Land

The U.S. Army’s new missile defense radar has landed in Guam and is preparing to be put to the test.
The Lower Tier Air and Missile Defense Sensor, or LTAMDS, arrived in Guam earlier this month with Army Secretary Dan Driscoll visiting Task Force Talon, the unit that will manage the LTAMDS radars on the island, over the weekend.
Defense News broke the news earlier this year that the Army would be sending the Raytheon-developed LTAMDS prototype radars to the strategic island as part of a larger effort initiated by the Army Chief of Staff Gen. Randy George. The Army hopes to test the advanced technology in real-life formations even before the development phase has formally concluded.
“Our soldiers on Guam are at the tip of the spear for homeland defense and deserve the very best,” Army Secretary Dan Driscoll told Defense News in a statement.
“We deployed the brand new [LTAMDS] radar to exercise in an operational environment. This radar will significantly improve..

WARSAW, Poland — In a bid to expand the tracked vehicle fleet of the country’s land forces, the Polish Ministry of National Defence has ordered 180 K2 Black Panther tanks with 81 accompanying vehicles from South Korea’s Hyundai Rotem. The deal is worth around $6.5 billion.
The contract was signed today in Gliwice, Poland, in the presence of Władysław Kosiniak-Kamysz, the nation’s Deputy Prime Minister and National Defence Minister, and South Korean Defense Minister Ahn Gyu-back who is on an official visit to Poland.
Under the plan, the tanks are to be supplied to the Polish Armed Forces between 2026 and 2030. Of these, 116 tanks will be produced in the K2GF variant which is manufactured in South Korea, and 64 vehicles will be procured in the K2PL variant, the Polish ministry said in a statement.
After the first three K2PL units are made at a South Korean plant, Poland’s defense industry will take over manufacturing activities for the remaining 61 tanks of this ..

ROME — Italian defense giant Leonardo has agreed to buy Italy’s Iveco Defence Vehicles for €1.7 billion ($1.9 billion), ending months of speculation about the future of the up-for-sale military vehicle maker.
The deal, which Leonardo will finance with available cash resources, marks another step into land systems for Leonardo after its tie-up last year to build tanks and fighting vehicles with Germany’s Rheinmetall.
It also keeps IDV Italian after domestic politicians expressed concerns over a long list of foreign suitors keen on buying the firm.
“This transaction reinforces Leonardo’s position as a reference player in the European land defense market, a segment expected to experience sustained growth in the coming years”, said Leonardo CEO Roberto Cingolani, after the deal was announced.
Leonardo said the deal would facilitate the greater integration of its electronics and turrets on IDV vehicles, which count the Italian army and Brazilian mili..

The U.S. Army is shelving its plans to pursue a new variant of the M88 Hercules recovery vehicle and will pursue upgrades to the older version, the service told Defense News in a statement.
“The Army has made the decision not to pursue the M88A3 combat recovery system due to affordability and instead concentrate on improving M88A2 Heavy Equipment Recovery Combat Utility Lift and Evacuation System (HERCULES) readiness and reliability,” according to a Friday statement from an Army spokesperson.
The decision came after the Army concluded the M88A3 development effort in March 2025. BAE Systems is the prime contractor.
“Since April 2025, the Army has been exploring alternative subsystem improvements as well as vehicle level overhaul efforts that could be accomplished on the M88A2 in lieu of procuring new M88A3 vehicles as concerns regarding affordability came to light,” the statement said.
The Army is still working on a formal path forward, but Program Executive Offi..

WIESBADEN, Germany − The U.S. Army is prioritizing a common launcher that could be used across the European alliance from which a wide variety of weapons could be fired, the service’s chief in charge of the European and African theaters, said last week.
As part of a newly announced Eastern Flank Deterrence Line, a regional plan focused on the Baltic states, the U.S. Army and its allies and partners plan to pursue key ground-based capabilities.
“Everyone loves to talk about long-range fires and air defense,” Gen. Christopher Donahue, U.S. Army Europe and Africa’s commander, said at the Association of the U.S. Army’s inaugural LandEuro conference in Wiesbaden, Germany.
“So specifically, what we want to develop is a common launcher … that is both offensive and defensive capable. We want a common fire control system so that any nation can use that fire control system,” he said. “Then obviously, we want everything to be optionally manne..

WIESBADEN, Germany − The U.S. Army is prioritizing a common launcher that could be used across the European alliance from which a wide variety of weapons could be fired, the service’s chief in charge of the European and African theaters, said last week.
As part of a newly announced Eastern Flank Deterrence Line, a regional plan focused on the Baltic states, the U.S. Army and its allies and partners plan to pursue key ground-based capabilities.
“Everyone loves to talk about long-range fires and air defense,” Gen. Christopher Donahue, U.S. Army Europe and Africa’s commander, said at the Association of the U.S. Army’s inaugural LandEuro conference in Wiesbaden, Germany.
“So specifically, what we want to develop is a common launcher … that is both offensive and defensive capable. We want a common fire control system so that any nation can use that fire control system,” he said. “Then obviously, we want everything to be optionally manne..

TOWNSVILLE, Australia — U.S. paratroopers made the most dramatic entrance possible to Australia during Exercise Talisman Sabre 2025. Flying 14.5 hours nonstop from Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson in Alaska, they parachuted from the night sky into the Australian countryside on July 14.
“We landed right on the X,” Col. Brian Weightman, commander of the 2nd Infantry Brigade Combat Team (Airborne) of the U.S. Army’s 11th Airborne Division, told Defense News during an interview in Townsville.
The commander said he was the first to jump onto the drop zone.
In such a parachute operation, casualties of up to 10% are anticipated, he explained.
“We’re very comfortable with that if we land and 90% of the force is able to continue on,” Weightman said.
Luckily, this nighttime airdrop resulted in only three minor injuries, one of which was caused by a midair parachute entanglement in the dark.
Their 6,800-mile flight was only the beginning of the unit’..

WARSAW, Poland — As numerous Eastern European allies pursue acquisitions of infantry fighting vehicles, Romania and Poland are advancing plans to boost their tracked vehicle fleets, yet with different strategies towards foreign suppliers and technology transfers.
In Romania, the country’s government decided on July 10 to launch its much-awaited program to replace outdated Soviet-times MLI-84 tracked infantry fighting vehicles with new gear. Bucharest aims to purchase some 246 vehicles along with simulators and a logistics package over an eight-year period after a deal is signed, earmarking close to €2.55 billion ($2.96 billion) for this acquisition. In the program’s potential second stage, a further 52 vehicles could be ordered.
Local observers say Romanian Ministry of National Defence is to select between Germany’s Rheinmetall with the Lynx, the CV90 made by BAE Systems Hägglunds in Sweden, South Korea’s Hanwha with the AS21 Redback, and General..

The U.S. Army has picked Anduril to be the lead integrator to build its next-generation command-and-control prototype, or C2, awarding the tech company a $99.6 million contract to deliver it in less than a year, according to statements from the service and company.
The prototype architecture will consist of “integrated and scalable” C2 capabilities using hardware, software and applications through a common data layer, the Army stated in a July 18 announcement.
The Army’seffort to overhaul its command-and-control ecosystem, dubbed Next-Generation C2, is one of the top priorities for Army modernization — if not the highest.
The capability will be delivered to the 4th Infantry Division, the service said.
The prototype will be “integrated onto compute nodes aboard multiple different types of mechanized vehicles” throughout the Division immediately upon award of the contract, Anduril noted, and will be continuously developed working directly with soldiers.
The..