Rebuilding the Arsenal 2026

A new report from the think tank founded by former Google CEO Eric Schmidt quantifies the grim realities of the U.S. defense industrial base’s dependence on China for critical rare earth minerals. It also details which weapons systems might face the most impact if that delicate supply relationship breaks down.

The white paper, exclusively obtained from the Special Competitive Studies Project, uses AI intelligence from the supply chain tech firm Exiger to assess how many unique components, identified by National Item Identification Number, or NIIN, contain critical minerals, such as antimony, gallium, germanium and tungsten.

From an assessment of almost nine million parts and 3,000 U.S. military weapon systems, the company identified more than 28,000 unique components  across 1,400 weapons systems containing just these four rare earths. The isolation of these parts is relevant in particular because of a near-term crisis: the expiration of a suspension on Chinese export controls set to take effect in November. Disruption to weapons fielding plans, as well as operational readiness and sustainment activities, according to the white paper, is very much a possibility. Yet according to Kit Conklin, chief strategy and global affairs officer at Exiger, the crisis is already here. 

In an interview with TWZ, he pointed to Japan, which is facing the prospect of a manufacturing halt after China choked off supply of some rare earths to the tune of more than 80% earlier this year.

“There’s no question that right now it’s a crisis for a lot of companies that are trying to get licenses approved by China and just not getting the licenses,” Conklin said. “So there’s real risk to current production, and when I think about us and scaling, whether it’s the drone industrial base or trying to scale our interceptor capacity to 1,000, 2,000, 3,000 interceptors a year, I mean, these are real choke points that we have that are impacting our ability to deliver these to the warfighter right now.”

Among the weapons systems most at risk for supply chain and manufacturing disruption, according to the data, is the vital Virginia-class submarine, which requires more than 300 critical NIINs containing the four elements, including 190 parts requiring germanium.

Germanium, used in optics, night vision systems, EO/IR equipment and more, is a byproduct of zinc ore. In January, the Pentagon announced an $18 million investment in the country’s only germanium production facility in St. George, Utah to expand refining capacity “sevenfold” to more than 20 metric tons annually by an unspecified deadline.

China controls some 68% of the world’s refined germanium. It has a far greater chokehold on gallium, used in semiconductors and solar cells, and especially advanced radars, controlling up to 99% of production. Each Virginia-class sub requires 50 unique parts containing gallium.

China controls about half the production of antimony, used to harden ammunition and to manufacture optics and electronics; and up to 80% of the supply of tungsten, used in manufacturing tools, warheads and heat-resistant components.

While it doesn’t break down components by weight, the report notes that the rare earth requirements for the Virginia-class sub are also considerable by mass: each sub required 9,200 pounds of the elements, while an F-35 Joint Strike Fighter jet requires 900 pounds.

The Virginia-class submarine is America’s only in-production fast-attack nuclear-powered sub that has been in service since 2004. Twenty three of these critical vessels are in service today, or roughly half of the total planned program, with the remaining boats yet to be built. It’s notable in the context of the paper because it has multiple points of exposure to supply chain disruption. Another of these exposure points: its 1,700 mission or safety-critical parts requiring casting, forging or extrusion. As the report lays out, supply chain bottlenecks around limited metal casting, forging and extruding capacity are delaying production timelines and putting manufacturing at risk.

China, again, produces about half of the world’s casting output and “is often the sole option for large castings,” the paper found. The analysis shows that more than half, or nearly 8,000, unique supply items containing steel castings have delivery lead times of more than 36 weeks. More than 9,400 items containing extruded aluminum, about 47% of these parts, have lead times that long.

“Virginia-class submarines, already threatened by U.S. reliance on China for critical minerals, are reportedly also three years behind schedule, potentially due in part to the lack of domestic large-scale casting capacity,” the report finds. An analysis of Navy construction timelines published earlier this year does indeed find that 10 of the 12 Virginia subs now under construction face delays of 36-44 months.

Alarmingly, a recent war game simulation found that the U.S. could not replace ships, planes and missiles lost to combat specifically due to casting and forging shortfalls, the report notes. That’s despite a $2 billion Pentagon initiative launched in 2024 aimed at revitalizing this industry.

Beyond submarines, the report shows that aircraft, including some of the nation’s workhorse fighter jets, face outsized production and sustainment risk due to rare-earth elements and casting/forging dependencies.

The B-2 Spirit bomber – the nation’s only nuclear-armed stealth bomber until fielding begins on the B-21 Raider sometime next year – requires 782 parts containing the four rare-earth elements isolated in the report.

The F/A-18 Hornet family of fighters flown by the Navy and Marine Corps, including the Navy’s Growler electronic warfare variant, tops the list for dependency on steel castings, with 3,800 individual parts requiring the process. Following is the KC-135 Stratotanker, with 2,570 parts. All 10 of the systems requiring the most metal castings for production are aircraft, the analysis shows. The legacy Hornet and the KC-135 have been out of production for decades, while the Navy’s Super Hornet will see its production line go cold in 2027. Any ongoing demand for castings for these systems would thus be in spares and repair parts. 

Military aircraft also represent the highest-need category among weapons systems requiring cadmium plating, a process used to make aerospace components corrosion-resistant.  The domestic supplier base has shrunk due to EPA safety limitations established in 2008. All of the top 10 weapons systems requiring the most cadmium-plated parts are aircraft, with the KC-135 topping the list with 2,780 unique components. The C-130 Hercules transport, B-52 Stratofortress bomber and Galaxy C-5 transport all have more than 2,000 parts.

The B-52, which is undergoing a service life extension to take it into the 2050s – past its century mark – may run into modernization delays not only over cadmium-plated and steel-casted components, but also due to overly rigid military specifications, which increase lead time and delays. The white paper cites the bomber’s rib airfoil and fuel vent valve components, which both have lead times of more than 400 days due in part to production being burdened with dozens of mil-spec compliance requirements, which the authors say have not kept pace with today’s commercial practices.

“The requirement for a part to meet so many mil-specs, if not reasonably necessary, may limit the number of possible suppliers of that part, potentially increasing its lead time and bottlenecking production,” they write. “For the B-52, this could inhibit current modernization efforts intended to keep the airplane operational through the 2050s.”

A final risk the paper addresses is workforce shortages and dangers from limited suppliers creating single points of failure. Across defense, the number of small suppliers has decreased by 43% in the last decade, it notes. It cites, as a case study, the February 2025 fire that forced the closure of SPS Technologies in Jenkintown, Penn. – a fastener maker that produced components for more than 1,000 weapons systems and was deemed critical for 90, including the Nimitz-class carrier, the F/A-18 fighter and the M1 Abrams tank. For systems including the Tomahawk Land Attack Missile and the MH-60 Black Hawk helicopter, the facility was a single-source supplier.

With operations offline until at least 2028, the supply chain has been “actively disrupted” due to the outage of just one facility, according to the paper.

“This case underscores the risk of single sourcing in the defense industrial base and the need to qualify alternate sources to avoid such significant chokepoints,” the authors write.

The paper hails work that has already begun to invest in domestic critical minerals production and shore up the defense industrial base. But it does hint that these efforts may be too late to avoid a crash if China shuts off or severely reduces exports. The paper notes that, on average, it takes the U.S. 29 years to open a new mine. The U.S. has one established domestic mine: The Mountain Pass Rare Earth Mine and Processing Facility, just outside of Las Vegas. Initially established in 1952 and reopened in 2018 after a long hiatus, it now produces more than 50,000 tons of rare earth oxides annually. Last year, for the first time in seven decades, a new domestic rare-earth mine opened in Wyoming, stating plans to start producing ores extracted from coal, including gallium and germanium, by 2029. Production is projected to total 456 tons of rare earths per year. The project had been in development for more than a decade before opening. 

Conklin said a July executive order aimed at developing domestic production of rare earths while collecting data on what elements systems required created opportunities for smart policy creation – perhaps in the next National Defense Authorization Act – around holistically attacking the problem. 

“I would love for us to figure out a way to get out of thinking about these supply chain risks system by system. We tend to have disparate requirements to look at the nuclear triad or subs or interceptors,” he said. “I think with the executive order that came out earlier this year, there’s a real opportunity for Congress to legislate on some of these issues beyond just figuring out what the risk [is] for antimony in the sub industrial base, and thinking about it a little bit more holistically.”

One potential solution he proposed: an agency within the executive branch (led, perhaps, by a critical minerals czar) who can coordinate production needs and resourcing and develop the most efficient pathways to secure needed materials.

While no U.S. defense manufacturer has yet publicly cited manufacturing disruptions due to rare earth availability, signs are increasing that the federal government is taking supply concerns seriously. In addition to Project Vault, a $12 billion White House initiative announced in February that would create a strategic stockpile of rare earths akin to existing stockpiles of critical medical supplies and petroleum, the U.S. Army has begun extending long-term leases on military land to companies seeking to build critical mineral processing facilities.

