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UCLA coach Mick Cronin won a spirited recruiting battle for one of the top European prospects, landing wing player Nikola Kusturica on Thursday.

Kentucky, Michigan and Gonzaga had courted Kusturica, a 6-foot-9 Serbian who is among the top 17-year-old players in Europe. Recruiting websites listed Kusturica as a five-star prospect, and college basketball analysts at Field of 64 and other outlets project Kusturica could be a top-five 2028 NBA draft pick.

UCLA announced it received a signed grant-in-aid agreement from Kusturica, who will join the Bruins for the upcoming season.

He adds to a freshman class that already included three-star center Javonte Floyd from Cedar Grove High in Atlanta and four-star forward Joe Philon III from Montverde Academy in Tampa, Fla. — both of whom signed in April and enrolled in summer classes — and Gunars Grinvalds of Latvia, a former Real Madrid forward who committed to the Bruins on June 5.

“We are very excited to add Nikola to our program,” Cronin said. “Nikola is an elite prospect with great size, skill and a competitive fire which is hard to find. As a 6-foot-9 guard, he can play all over the floor. He impacts the game as a scorer, playmaker and shot blocker. For a very young player, Nik has had a decorated career with the Serbian national team and his club team in Barcelona. UCLA appreciates the support of his international team and his club for their cooperation and development of Nikola.”

Kusturica is expected to arrive in Westwood early next month and join team workouts that began on Thursday and continue for eight weeks.

Kusturica signed with FC Barcelona’s youth team in 2023 and became the youngest athlete to play in the Spanish club’s program. He helped FC Barcelona win the U18 Adidas Next Generation Tournament championship in May, averaging 16.2 points, 6.5 rebounds and 3.2 assists in six games and collecting 20 points and 10 rebounds in the finals against Real Madrid.

This month, Kusturica averaged a team-leading 24.6 points, 6.9 rebounds and 2.7 assists in seven games for Serbia at the FIBA U17 World Cup in Istanbul, Turkey, shooting 46.8% from the field and 72.9% from the free-throw line, including a team-high 37 points in Serbia’s loss to the U.S. in Sunday’s gold-medal game.

He was named the tournament’s best defensive player and earned all-star honors after leading his team with 16 steals and 12 blocks.

Competing in Spain’s U22 league during the 2025-26 season, Kusturica averaged 13.5 points, 7.5 rebounds and 1.9 assists in 19 games and scored in double digits 16 times.

Last year, Kusturica was named the most valuable player of the FIBA U16 EuroBasket tournament in Tbilisi, Georgia, after averaging 20 points, 7.7 rebounds and 3.4 assists per game.

He led Serbia to its first U16 EuroBasket title since 2007, contributing 18 points, 14 rebounds, eight assists and five steals in a 99-86 victory over Lithuania in the finals.

One person clearly influential in UCLA’s recruitment was Yogi Jovanovic, UCLA’s director of international recruiting and an assistant coach. Like Kusturica, Jovanovic is Serbian and has been coach of the country’s U20 national team and is on track to be an assistant coach for Serbia’s Olympic team during the 2028 Games in Los Angeles.

Grinvalds also signed a grant-in-aid agreement. The 6-7 forward competed for Real Madrid in Spain’s Liga ACB.

Two months ago at the U18 Adidas Next Generation Tournament in Greece, the 18-year-old averaged 12 points, 5.3 rebounds and 1.3 assists in six games with Real Madrid.

“Gunars can really shoot the ball at an elite level,” Cronin said. “We like that he has good size at his position. Gunars is interested in his development and continued improvement as a player. We believe he is a great fit here at UCLA as he’s an excellent student and a very hard worker.”

Back in November 2024, TWZ broke a story about a series of incursions over U.S. bases in England by drones of mysterious origin. While the source of these uncrewed aerial vehicles does not appear to have been officially determined, a new report suggests they were launched by Russian ships. 

