied West Bank.

Palestinian universities have been a particular target in this pressure campaign, with campuses raided, students detained, and strict restrictions on activities and events within university grounds.

Israeli authorities are likely focusing on Palestinian universities because they hold a special significance for Palestinian resistance. They historically served as spaces for anti-occupation activism and have been an integral part of the Palestinian political landscape for decades.

Political analyst Mohammed al-Qeeq, who served as president of the Birzeit University Student Council between 2006 and 2007, told Al Jazeera that Israel has targeted writers, influencers, and activists, along with students, to deter any resistance to the occupation.

Universities have historically served as a “fundamental pillar” of Palestinian resilience and identity.

“Israel had also sought to weaken Palestinian political and social cohesion inside universities by deepening divisions between factions and creating chaos”, he said.

Remembering Fadi

For Rania, the memorial served to cement the names of the martyred students in the minds of the next generation of Berzeit students, including her brother’s.

“I cannot deny that I felt a pang of anguish when the memorial was demolished,” she told Al Jazeera. “I realised the goal wasn’t simply to uproot a physical object; I felt the suppressed violence Israel inflicts upon us.”

The memorial, constructed in 1996, stood on the campus when Fadi studied at Birzeit University. He had been arrested multiple times, spending a total of eight years in detention, and Israel denied Fadi the chance to wear a graduation gown.

“He didn’t even complete two years of study due to repeated arrests and injuries from soldiers’ gunfire,” Rania said. “Yet, he loved Birzeit University dearly and would stand by the memorial, contemplating the names of the student martyrs, never knowing that his own name would one day be added to theirs.”

This year, Rania’s son enrolled at Birzeit University as a first-year student. Shortly before classes started last September, an Israeli officer phoned him, threatening him if he participated in any student activities on campus. “Remember what we did to your uncle,” they warned him.

The Navy has announced plans to buy 30 new drone boats, 10 from each of three companies, under its Medium Unmanned Surface Vessel (MUSV) program. The deals are an important step forward for the Navy’s latest attempt to field larger USVs after years of setbacks and shakeups, but it remains to be seen when these new capabilities might actually become operational.

Galliano Marine Services, Huntington Ingalls Industries (HII), and Saronic Technologies each received so-called Other Transaction Authority (OTA) agreements in relation to the MUSV program today. OTA is a contracting mechanism designed to support rapid prototyping and other research and development work without having to use more traditional and often lengthy processes.

The awards “mark a significant step forward in translating the strategic vision into a tangible fleet capability,” Chris Miller, the Navy’s Acting Direct Reporting Portfolio Manager for Robotic and Autonomous Systems (DRPM RAS), told TWZ and others at a media roundtable earlier today. “Each agreement is for the procurement of 10 MUSV at an average procurement cost of $40 million per vessel.”

Saronic and HII submitted their Marauder and Romulus designs, respectively, to the MUSV Phase I competition. Galliano Marine Services, which does business as Edison Chouest, does not appear to have announced its entrant publicly. At a unit cost of $40 million, the total price tag for 30 MUSVs, regardless of type, would be $1.2 billion.

“Production will begin immediately at shipyards in Loreauville, Houma, and Franklin, Louisiana, with deliveries starting as early as the fourth quarter of [Fiscal Year] 2027,” Miller added.

To take a step back quickly, the Navy has used a variety of definitions for what qualifies as a “medium” USV over the years. It’s also important to note that the Navy already fields several speedboat and jet ski-type USVs operationally that are capable of performing various different missions, including employment as one-way attack munitions.

Threshold MUSV program requirements the service put out in March included a range of at least “2500 nm [nautical miles] at 25 knots while carrying a 25 MT [metric ton] load on the payload deck in NATO STANAG 4194 Sea State 4.” Sea State 4 is characterized by wind speeds of 17 to 21 knots and wave heights between four and eight feet, per that NATO standard. The MUSVs also had to be able to carry forty-foot equivalent units (FEU) containerized payloads and refuel at sea at a rate of “2,000 gallons per minute of fuel through deck connections.” Various other operational and sustainment requirements were laid out at that time, as you can read more about here.

The OTAs announced today were awarded “following successful at sea testing” under Phase I of the MUSV program, according to a press release the Navy put out today. A total of seven companies competed in this initial phase, with the others being Birdon, Leidos, PacMar Technologies, and Sea Machines. That work was conducted under an earlier round of OTAs.

“The testing evaluated, among other things, the vessel’s ability to see and understand the surrounding maritime environment, how well the vessels navigated autonomously according to the international regulations for preventing collisions at sea, and the vessel’s ability to conduct a long-duration mission,” the Navy’s Miller said at the roundtable earlier today. “The demonstrations had to prove that the designs were mature enough to meet the Navy’s operational standards and our requirements.”

