AUG 6, 2026
Programs & Procurement
The Congressional Budget Office estimated on August 5, 2026 that the U.S. Navy's 15-ship Trump-class battleship program would cost $275 billion through 2056, with a lead ship at $23.4 billion and a design larger than any surface combatant built since 1945.
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AUG 5, 2026
Programs & Procurement
Yuma Proving Ground has fired a full-scale hypersonic warhead from a cannon derived from the canceled Strategic Long Range Cannon, giving the Army a cheaper way to measure what a Mach 5 impact actually does to a target.
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AUG 5, 2026
Programs & Procurement
The German group revealed a 140-metre guided-missile frigate on August 3, 2026, built around the Aegis combat system and 64 strike-length launch cells. It is Rheinmetall's first attempt to act as prime contractor for a major surface combatant.
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AUG 5, 2026
Data Analysis
Across 81 armies tracked by GlobalMilitary.net, China fields 4,770 main battle tanks, more than any other country. Greece, in fifteenth place, holds more than Germany, the United Kingdom and France combined.
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AUG 5, 2026
Programs & Procurement
Two separate reports published on August 4, 2026 say five months of war with Iran have consumed virtually all of the US Army's long-range precision missiles and between 38 and 80 percent of its THAAD interceptors. The Pentagon disputes the figures.
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AUG 4, 2026
Data Analysis
Forty-seven years after entering service, the F-16 remains the most numerous combat aircraft in the world outside China and Russia, with 2,621 airframes active across 27 air forces in GlobalMilitary.net's 2026 inventory data.
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AUG 4, 2026
Programs & Procurement
The Department of War awarded Northrop Grumman a $3 billion framework agreement on 3 August 2026 to build solid rocket motors for PAC-3 MSE and THAAD, breaking a single-source bottleneck in the drive toward nearly 14,000 interceptors.
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AUG 4, 2026
Programs & Procurement
The Department of the Navy announced on 3 August 2026 that the 19 Virginia-class submarines fitted with the Virginia Payload Module will be redesignated from attack submarines to guided-missile submarines, each carrying 40 Tomahawks instead of 12.
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AUG 3, 2026
Data Analysis
The United States and Russia hold 27 of the world's 45 operational ballistic missile submarines. Five other navies field the remaining 18, and every established fleet is being replaced at the same time.
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AUG 3, 2026
Programs & Procurement
DAPA and Hanwha Ocean signed on 31 July for the detailed design and construction of the KDDX lead ship, unlocking a 7.8-trillion-won programme for six destroyers built around an entirely Korean combat system.
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AUG 3, 2026
Programs & Procurement
The government approved Delivery Phase 4 of the Dreadnought programme on 30 July, awarding BAE Systems £5.9 billion to build, integrate and test the four submarines that will carry Britain's nuclear deterrent from the early 2030s.
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AUG 2, 2026
Data Analysis
GlobalMilitary.net's conflict tracker has logged 129 aircraft destroyed since the war began on February 28, 2026. Uncrewed aircraft account for 60 of them, and a single type, the General Atomics MQ-9 Reaper, for 36.
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AUG 2, 2026
Military Event
A US Marine Corps F-35B Lightning II crashed and burned near the runway at Marine Corps Air Station Miramar in San Diego on July 31, 2026. The pilot ejected and survived, and the Marines classified the accident as a Class A mishap.
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AUG 1, 2026
Data Analysis
GlobalMilitary.net inventory data weighted by fleet size puts the average North Korean combat aircraft design at 65 years old, against 33 for the United States and 20 for the United Kingdom.
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AUG 1, 2026
Programs & Procurement
Turkish Aerospace released footage on July 31 of the second airworthy KAAN prototype taxiing under its own power at Ankara, with the company's president saying the aircraft could fly within a couple of months.
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AUG 1, 2026
Programs & Procurement
Gen. Dale White told an industry conference in Dayton on July 30 that the sixth-generation fighter has entered engineering and manufacturing development and that Boeing is building test aircraft, with first flight held to 2028.
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JUL 31, 2026
Programs & Procurement
Footage released on July 29, 2026 shows the YJ-20 hypersonic anti-ship missile launching from a Type 052D destroyer, spreading the weapon from China's ten largest warships to a class of 35 hulls still in production.
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JUL 31, 2026
Programs & Procurement
The US Army converted a one-year PAC-3 order into a seven-year agreement worth up to $58.6 billion on July 29, 2026, the largest Patriot interceptor contract ever placed, as the wars with Iran and in Ukraine drain American missile stocks.
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JUL 31, 2026
Military Event
The Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force fired its first Tomahawk cruise missile from the Aegis destroyer JS Chokai in the Pacific on July 29, 2026, making Japan the third country outside the United States to launch the weapon from a surface warship.
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JUL 30, 2026
Programs & Procurement
South Korea's Defense Acquisition Program Administration declared the KF-21 Boramae fighter program complete at a ceremony in Sacheon on July 29, 2026, ten years and seven months after system development began, with the first production aircraft due in September.
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JUL 30, 2026
Programs & Procurement
The US Navy awarded General Dynamics Electric Boat and HII's Newport News Shipbuilding a combined $76.6 billion on July 29, 2026 for nine Block VI Virginia-class attack submarines and five Build II Columbia-class ballistic missile boats.
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