Conklin said he doesn’t anticipate major changes in rare earth exports between now and the end of the year, describing the U.S.-China supply relationship as “in a bit of a détente.” That said, with new policies pending, we could be only days away from new revelations about the extent of the impact of these materials on the defense manufacturing enterprise.

Contact the editor: Tyler@twz.com

British defense contractor Babcock has confirmed that it is putting itself forward for the U.S. Navy’s future frigate program, with its Arrowhead 140 general-purpose frigate, the design behind the Royal Navy’s Type 31 class, expected to form the basis of its proposal. The move adds another foreign-designed warship to Washington’s search for a relatively mature frigate that can be built quickly and in significant numbers.

Babcock has held preliminary discussions with Pentagon officials and is expected to submit an expression of interest before the end of October, according to recent reporting by The Telegraph and Navy Lookout. The proposal is understood to potentially involve Huntington Ingalls Industries (HII), America’s largest military shipbuilder, with the two companies exploring an arrangement that could see the Arrowhead 140 built in the United States under license.

“Of course we’re interested. We have a world-class frigate, close links to the U.S. and U.S. industry. It would be insane for us not to respond,” Sir Nick Hine, head of Babcock’s marine business and a former Second Sea Lord, told The Telegraph.

The initiative comes as the U.S. Navy seeks to accelerate the acquisition of smaller surface combatants after the troubled Constellation class frigate program was axed. Japan’s upgraded Mogami class, South Korea’s Chungnam class, and Turkey’s Istanbul class have also been reported as candidates for the Navy’s international frigate effort. You can read more about all three designs here.

Fincantieri Marine Group, which had developed the cancelled Constellation class frigate for the U.S. Navy, also says it sees a possible new opportunity in the service’s latest frigate plans. 

Meanwhile, German defense contractor Rheinmetall, a newcomer to the surface combatant market, recently unveiled its GMF 140 frigate, which it has said it plans to offer “initially as part of a procurement project in North America” before pursuing opportunities with other allied navies.

For Babcock, the opportunity would be a major expansion of its relationship with the U.S. defense industry. If successful, the company would likely provide the design, engineering expertise, and potentially the intellectual property needed for American shipyards to manufacture the frigates.

This would mirror the process for the Polish Navy’s Project 106 Miecznik (Swordfish) class, which is building three new multirole frigates in Poland, rather than using the company’s own facilities in Britain.

The Navy’s assessment of potential options is due by November 12. No contract has been awarded, and the details of any Babcock-HII proposal remain unconfirmed.

The Arrowhead 140 is the foundation of the Royal Navy’s five-ship Type 31 program, which is being built at Babcock’s Rosyth shipyard in Scotland. The design is derived from the Danish Iver Huitfeldt class frigate. As well as Poland, the warship has also been selected for Indonesia.

The Type 31 Frigate in action

The Arrowhead 140 has a baseline length of approximately 455 feet, a beam of 65 feet, and a displacement of around 5,700 tonnes, although national variants may be considerably heavier. The vessel uses a conventional combined diesel-and-diesel (CODAD) propulsion system and can achieve speeds exceeding 28 knots. Its design emphasises long endurance, with a baseline endurance of approximately one to two months. The AH140 incorporates a flight deck and hangar for naval helicopter operations, accommodation for embarked personnel, boat-handling facilities, and adaptable mission spaces. Its modular architecture allows customers to integrate different sensors, combat management systems, electronic warfare equipment, and weapons according to national requirements.

Taking the Polish Navy’s Project 106 class as an example of an Arrowhead 140 iteration, this is a notably heavily armed adaptation, featuring a 76mm Leonardo Strales main gun, a 32-cell Mk 41 vertical launch system for surface-to-air missiles, eight Naval Strike Missiles for anti-ship strike, and lightweight torpedo launchers. The Polish variant is reported to have a maximum displacement of approximately 7,700 tonnes.

The Type 31 is a general-purpose warship capable of undertaking maritime security, escort, and surface warfare missions. Its relatively large hull offers considerable internal volume for weapons, sensors, aviation facilities, and future upgrades.

That could make it attractive to a U.S. Navy looking for a ship able to protect convoys, operate independently, and supplement its larger destroyers. A frigate with a significantly lower operating cost than an Arleigh Burke class destroyer could still take on a range of missions, freeing more capable combatants for broad area air and missile air defense, sustained strike operations, and other more demanding tasks.

The Arrowhead 140’s size could also provide flexibility in accommodating American weapons and combat systems. However, a U.S. version would require a defined configuration, and there is no publicly established weapons fit for a potential American variant.

At the same time, the Royal Navy’s Type 31 frigate has not yet entered operational service, and its baseline configuration is not optimized for every mission the U.S. Navy may require. In particular, the integration of the sonar and other systems needed for sustained anti-submarine warfare would be a significant undertaking.

The Navy will also have to wrestle with how much of the existing design can be retained while meeting its own requirements. One of the major lessons from the Constellation program was that extensive modifications to an existing foreign design can create huge cost and schedule risks. With so little left of the original design after it was adapted to Navy specifications, this eventually doomed the program.

For Babcock, it will be essential to keep the Arrowhead 140 as close as possible to its established configuration, while integrating essential American equipment, to keep the proposal competitive.

Babcock does not operate a shipyard in the United States, making an American industrial partner central to its approach.

HII, which operates major shipbuilding facilities at Newport News and Ingalls, would offer substantial experience constructing warships for the U.S. Navy. Babcock and HII already have an established relationship in the submarine sector, including work supporting the Virginia class attack submarine program.

Babcock’s facilities in Rosyth and Bristol manufacture tactical missile-tube assemblies for General Dynamics Electric Boat, supporting the Common Missile Compartment used by the U.S. Navy’s Columbia class and the Royal Navy’s Dreadnought class ballistic missile submarines. HII has also expanded its relationship with Babcock through work involving Virginia class submarine components.

Those existing industrial relationships could provide a foundation for a surface-ship partnership. Under a potential arrangement, Babcock could transfer the necessary design rights and provide technical support while an American yard undertakes construction.

Such an arrangement would fit the Trump administration’s stated goal of using allied expertise to accelerate warship production while rebuilding domestic shipbuilding capacity. It would also allow Babcock to pursue a potentially significant U.S. order without requiring Rosyth to absorb a large new construction program alongside its Royal Navy commitments.

The prospect of HII supporting more than one design raises questions about production capacity, program priorities, and how the company would manage competing demands on its shipyards.

More generally, the administration’s interest in foreign frigates reflects growing concern about the time and expense involved in developing new American warships.

The Constellation class program was supposed to provide a modern replacement for the Navy’s retired Oliver Hazard Perry class frigates. Based on the European FREMM design, it underwent extensive modifications for American service before suffering serious schedule and cost problems. The Navy subsequently abandoned the program.

The service is now pursuing FF(X), a patrol frigate intended to be easier to build and field. Its initial configuration, however, is not expected to include a vertical launch system, limiting its ability to provide some of the capabilities associated with a more heavily armed multi-mission combatant.

HII is building the FF(X) frigate, based on the Coast Guard’s Legend class National Security Cutter. It is somewhat telling that they would partner with Babcock on the foreign frigate offering considering they already have the FF(X) contract.

The international frigate effort is intended to examine whether a ship based on an existing allied design could provide a different balance of capability, cost, and delivery speed.

An August presidential memorandum opened a route for the Navy to consider allied designs and, under limited circumstances, overseas construction through a national security waiver. The approach has been compared with a model in which an initial small number of ships could be constructed abroad before production moves to U.S. yards.

The reported framework limits overseas construction to no more than two ships and ties it to investment in American shipbuilding. Any eventual Babcock proposal would therefore need to demonstrate how the design could be transferred and produced domestically at the required pace.

That could be a big challenge. Babcock’s own Type 31 production line is already committed to the five ships ordered by the Royal Navy, while setting up an American production line would require workforce training, supply-chain development, and the transfer of manufacturing knowledge.

The Navy will also need to establish whether a foreign design can meet its minimum operational requirements without undergoing the kind of extensive redesign that dogged the Constellation program.

Babcock enters a field that already includes several established frigate designs from Japan, South Korea, and Turkey — and potentially more.

Each offers a different combination of design maturity, combat systems, production capacity, and potential industrial arrangements. The Mogami and Chungnam programs have operational ships in service, while the Arrowhead 140 has been selected for multiple export programs but is yet to enter operational service.

Introducing the Babcock Arrowhead 140

Babcock’s selling point is likely to be the Arrowhead 140’s size, adaptability, and established design pedigree, combined with the prospect of American production through HII.