In terms of the long-duration mission requirements, “the test was that they had to be able to execute [over] roughly 26 hours and over 360 nautical miles with only a single input during that time from a C2 [command and control] station allowed,” Milleter further explained. “So, it basically demonstrated that the vessel could run for an excess of 24 hours at an extended range with very minimal input from the actual operator from a C2 station. This provided basically our input and our ability to assess how truly autonomous the functionality was of the platforms.”

Overall, the OTA awards “were based on the optimal mix of autonomy, performance, design, production schedule, and cost,” he added.

The MUSV Phase II contracting notice outlines additional parameters, including that submitted designs cannot be more than 295 feet (90 meters) long or displace more than 5,000 metric tons. The USVs also have to be able to accommodate “at least 2x Twenty-foot Equivalent Unit (TEU) [containerized payloads] weighing 24,000 kg each and consuming 25 kW each” and be “capable of executing multi-day unmanned operations of at least 10 days.” The drone boats need to be “operable in NATO STANAG 4194 Sea State 4 and survivable in Sea State 6,” as well. The full lists of threshold requirements and desired attributes are reproduced below.

In addition, “to be considered for this Call for Solutions, the proposed MUSV must be ready for operational demonstration at the time of solution submission,” according to the Phase II contracting notice. “An MUSV requiring substantial modifications for the production platform compared to the as-demonstrated platform will not be considered.”

“The Phase II solicitation allows entrants to compete and existing vendors to submit updated product blocks and modular payload configurations,” Miller, the Acting DRPM RAS, said today. “Testing evaluations will begin as early as November 16th, and proposals will be assessed on a continually rolling basis over the next five years.”

Miller also drew attention to the elimination of the speed and at-sea refueling targets previously outlined in Phase I.

“What we learned from Phase I is that as you increase the speed requirements and some of these other things, it does present certain challenges for industry,” according to Miller. “So I’m trying to actually find the sweet spot in the market where there is healthy competition, and there’s opportunities, and we can have more things that potentially are dual use, both military and civilian.”

So far, the Navy has only offered limited insights into exactly what specific mission sets it wants the MUSVs to perform, even initially.

The “MUSV Phase I requirements were closely tailored to fulfill operational requirements for a specific mission set focused on demonstrated ability to carry containerized payloads while meeting specific vessel performance requirements for speed and range,” Miller said during today’s roundtable. “However, there is an ever-increasing demand signal that we must be ready to meet. To ensure scalability across the broader mission sets and to support our joint force, we issued a formal call for solutions for MUSV Phase II integration and testing.”

He also stressed that the modularity of the designs being acquired now would allow for the continued evolution of their capabilities as time goes on.

With the focus on containerized payloads, “honestly, inside you could have a sensor, you could have repair equipment for ships,” Rebecca Gassler, who was the Navy’s Portfolio Acquisition Executive for Robotic and Autonomous Systems (PAE RAS) until August, also told TWZ and other outlets back in March. “You could have any number of payloads inside those, and you basically are able to just swap them on.”

In announcing the new OTAs today, as well as discussing the Phase II MUSV plans, the Navy also highlighted continued opportunities for the other companies that had been involved in Phase I.

“Leidos, PAC MAR, and Sea Machines were determined to complete the project provided for in their prototype other transaction agreement and will receive a $15 million award as part of the previously established terms of the prototype OTs,” the Navy’s MUSV announcement today adds. “Alongside the OT awardees, will be accepted onto the Drones.mil hosted Maritime Marketplace, where they are now eligible to receive follow-on production agreements from authorized acquisition authorities across the DOW [Department of War].”

Birdon did not complete the required testing. Based on the terms of the Phase I OTAs, Galliano, HII, and Saronic will also receive $15 million awards and be included in the marketplace. The aforementioned Phase II CFS is intended “to expand its acquisition pipeline through a Maritime Marketplace to broaden offerings and satisfy future MUSV mission sets,” as well, per the Navy.

The Navy stressed the importance of this open-ended “marketplace” model as a way to accelerate the acquisition process when it first outlined the MUSV program to the public back in March, as you can read more about here. Just last week, the service also established a new Robotic and Autonomous Systems Warfighting Development Center (RASWDC) to serve as a focal point for “the development, operational integration, and employment of robotic and autonomous systems (RAS) across the maritime domain,” to include the MUSV effort.

The Drones.mil marketplace also extends to all branches of the U.S. military and beyond just USVs. Miller today did highlight the potential for possible cooperation with other services on drone boat efforts through this framework. He also said the Navy might be willing to consider additional acquisition strategies, including leasing uncrewed platforms, in the future.

Larger USVs have long been seen as key to bolstering the U.S. Navy’s overall operational capacity above the waves, and doing so in a cost-effective and rapidly producible manner. They are also viewed as central to enabling new, more distributed concepts of operations designed to help expand operational coverage and reduce the vulnerability of crewed ships, especially in any future high-end fight in the Pacific with China.