Produced by the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS), the report investigated a spate of drone incursions across Europe that began in August 2024 and found that “it is highly likely that the Kremlin conducted a UAV campaign over Europe.”

“We assess it is likely that Russian-linked vessels and the ‘shadow fleet’ were used as launch/recovery platforms for UAVs as part of the Kremlin’s wider unconventional war on Europe,” the report added.

Investigators rely heavily on circumstantial evidence and open-source information. TWZ cannot independently confirm these findings, which offer new insights, if not concrete answers, about who could have been behind the flights.

The drone incursions over the bases we were the first to write about were among the earliest in the wave over Europe investigated by IISS. Around this same time, there were also flights over Ramstein Air Base in Germany, the report notes. We covered those incidents as well.

As we reported at the time, drones of an unknown origin were first spotted over RAF Lakenheath and then over RAF Fairford, RAF Feltwell, and RAF Mildenhall.

The report makes particular note of the importance of RAF Lakenheath, which is being readied to host nuclear weapons, a topic we previously covered.

“A public appeal for information drew roughly 170 reported sightings, about half of which were deemed credible, either corroborated by multiple witnesses or backed by imagery that couldn’t be explained away as ordinary air traffic.”

“Operational security appeared sophisticated,” IISS posited. “The UAVs entered the airspace around the RAF bases at low altitude with their lights visible and departed at higher altitudes. Arrival and departure directions varied across the incident period.”

Witness reports “indicate more than one platform type may have been involved,” the report proffers. “Some observations were consistent with multirotor UAVs; others with fixed-wing platforms. The propulsion noise of the UAVs was inconsistent across accounts, with some observers describing sounds more typical of petrol engines than electric motors.”

“Notably, the Hav Dolphin, a vessel later linked to a 2025 drone incident in Germany, happened to be docked in the UK at the time,” the investigators found.

That vessel was one of many either operated by Russia as part of its so-called “dark fleet” of sanctioned ships, or those connected to Russia, that the report goes into great detail to link to drone incursions throughout Europe after the incidents at U.S. bases there. The report describes these vessels as “Russian-linked commercial vessels, including shadow-fleet tankers, coastal freighters, and smaller craft.”

IISS suggested that the Russian Orlan-10 drone could have been one of the platforms used during the incursions.

“Orlan-10, a compact, multi-purpose UAV in service with Russian Armed Forces since 2010, has a range and payload profile consistent with stand-off collection against coastal and inland targets and fits the deck space of a mid-sized commercial vessel,” IISS stated. 

“Commercial specifications for the platform, including those published by Russian geospatial firms using the Orlan-10 for civilian aerial survey operations, document an operational range of 500 kilometers, endurance of up to 12 hours, and speeds of 90–130 km/h, performance parameters consistent with maritime launch from a vessel operating well beyond visual detection range of the European coastlines in question.”

Moreover, “the Orlan-10’s power is an internal combustion engine, a detail that may be relevant in light of witness accounts from November 2024 incidents at RAF Lakenheath, where propulsion noise was described by some observers as more characteristic of petrol engines than the electric motors typical of consumer and first-person view (FPV) drones.”

In addition, the Orlan-10’s available payloads “include a satellite navigation spoofing module and a Global System for Mobile Communications network monitoring module alongside optical and thermal sensors, indicating the Orlan-10 family has active electronic warfare capability as well as passive ISR.”

The Orlan-10 has been widely used as an intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance drone by Russia in its ongoing war on Ukraine. Given that, however, using it for a clandestine operation like this seems very strange. The report critically recognizes this, stating “the use of identifiable Russian UAV platforms carries inherent attribution risk.”

“An alternative, and operationally credible, hypothesis is that commercially available or modified platforms were used precisely to preserve deniability, including long-range [first-person view] FPV systems, home-built fixed-wing aircraft or commercial UAVs modified to use cellular rather than radio frequency (RF) communications,” IISS added.

