President Zelenskyy:
❗️For the first time in the history of this war an enemy position was taken using only unmanned platforms - ground robotic complexes and drones.
Russian soldiers in the position surrendered into captivity.
1. A lot of people are focused on the apparent contradiction/absurdity of Trump blockading the Strait if he wants to open it. And yes, that is a real issue. But the even more immediate concern is what the U.S. Navy must do to actually put this plan into effect.
this is a useful comparison but actually way undershoots the extent of the purges in China by only counting the officially gone and excluding the much larger category of disappeared, which adds about another 69 senior officers since 2023.
chinapower.csis.org/china-pla-mi...
@dexeve.bsky.social & I have a new piece out in Survival. In 2024, South Korea secretly deployed more than 300 KTSSM missiles at soft, fixed sites--suggesting that, in a crisis, Seoul may strike first & giving Pyongyang 300 reasons to beat them to it.
doi.org/10.1080/0039...
🧵 A masterclass in creating a dysfunctional command climate.
Also, just existing in the military is dangerous business. And it's why we take safety so seriously. And when the SecDef reaches down and cancels a subordinate's investigation out of hand, brother, bad things are happening.
Nothing says we will always have the backs of our warfighters™️ quite like undermining the chain of command.
U.S. and European officials have told The Associated Press that Russia is sending a shipment of drones to Iran including upgraded versions of the drone technology that Tehran originally supplied to Moscow after its invasion of Ukraine.
Is russia actually preparing to invade #Estonia?
Lately, Western but sadly also Ukrainian media and bloggers have been sounding the alarm about 70,000 troops and hundreds of tanks at the border.
But satellite imagery tells a very different story. 🧵 1/13
I live in the same local news area, I watched the local news that night talk about the high potential for flooding, and later in bed watched the radar of the rain on my phone before I fell asleep. I knew there was going to be flooding, everyone did who paid even a minimal amount of attention.
If you'd have told me before the war that 25 days into a war between Iran and U.S./Israel that Iran would still be launching TBMs and that they were getting past interceptors and striking Tel Aviv, I would have told you: "yeah, that checks."
New study finds notion that humans can "double-check" AI to be flawed. Participants trusted AI 93% of the time when it was correct, but still trusted it 80% of the time when it was wrong, while being *more* confident in their conclusions.
papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....
Things the World Doesn’t Get, Part 94: The Missile Technology Control Regime
Iran’s powerful missiles are an example of a gross failure of the international system on which the security, prosperity and well-being of the USA, the G7, the EU and others rely.
Here’s why.
A 🧵/1.
Right. Lots of speculation on this site all week about what the Marine Expeditionary Units headed towards the Persian Gulf might do, most of it pretty unhinged, so this thread is MEU 101. I'll keep adding to it as necessary.
I keep seeing this framing like Bremmer's. It is wrong. Instead:
1. Iran was developing an ICBM when Khamenei imposed a 2,000-km range limit.
3. The programs shifted to space launch.
4. Khamenei lifted the restriction in October 2025 after the June attacks.
5. Now he's dead, and here we are.
Iran targeted Diego Garcia with an IRBM. While most people think Iran used an enhanced Khorramshahr (aka Musudan), the distance is so great we should also keep in mind the possibility of a variant of one of Iran's space launch vehicles like the Zoljanah or Qaem-100.
Wow. If I'm not mistaken, this marks the longest-range use of ballistic missiles in warfare to date. www.wsj.com/livecoverage...
NEW: Israeli strikes on Iranian internal security forces, including decapitation strikes, have likely caused shock and confusion within the Iranian internal security apparatus and disrupted internal security operations to some degree. Iran Update, March 19, 2026: isw.pub/IranUpdate03...
1/4
Because people have been CLAMORING for it... here are my current model outputs for dimensions of craters dug by nuclear weapons at roughly optimized depths of burst. I've included the highest-yield US nuclear weapon currently deployed (B-83), and the 100 Mt Tsar Bomba. NYC for scale (sorry).
Yes.
oh no the thing that has happened to every single world power in every single major conflict since the advent of modern artillery is happening again
Since people are rediscovering "clobbering" of cruise missiles, let me explain: Tomahawks use "terrain contour matching" (TERCOM) to find their way to targets. For reasons, about 1-2% of Tomahawks "clobber" -- get lost and fly into the ground -- en route to target.
New Nukesletter: on recent revelations from ONI on the JL-4 (China's next-gen, longer-range SLBM) and on China's all-nuclear-propulsion future submarine force. panda.substack.com/p/a-glimpse-...
The IRGC and its Basij militia are shooting directly at Iranians who are shouting anti-regime slogans from their windows in Tehran.
They are exploiting the chaos of war to shut down the internet and to target and kill anyone they choose with ease.
Israel used 2,000+ bombs in the first 30 hours of the Iran war; the US struck 1,000+ targets in the first 24 hours. Iran responded with at least 390 missiles and 830 drones in the first two days. Bellingcat has tracked the munitions used by all sides so far: www.bellingcat.com/news/2026/03...
Iran fired 1200+ projectiles at 5 countries in the first 48 hours. Most were drones. These saturation attacks aim to overwhelm air defenses and drain interceptors. $20-50K Shaheds vs. $4.19M air defense interceptors put US partners on the wrong side of the cost curve.
Russia had negative net gains in Ukraine in February, for the first time since 2023
Think this is a weird base? Perturbed by the cavern launch sites? Read more about it in this great piece by @josephhdempsey.bsky.social
www.iiss.org/online-analy...
Conventionally-armed ballistic missiles suck unless one can achieve very high levels of accuracy. Last time Israel didn’t even bother to intercept Iranian missiles aimed at passively defended targets. No reason to think this will turn out differently for the Iranians.
New Nukesletter post on Substack: my early assessment of the fundamental missteps in how Iran approached deterrence (with its missile force, with its approach to the nuclear threshold, and with diplomacy with a bad faith Trump administration).
panda.substack.com/p/making-sen...