“It is already in the hands of deployed forces preparing for real-world missions.
At its core, SMASH is built around automated target tracking and real-time ballistic computation. When a shooter brings the optic onto a target, the system identifies and locks onto it using onboard visual processing. From there, it continuously analyzes movement, range estimation cues, and the shooter’s own weapon stability.
…
The optic calculates when a projectile from the rifle will intersect the moving target’s path, accounting for variables such as target velocity, angle change, and shooter-induced sway. Rather than relying purely on instinct and reaction time, the system shifts the hardest part of the engagement into computation. It’s a game changer.
In operational terms, the trigger mechanism is also governed by this solution.
The weapon will not release a shot unless the calculated hit probability meets a defined threshold, though operators can override the system if required. This introduces a hybrid firing model: human intent still initiates engagement, but the system determines optimal timing.”
The US really needs to up their game when it comes to mass, cheap, attritable drones.
Many US methods are obsolete and America’s industrial base is not prepared to mass produce drones. Russia and China are already ahead of the US in drone warfare.
The US needs to work with Ukraine to learn from their experience.
The Chinese Communist Party is actively helping a military theocratic dictatorship try to kill Americans.
“US intelligence indicates that China is preparing to deliver new air defense systems to Iran within the next few weeks, according to three people familiar with recent intelligence assessments.
It would be a provocative move considering Beijing said it helped broker the fragile ceasefire agreement that paused the war between Iran and the US earlier this week. President Donald Trump is also set to visit China early next month for talks with Chinese President Xi Jinping.
The intelligence also underscores how Iran may be using the ceasefire as an opportunity to replenish certain weapons systems with the help of key foreign partners.”
The MQ-9 Reaper drone was great when the enemy didn’t have anti-air capabilities, but when they do, the slow, loud, and radar-visible drone is easily shot down.
The A-10 can do one thing really well–blowing up stuff on the ground. But, it can’t do much else, and is only brought in after the most threatening air-to-air threats are destroyed or suppressed. The military would prefer to have more general and advanced craft than one with such a narrow use. Congress has kept it alive because it is popular and gives their constituents jobs. A major advantage of the A-10 is its cheaper to fire.
“The new grenade, called the M111, becomes the Army’s choice for urban combat, when troops must clear indoor areas to take and hold territory…
It’s the first new grenade introduced for US forces since 1968
…The use of shock waves, or blast overpressure (BOP), kills or disables enemies with the force of the explosion, vaporizing the weapon’s plastic outer shell.
Troops outside an enclosed area can throw the new grenade into that area, and enemies cannot take cover behind interior walls, furniture or appliances that shrapnel may not be able pierce, the military said.”
An F-35 may have been hit by an Iranian anti-air missile. The plane and pilot survived, making it safely to a base in the Middle East. Stealth makes the F-35 harder to detect and hit, but not invisible. If a video given by Iran purporting to be the F-35 getting hit is real, then it looks like a smaller payload delivered by a relatively short-ranged infrared or electro-optically guided weapon, or even a shoulder fired missile. If a radar guided weapon targeted it, the plane would sense it and the pilot would be trying to avoid it. And if larger, longer-range weapons hit it, the plane would not have survived that size of payload.
Militarily opening the Strait of Hormuz will be incredibly hard. Iran only has to get through once, the US needs to stop every weapon. It will require the great risk of putting a lot of forces close to Iran.