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Four Silicon Valley technology executives from major companies are joining the U.S Army Reserve as officers to inject the speed and expertise of commercial technology development into military innovation through the newly established Detachment 201, an Executive Innovation Corps, the service announced Friday.
The Pentagon has long turned to civilian experts for technological insight, from World War II-era scientists to modern advisory boards like the Defense Innovation Board. Detachment 201 takes the desire to collaborate with the high-technology industry to a new level: embedding senior tech execs directly into the Army Reserve as uniformed officers.
Those first Army Reserve lieutenant colonels, who will be sworn in today are Shyam Sankar, Palantir’s chief technology officer; Andrew Bosworth, chief technology officer of Meta; Kevin Weil, OpenAI’s chief product officer; and Bob McGrew, an advisor at Thinking Machines Lab and former chief research officer for OpenAI, the Arm..

The U.S. Army has signed off on the advancement of two industry teams into a technology development phase to build prototypes of a Bradley Infantry Fighting Vehicle replacement.
American Rheinmetall Vehicles and General Dynamics Land Systems have passed through the critical design review stage of a competition to build the XM30 Mechanized Infantry Combat Vehicles and have the green light to start bending metal, several individuals within industry and the service have confirmed to Defense News.
The individuals were granted anonymity because they are not authorized to speak publicly.
The two companies were chosen from a pool of bidders in June 2023 to proceed to the detailed design phase of the program.
The XM30 was recently called out in a memo issued by the Army secretary as a program the service is keen on accelerating, along with a modernized version of its Abrams tank it is calling the M1E3. The service is championing the program as it axes other vehicle programs like the M10 Booker..

The Army has spent well over a billion dollars on a light tank the service is now terminating, just as the program was slated to enter into full-rate production.
The M10 Booker was going to be the first new combat vehicle to enter the force in four decades.
The service noted its plans to cancel the M10 Booker procurement in a memo issued at the start of last month and on June 11 officially announced the program’s end.
“In response to current world events and in support of the strategic objectives outlined in the Army Transformation Initiative, the U.S. Army has issued a termination for convenience of the current low-rate initial production of the M10 Booker combat vehicle and will not enter into full-rate production as originally planned,” the Army said in a statement.
The Army set out to fill a lethality gap in its infantry formations, and following analysis spearheaded by Lt. Gen. H.R. McMaster, who led the Army’s future-focused efforts within Training and Doctrine Comman..

In the wake of a string of deadly military aviation accidents over the past several years, the U.S. Army is launching a major overhaul of how it trains new pilots that focuses on getting back to the basics.
The overhaul includes rethinking the type of aircraft used for training, along with a likely shift to a contractor-owned-and-operated schoolhouse.
“I think I have one sacred responsibility and that is to deliver competent aviators to the government,” Maj. Gen. Clair Gill, commander of the Army Aviation Center of Excellence Command, said at an Army aviation conference in Nashville, Tennessee, last month. “I’m not sure that I’m doing that in spades right now.”
The fatal Jan. 29 collision of a U.S. Army UH-60 Black Hawk helicopter and an American Airlines passenger jet near Reagan National Airport in Washington, D.C., and a spate of Army aviation mishaps over the last several years have been at the forefront of the minds of Army aviation leaders as t..

Some Army installations could be powered by nuclear microreactors under an executive order recently issued by President Donald Trump.
The order, published May 23, calls for deploying advanced nuclear reactor technologies for national security and directs Army Secretary Daniel Driscoll to establish a program using the technology for both installation and operational energy.
It orders the operation of a nuclear reactor at a domestic military base or installation by Sept. 30, 2028.
“Advanced nuclear reactors include nuclear energy systems like Generation III+ reactors, small modular reactors, microreactors, and stationary and mobile reactors that have the potential to deliver resilient, secure, and reliable power to critical defense facilities and other mission capability resources,” according to the order.
Pentagon to build micro nuclear reactor to power far-flung bases
Testifying before the House Armed Services Committee on Wednesday, Driscoll and Army Chief of Staff Gen. Ra..

