Free Republic

The U.S. military recently published photos of Marines in a unit headed to the Middle East equipped with an advanced optic designed to help them shoot down small drones. The April 4 photos show members of the 11th Marine Expeditionary Unit, or MEU, using a smart scope optic mounted on their M4 carbines as part of training against small drones. Roughly 2,500 Marines in the unit are currently embarked on the Boxer Amphibious Ready Group, which deployed in March to support operations in the Middle East. When the photos were taken, the Marines were aboard a ship in the Pacific...

Kuwait's interior ministry reported "severe material damage" at several vital facilities of the Kuwait Petroleum Corporation and the energy and water resources ministry after an Iranian drone attack on Wednesday. The ministry said fires broke out in some of the attacked sites, which it said include oil facilities and three power stations and water desalination plants.

Traumatic brain injuries are quickly emerging as the signature wound of the U.S. war with Iran so far, echoing a pattern of post-9/11 wars... More than 200 U.S. troops have so far been wounded in the war, and at least 140 of those were TBI-related injuries... It’s a surge being driven by Iran’s reliance on one-way attack drones and the concussive blasts they deliver in strikes against American troops in countries across the Middle East, including Kuwait and Saudi Arabia and Bahrain. Symptoms of TBI can be subtle at first but often linger for years, or even a lifetime, ranging...

Ebrahim Zolfaqari said ​Iran targeted satellite equipment and ⁠munitions ⁠on the ⁠island with ​drones, adding that U.S. forces ​had relocated ⁠there from Arifjan camp after that base was repeatedly struck ⁠by Iran.Bubiyan island is the largest of ⁠Kuwait's coastal islands chain, located in the northwest of the [Persian]Gulf.

Operation Epic Fury marks a turning point in the art of war. The key to 20th-century battles was air power. In the past, space and cyber activities have traditionally played supporting roles as so-called force multipliers. But this is no longer the case. In this conflict they have become mainstream, carving out new fronts for the wars of the future. The use of space is no longer something that is just nice to have, because everything from comms to intel to navigation uses space and cyber assets. Along with the National Reconnaissance Office, which manages US spy satellites, the US...

Reports of multiple unauthorized drones over Barksdale Air Force Base and Fort McNair should alarm every American. Up until now, no threat has been identified. If this were happening overseas, we’d call it pre-operational surveillance. That’s how I was trained. At home, we’re still calling it, "mystery." It’s only a matter of time until a credible threat presents itself. What’s most alarming is that we cannot definitively answer who is flying these drones. all it’s going to take is one single drone to slip through our defenses and kill an American, to cause massive strategic damage to our country. I’ve...

Multiple sources have claimed that the Chinese government is suspiciously repositioning its military assets, signaling possible future activity around Taiwan. The reports come from the Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies, which tracks Chinese military might and defense systems. The China Airpower Tracker reportedly showed lines of typically retired Chinese fighter jets, which have drawn suspicion from experts. The J-6 fighter (also known as the Shenyang J-6) was first developed in the late 1950s. China retired the line of jets in the late 1990s, but now, experts say, China is retrofitting the old fighters to serve as unmanned craft and staging...

This NATO war game went horribly wrong. Ukraine’s drone warfare exposed NATO weaknesses during a major Estonia war game, and the results were brutal. In this video, I break down how just 10 Ukrainian operators simulated the destruction of two NATO battalions, and what that reveals about outdated doctrine and the future of warfare. In May of 2025, NATO ran a major "military exercise" called Hedgehog in Estonia, involving over 16,000 troops from 12 NATO countries. This "wargame" highlighted the critical role of a Ukrainian-Estonian OPFOR unit, leveraging advanced "drones" and the expertise of "Ukraine soldiers" to simulate a mechanized...

Not an entertainer or talk show celebrity, Postol has banks of lecture slides showing nuke-war damage, missiles & drones in eye-glazing technical detail. Take-away: if a cheap but accurate drone hits your apartment even with a reinforced safe-room, the building will collapse, so you'd better huddle in a shelter. But the destruction of radars means you have no warning. Your life is completely disrupted. While U.S. Defense Industries (Lockheed-Martin, General Dynamics,TRW, etc.) have been getting fat pedalling us decades of useless, expensive whiz-bang systems that never worked but make fantastic Congressional pork: lean-mean Ukrainians, Russians, Chinese & Iranians have been...

Support Free Republic join me in supporting FR as the deadline approaches... "Jesus entered the temple courts and drove out all were buying and selling there. He overturned the tables of the money changers and the benches of those selling doves... Iran says it attacked an anti-drone depot in the United Arab Emirates operated by Ukrainians defending an American base... Your host self-identifying as a great hypocrite with a song about hypocrisy penned... A clue about what Epstein was up to with all his international contacts in the story of French diplomat Fabrice Aidan now being investigated by French authorities......