With the Arrowhead 140 adopted by multiple navies, this brings potential cost savings through economies of scale, shared design evolution, and collaborative upgrades across the fleet. A wider international user base also brings the possibility of overseas industrial partnerships, including training and logistical support around the globe.

At the same time, U.S. Navy selection would represent a major endorsement of the platform and would further strengthen its position in other export markets.

For now, Babcock’s confirmation that it intends to pursue the opportunity adds another contender to the Navy’s search for a new frigate. Whether the Arrowhead 140 advances beyond the initial expression of interest will depend on how its capabilities and production prospects compare with the other candidates. And critically, Babcock and its U.S. partners will need to convince the Pentagon that they deliver a ship that meets the Navy’s requirements without repeating the delays and redesign challenges of the Constellation program.

Contact the author: thomas@thewarzone.com

Zone 5 Technologies has shared with TWZ the first photos of its latest Block 40 Rusty Dagger low-cost cruise missile in a surface-launched configuration. The images offer a new look at a weapon developed first with air-launched applications in mind, and for export to Ukraine. It is now being adapted for use from land and sea, including by U.S. and other allied forces.

Zone 5 has not disclosed where or when the pictures were taken, or which programs, specifically, the ground-based launches were conducted under. The images do not offer a clear view of the trailer-mounted launcher, either. A spokesperson for the company did stress to TWZ that versions of Rusty Dagger have now been selected for separate U.S. Army and Navy programs, in addition to its initial development through the U.S. Air Force.

In May, Zone 5, as well as Anduril, CoAspire, and Leidos, received framework agreements from the Pentagon under the Low-Cost Containerized Missile (LCCM) program. The U.S. Army’s Portfolio Acquisition Executive Fires (PAE Fires) is running LCCM in cooperation with the Office of the Under Secretary of War for Research and Engineering (OUSW R&E). The aim of this program is to procure more than 10,000 low-cost cruise missiles, in total, over three years, beginning in 2027.

Then there is also the Consolidated Affordable Ordnance System (CHAOS) effort from the U.S. Navy’s Portfolio Acquisition Executive for Munitions (PAE Munitions). CHAOS is focused on low-cost anti-ship cruise missiles, particularly for U.S. allies and partners. CoAspire is also on contract for CHAOS with a version of its Rapidly Adaptable Affordable Cruise Missile-Extended Range (RAACM-ER) design.

“We designed a surface-launch Rusty Dagger to be the foundation of U.S. and allied mass-produced affordable precision deep strike weapons,” Tom Kanewske, chief strategy officer at Zone 5, told TWZ in a statement.

“Our team went from design to demonstration in less than three months, bringing Rusty Dagger from pylons and pallets to ground launcher and shipping containers,” added Kyle Maxhimer, Zone 5’s president.

Zone 5 says the Block 40 version of Rusty Dagger can accommodate warheads in the 100-to-250-pound classes. It can still be configured for air-launch, either from pylons under the wings of aircraft or via palletized munitions systems. In order to be fired from launchers on the ground or at sea, the new version of the missile is fitted with a solid-fuel booster rocket at the tail end.

More specific details about the Block 40’s capabilities compared to the preceding air-launch-only version, also referred to as the Block 20, remain limited. From what we can see now, the two variations appear outwardly similar in many respects, at least broadly speaking. Earlier variations had a distinctive tail configuration with four squared-off fins, two facing upward and two more angled to either side. The shaping of the fins on the Block 40 does look to be more rounded. It’s also possible the missile may have a new cruciform tail fin arrangement, but this could also be a trick of the angle from which the missile is being viewed, coupled with the low resolution of the available images.

Previous reports have said that Rusty Dagger has a range of 300 nautical miles when delivered at low altitude, which is increased to 500 nautical miles when launched by aircraft at medium altitudes and flying at higher speeds. In general, surface-launched versions of missiles typically have shorter maximum ranges compared to their air-launched counterparts.

Regardless, the Block 40 version is an important further evolution of the Rusty Dagger design. The initial air-launched version of the missile, now designated the AGM-188A, has already been in development for several years, in part now under the U.S. Air Force’s Extended Range Attack Munition (ERAM) program. This has included live-fire tests conducted at Eglin Air Force Base in Florida in January 2025. We now know that Rusty Dagger has been cleared for use on four different types of fighters, including the F-16. Development of CoAspire’s Rapidly Adaptable Affordable Cruise Missile (RAACM) was also conducted as part of the ERAM effort.

Like the Navy’s CHAOS effort, ERAM has been focused primarily on supporting allies and partners, starting first with Ukraine. A Zone 5 spokesperson told TWZ that, as things stand, Rusty Dagger remains the only publicly reported operational missile in its class fielded by the Ukrainian military.

It appears that the AGM-188A “Rusty Dagger” cruise missile has undergone field testing in Ukraine.

Russian sources are publishing photos of an unknown 8-element CRPA antenna. On the back side of the unit there is a circuit board with a large heatsink, which carries the CAGE code… pic.twitter.com/phZeOJfHJ0

— 𝔗𝔥𝔢 𝕯𝔢𝔞𝔡 𝕯𝔦𝔰𝔱𝔯𝔦𝔠𝔱🎻🇬🇪🇺🇦🇺🇲🇬🇷 (@TheDeadDistrict) June 7, 2026

ERAM has also been feeding into the Air Force’s own Family of Affordable Mass Missiles (FAMM) plans. The service wants to acquire 28,000 FAMM munitions in pylon-launched and palletized configurations over the next five years.

As we reported earlier this year, Rusty Dagger is now part of a broader portfolio under Norwegian defense company Kongsberg, which acquired a 90 percent stake in Zone 5. Kongsberg has positioned the missile alongside its stealthy Joint Strike Missile (JSM), with the two weapons serving different, complementary roles.

Rusty Dagger is designed around affordability and volume, while JSM offers a sophisticated, low-observable strike capability. The concept gives customers a mix of weapons suited to different targets and mission requirements, rather than relying exclusively on expensive, high-end missiles.

Zone 5 says it is now expanding manufacturing in the United States. Production is established in San Luis Obispo, California, with production beginning in the Dallas-Fort Worth area of Texas. A franchised facility is also being developed in Miamisburg, Ohio, with Hawthorn Aero, a company that describes itself as specializing “in high-rate airframe manufacturing, offering scalable solutions from design to full vehicle integration for aerospace industries.”

The company says each site is designed to reach a capacity of more than 2,500 missiles annually by the end of 2027. If all three reach that level, combined annual capacity would exceed 7,500 missiles.

The expansion reflects the growing emphasis on affordable weapons that can be manufactured in large quantities and replenished quickly, something that is considered especially critical if the United States is to face China in a future high-end conflict in the Indo-Pacific region.

The ground-launched Rusty Dagger shown in the photos underscores how far the missile family is moving beyond its original air-launched role. With production expanding and multiple U.S. military programs in the picture, the surface-launched variant adds another potential route to getting the weapon into service.

Contact the author: thomas@thewarzone.com

America’s adoption of long-range one-way attack munitions like the Low-Cost Uncrewed Combat Attack System (LUCAS) is evolving quickly. Training on how to fold these relatively low-cost, but potentially highly destructive systems into a joint force playbook for targeting adversaries on land and at sea, from the Pacific to Europe, and anywhere in between, continues.

How exactly LUCAS drones, and other types to come, will be used in future fights globally was highlighted during a panel at the Association of the U.S. Army’s (AUSA) main annual symposium earlier this week, at which TWZ was in attendance. The discussion was centered on how Army training is changing to meet the extreme combat demands of the future.

The U.S. military first announced it had begun fielding LUCAS, which was reverse-engineered from the Iranian-designed Shahed-136, in December 2025. This came just months after TWZ laid out a detailed case for why the U.S. military should start acquiring Shahed-136 clones in large volumes. LUCAS made its official combat debut in the opening phases of major combat operations against Iran earlier this year. The pusher-propeller, combustion-engine-powered kamikaze drones, which are employed from static launchers that can be positioned on the ground or installed on ships, and with the help of a small rocket booster, were subsequently praised as “indispensable” by America’s top commander in the Middle East.

With all that in mind, “long-range strike drones like LUCAS, how is that fitting into your planning and training?” our Howard Altman asked the panelists at AUSA.

“We’ve taken our Bayonet Academy, as we call it, a training area at JBLM [Joint Base Lewis-McChord in Washington State], and have started incorporating the employment of long-range one-way attack. Like, how do I maintain it? How do I employ it? How does that then get orchestrated in order to achieve that effect?” Maj. Gen. Bernard Harrington, head of the 7th Infantry Division, responded. “So we see that playing a key role in order to be able to achieve that effect at mass, … [and] in an affordable manner, while also being able potentially to preserve something that’s more exquisite for something that requires an exquisite munition.”