Russia uses ‘Orlan-10’ drones to help detect and attack Ukrainian military positions

The think tank acknowledges that its maritime-launch hypothesis “rests on a convergence of opportunity, demonstrated capability and a consistent geographic pattern — but no European government has yet publicly tied a specific shadow-fleet vessel to a specific incident, despite officials suggesting privately that they could. The rest of this report treats the maritime-UAV link as the most plausible explanation for where and when the incidents occurred, while acknowledging that confirming it will require evidence that isn’t yet public.”

This is not the first time Russia was accused of being behind the drone incursions.

In February 2025, the U.K.-based The i Paper made similar allegations in its investigation, however, they suggested the flight could have been carried out by Russian operatives on the ground.

That investigation spurred some politicians to call for further investigation.

“Julian Lewis, the former Tory Chair of the Defense Select Committee said: ‘When the US and British authorities detected the drone intrusions at both airbases last November, they stated that investigations were underway,’” the outlet reported. “‘Meanwhile, there is credible evidence here of the possible presence of GRU-linked operatives near Lakenheath and Mildenhall. I shall be asking Ministers to consolidate the findings of all these investigations and to make a Statement in the Commons as soon as possible.’”

Tom Tugendhat, the former Security Minister, told The i Paper that the findings “demand urgent investigation by the MOD and UK intelligence services.”

Still, the MoD investigation into the RAF Lakenheath incidents concluded with no suspects identified, according to the Bury Mercury newspaper.

Less clear are results from investigations into the other three bases involved.

“The UK takes the security of military bases seriously and works closely with allies, law enforcement partners and other authorities to protect Defense people, sites and capabilities,” the U.K. MoD told us Thursday morning when we asked about the allegations made by IISS that the Russians were likely behind the drone incursions and for their assessment of who was operating them.

“Through the Armed Forces Bill, we’re giving our defense personnel greater powers to defeat drones threatening our bases and we have invested significantly in counter-drone capabilities. We continue to strengthen our ability to detect, deter and respond to potential threats,” MoD added.

MoD declined to provide further details, saying it “does not comment on intelligence matters or on the specific security arrangements at Defense sites.”

We also asked U.S. Air Forces in Europe-Air Forces Africa (USAFE) whether the IISS allegations about Russian involvement in these events were accurate.

“We can confirm small Unmanned Aerial Systems activity took place over several of our UK installations in 2024,” a spokesperson told us. “These events were monitored, and it was determined there was no impact on personnel or operations.”

“Due to operational security, we cannot speak to intelligence matters,” the spokesperson added. “We continue to work closely with our UK partners to ensure the safety and security of our installations.”

The command said it is working on a response to our question about who was behind these incursions, but that it would not be ready before the July 4 holiday.

The issue of drone incursions is not unique to Europe, as we have frequently reported. There have been numerous incursions at military installations across the U.S., including some near the water, like Langley Air Force Base in December 2023 that The War Zone was the first to report. More recently, Barksdale AFB in Louisiana, home of B-52 strategic bombers and nuclear weapons, experienced a similar series of very troubling incursions. Off the cost of California, American warships were swarmed sporadically for days in the summer of 2019. There are many other examples, as well, and as is case in Europe, it remains publicly unknown who operated those drones in all those instances.

The IISS report does not go into any of the cases outside of Europe. It does, however, clearly point the finger at Russia as the culprit behind the drone overflights that have bedeviled Europe, including U.S. bases in England and Germany.

Contact the author: howard@twz.com 

EastEnders have welcomed back a familiar face, but fans fear this will lead to dangerous scenes for Chelsea and Jordan Fox after they survived serial killer Gray Atkins

A familiar face has come back to EastEnders – and it spells trouble for Chelsea and Jordan Fox. Chelsea’s sister Libby, played by Belinda Owusu, has returned Walford after hearing about her mother Denise’s cancer diagnosis, but while many were happy to see her, it wasn’t long before she and Chelsea started bickering.