HUGE SENTENCE IN FLORIDA: @AGJamesUthmeier announces 81 YEARS for Mario Crawford, who used drones to smuggle drugs, weapons & cell phones into state prisons Officials warn contraband is no longer just coming through the gates, it’s coming over the fences

Amid the raging conflict in the Middle East, the astonishing events at Barksdale Air Force Base earlier this month have attracted only limited media attention. It is reported that swarms of unidentified drones repeatedly loitered over Barksdale between March 9 and 15, drawing no publicly known effective response from the military or the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Barksdale is the headquarters of the Air Force’s Global Strike Command, which is responsible for the nation’s nuclear intercontinental ballistic missiles and strategic bomber forces, including B2, B1, and B52 aircraft. The base is home to the 2nd Bomb Wing B52s and...

As all eyes are glued to the happenings in the Middle East, this story flew under the radar for most of us. But in a lot of ways, the implications for our national security could be greater than what happens in the next few weeks in the Persian Gulf. Drone warfare has come to the United States—to the heart of our nuclear deterrent capabilities—and our defenses proved inadequate to stop sophisticated drones from interfering with wartime operations.

ultiple recent drone incursions over U.S. bases housing strategic military assets amplify concerns The War Zone has been documenting for years about highly worrisome drone flights over these installations and critical capabilities. These incidents, as we’ve noted, present a risk to national and local security. One of the drone overflights took place earlier this month at Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana, home of B-52 Stratofortress bombers and nuclear weapons storage facilities, and a key part of the airborne leg of America’s nuclear triad. Another was at an unspecified installation last month, the commander of U.S. Northern Command mentioned in...

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky made a surprise visit to Saudi Arabia on Thursday amid a wider effort to lend Ukraine’s drone defense expertise to the U.S. and Gulf States. Zelensky had offered his country’s expertise in defense against kamikaze drone attacks, cultivated in its grinding war against Russia, just days after the war began. These promised personnel arrived in the Middle East recently, with Zelensky saying last week that 201 personnel had been deployed, and another 34 were on their way. Drones were at the top of the agenda of Zelensky’s visit. In a post on X, he stated that...

Russia is reportedly set to begin shipping drones, medicine and food to its ally Iran in support of its ongoing military efforts against the United States and Israel. Western intelligence reports claim that Moscow and Tehran have held secret talks of drone supplies shortly after the war began, the Financial Times reported. The Russians have already given Iran satellite imagery, targeting data and intelligence support but the drones would be the first potentially lethal aid they've supplied. Russia has denied assisting Iran in its month-old conflict with the United States and Israel. Washington said it also received a denial about...

On March 25, 2026, Chinese state media presented the first full-process demonstration of the Atlas drone swarm operations system, offering one of the clearest public looks so far at how China intends to employ coordinated unmanned strike formations on the battlefield. The sequence linked target identification, launcher activation, drone deployment and precision strike into a single operational chain, signaling a shift toward algorithm-enabled warfare. Beyond the platform, it highlights growing emphasis on autonomous coordination, layered drone use and software-driven battlefield control. Global Times reported that Atlas is built around the Swarm-2 vehicle with command and support elements, forming a complete...

That's what he looks like

Poland placed air defenses on the 'highest state of readiness' as Russian strikes approached NATO airspace, Poland's operational command said Russia launched nearly 400 drones and dozens of missiles across Ukraine overnight Monday, triggering NATO to scramble fighter jets in neighboring countries, according to reports. The massive aerial assault killed at least four and injured >24, with strikes hitting multiple regions including Kyiv, Zaporizhzhia and Kharkiv Poland and Romania both scrambled fighter jets as Russian strikes approached NATO airspace, East2West reported, with Warsaw placing air defenses on the "highest state of readiness," Poland’s operational command said. "Due to the activity...

Russian air defenses downed 389 incoming Ukrainian drones, Russia’s Defense Ministry said Wednesday, in what was the largest reported overnight attack on Russian regions and Crimea since Moscow’s forces invaded Ukraine more than four years ago. The drones were stopped over 13 Russian regions as well as the Crimean Peninsula, which Russia illegally annexed from Ukraine in 2014. The attack underlined the growing capability of Ukraine’s domestically developed and manufactured long-range drones. It came a day after Russia fired almost 1,000 drones and 34 missiles at civilian areas of Ukraine in the space of 24 hours, extending its usual nighttime...