Andrew reports on navies and major defense programs worldwide. From carrier deployments to submarine deals, he follows the contracts, commissionings and fleet movements that shape maritime power — with a close eye on NATO and Indo-Pacific procurement.
His coverage runs hull by hull: launches, sea trials, commissionings and retirements, and the shipbuilding industrial base behind them. Each story is cross-referenced against GlobalMilitary.net's ship class pages and per-country fleet inventories to show how a single event shifts the wider naval balance.
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.
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.
The Ohio-class guided-missile submarine USS Georgia returned to Naval Submarine Base Kings Bay on July 27, 2026 from the last operational deployment of her career. The Navy has since deferred her inactivation to July 2027 at Norfolk. Her three sister SSGNs follow by fiscal 2029.
A bipartisan House bill introduced on July 21, 2026 would set a floor of 126 A-10 Thunderbolt IIs through fiscal 2033 and bar further retirements until a certified close air support replacement is flying.
Jakarta firmed a February letter of intent at the Farnborough airshow on 21 July, becoming the M-346's 23rd operator and the first in Asia to take the radar-equipped Block 20 standard.
Twenty countries have 2,402 F-35 Lightning IIs on order against 1,041 already delivered to 13 operators, an order book more than ten times the size of the next-largest fighter program.
A Su-57 fifth-generation fighter crashed in the Odintsovo district west of Moscow on July 23 shortly after taking off from Kubinka Air Base, Russian media reported; the pilot ejected safely.
The first Polish Air Force F-35A built at the Cameri final assembly line in northern Italy flew on July 22, 2026, opening the Italian-assembled half of Poland's 32-aircraft Husarz program.
Germany's Bundestag Budget Committee cleared roughly €6.3 billion on July 8, 2026 to buy four TKMS MEKO A-200 frigates, designated the F128 class, restoring anti-submarine capability after the cancelled F126 program.
The first of 38 Tranche 4 Eurofighters ordered by Berlin under Project Quadriga flew for the first time at Airbus' Manching plant on July 14, with delivery to the Luftwaffe expected later this year and the full batch due by 2030.
The US State Department approved a possible $1.96 billion sale of up to 20,000 APKWS II laser-guidance kits to Saudi Arabia on July 15, split evenly between air-to-air and air-to-ground versions, as Riyadh seeks a low-cost defense against Iranian and Houthi drones.
The US Air Force and Anduril announced on July 15 that the YFQ-44A Fury fired an AIM-120 AMRAAM over the Mojave Desert, the first live air-to-air missile shot by a US Collaborative Combat Aircraft.
France and Ukraine signed a procurement roadmap in Paris on July 13 covering 16 Rafale fighters for delivery from 2028, SAMP/T NG air defenses, and the first licensed production of French missiles on Ukrainian soil.
The first of two C-390 Millennium transports ordered by Czechia landed at Prague-Kbely on July 6 after a 14-hour ferry flight from Brazil, escorted into Czech airspace by Gripen fighters.
A Zambia Air Force Sikorsky S-76C++ carrying Vice-President Mutale Nalumango crashed shortly after take-off at Nakonde on July 9, 2026. All eight people on board escaped unhurt.
GlobalMilitary.net tracking recorded 114 loss events destroying 148 military aircraft between January and June 2026. Iran accounted for 61 of them, most destroyed on the ground during February-March strikes, ahead of the United States and Russia.
Chancellor Friedrich Merz announced on July 9 that Germany will acquire US-made Tomahawk cruise missiles and ground-based Typhon launchers, a purchase reported at over $1 billion that extends the Bundeswehr's strike reach to around 2,500 kilometers.
The NATO Summit Defence Industry Forum in Ankara produced a wave of transatlantic arms agreements on July 7, 2026, led by Europe's first ATACMS production line, a four-nation Triton drone buy, and a new Polish cruise-missile plant.
The trinational GCAP Agency on July 3 awarded a £4.6 billion ($6.1 billion), 18-month contract to Edgewing, the BAE Systems-Leonardo-JAIEC joint venture, to complete concept work and begin detailed design of the sixth-generation fighter targeted for service entry in 2035.