Earlier this year, the Army brought the 7th Infantry and the 1st Multi-Domain Task Force together under the umbrella of what it now calls the Multi-Domain Command-Pacific (MDC-PAC). Maj. Gen. Harrington is also now the commander of MDC-PAC, and has talked previously about how he sees uncrewed capabilities as critical to overwhelming adversaries in future conflicts. The service’s MDTFs, of which there are now four, have been at the leading edge of fielding new long-range strike and other advanced capabilities.

In his response to Altman’s question, Harrington elaborated more on how he sees long-range one-way attack munitions like LUCAS factoring specifically into future fights in the Pacific, such as one against China. The Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) has already established extensive anti-access and area denial (A2/AD) bubbles in the Western Pacific and is continuing to expand on that strategy.

“So as we start modeling out what it looks like to be able to penetrate a portion of the anti-access/area denial network in support of the joint task force in the PACOM [U.S. Pacific Command] area of operations, we started looking at, well, how do I bend – how do I achieve mass at a cost curve?” the 7th Infantry and MDC-PAC commander explained. “What effect am I really trying to achieve on a system in order to provide that window of opportunity for that joint force commander?”

“So maybe I don’t necessarily need to sink a ship, but if I take out certain systems on that vessel, well then it creates this temporal window opportunity,” he continued. “Then that joint force commander can surge in that carrier strike group or bomber task force.”

What the general is describing here is typically referred to as a mission kill. For years now, TWZ has repeatedly highlighted how long-range one-way attack drones and loitering munitions could be used in exactly this way against even larger warships. Damaging or destroying radars, communications antennas, and other subsystems could severely degrade a ship’s combat effectiveness and increase its vulnerability to follow-on attacks. The time and effort required for repairs could keep it sidelined for a protracted period of time.

“So when we started looking at that, we saw great value. That maybe I don’t have to use specifically or unmask an exquisite system to achieve that effect,” Harrington added. “If I can achieve [the] effect of mass utilizing lower cost systems, hey, maybe that will get me there. So we modeled that, and what we saw was, particularly with our unmanned surface vessels [USV], long-range one-way attack, long-range launch effects, the ability to synchronize and mass that could potentially get us to achieve that effect.”

As with long-range one-way attack drones, the adoption of kamikaze USVs by the U.S. military is evolving rapidly. America’s first use of this capability in real combat also came against Iran in July.

The term “launch effects” that Harrington used here is a catch-all term the U.S. military now routinely applies to a diverse array of uncrewed aerial systems designed to be launched from other platforms in the air, on the ground, and/or at sea. This includes loitering munitions, but also designs configured for surveillance and reconnaissance, electronic warfare, signal relay, and other tasks. The lines separating long-range one-way attack drones, launched effects, and traditional cruise missiles and decoys are in many cases now very blurry.

None of this is limited to the Pacific region or the Middle East, either.

“So, in terms of launch effects, I think you mentioned LUCAS. Covenant’s out there. There’s other systems that are out there,” Brig. Gen. Steven Carpenter, head of Multi-Domain Command-Europe (MDC-E), another one of the panelists, also said in direct response to Howard Altman’s question. “In Europe, we like that, more than accepting risk in an area, maybe we’re disintegrating an anti-access/area denial bubble in the center, and then way up north, we’re going to go ahead and accept some risk there. We like to use those systems to create counter-fire parity, long-range fires parity with an adversary.”

Similar to the establishment of MDC-PAC, MDC-E was formed last year by blending together the 56th Artillery Command and the 2nd MDTF, both of which are forward-deployed in Germany.

The “Covenant” mentioned by Carpenter is a U.S.-Israeli company that has been developing a long-range strike weapon system called Anthem. It was just confirmed in September that the U.S. Army has been actively engaged in testing of Anthem. This includes a live-fire demonstration in Morocco earlier this year. You can read more about Anthem and the current plans for it here.

“The reason we like those types of systems is because they’re EMI [electromagnetic interference] resilient, they’re longer range, and they’re higher yield, so they can go ahead and destroy like SS-26 systems, SS-21 systems,” the MDC-E commander added.

SS-26 Stone and SS-21 Scarab are the NATO reporting names for Russia’s Iskander-M and the older Soviet-designed OTR-21 Tochka short-range ballistic missiles, respectively. They are both fired from road-mobile launchers. Russia and Ukraine have employed Tochka in the course of their ongoing conflict, though their role on both sides has steadily diminished amid shrinking inventories. Tochka is also increasingly limited in service elsewhere globally. Iskander-M is a much more capable design that has factored heavily into U.S. military planning in Europe for years now. The U.S. military has previously acknowledged that war in Ukraine has led to improvements to that missile that make it even more dangerous and difficult to intercept.

Long-range one-way attack munitions like LUCAS are well suited to striking surface-to-surface and surface-to-air missile launchers, along with other high-value and time-sensitive targets, as TWZ highlights regularly. It’s also worth noting that Iran’s Shahed-136, specifically, traces its roots back to pioneering Israeli developments in munitions of this kind, where the focus initially was explicitly on finding new avenues to neutralize hostile air defenses. Iran has shown Shahed-136s and other related designs being employed in exactly this way in large-scale exercises in the past, as seen in the video below.

Shahed 136 drone Great Prophet 17 drill

More recently, Iranian forces demonstrated just how effective these capabilities could be in a real-world context in retaliatory attacks on prized air defense radars on the opposite side of the Persian Gulf after the United States and Israel launched their open waves of strikes back in February. TWZ previously explored the far-reaching ramifications of this in a detailed feature that you can find here.

Overall, as we’ve previously written:

“When it comes to this class of drone, speed and advanced guidance concepts do not define its utility. Range and cost do. Survivability comes in numbers, and due to their smaller size, use of composite materials, and small internal combustion engine, as well as their slow speed. These attributes, along with their low-altitude flight profile, mean they possess a reduced signature and general level of detectability that can be a challenge for traditionally configured ground-based radars. Despite their smaller signature, the fact that they are still somewhat vulnerable to interception is actually a positive, but we will get to that in a moment.”

“Above all else, the Shahed-136 and other long-range one-way attack drones exist to put a relevantly-sized warhead on a target far from their launch position at the lowest possible cost. It was previously estimated that the Russian Shahed-136 variant costs around $50,000 per copy, with some estimates being far lower. This cost has also likely declined significantly since Russia has mastered the design and drastically ramped up serial production. By comparison, traditional cruise missiles with similar range have costs in the millions of dollars per round, so the price differential is very dramatic. The Shaheds are also just far easier to build and can be produced in much less time than a typical cruise missile.”

The ‘mass’ afforded by LUCAS and other long-range kamikaze drones also imposes problematic cost calculations for opponents when it comes to the air defense equation, and offers a way to rapidly drain an opponent’s stocks of vital interceptors. These are realities the U.S. military is currently grappling with after expending thousands of anti-air interceptors in conflict with Iran and in other crises in the Middle East in recent years, as well as supporting allies and partners, such as Ukraine.

LUCAS, specifically, is already in line to become even more capable through the introduction of a swarming capability, made possible by the Hivemind autonomy software package from Shield AI. As we’ve explained before:

“Using the software, multiple LUCAS drones will be able to share tasks and maneuver cooperatively, making saturation attacks even more effective. As well as the drones dynamically rerouting, avoiding air defenses, and otherwise adapting to changing battlefield conditions, an AI pilot makes it easier for missions to continue despite hostile jamming or loss of datalink connectivity. Indeed, using AI, drone swarms can maintain near-perfect combat efficiency even if it loses members. Drones can be configured with all different payloads, with the swarm’s makeup tailored to each mission, and the AI system can maximize their collective effectiveness at all times.”

The U.S. Army still has many questions to answer about how it will field LUCAS and other long-range one-way-attack drones on a more widespread basis, as well as train personnel to employ them. As evidenced by the establishment of the MDTFs, and now the MDC-PAC and MDC-E formations, the underlying force structure that will go along with all of this is still evolving, as well.

The remarks from Maj. Gen. Bernard Harrington and Brig. Gen. Steven Carpenter at AUSA this week show senior Army leaders are working hard now to lay the groundwork to answer these questions. A clear vision for how LUCAS and similar weapons will be employed in future fights against land-based and maritime threats is taking shape already.

Contact the author: joe@twz.com

AEVEX Corp. has publicly shown its Specter jet-powered drone for the first time at the Association of the U.S. Army’s (AUSA) annual meeting in Washington, D.C., where TWZ is in attendance. The aircraft is the latest development from a company that has played a significant role in the U.S. military’s one-way attack drone efforts. Most notably, it built the secretive Phoenix Ghost family rushed to Ukraine in 2022.