They argued about many things, starting with whether Chelsea should have noticed Denise was ill and called Libby earlier. Soon, the conversation turned to Chelsea’s son Jordan, who was recently in a car accident and may not be able to walk again. As Chelsea broke down, Libby comforted her sister. But, again, their peace with each other didn’t last long.

Libby pushed Chelsea to open up more and fill her in on what was going on. As such, Chelsea revealed that she had received a birthday card for Jordan from his great-grandmother, Sheila, along with a cheque for £1000.

When asked why she hadn’t cashed it, Chelsea said she didn’t want anyone connected to her ex husband Gray, Jordan’s father who was abusive and killed multiple people, involved in her son’s life, in case they were still in contact with Gray. The murderer, who was also physically abusive towards Chelsea, is currently in prison for his crimes. Since Sheila is Gray’s grandmother, Chelsea didn’t want to risk her being involved.

But, Libby later took the card, with the cheque inside. Fans were unsure what Libby planned to do with it, but some felt that if she cashed the cheque, this would put Chelsea and Jordan in danger.

One floated the idea that Libby planned to cash the cheque: “First episode back and Libby has already just slotted in like shes been back for ages, although if she does end up cashing the check I hope its actually to help Jordan and not another ‘I’m in debt and need to pay someone off’ storyline again.”

Another added: “Well I hope not since she did say she was willing to give Chelsea money for Jordan’s wheelchair and other stuff so I doubt they writers will make her do that considering what she said today.

“I also hope before she cashes it in she discusses it with Chelsea first because at the end of the day it’s gonna affect Jordan and Chelsea since it’s gonna be from her ex partner’s family and who knows they might still be in touch with him so it could potentially put both Jordan and Chelsea at risk but that’s just my opinion.

“So I hope she discusses it with Chelsea before doing anything bc if I was Chelsea I’m not sure how comfortable I would feel either taking money from my abusive ex’s family.”

A third added that they thought this could lead to a custody battle that puts Gray back in Jordan’s life: “I really hope she talks to Chelsea too, because if she cashes the cheque, Gray’s family could use to suggest that they take over Jordan’s care entirely – they’re already paying and they’ll say Chelsea let him get hurt.

“And if they have custody, they might take him to see Gray, which isn’t safe for anyone, especially Chelsea when she tries to get Jordan back.”

Belinda Owusu, who plays Libby, has already teased that her return to the Square leads to tough scenes for Chelsea, and what will happen with the cheque. She said: “With Chelsea overwhelmed by Jordan’s care and the financial strain, Libby sees it as potential support. She’s torn – she respects Chelsea’s boundaries but also believes it could offer some relief.”

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A former Philippine Navy warship was sent to the bottom today by the combined effects of maritime strike drills launched by Japanese, Philippine, and U.S. forces in the Luzon Strait, one of the world’s most strategic and tense bodies of water. The maneuvers, which reportedly involved a variety of anti-ship missiles and rocket artillery, were part of the broader Balikatan exercise, which is especially important in the context of rising tensions in the Indo-Pacific.

Located roughly 50 miles offshore, the target vessel for a live-fire sinking exercise (SINKEX) campaign was the decommissioned Philippine Navy Rizal class patrol corvette, the former BRP Quezon. The ship was originally completed for the U.S. Navy as an Auk class minesweeper during World War II, serving as the USS Vigilance before being transferred to the Philippines and serving in a new role in the late 1960s. The BRP Quezon, which had a standard displacement of 890 tons, was decommissioned in 2021.

The maritime strike (MARSTRIKE) drills were conducted on the island of Luzon, which sits at the northern end of the Philippines, and is the country’s largest and most populous island. Specifically, the live-fire drills took place around the Paoay Sand Dunes, in the coastal region of Ilocos Norte.

