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European defense stocks surged on Monday after leaders met with Zelenskyy in London. Ukraine's president left Washington on Friday without a minerals deal after clashing with Trump. Rheinmetall, BAE Systems, and Leonardo rose sharply amid expectations of higher defense spending. European defense stocks surged again on Monday as the UK, France, and Ukraine agreed to work on a peace deal following Volodymyr Zelenskyy's clash with President Donald Trump. European leaders met with the Ukraine president in London on Sunday. Expectations of rising demand for weapons and other military equipment are behind the stock surges on European markets. UK Prime Minister...

BERLIN, March 2 (Reuters) - The parties in talks to form Germany's new government are considering quickly setting up two special funds potentially worth hundreds of billions of euros, one for defence and a second for infrastructure, three people with knowledge of the matter told Reuters. Economists advising the parties that will likely form a new government coalition estimate around 400 billion euros ($415 billion) are needed for the defence fund and 400 billion to 500 billion euros for the infrastructure fund, the people said. Friday's heated White House meeting between Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy and U.S. President Donald Trump...

Normal Americans have noticed many of the inestimable benefits of the Harris/Biden DEI years. To be fair, Barack Obama gave Biden’s handlers a real leg up on DEI, but the handlers really ran with it. Among the most noticeable of those "benefits" has been a dramatic increase not only of US Navy ships that look like third world rust buckets, but an equally dramatic apparent increase in those rust buckets running into other ships and geographic features. It's unusually difficult to find current data on ship collisions. There’s quite a bit of information on the 2017 collisions of the destroyers...

I posted yesterday that those that signed the letter demanding Congress investigate the firing of the CJCS, and their insubordinate remarks should be charge with Article 88 of the UCMJ and court-martialed. I received one response that stated that since they are retired, the UCMJ does not apply to them. Is that true? And if is not true, that they can be brought up on UCMJ charges, than is that true for all retired personnel?

Amid the war on terror and the many military conflicts of the past two decades, Democrats were often critics of foreign adventurism and military spending, pointing to the bloated Pentagon budget as an obvious target for cuts to balance the budget. Now that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has ordered a sweeping budget review and the implementation of those cuts, Democrats -- determined to obstruct the Trump agenda -- are suddenly livid and sound like Bush-era Republicans warning of national security failures should the Defense Department lose funding. The fiscal year 2025 National Defense Authorization Act approved $883.7 billion in funding...

Links to video: https://podcast.hillsdale.edu/erik-prince-the-future-of-dynamic-warfare/ Or https://youtu.be/WPMgzm_9K50?si=sAiO_dDDrcHs847h

On Friday’s “PBS NewsHour,” Washington Post Associate Editor and MSNBC host Jonathan Capehart stated that it’s incorrect to claim that Europe is ripping off the United States on defense by not spending enough on their defense because they’re not “paying the United States money in a protection racket.” It’s just people want them to “spend more of your GDP on your own defense, rise up to the level of where the United States is, relatively speaking” so that “the burden is more fairly shared.” New York Times columnist David Brooks stated that Europe has increased its defense spending.

In what has become a horror show for the British army, the force is even more hollowed out than once thought. The Brits may only have 20 to 25 main battle tanks that they could count on should there be an overseas deployment. The Royal Armored Corps is supposed to have 59 Challenger 2 tanks, but there haven’t been that many in years. The problem started in the 1990s and got worse due to parts shortages, defense contractors going bankrupt, and maintenance and repair worker shortages.

MANCHESTER, Ky. (KT) – Kentucky State Police (KSP) are continuing its investigation into an apparent home invasion this past weekend in Clay County that left both of the alleged suspects dead. KSP logo On Saturday, shortly before 4:30 a.m., Clay County 911 contacted Kentucky State Police (KSP) Post 11 in London to report a shooting incident within the city limits of Manchester. The Manchester Police Department responded to the scene and found two individuals who had been shot. They requested KSP’s assistance in investigating the matter. Upon their arrival, troopers determined that the two men involved had forcibly entered a...

New York -- When a suspicious video of ballots being ripped up in Pennsylvania gained attention on social media last October, federal agencies responded quickly and called it out as Russian disinformation. On Election Day in November, bomb threats to polling places in numerous states caused relatively few disruptions to voting. It’s one of the many scenarios covered by the nation’s cybersecurity agency in its outreach to state and local officials.The Trump administration’s downsizing and disbanding of federal agencies has hit efforts that improve election security and monitor foreign influence. That could create gaps for America’s enemies to exploit the...

SAN ANTONIO - A hairstylist is calling one of her customers a hero after he came to the rescue during an armed robbery inside a North Side beauty salon, shooting and killing the suspect. The whole ordeal took place around 7:30 p.m. Wednesday night at Marissa's Beauty Salon on Basse Rd. It was thirty minutes before closing when a masked man holding a gun barged in demanding everyone's property, according to the hairstylist named Nancy, who declined to give her last name. "Money, cell phones," Nancy remembers the man shouting. "Money, cell phones, purse. Money, money." There were only three...