AEVEX announced Specter in September, describing it as a high-speed, low-cost, jet-powered autonomous platform designed for high-risk operational environments. The aircraft is being developed around a modular architecture, with ground-launched and air-launched variants planned. Its interchangeable nose section is intended to accommodate different payloads, including kinetic warheads, electronic warfare equipment, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) systems, and other future capabilities.

That flexibility is central to how AEVEX is pitching the aircraft. The company is aiming for an adaptable system that can be configured for different operational needs while remaining affordable enough to be used basically as a cruise missile in combat applications.

The aircraft’s external configuration features a prominent V-shaped lower fuselage, high-mounted, unswept trapezoidal wings, a v-tail and rear-mounted conformal engine intakes. Clearly, low observability was one design driver for Specter, with the goal of balancing survivability with low-cost likely factored in heavily. AEVEX has not publicly discussed Specter’s low-observable characteristics.

The company has also not disclosed key performance and technical details, including the aircraft’s range, payload capacity, communications architecture, terminal targeting methods or the extent of its autonomous capabilities.

“We’re really excited to kind of really up our stats on range and speed,” Craig Anders, an AEVEX representative, told TWZ at AUSA, describing Specter’s turbine engine. The aircraft is being designed to reach speeds in the sub-Mach range, he said.

Anders also elaborated on how Specter is intended to carry more than a conventional warhead. “This thing is going to have the ability to carry cameras and different types of non-kinetic effect payloads,” he said, describing it as a “multi-mission, multi-domain fighter.”

Despite that broader mission set, attrition remains a core part of the concept. Anders said the idea was for the aircraft to be attritable, with a relatively low price tag allowing commanders to send it farther into dangerous areas without putting more expensive capabilities at risk.

The distinction is important. Specter is not being presented simply as a disposable munition, nor as a high-end unmanned combat aircraft. Instead, AEVEX appears to be pursuing a middle ground: a jet-powered platform that can perform one-way attack missions but also support reconnaissance and provide other effects in high-threat areas, depending on its configuration. It is also meant to be built economically at scale.

AEVEX is developing Specter with Divergent, an engineering and manufacturing company known for its digital production processes and metal additive manufacturing. The partnership is intended to help make the aircraft easier to manufacture at scale while supporting changes to its design and configuration.

Anders said Divergent works with AEVEX engineers on the aircraft’s digital design and produces its fuselage. AEVEX is responsible for the internal systems, mission integration, flight characteristics and navigation science, he explained.

The manufacturing approach is a significant part of the program’s affordability ambitions. AEVEX says Divergent’s Digital Manufacturing and Production System (DAPS) is being used to support scalable production and manufacturability. However, the companies have not disclosed Specter’s projected unit cost or demonstrated that it can yet be produced at the volumes and prices the concept ultimately requires.

Introduction to DAPS™

AEVEX is also drawing on its CompassX autonomy architecture and experience delivering thousands of autonomous systems. The company says Specter’s open interfaces and software-defined capabilities are intended to allow the platform to evolve as operational requirements change, rather than being optimized around one fixed mission.

Specter remains in development, with its first flight planned for December 2026. Anders said the initial flight would be a basic test, with early test aircraft fitted with landing gear so they can be recovered and reused for work on flight characteristics and handling. It isn’t clear if a truly reusable gear-equipped operational version is eyed for the future. Regardless, further testing could include tuning the aircraft’s dive profile.

The planned initial configuration uses a ground launch assisted by a rocket, or rocket-assisted takeoff (RATO), system. An air-launched version is also on the roadmap, Anders said, with that capability expected to follow in the relatively near term.

AEVEX is pursuing several potential military applications. Anders identified the U.S. Army’s Family of Affordable Mass Missiles (FAMM) effort as a primary focus, while noting that the service has its own high-speed requirements. He also said the company is looking at opportunities associated with Rapid Dragon and other programs.

Those comments indicate the range of applications AEVEX hopes Specter could address, not that the aircraft has been selected for any of them. Its performance, cost and ability to meet specific requirements will need to be demonstrated as development and testing progress.

Specter’s intended combination of jet propulsion, attritability and modular payloads could offer an enticing balance. It is not being presented as a higher-end ‘exquisite’ cruise missile, but neither is it limited to carrying a single payload type. The challenge for AEVEX will be delivering enough speed, range and mission flexibility to make the aircraft useful across multiple roles without pushing its price beyond what operators can justify procuring it in large numbers.

A stealthy weapon that is jet-powered like Specter, one that can be configured for various types of one-way missions, could bridge the gap between far more advanced and costly autonomous aircraft and cruise missiles and lower-end one-way attack drones. There have been other concepts that are similar to Specter, we are living in a low-cost cruise missile explosion of sorts, but the company’s unique pedigree of innovation and fast fielding in the one-way attack munition space could give Specter additional credence.

Contact the author: thomas@thewarzone.com

Lockheed Martin has unveiled the PAC-3 Edge, a new interceptor that would represent the top tier of the U.S. Army’s Patriot air defense missile family. The missile is being developed to deliver greater performance against advanced threats than the current PAC-3 Missile Segment Enhancement (MSE), as the Army advances a competition for its next-generation interceptor.

The company says PAC-3 Edge will offer improved performance against increasingly challenging aerial threats, including advanced ballistic and hypersonic missiles. The design builds on the PAC-3 MSE’s existing technology while incorporating a new seeker, an upgraded control system, and a more advanced solid rocket motor developed with Northrop Grumman.

In terms of appearance, PAC-3 Edge differs significantly from the PAC-3 MSE. It does away entirely with the mid-body strakes. The missile body also lacks the distinctive tapered section that separates the narrower forward section from the broader rear section on the MSE version.

Lockheed announced on October 9 that it had been selected to advance to the next phase of the Army’s Future Interceptor program. Company officials said testing is expected to begin in 2027, with initial deployment targeted for 2031.

The Army’s selection of Lockheed and another unnamed competitor marks a significant development in the service’s effort to improve the Patriot system’s ability to deal with more sophisticated threats. The Army previously abandoned its Lower-Tier Future Interceptor (LTFI) program in 2024, citing cost concerns, and instead emphasized incremental improvements to the existing PAC-3 MSE. The subsequent emergence of the Future Interceptor competition points to renewed interest in a more substantial leap in capability.

A More Capable Patriot Interceptor

PAC-3 Edge is intended to preserve the advantages of the existing PAC-3 family while improving the missile’s ability to engage targets at longer ranges and higher altitudes.

One of the central changes is a new seeker being developed by Lockheed Martin’s Strigo Product Center. The company says the technology will improve target detection and tracking, helping the interceptor deal with more demanding threats. The company has not disclosed the seeker’s technical details, but one possibility is a dual-mode or multimode configuration, combining different sensing methods to improve target acquisition and tracking in challenging conditions. Such an approach could help an interceptor maintain a reliable track against maneuvering targets and better distinguish real threats from decoys or other countermeasures.

Tim Cahill, president of Missiles and Fire Control (MFC) for Lockheed Martin, told TWZ that the same seeker technology that will be used in PAC-3 Edge will also find its way into future offensive and defensive systems going into the future. “So it isn’t just a one single seeker solution, but it will be a family of seekers that will operate across a number of regimes,” Cahill explained. “Frankly, I’d like to not tell everybody exactly what we’re doing, but it is clearly different from what is out there right now,” Cahill said, adding that hardware assemblies and components are now being tested in the lab, and that seekers have been flown on aircraft testbeds.

Lockheed PAC-3 promo

The missile will also use a three-pulse (as opposed to two-pulse) solid rocket motor designed by Northrop Grumman. Unlike a conventional motor that provides most of its thrust in a single sustained burn, a multi-pulse design can deliver thrust at different points during flight. That can help preserve energy for the terminal engagement, when an interceptor may need to maneuver aggressively to reach a target.

Lockheed says the combination of the new seeker, propulsion system, and control system improvements will provide greater maneuverability and improve performance at extended ranges and higher altitudes. To ensure greater agility, Jason Reynolds, vice president and general manager of Integrated Air and Missile Defense (IAMD) at Lockheed Martin, explained that the new missile adds a greater number of more capable attitude control motors (ACMs), compared to the PAC-3 MSE. These small thrusters ring the missile’s forward body.

PAC-3 Missile: How The System Works

The new characteristics could be particularly important against maneuvering ballistic missile warheads and hypersonic weapons, which can pose difficult interception problems because of their speed, altitude and dynamic flight profiles. However, the company has yet to demonstrate PAC-3 Edge’s performance in flight testing.

The extent to which PAC-3 Edge could overlap with, or potentially augment, the capabilities of the Army’s Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system also remains unclear. THAAD is designed to intercept ballistic missiles at higher altitudes and longer ranges than Patriot, where midcourse window bleeds into the terminal intercept window. If PAC-3 Edge delivers a substantial improvement in engagement range and altitude over PAC-3 MSE, it could potentially provide at least some backfill for THAAD.

