“US to Deploy Anti-Ship Missiles on Subs in 2024 to Counter China”
“‘Maritime Strike’ Tomahawks part of Asia-focused naval force”
“New missiles to be fielded on US submarines after Sept. 1”
“The US Navy plans to begin arming submarines next year with ship-targeting versions of the widely used Tomahawk missile, part of Washington’s push to ramp up military capabilities to challenge Chinese maritime forces, particularly around Taiwan.
The “Maritime Strike” version of the Tomahawk, the RTX Corp. missile traditionally used as a ground-attack weapon, will be fielded after Sept. 1, program manager Capt. Jon Hersey said in a statement. The latest models will be modified with a new guidance system enabling them to “to engage a mobile target at sea,” he said, adding the Navy took delivery of the initial version last year for tests before declaring it combat ready.
Fielding the new version of the Tomahawk — which made its battlefield debut in the early hours of the 1991 Persian Gulf War in Iraq —- would add to a growing US arsenal of ship-attack missiles to complement submarine-launched torpedoes intended to counter China’s numerically superior fleet. While the Navy also plans to start fielding the weapons on surface vessels, those are more vulnerable to China’s land- and sea-based anti-ship arsenal.”
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“Japan may someday also deploy the new anti-ship version of the missile. The State Department notified Congress this month that Tokyo has been cleared to receive it first ground-attack Tomahawks in a sale valued at as much as $2.35 billion for up to 200 missiles.
“Should Japan also get this weapon, it adds another level of complexity the Chinese will have to contend with,” Sadler said.”
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“The US anti-ship arsenal now includes the ship-launched RTX SM-6 air defense missile adapted by the Pentagon’s Strategic Capabilities Office and Lockheed Martin Corp.’s Long Range Anti-Ship Missile. It can be launched from the Air Force B-1-B bomber and the Navy’s top aircraft carrier fighter, the F/A-18 E/F.
Separately, the Navy also fields Boeing Co.’s sea-skimming Harpoon anti-ship missiles, and Taiwan is buying at least 400 ground-launched versions for coastal defense. Those type of missiles figured prominently in a series of tabletop war games of a potential invasion of Taiwan by China conducted last year by the Center for Strategic and International Studies.”
No one could have foreseen this. OR NOT.
“The Violent Homecoming of Russian Convicts Freed to Fight in Ukraine”
“Wave of new, brutal crimes comes as former prisoners finish military contracts and go home; ‘thousands of criminals are walking our streets’”
“In early August, police in Russia’s rural northwest were called to the scene of a mass murder. In the charred remains of two homes set ablaze hours earlier, they found the burned, mutilated bodies of six local residents.
News of the massacre shook Derevyannoye, a village of 1,200 people, where sailing boats bob in Onega Lake and the border with Finland is a three-hour drive away. What was most shocking was the identity of one of the two suspects: a repeat offender freed from a maximum-security prison to fight in Ukraine.
Igor Sofonov had been in and out of jail for 20 years by the time he joined Storm Z, a unit of convicts created to bolster Russia’s war effort. If he and others survived long enough to complete their six-month contracts, they were promised their freedom through a secretive program of presidential pardons.
Sofonov survived, and returned to Russia with the remainder of his sentence for drug trafficking erased. He is among around 30,000 enlisted ex-prisoners, many of whom had been serving long prison terms for violent crimes, who have returned home to liberty.”