“Unmanned technology is redefining operations and providing our combatant commanders with unprecedented scale, persistence, and risk tolerance,” the Navy’s Miller said at the roundtable.

At the same time, as mentioned, the Navy has attempted to acquire operational fleets of larger drone boats in the past without success. Today, the service’s capabilities in this regard remain limited to a pocket force of still largely experimental optionally-crewed designs.

Since the Navy first unveiled it in March, MUSV has already faced certain hurdles. This includes a major leadership shakeup in August that saw PAE RAS Rebecca Gassler, the first person to ever hold that post, removed from her post after just eight months for reasons that are still not immediately clear.

In July, it also emerged that Blue Water Autonomy and Saildrone had filed suit against the Navy over being left out of Phase I of the MUSV competition. The companies alleged that the service did not follow its own selection criteria. That lawsuit is still ongoing. Blue Water Autonomy, among others, had also previously made investments in response to requirements the Navy had laid out for a previous effort called the Modular Surface Attack Craft (MASC) last year. The MUSV program has now fully supplanted MASC.

In speaking at the roundtable today, Miller acknowledged potential budget limitations and other hurdles that could still impact MUSV going forward. “I’m trying to be prepared depending on where that demand goes,” he said.

As said at the start, today’s MUSV announcement is an important new step forward for the Navy’s efforts to acquire fleets of larger USVs, but the service still has to transition these efforts into operational realities.

Contact the author: joe@twz.com

U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) has retired the last of its P-3 Airborne Early Warning (AEW) aircraft. The AEW version is instantly recognizable from the saucer-like radar dome on top, as seen on other AEW types like the E-2 Hawkeye and the E-3 Sentry. CBP was the only operator of this variant of the P-3 Orion and is said to have been the only law enforcement agency to fly any kind of dedicated AEW plane. The retirement of these aircraft comes at a time when American AEW assets, in general, are under heavy strain by demands globally.

CBP officially retired its final P-3 AEW on September 30, 2026, after a final flight from National Air Security Operations Center Jacksonville (NASOC Jacksonville), in Jacksonville, Florida. CBP has also flown Long Range Tracker (LRT) variants of the P-3, configured for more traditional maritime surveillance missions. The current plans for the LRT aircraft, and whether their sunset may also be on the horizon, are not immediately clear, and TWZ has reached out for more information. Orions of all types have been steadily disappearing from service with the U.S. military and elsewhere across the U.S. government as the aging aircraft become more difficult to operate and maintain.

“Our Jacksonville-based P-3 AEW fleet has served as a cornerstone of America’s outer-layer border security,” according to a brief announcement from CBP about the retirement on social media. “Its crews flew far beyond our borders, providing wide-area surveillance across the Caribbean, Gulf of America [Gulf of Mexico], and the transit zones of Central and South America, helping detect and track threats before they could reach the United States.”

By all indications, including official CBP sources, the P-3 AEW fleet consisted of eight aircraft at its peak. There is a confusingly worded 2014 CBP press release that mentions an “11th and final Lockheed Martin P-3 Airborne Early Warning (AEW) aircraft overhaul,” but that figure looks to also include three of the six LRT versions. The same release says that CBP only had 14 P-3s of all types at that time.

What was then known as the U.S. Customs Service (USCS) first began operating the P-3 AEW version in the late 1980s. The aircraft were converted from second-hand maritime patrol variants of the Orion. The first example had started life as a P-3B for the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF). Ex-U.S. Navy P-3s were also converted.

The initial three P-3 AEWs were equipped with the AN/APS-138 radar. The same radar was used on early E-2C Hawkeye airborne early warning and control aircraft operated by the U.S. Navy, as well as several other armed forces internationally.

“The Customs Service had previously borrowed U.S. Navy E-2Cs to meet its antinarcotics surveillance requirements, but required an aircraft with longer range and on-station time,” according to a 2006 report from Forecast International. “In June 1989, the U.S. General Accounting Office issued a report on the drug interdiction P-3B AEW aircraft. The findings indicated that the radar performance was as specified, but the P-3B (when compared to the E-2C) was less costly to operate per square mile of area covered because of the higher cruising speed and longer endurance. The P-3B had at least twice the in-flight endurance of the E-2C.”

Starting in the 1990s, USCS began the process of acquiring additional P-3 AEWs with newer AN/APS-145 radars, as also used on later model E-2Cs. The original AEW Orions were eventually refitted with APS-145s, as well. It’s worth noting here that the U.S. Coast Guard separately moved to acquire an AEW version of the C-130H, designated the EC-130V, in the 1990s, which used the AN/APS-125 radar, also used on older E-2s. Budget cuts led to the end of that program. The EC-130V that had been built was redesignated as an NC-130H and subsequently used for test purposes.