The announcement did not provide detailed performance figures for the new interceptor, including its maximum engagement range, speed, or specific target set. It also did not establish how much better the missile will perform than the PAC-3 MSE in operational conditions.

Addressing An Air Defense Force Under Pressure

The Army has a pressing need to improve its air and missile defense capabilities while expanding the number of interceptors available to its forces.

TWZ has been reporting on the strain facing the Patriot force and its interceptor supply for years. In July 2025, we reported on the Army’s plan to expand its Patriot air defense force by roughly a quarter, adding four battalions as the service sought to meet growing operational demands. More recently, we have detailed the challenges of replenishing interceptors after intensive combat operations, including the scale of U.S. missile and drone engagements in the Middle East, as well as transfers to Ukraine.

Related to this, the push for a more capable Patriot interceptor comes as the system faces increasingly sophisticated threats and adversaries that have learned from years of combat. Russia has improved its ballistic missile tactics to pierce the Patriot’s protective umbrella, while Iran has demonstrated ways to exploit gaps in layered missile defenses, including introducing extremely high-speed ballistic missiles and cluster warheads that open at high altitude.

PAC-3 MSE is currently the most advanced operational member of the PAC-3 family. It is designed primarily as a hit-to-kill interceptor, destroying targets through the force of direct impact, but it also incorporates a small explosive charge known as a “lethality enhancer,” as TWZ has previously detailed.

PAC-3 Edge is intended to push those capabilities further still. Lockheed says the new missile is being designed to work within the Army’s existing and future integrated air and missile defense architecture, including the Integrated Battle Command System (IBCS) and the M903 Patriot launcher. The company has also identified containerized launchers and HIMARS Flex among the systems with which it intends to integrate the interceptor.

Such compatibility could allow the service to retain much of its existing infrastructure while improving the performance of the weapons used within it.

The precise extent of that compatibility, however, will depend on development, testing, and integration work that remains ahead.

IBCS a Revolutionary C2 System

Production And Cost

Lockheed is developing PAC-3 Edge as the company and the Pentagon work to expand production of the existing PAC-3 MSE.

In January, Lockheed Martin announced a seven-year agreement with the Pentagon to more than triple annual PAC-3 MSE production capacity, initially targeting an increase from roughly 600 interceptors to 2,000 a year. The effort subsequently received a major funding boost in July, when the U.S. government awarded Lockheed a contract modification worth up to $53.86 billion, bringing the total multiyear contract value to $58.62 billion. Lockheed says the effort is intended to more than triple production by the end of 2030, while expanding its workforce and investing in manufacturing infrastructure and its supply chain.

Those efforts could provide a foundation for producing PAC-3 Edge if the missile completes development and enters service. Lockheed has said the new interceptor will be manufactured on its existing PAC-3 production line in Camden, Arkansas, with factory modernization expected to support the eventual transition.

The company has also highlighted substantial internal investment in the new missile and its seeker technology. That investment could reduce development risk and give Lockheed greater control over critical components, although the program’s final cost and production schedule remain important unknowns.

The broader challenge is not simply developing an interceptor with better performance. Advanced missiles can be expensive, and air defense forces must balance the capabilities of individual weapons against the number they can afford to procure and keep available. Sustained combat operations can rapidly consume interceptor inventories, making production rates and replacement costs central considerations.

Cahill says the company has also identified the opportunity to mix and match components between PAC-3 Edge and other missile offerings from Lockheed Martin. “We are getting increasingly modular, and increasingly we’re mixing and matching pieces and parts,” he said.

Ultimately, if it chooses PAC-3 Edge, the U.S. government will decide exactly how to handle production of the PAC-3 MSE and the new missiles. “We would expect the typical thing is you’ll feather them, so you would expect that over time MSEs would come down,” Cahill continued. “We’re still talking, seven, eight, nine, 10 years away. You would expect that the Edge production would go up, but there’s plenty of capacity in the factory to manage whatever surges are going to be needed there.”

At the same time, it should be noted that Lockheed Martin is also working on a lower-cost PAC-3 development, the PAC-3 Adapted Capability Effector (ACE). The company says that this interceptor will cost less than half as much as the PAC-3 MSE, meaning it would have a price tag of around $2.5 million. The company says that the PAC-3 ACE will preserve two-thirds of the capability the PAC-3 MSE had, and it has already generated considerable international interest.

Future Interceptor Competition

Lockheed has confirmed that it is one of two companies selected to continue in the Army’s Future Interceptor competition. The identity of the other competitor has not yet been disclosed, and the Army has not publicly provided a complete account of the competition’s requirements.

The effort follows the cancellation of the earlier Lower-Tier Future Interceptor (LTFI) program, which had involved Lockheed Martin and Raytheon. At the time, the Army opted to focus on upgrades to the PAC-3 MSE and on better integration of its existing air and missile defense systems.

The renewed competition suggests that incremental upgrades alone may not be sufficient to address the Army’s longer-term requirements. The development of faster, more maneuverable missiles and other advanced aerial threats is driving demand for interceptors capable of operating across a wider engagement envelope.

For PAC-3 Edge, which is designed to address emerging threat requirements, the planned 2027 testing start and 2031 deployment target leave substantial development work to complete, including demonstrating the seeker’s performance, validating the propulsion system, and proving the missile’s ability to engage representative targets.

For now, the unveiling establishes the direction Lockheed wants to take the Patriot interceptor family. Whether PAC-3 Edge can deliver the promised increase in performance, while meeting the Army’s cost and production requirements, will become clearer as the program progresses. Regardless, from what is being experienced on the battlefield, a more capable, higher-reaching Patriot would be a very welcome addition to the Army’s Patriot family.

Contact the author: thomas@thewarzone.com

Castelion has released what appears to be the first image of its relatively ‘cheap’ Blackbeard hypersonic missile being fired from a ground launcher, providing a new look at the containerized launch architecture now under development for the U.S. Army.

The photograph, posted by Castelion on X, shows a Blackbeard missile leaving a launcher mounted on a high-mobility truck chassis. While the missile itself is by now a familiar sight, the new image offers a first public glimpse of how Castelion intends to package and operate the ground-launched version of Blackbeard, known as Blackbeard GL.

The Army’s previously disclosed plans for the program call for an initial Blackbeard ground-launch demonstration using a modified Multiple Launch Rocket System Family of Munitions, or MFOM, pod, followed by the development of Blackbeard GL prototypes and a dedicated launcher pod. Ultimately, the service intends to conduct an MVP flight test using the M142 High Mobility Artillery Rocket System’s (HIMARS) fire-control system.

The Army’s Fiscal Year 2027 budget documentation indicates that this effort is moving toward increasingly representative hardware. Among the milestones listed for FY2027 is a live-fire launch of a “production representative” Blackbeard GL and launcher pod.

Castelion has already released extensive imagery of Blackbeard test vehicles, and the company formally unveiled the weapon’s current external configuration earlier this year. Those images showed a two-stage arrangement with a booster and an upper vehicle that has characteristics consistent with a hypersonic glide or maneuvering payload. Compared to the air-launched version, seen below, the ground-launch model lacks the cruciform tailfins at the rear of the lower stage, but otherwise appears similar.

The precise propulsion system and flight profile of the production weapon remain undisclosed. Little is known about its performance parameters, either. Castelion has previously hinted that the missile could strike targets at ranges of just under 500 miles, although its range would likely be reduced when launched from the ground, without the altitude and speed provided by an aircraft launch platform.

The launcher appears to use a relatively compact enclosed container, consistent with the Army’s stated interest in leveraging the existing MFOM ecosystem and, eventually, HIMARS. The photograph doesn’t establish how many Blackbeards could be carried by a single launcher, although, based on the dimensions, at least two and perhaps as many as four missiles appears a feasible load.

Exactly how closely the pictured launcher corresponds to the eventual production Blackbeard GL pod is also not yet clear. Castelion has previously stressed that its test hardware is deliberately designed to support rapid development cycles and should not necessarily be interpreted as representative of the final weapon system.

Castelion had previously shown Blackbeard-related test articles alongside palletized launch equipment, including launch hardware mounted on an Oshkosh MKR18 Logistics Vehicle System Replacement truck. The company has also said it was converting such a vehicle into a launcher for flight testing. That appears to be the vehicle shown in the new image, too.

The Army’s interest in Blackbeard GL is rooted in cost as much as performance.

The service has described the weapon as an affordable, mass-produced hypersonic precision-fire capability intended to engage time-sensitive moving and hardened targets. The stated objective has been to obtain roughly 80 percent of the capability of the Army’s planned Precision Strike Missile (PrSM) Increment 4 while achieving a substantially lower cost per round.