BERLIN (Reuters) - The German army's battle-readiness is less than when Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022, military officials, lawmakers and defence experts told Reuters.Even if a new government boosts defence spending, it will remain hamstrung for years, particularly by a lack of air defence, artillery and soldiers, they said."Before Russia's invasion of Ukraine, we had eight brigades at around 65% readiness," Colonel Andre Wuestner, head of the German Armed Forces Association, told Reuters in an interview. Sending weapons, ammunition and equipment to Ukraine, as well as accelerating Germany's own drills, took a toll on the available equipment, he said."Together, this...

STUTTGART, Germany — Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on Tuesday began his first international trip overseas spending some quality time with American troops stationed in Germany early in the morning for some physical training — or PT, in military-speak. Side-by-side with Green Berets from the 10th Special Forces Group, the 44-year-old defense secretary did the “HERO workout” — a series of exercises honoring those who have fallen in the line of duty. Hegseth did the workout despite arriving to Germany around 2 a.m. that morning and only getting a few hours sleep. Asked why it was important for him to do...

No joke: Wired wants you to believe this is a bad thing. The Young, Inexperienced Engineers Aiding Elon Musk’s Government Takeover Engineers between 19 and 24, most linked to Musk’s companies, are playing a key role as he seizes control of federal infrastructure. WWW.WIRED.COM https://www.wired.com/story/elon-musk-government-young-engineers/ "Elon Musk's Government Takeover" Gotta love the pea-sized brains over at Wired. Elon Musk's takeover of federal government infrastructure is ongoing, and at the center of things is a coterie of engineers who are barely out of — and in at least one case, purportedly still in — college. Elon isn't taking over anything. He's...

Senate Budget Committee Chair Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) on Friday unveiled a 61-page budget resolution that would lay the groundwork for the Senate to pass a special budget reconciliation bill that would provide $175 billion to secure the southern border and $150 billion to beef up national defense. “To those who voted for and support real border security and a stronger defense in a troubled world, help is on the way,” Graham said in a statement. “This budget resolution jumpstarts a process that will give President Trump’s team the money they need to secure the border and deport criminals, and make...

On January 15th and January 16th, in Houston, Texas, two young men fired guns in defense of self and others. One young man was protecting himself and his companions in the car he occupied. The other was protecting his pregnant significant other. Both actions appear to be justified. Both young men are reported to be less than 21 years old.The Texas restoration of Constitutional carry, passed in 2021, generally excluded people under the age of 21. Here are the two incidents.On January 16, 2025, at 9:30 p.m., a young man was driving with his pregnant significant other. The incident started...

The good news: Our American fighting forces now have President Donald J. Trump as their commander-in-chief and Pete Hegseth as their Secretary of Defense. The better news: because of this, military recruitment has hit its highest record since 2010.The U.S. Army recently announced it shattered previous recruiting records, with December 2024 being the most productive December in 15 years.The branch reported it enlisted nearly 350 soldiers every day that month, Army officials announced Tuesday on social media."Our Recruiters have one of the toughest jobs – inspiring the next generation of #Soldiers to serve. Congratulations and keep up the great work!...

Former Secretary of Defense Mark Esper has become the latest ex-official from President Trump’s first term to lose their security detail, according to a report. The Pentagon revoked Esper’s taxpayer-funded security detail on Tuesday night, CBS News reported on Wednesday. Esper’s security detail had been provided by the Department of Defense as a result of threats he’s received from Iran since the 2020 US airstrike that killed Iranian Gen. Qasem Soleimani. The Pentagon did not immediately respond to The Post’s request for comment. Esper, 60, served as Trump’s secretary of the Army from November 2017 to July 2019, before he...

President Trump's foreign policy is once again being hijacked out from under him.. Staffing a new administration is a big job. That’s why having trusted people doing the staffing is important. Unfortunately, as I document in today’s article, “The Koch Appeasers Taking Over Trump’s Defense Department”, a network of Koch-funded people whose foreign policy is at odds with America First are filling up the Pentagon. John A. Byers argued that “peaceful coexistence and mutually beneficial prosperity” with China must be the watchwords for a second Trump administration. “The vastness and persistent growth of China’s trade” suggests a “future of mutually...

At about 5:30 a.m., nearly two hours before sunrise in Garland, Maine, a suspect stole a Komatsu front end loader from a nearby gravel pit. The suspect then used the front end loader to attack a nearby home with people inside. The machine caused significant damage to vehicles parked in the driveway in an apparent attempt to force entry into the house. The sheriff’s officer reports residents exited the house and fired shots at the driver, wounding him and forcing his retreat.Here is the report from the Penobscot County Sheriff’s Office:Gunshots were fired during an incident involving a stolen front-end...