The P-3 AEWs were also equipped with a sensor turret containing electro-optical and infrared (EO/IR) video cameras, allowing the aircraft to more closely investigate targets spotted on radar. CBP regularly conducted P-3 operations that paired AEWs with LRT variants to provide an even broader array of sensor capabilities on missions. The LRTs have EO/IR sensor turrets, as well as AN/APG-66 and SeaVue radars. The pulse-doppler AN/APG-66 is primarily designed for spotting and tracking aerial targets, and was originally used on early variants of the F-16 fighter. SeaVue is a multi-function type with surface search and synthetic aperture radar (SAR) imagery modes. Images produced via SAR are highly detailed maps of the surface below, and can be captured day or night, and regardless of any cloud cover, smoke, or dust. 

Beyond radars and other sensors, the P-3 AEWs also had a robust communications suite consisting of VHF and UHF radios, as well as satellite communications links by the end of their career. CBP’s entire P-3 fleet, including the AEWs and LRTs, has received various updates over the years, including new ‘glass cockpits’ starting in the early 2000s.

CBP Air and Marine Operations: Extended Border Operations

Though primarily employed in support of counter-narcotics interdiction operations, the airborne radar and command and control capabilities were also applied to other missions, including disaster relief and humanitarian assistance efforts at home and abroad. As an example, CBP’s P-3 AEWs helped with air traffic coordination, as well as provided other support, during relief efforts in Texas in the wake of Hurricane Harvey in 2017.

At the same time, CBP’s entire P-3 fleet, including both the AEW and LRT versions, has only been getting increasingly older and difficult to sustain. The P-3B variant first entered U.S. Navy service in the 1960s. CBP did put its P-3s through a Service Life Extension Program overhaul in the 2010s, which included “new wings and tail for each aircraft and completely strips down the aircraft to its bare metal for an inspection,” according to a 2014 press release.

As mentioned, the P-3 family has been in steadily dwindling service in the United States, overall, in recent years. The U.S. Navy has completely retired the Orion as a maritime patrol platform, and the service has also fully divested its more specialized EP-3 intelligence-gathering variants. The Navy had retained a small number of P-3s for research and development and test and evaluation activities, but growing sustainment challenges have been prompting the retirement of those planes, as well. The last NP-3C assigned to the Navy’s Scientific Development Squadron One (VXS-1), the “Warlocks,” was also retired last month. VXS-1 previously operated a ‘domed’ NP-3D, similar to, but distinct from, CBP’s P-3 AEWs, as well. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) is also in the process of replacing its pair of P-3s, configured as civilian hurricane hunter aircraft, with new C-130J Hercules-based platforms. The shrinking U.S. Orion operator base can only have a knock-on impact on CBP P-3 operations.

A key question now is how CBP will fill any gaps left by the retirement of the final AEW version. The agency does continue to operate a mix of other crewed fixed-wing aircraft with mixtures of radars and other sensors, as well as MQ-9 drones, but none of these platforms are equipped with a sensor like the AN/APS-145. CBP also has a network of tethered aerostats with radars at fixed sites around the Caribbean. As an aside, General Atomics, together with Saab, is now working on an AEW configuration for the MQ-9B drone, but there are no known U.S. orders for that capability at the time of writing. That platform will not offer the same level of flexibility and look-down capability as modern crewed AEW aircraft, either. Look-down AEW capability is only growing in importance today amid expanding and evolving drone threats, including to the U.S. homeland.

High demand for AEW support, in general, means that the U.S. military regularly steps in to provide additional coverage with U.S. Navy E-2s and U.S. Air Force E-3s to aid in U.S. counter-drug operations around Latin America. Newer E-2D Advanced Hawkeyes notably have far more powerful radars than the E-2C or the P-3 AEW, with added surface search and track capability, too. At the same time, as mentioned at the start, those assets are in heavy demand, especially in light of the conflict with Iran. On top of that, the Air Force’s E-3 fleet is facing serious sustainment challenges itself, with replacement E-7 Wedgetail aircraft still years away from being delivered.

The Air Force, in particular, is also aiming to eventually push most, if not all, air moving-target indicator (AMTI) tasks currently performed by aircraft like the E-3 and E-7 into space. The service is heavily investing to accelerate the fielding of those capabilities, which could eventually offer revolutionary constant, persistent coverage globally. The first of those satellites are still not expected to reach an early operational state until 2028. It is possible that CBP could get access to a tailored data feed from this system when it does become operational. It still does not obviate the need to have crewed or uncrewed aircraft capable of more closely investigating tracks of interest using EO/IR cameras and other sensors.

Whatever the future might now hold, CBP’s unique time as the operator of the P-3 AEW aircraft has come to an end.

Contact the author: joe@twz.com