Existing U.S. hypersonic weapons such as the Army’s Dark Eagle Long Range Hypersonic Weapon use large, highly specialized launch equipment. Blackbeard is instead being developed around the idea that a hypersonic weapon can be sufficiently compact, inexpensive, and manufacturable to be treated more like a conventional tactical munition.

A containerized launcher compatible with an existing mobile fires ecosystem would reinforce that concept. It could allow the Army to introduce a new hypersonic effect without creating an entirely separate launcher, crew, transport, and reload architecture.

The ground-launched version is only one part of Castelion’s broader Blackbeard effort.

The company is also working with the Navy to integrate the weapon onto the F/A-18E/F Super Hornet. In April, Castelion received a $105 million Navy contract supporting integration and the transition toward an early operational capability, while a subsequent $23.4 million order covered 50 early-operational-capability pre-production missiles and associated storage and shipping containers.

The Navy has since moved into additional procurement, underscoring Castelion’s effort to establish Blackbeard as a weapon that can be produced in the quantities required. Blackbeard could also find its way onto Navy ships and submarines, as well as ground-based launchers, as we have discussed in the past.

As for the Army, the next major milestone will be the planned production-representative Blackbeard GL and launcher-pod live-fire testing.

“Once Castelion achieves testing and validation, the Department will award a two-year multi-year procurement contract for a minimum of 500 Blackbeard missiles annually, with options to extend for up to five years,” the Pentagon announced in May of this year. “To further encourage Castelion’s self-funded facility expansion, the Department is actively seeking the necessary authorizations and appropriations to purchase over 12,000 Blackbeard missiles over five years.”

This reflects a broader and accelerating U.S. military push for lower-cost precision weapons that can be manufactured relatively simply and at scale, increasingly with help from non-traditional defense contractors. The goal is to build large stockpiles affordably before a major contingency, particularly a potential large-scale conflict with China in the Pacific, while ensuring production can keep pace with demand during a prolonged war.

For now, Castelion has demonstrated what the Army’s Blackbeard launch system actually looks like when it fires, at least in its initial form.

Contact the author: thomas@thewarzone.com

The U.S. Navy is preparing to sign a contract with Lockheed Martin to integrate the stealthy AGM-158C Long Range Anti-Ship Missile (LRASM) onto the Air Force’s B-52 Stratofortress bombers, according to an October 7 government notice. The effort would add another long-range maritime strike option to the U.S. bomber force as the military looks to counter increasingly capable adversary naval forces, especially in the Indo-Pacific theater.

The planned contract comes months after the Air Force revealed that the stealthy B-2 bomber can also launch LRASM, a capability that had not previously been publicly disclosed. You can read more about that here.

The latest Naval Air Systems Command (NAVAIR) notice says the command intends to enter into sole-source negotiations with Lockheed Martin and subsequently award a cost-plus-fixed-fee delivery order covering LRASM integration on the B-52. The work would include missile software updates, associated testing, repairs to test assets, and failure review boards.

The notice does not provide a schedule for completing the integration or fielding the capability.

Long Range Anti-Ship Missile (LRASM)

The B-52 is already capable of carrying large numbers of air-launched cruise missiles, including the AGM-158 Joint Air-to-Surface Standoff Missile (JASSM) family. LRASM is derived from that family, sharing a similar general form factor while incorporating features specifically designed to find and attack ships in contested maritime environments.

The B-52 can carry up to 20 JASSMs, and the weapons have the same dimensions, but the government notice does not specify how many LRASMs the bomber would ultimately carry.

This is not the first time the B-52’s LRASM integration has been in the works.

As long ago as November 2019, Naval News reported that $10 million in Fiscal Year 2019 funding had been allocated to study integrating the missile onto the bomber, with Lockheed Martin and the Navy and Air Force expected to work on the effort. At the time, officials said the fielding timeline and the bomber’s eventual missile capacity had yet to be determined.

The U.S. Air Force’s Fiscal Year 2027 budget proposal further outlines plans to integrate the latest variants of LRASM and JASSM onto the B-52, including versions not yet cleared for use on the bomber. According to the document, the effort, which is intended to enable the deployment of next-generation stealthy cruise missiles against targets protected by sophisticated integrated air defense systems, will focus on engineering and manufacturing development, software updates, and weapons integration. Planned work in FY2027 includes incorporating the missiles’ operational flight programs into the B-52’s baseline bomber software, validating safe weapon separation from both wing-mounted stations and the internal carriage launcher, updating armament interfaces, and completing system-safety testing.

LRASM is designed to attack high-value surface vessels at long distances while reducing the exposure of the aircraft launching it. Its guidance combines GPS-assisted inertial navigation with onboard sensors and autonomous target-recognition capabilities intended to help it operate in heavily defended environments. Its imaging infrared seeker supports terminal target acquisition without relying on active radar emissions in that phase of flight. The missile operates with a high degree of autonomy, enabled by an integrated route-planning capability linked to its onboard electronic support measures (ESM) system. LRASM also has a datalink that allows it to get threat updates while in flight. It can also work cooperatively with other LRASMs during coordinated strikes. 

The missile’s precise operational range is not publicly disclosed. However, the baseline LRASM is reported to be able to strike targets at between 200 and 300 miles, in line with the AGM-158A JASSM. The forthcoming C-3 version is expected to have the same reach as the JASSM-ER, which is reported to be around 600 miles.

For the B-52, the addition of LRASM would provide a dedicated anti-ship weapon alongside its established land-attack arsenal. A bomber operating at a considerable distance from a hostile fleet could launch multiple missiles toward maritime targets, complicating an adversary’s air-defense and interception problem. The aircraft’s payload capacity could also allow it to contribute substantial missile volume to a coordinated strike.

The B-52 was previously adapted to carry AGM-84 Harpoon anti-ship missiles, although the weapon is not listed among the bomber’s current publicly documented armament. Compared to the Harpoon, however, LRASM represents a quantum leap in capability, offering drastically greater range, a stealthy design, and the ability to react to threats and adapt in real time. Combined, these traits make for a far more survivable and lethal anti-ship capability.

The B-52 also has a demonstrated naval mine-laying capability through the Quickstrike family of aerial mines. This includes carrying 2,000-pound Quickstrike-ER mines fitted with GPS-aided, winged guidance kits, allowing them to glide to designated points in the water from more than 40 miles away. The system enables the bomber to seed minefields with greater precision while remaining farther from potentially defended waters, threatening enemy shipping routes, port access, and naval movements.

The B-52 effort comes against the backdrop of the Air Force’s newly acknowledged use of LRASM on the B-2, which adds a different dimension to the service’s anti-ship capabilities.

LRASM was also previously integrated on the B-1B, meaning that all three of the Air Force’s strategic bombers will eventually be able to employ it.

The renewed focus on bomber-launched anti-ship weapons reflects the challenges posed by modern naval forces, particularly in the Indo-Pacific. China’s expanding surface fleet, increasingly sophisticated air defenses, and layered anti-access/area-denial capabilities have made the ability to attack ships from a distance an important consideration for U.S. military planning.

LRASM is designed to help address those challenges by combining long-range flight with reduced observability and autonomous terminal targeting. Its onboard sensors and navigation capabilities are intended to help it identify and engage appropriate targets in environments where communications and external targeting support may be limited or contested.

Bomber integration also offers a way to increase the number of potential launch platforms without relying exclusively on tactical aircraft or surface combatants. A B-52 carrying a substantial missile load could contribute to a coordinated attack alongside B-1s, stealth bombers, naval aircraft, and other forces.

The B-52’s payload capacity would make it particularly useful for delivering larger quantities of weapons from outside the most heavily defended areas.

The planned B-52 integration also fits into a broader effort to expand LRASM’s availability across the U.S. military. Publicly discussed integration efforts have included the F-15E, F-15EX, F-16C/D, certain variants of the F-35, and the Navy’s P-8A Poseidon, in addition to established launch platforms, namely the Navy’s F/A-18E/F Super Hornet fighters and the B-1.

Meanwhile, the B-52 fleet is currently preparing for a slew of major upgrades. These include a critical radar overhaul alongside new engines, enhanced communications systems, and other improvements. The scope of these changes is significant enough that the aircraft will be redesignated from B-52H to B-52J. The bombers are also slated to further expand their weapons capabilities, including through the addition of the Long-Range Stand Off (LRSO) nuclear cruise missile. The upgraded B-52Js are expected to remain in service through at least 2050.

B-52 Future Stratofortress: The Upgrades That Will Transform The B-52H Into The B-52J

Even in its current configuration, the B-52 is particularly well suited to carrying the LRASM, given its substantial payload capacity and ability to launch weapons from standoff distances beyond the reach of enemy air defenses. Its upgraded networking capabilities will greatly enhance its effectiveness by allowing it to operate as part of a broader kill web, drawing on data from multiple platforms and sensors to support targeting over vast distances. In more dynamic operational environments, the bomber’s new radar can generate its own targeting information in real time. The B-2, B-1, and the B-52 all offer distinct levels of penetration and weapons-delivery capability, with the forthcoming B-21 able to push deeper into contested airspace; it will certainly employ LRASM too.