Within the Army Transformation Initiative, the Army’s Next Generation Command and Control (NGC2) effort represents a fundamental change in delivering data-driven C2 to our formations. From requirements to resourcing, acquisition and contracting, every gear in the system is being rebuilt to drive smarter, faster, and more effective outcomes. The scope and pace of this change is creating both opportunities and questions as industry adapts with us.
What are we doing with NGC2?We’re delivering seamlessly integrated C2 capability from corps down to squad. The key is a data integration layer that enables a rapid buildout of applications across warfighting functions such as fires, intelligence, logistics, and protection, and provides a common operating picture across all. The integrated data layer is the foundation for multifunctional artificial intelligence-enabled models that will rapidly augment decision making and speed.
Commercial hardware and software is critical to achievin..

Soldiers with the Hawaii-based 25th Infantry Division are in the midst of a training exercise with Philippine allies that has them pushing farther and striking deeper with the help of new drones.
The 2nd Mobile Brigade Combat Team, 25th Infantry Division, is forward deployed in the Philippines, training with the 7th Infantry Division of the Philippine Armed Forces as part of a Joint Pacific Multinational Readiness Center, or JPMRC, exercise.
Maj. Gen. Marcus Evans, 25th Infantry Division commanding general, told Army Times on Monday that the most challenging part of the exercise so far has been the environmental factors. High temperatures and monsoon conditions have slammed troops as they’ve operated across islands and jungles in the Luzon area of the Philippines.
The exercise marks the brigade’s second evolution of the Army’s Transformation in Contact, or TIC, initiative following its first evolution in 2024. As part of the initiative, which seeks to modernize and evolve f..

Early this year, the Pentagon issued a memo halting development of a new radar meant to protect Guam from high-end air and missile threats, according to a May 22 Government Accountability Office report on the effort to protect the strategic island in the Pacific.
“On January 7, 2025, the Deputy Secretary of Defense [Kathleen Hicks] directed the [Missile Defense Agency] to cease development of one of the elements, the AN/TPY-6 radar, but to retain the currently fielded panel as an experimental asset with potential to develop for operational use within the [Guam Defense System] in the future,” the report states.
While Hicks’ decision came at the end of her tenure under the Biden administration, GAO notes the changes are not binding on the new administration.
The Pentagon’s plan to develop an elaborate air-and-missile defense architecture is beginning to take shape and will be pieced together over the coming years in order to protect Guam from increasingly complex threat..

Marine Corps and Army missile systems are set to deploy to a key chokepoint in the Philippine Island chains for anti-ship drills during the military exercise known as KAMANDAG.
The unmanned, anti-ship Navy-Marine Expeditionary Ship Interdiction System, or NMESIS, and the Army’s High Mobility Rocket Artillery System will feature prominently in the exercise with their emplacement between Luzon and Taiwan, U.S. Naval Institute reported.
The 3rd Marine Littoral Regiment’s NMESIS is heading to Batanes, the northernmost portion of Philippine territory. The platform first reached the island of Basco and Batan for Balikatan 2025, a maritime security exercise.
This unit will be the next to field the ship-killing missile system
That was the first time the Marines deployed the anti-ship missile to the Luzon Strait.
“The insertion of the NMESIS on Batan during Exercise Balikatan 25’s MKTSO was an achievement of a major milestone not just for 3rd MLR, but for the entire U.S…

CULPEPER, Va. — L3Harris has begun clearing forest and carving out roads deep in the Virginia countryside, breaking ground on a major expansion at its Orange County facility to produce small and medium solid rocket motors – key components for the Javelin antitank weapon.
As part of the Defense Production Act used to boost the replenishment of weapons sent to Ukraine,L3Harris’ Aerojet Rocketdyne is building state-of-the art facilities for solid rocket motor production, such as casting and assembly, and for mixing and grinding operations while upgrading its testing plant.
The U.S. has sent Ukraine over 10,000 shoulder-fired Javelin systems since Russia invaded in February 2022 and is now working to replenish its depleted stock. Javelin is a joint venture between Lockheed Martin and Raytheon. Aerojet Rocketdyne supplies the rocket motors for the weapon.
Lockheed Martin aims to boost annual production from 2,400 Javelin missiles to nearly 4,000 by 2026, and Aerojet will need to cont..