The drills began around 10:00 a.m. local time with a U.S. Army M30/31 Guided Multiple-Launch Rocket System (GMLRS) fired as a “probing round,” with the location of the target vessel being confirmed around 10:15 a.m.

The GMLRS artillery rocket is a highly precise, rapid-strike weapon that can attack targets to a distance of around 50 miles, which would put it right at the limit of its range. It is fired from the M142 High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS) that can launch six guided or unguided 227mm artillery rockets or a single Army Tactical Missile System (ATACMS) missile without reloading. GMLRS is not capable of engaging moving targets, so it has limited application in the traditional anti-ship mission set.

In a combined strike, anti-ship missiles were reportedly then launched from a U.S. Marine Corps Navy-Marine Expeditionary Ship Interdiction System (NMESIS) and from a Philippine Navy C-Star system.

Of these, NMESIS employs an uncrewed variant of the 4×4 Joint Light Tactical Vehicle (JLTV), also known as the Remotely Operated Ground Unit Expeditionary-Fires (ROGUE-Fires), on which is mounted a launcher with two ready-to-fire Naval Strike Missiles (NSM). These have a range of around 130 miles and have low-observable features, making them harder for enemy air defenses to detect and engage.

NMESIS is meant to be rapidly deployable and capable of highly dispersed operations in austere areas. As an uncrewed vehicle-launcher combo, small teams of Marines monitor multiple launchers dispersed around an area and move them regularly to keep them from being targeted by the enemy. The system was first deployed in a Balikatan exercise last year, as you can read about here.

While Philippine media reports that the NMESIS, operated by the Hawaii-based 3rd Marine Littoral Regiment, fired a missile during today’s drill, this is refuted by a report from Stars and Stripes. The 3rd MLR is notable in itself, being expressly designed to fight within an enemy’s own littorals, with all the challenges that brings.

Meanwhile, the C-Star is the Philippine Navy’s primary anti-ship missile. Produced by South Korea’s LIG Nex1, a version of this missile is used by the Republic of Korea Navy as the Haeseong. The Philippines uses the C-Star to arm its two Miguel Malvar class and two Jose Rizal class frigates, which are also made in South Korea. Similar to the U.S.-made Harpoon, the C-Star is a turbojet-powered, sea-skimming missile with a range of around 90 miles.

In the drill, the C-Star was likely fired from the Philippine Navy frigates BRP Miguel Malvar and Antonio Luna, both of which are known to be taking part in Balikatan.

These were followed by two rounds fired from a Japanese land-based Type 88 anti-ship missile system, fired for the first time during a Balikatan exercise, and for the first time anywhere outside Japan. The Japanese missiles reportedly struck the hull of the target ship around 10:30 a.m.

JSDF Type 88 missiles fire for the first time in Balikatan 2026 | GMA News

Developed by Mitsubishi Heavy Industries in the 1980s, the Type 88 (also known as the SSM-1) is the primary coastal anti-ship missile system of the Japan Self-Defense Forces, with a range of around 100 miles, although more capable and further-reaching weapons are now in development, as you can read about here.

Interestingly, in a video released of the live-fire event in Ilocos Norte, close protection was being provided to the truck-mounted Type 88 launcher by a Marine Air Defense Integrated System (MADIS), also from the 3rd Marine Littoral Regiment. MADIS utilizes the JTLV and distributes different sensors and effectors between individual JLTVs, as you can read more about here. In this kind of scenario, it would be tasked with protecting the coastal missile battery against kamikaze drones and other aerial threats at short ranges.

The vessel sank rapidly, meaning that the Philippine Air Force wasn’t able to deliver more munitions onto the target. FA-50 light combat aircraft and A-29 Super Tucano turboprop close support aircraft had both been prepared to strike the same ship, but were stood down.

Other air assets taking part included a U.S. Navy P-8 Poseidon maritime patrol aircraft and an MQ-9 drone.