The integration of LRASM onto the B-52 could prove critical to generating the volume of sorties needed to counter China’s expanding naval fleet. With its substantial payload capacity and ability to launch missiles from standoff distances, the B-52 could deliver significant anti-ship firepower across the vast distances of the Indo-Pacific. These missions would likely involve very long-range sorties, making the bomber’s payload capacity, endurance and networking capabilities particularly valuable in sustaining operations against Chinese naval forces.

If the LRASM integration proceeds as planned, the result would be another addition to the U.S. military’s long-range anti-ship arsenal, giving the Air Force’s venerable B-52 a more explicit role in the growing emphasis on striking hostile fleets at a distance.

Contact the author: thomas@thewarzone.com

The U.S. Air Force’s scramjet-powered Hypersonic Attack Cruise Missile (HACM) has finally reached the flight test phase, with at least one “release” having been carried out so far over a range in Australia. HACM has suffered significant delays, and the Air Force has taken the risky step of scaling back overall testing plans to try to keep the program on schedule. The stated goal is to be able to make a decision to start rapidly acquiring HACMs in 2027.

The Air Force has been working on HACM in cooperation with the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF). The program has been conducted, in part, under the broader umbrella of the U.S.-Australian Southern Cross Integrated Flight Research Experiment (SCIFiRE). The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency’s (DARPA) Hypersonic Air-breathing Weapon Concept (HAWC) project also fed into HACM. Raytheon (now formally RTX), in cooperation with Northrop Grumman, was chosen to develop the missile in 2022. The weapon has reportedly been designated AHM-4A in a new branch of the U.S. military’s joint service nomenclature system for aircraft and missiles.

“The U.S. Air Force, in partnership with Australia, has conducted a flight test of the Hypersonic Attack Cruise Missile (HACM) as part of our continuous work to advance long-range strike capabilities,” an Air Force spokesperson confirmed to TWZ today. “This effort is part of the Southern Cross Integrated Flight Research Experiment (SCIFiRE), a collaborative agreement built on more than 15 years of partnership between our two nations.”

“Leveraging this enduring alliance, the Royal Australian Air Force executed the release of a HACM flight test unit over a designated Australian test range, gathering crucial data to advance the program’s objectives,” the spokesperson added. “The flight was the culmination of an extensive series of tests designed to measure the missile’s performance under realistic flight conditions.”

The spokesperson did not name the test range where the “release” was conducted or say when that occurred. Whether the missile flew under its own power for any amount of time after release is unknown. What aircraft was used to carry the missile aloft is also not known. TWZ has reached out for more information.

The Air Force did say previously that it planned to conduct HACM launches in Australia. The expectation has long been that this would be done at the country’s sprawling Woomera Test Range, which provides an ideal location for extended-range flight testing activities in general. The U.S. and Australia have partnered on other hypersonic testing at Woomera in the past, as seen in the video below. The remote inland location of the range complex makes it well suited for conducting more sensitive tests away from prying eyes, as well.

HiFiRE 5B rocket reached Mach 7.5

The Government Accountability Office (GAO), a Congressional watchdog, has also reported in the past that RAAF F/A-18F Super Hornets would be used to conduct at least some of the HACM test launches. This would fit with today’s statement from the U.S. Air Force saying that it was the RAAF that “executed the release.” The Air Force’s initial launch platform is the F-15E Strike Eagle, though others are expected to follow.

To date, neither the Air Force nor Raytheon has released a confirmed picture or rendering of HACM. In 2023, the Air Force did release a picture, seen below, showing an air-breathing hypersonic cruise missile test article related to either HACM or the preceding HAWC effort.

“The missile consists of two stages, a rocket booster and a scramjet cruiser, which separates from the booster and eventually dives toward its target,” according to GAO. Scramjets do not function effectively at lower speeds, and designs powered by them require some form of initial boost to a high Mach velocity. Hypersonic speed is generally defined as anything above Mach 5, but what HACM’s peak speed might be is unknown.

Two-stage air-breathing missile-like hypersonic vehicle designs have been tested on several occasions in the past. This includes Boeing’s scramjet-powered X-51 Waverider and HyFly 2 hypersonic test vehicles, among others. The X-51 (as its name indicates) and HyFly 2 also notably had so-called ‘waverider’ configurations designed to ‘skip’ on the shockwaves generated during high-speed flight to help provide additional lift. Whether HACM might also use this principle is not known.

X-51A WaveRider Scramjet Second Hypersonic Flight Test

It’s also worth noting here that Castelion’s Blackbeard hypersonic missile also has a two-stage configuration. It remains unconfirmed whether or not the second stage of that weapon is powered, but it does not appear to be an air-breathing design either way. Castelion is currently developing an air-launched version of Blackbeard for the U.S. Navy, which is also in flight testing now, as well as a ground-launched type for the U.S. Army. You can read more about that missile here.

Scramjet-powered air vehicle designs, including aircraft and missiles, have historically proven challenging. As noted, HACM has suffered delays over the years. The original goal had been to begin flight testing in 2024, which slipped first to 2025 and then 2026.

“The HACM program is on track to conduct its first flight test in the second quarter of fiscal year 2026, but officials said there is effectively zero margin left in the schedule for the rapid prototyping effort. The program has already descoped the rapid prototyping effort from seven to five planned flight tests,” GAO said bluntly in a report published in July. “The Air Force plans to produce 13 missiles during the rapid prototyping effort, including test assets, test spares, and operational rounds.”

“If a significant flight test failure occurs, it is likely that the program will not be able to complete all five tests within the 5-year rapid prototyping timeframe,” the report continued. “According to the program, completing at least the first three flight tests is critical for informing the Air Force’s decision to initiate a rapid fielding effort and procure HACM in fiscal year 2027.”

GAO’s July report, which had a January cutoff date, noted later on that the Air Force’s target date for initiating the rapid fielding effort, more specifically, was the first quarter of Fiscal Year 2027. This fiscal period began last Thursday and runs through the end of the year. Whether the service is still aiming to keep to that part of the schedule is unclear, but it would seem extremely difficult to do so.

“The HACM program has taken on risk to maintain its current schedule. According to program officials, maintaining the schedule has required aggressively resequencing activities to focus almost exclusively on those necessary to support the first flight test date,” GAO’s report added. “In some cases, officials said this has involved risky strategies, such as concurrently performing parts validation testing while completing the system’s design, which could require the redesign of key parts if they fail validation testing.”

In terms of U.S. hypersonic missile developments, challenges have also not been limited to scramjet-powered types like HACM. Air Force, Navy, and Army efforts to develop a variety of air- and surface-launched hypersonic missiles in various sizes and configurations have all suffered setbacks in the past decade or so. The Navy notably cancelled its own air-launched hypersonic cruise missile program, called Hypersonic Air-Launched Offensive Anti-Surface Warfare, or HALO, last year. The service subsequently shifted focus to the aforementioned Blackbeard under a program called the Multi-mission Affordable Capacity Effector (MACE). This has all prompted particular concerns about a growing and increasingly worrisome gap in this regard between the United States and its chief global competitors, especially China.

There is also a cost question. HACM traces to a time when hypersonic missiles were generally viewed, at least publicly, as highly capable, but also higher-cost and lower-density, assets. Blackbeard, for example, reflects a more recent push to develop and field more economical munition designs across the board that can also be more readily produced at scale. This demand signal has become even more pronounced in light of the dwindling American stockpiles of critical munitions due to the conflict with Iran, as well as other crises globally in recent years. More exquisite munitions, including hypersonic types, will still be part of the larger U.S. arsenal going forward.

Regardless, the U.S. military, as well as its Australian counterparts, have made it clear in the past that they view hypersonic weapons as critical for success in future conflicts, especially high-end fights, such as one in the Pacific against China. In general, air-breathing hypersonic cruise missiles offer a valuable and highly flexible way to strike targets, especially time-sensitive ones, quickly and over extended ranges. The weapon’s high speed and maneuverability drastically increase its ability to penetrate through enemy air defenses and reduce the total time an opponent has to react.

Whether or not the Air Force will be able to avoid any more major delays with HACM remains to be seen. The service’s goal to start at least limited production of HACM before the end of 2027, if not sooner, is even more ambitious now after years of schedule slips. As mentioned, officials have already acknowledged there was no more margin for error at the start of the year. There are many questions still about what form any initial fielding will take, and how that might be further impacted by the truncated testing plan.

The HACM program has at least now hit the important milestone of beginning flight testing.

Contact the author: joe@twz.com