With the ship sunk or sinking, a coup de grace was provided by a U.S. HIMARS, which fired onto the same coordinates.

Also involved in Balikatan is the Royal Canadian Navy frigate HMCS Charlottetown, although it appears that it didn’t take part in the live-fire event.

According to a Philippine military spokesperson, another round of live-fire drills will take place tomorrow as part of Balikatan, utilizing a stand-by target vessel. This will also allow Philippine Air Force aircraft to take part.

The live-fire drills, conducted under the Balikatan exercise, signaled a notable expansion of Japan’s military role in the region as Tokyo strengthens security partnerships with its allies amid growing tensions with Beijing.

Overall, the live-fire exercise is highly significant due to its proximity to the Chinese mainland and the long range of some of the missiles that have been employed.

The Luzon Strait, into which the various missiles and rockets were fired, sits between Taiwan and the Philippines, spanning about 220 miles at its narrowest point. It serves as a vital shipping route and a highly strategic military corridor, particularly for China’s rapidly expanding naval forces. From this passage, assets stationed in the South China Sea can move into the Philippine Sea and the wider Pacific, and back again. This includes China’s growing fleet of nuclear-powered submarines, some of which underpin its second-strike nuclear deterrent.

The strait is also a crucial gateway for the U.S. Navy entering the South China Sea and would likely be a central battleground in any major conflict over Taiwan. Because of its importance, the area is closely monitored for activity both above and below the surface. In the event of war, it would quickly turn into a dense anti-ship missile engagement zone (SMEZ). The live-fire campaign today gave just a small taster of that kind of contingency.

Earlier this week, the U.S. Army test-fired a Tomahawk cruise missile from a Typhon launcher in the central Philippines, successfully hitting a target around 370 miles away in Nueva Ecija.

On this occasion, the Tomahawk missile was supporting ground troops in a night land maneuver exercise led by the 25th Infantry Division in Fort Magsaysay, part of the Balikatan exercise.

The Typhon ground-based missile system can also fire SM-6 multi-purpose missiles, which are used in this application in a quasi-ballistic missile land-attack mode. As for the Tomahawk cruise missile, this provided land attack and anti-ship capabilities. 

As we have discussed before, Typhon’s arrival in the Philippines in 2025 sent a clear signal to Beijing and throughout the region. It is a glimpse of what’s to come as the service works through plans to permanently base these systems in China’s backyard.

Compared to the longer-range Typhon, which is deployed further from the Luzon Strait, for the Balikatan exercise, the shorter-range NMESIS and Type 88 anti-ship missiles are pushed much closer to the zone in which their likely wartime targets would be found. As we have explored in the past, anti-ship missiles of this kind, and especially NMESIS, can also be deployed deeper into the strait, making use of smaller Philippine islands, like the Batanes island chain, although that ratchets up their exposure to counterstrikes considerably.

For both these kinds of missiles, their survival would rely upon the dispersal of launchers and other vehicles, as well as regularly moving them around to help prevent them from being targeted by the enemy. Of course, with the uncrewed NMESIS, this is designed from the ground up to not put personnel in harm’s way. All of this kind of doctrine is central to the Marines’ Expeditionary Advanced Base Operations (EABO) strategy, which is now a core tenet of how it would fight in the Pacific.

Already, China has voiced its displeasure at the deployment of the U.S. Army’s Typhon system to the Philippines. What is now becoming a regular appearance of NMESIS, backed up by other highly mobile strike systems, including allied anti-ship missiles, within reach of the Luzon Strait, will undoubtedly trigger similar concerns in Beijing. However, the live-fire sinking exercise today underscores how critical this waterway is to the U.S. military and its allies in the region, just as it is to China. Having more varied and more mobile anti-shipping assets in the northern Philippines complicates targeting for China, while extending the capabilities of the anti-access strategy of the U.S. military and its allies in the Luzon Strait, should a conflict break out.

Contact the author: thomas@thewarzone.com