The announcement comes as fears of a broader regional war grow, with Israel striking hundreds of targets in Lebanon in what is by far the deadliest cross-border escalation in nearly a year of violence between Israel and Hezbollah.

“In light of increased tension in the Middle East, and out of an abundance of caution, we are sending a small number of additional US military personnel forward to augment our forces that are already in the region,” Pentagon spokesman Major General Pat Ryder told journalists, declining to provide further information for security reasons.

The United States has thousands of troops in the Middle East region, as well as warships, fighter jets, and air defense systems deployed to protect both its forces and Israel.

Ryder warned of the potential for the Israel-Hezbollah violence to escalate, calling for a diplomatic solution.

“Clearly there is the potential for these tit-for-tat operations between Israel and (Hezbollah) to escalate and to potentially spiral out of control into a wider regional war, which is why it’s so important that we resolve… the situation through diplomacy,” Ryder said.

World powers have implored Israel and Hezbollah to pull back from the brink of all-out war, with the focus of violence shifting sharply in recent days from Israel’s southern front with Gaza to its northern border with Lebanon.

Hezbollah, a powerful political and military force in Lebanon, has exchanged near-daily fire with Israel in support of its ally Hamas.

The Palestinian militant group carried out the worst-ever attack on Israel on October 7, sparking a conflict that has drawn Hezbollah and other Iran-backed groups around the region into the violence.

The post US Sending More Troops to Middle East as Tensions Grow appeared first on The Defense Post.

Today, the service faces perhaps its toughest-ever challenges to gaining and maintaining control of the air, and it must rise to meet those challenges. This is the USAF’s sacred, non-negotiable commitment to the nation. Failure is not an option.

Air Force senior leaders must unequivocally commit to this founding purpose, in both word and deed, beginning with a commitment to the Next Generation Air Dominance (NGAD) program — the initiative to create a “family of systems” to ensure continued ability to control the air. Otherwise, one must question why the nation has an Air Force. 

The Importance of Air Superiority

Air superiority is the bedrock of American military operations. It provides boundless options for the US military and its allies and partners, allowing air, maritime, and land forces to operate unimpeded by enemy threats. Without it, friendly forces are left vulnerable, dependent on the whims of adversaries.

The historical record is clear: for seven-plus decades, the US Air Force consistently maintained air superiority over every battlefield where it was called upon. This dominance enabled other Air Force missions, such as mobility, intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance (ISR), and strike operations, while also allowing land and naval forces to maneuver in their domains without fear of being either surveilled or attacked from above.

Today, new challenges are leading some to question the viability of the Air Force’s foundational mission — including some of the Department’s most senior leaders. These views are misguided.

Arguments Against the Air Force’s Core Purpose

 Common themes voiced by air superiority naysayers include ubiquitous sensing, allowing adversaries to find and fix air force assets on the ground and in the air, and voluminous, precise long-range fires, allowing adversaries to effectively target air force assets in the air and on the ground at scale.

Naysayers also cite the proliferation of affordable unmanned systems that allow state and non-state actors to “flood the zone” with countless low-cost systems to overwhelm traditional, higher-priced air superiority assets, including ground-based missile defense systems, as justification for their position.

The ongoing conflict between Ukraine and Russia – one in which neither side has gained control of the air – is used as a common validation of these arguments. This analysis draws the exact opposite lessons the US Air Force must learn.

It is true neither Ukraine nor Russia has achieved air superiority, resulting in a protracted, land-centric war of attrition, and it is equally true the challenge of controlling the skies over any potential battlefield in the Indo-Pacific is daunting, but these are actually arguments for and not against investments such as NGAD.

The failures of both Russia and Ukraine are not due to ubiquitous sensing, long-range fires, or swarms of drones but rather to fundamental flaws in the “Soviet way of war.”

Both Russian and Ukrainian Air Forces are treated as artillery arms of the land force rather than independent pieces of an integrated joint force executing a campaign to achieve strategic objectives. Failures on both sides to effectively organize, train, equip, and utilize their Air Forces has resulted in the current stalemate.

The lesson is not to walk away from the tools necessary to control the air domain in favor of fielding more drone and counter-drone capability. Rather, the USAF should double down on ensuring its Airmen have what is needed to effectively gain air superiority as rapidly as possible at the outset of any conflict. This begins with the NGAD program.

Pacing, Not Chasing, Threats

America’s adversaries are committed to matching our technology, and they are building a network of ubiquitous sensors and precise long-range fires in the hope we will flinch. Without a commitment to NGAD, we play right into their hands.

If the US Air Force chases rather than paces the threat, it is doomed to fail.

Pacing the threat requires a commitment to building and fielding the most capable air superiority force that the US, allies, and partner industries can produce… a commitment to NGAD.

NGAD Cuts – The Wrong Message

 Unfortunately, recent cuts to the NGAD program raise serious concerns about the Air Force’s commitment to its founding purpose. Furthermore, such cuts negatively incentivize sister services to divert precious investment dollars to “cover down” on an Air Force responsibility rather than investing in securing their primary fighting domains.

To wit, the Army, Navy, and Marine Corps have each increased investments in long-range fires and associated enabling infrastructure, as well as enhanced defensive measures, all under the assumption the Air Force can no longer provide air cover for the Joint team.

The Role of Policy

 The most capable Air Force is useless if its hands are tied with policy constraints. Military leaders must advise policymakers on the authorities required to gain and maintain air superiority vis-a-vis a peer competitor. Investments are useless if policymakers are not committed to unleashing the power of their Airmen.

Harnessing Innovative Technologies

On August 5, Gen (ret) Mark Milley and Eric Schmidt released an article in Foreign Affairs Online titled “America Isn’t Ready for the Wars of the Future.”

While I agree with their points on the need to leverage artificial intelligence and drones, reform the Department of Defense’s acquisition system, and capitalize on the US’ one-of-a-kind innovation ecosystem for the good of national defense, I disagree that the era of “shock and awe” campaigns is finished.

Technology changes, as the authors duly noted, but the principles of war have proven timeless. A commitment to NGAD is a commitment to arming America’s Airmen with the exact game-changing technologies advocated by Gen Milley and Mr. Schmidt.

Conclusion

Air Force senior leaders must reaffirm their commitment to the Service’s core mission of controlling the air by providing Airmen with the tools necessary to accomplish the mission, beginning NGAD.

Fielding NGAD arms policymakers with a credible deterrent, assures America’s allies and partners, and allows sister services to focus investments on core missions in their domains.

General Charles S. Corcoran is a retired US Air Force Major General with over 31 years of military service, culminating in his most recent role as Assistant Deputy Chief of Staff for Operations at USAF Headquarters (HQ) in Washington, DC.

Prior to that position, General Corcoran was the Commander of the US Air Force Warfare Center, Nellis Air Force Base, Nevada.

The views and opinions expressed here are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial position of The Defense Post.

The Defense Post aims to publish a wide range of high-quality opinion and analysis from a diverse array of people – do you want to send us yours? Click here to submit an op-ed.

The post Will Budget Cuts Compromise the US Air Force’s Air Superiority? appeared first on The Defense Post.

The son of Hezbollah lawmaker Ali Ammar was among the dead, a source close to the group told AFP, requesting anonymity to discuss sensitive matters.

The source had earlier said the son of another Hezbollah lawmaker, Hassan Fadlallah, was also killed, but later confirmed that the son was alive but injured.

The blasts “killed nine people, including a girl,” minister Firass Abiad said in a casualty update.

“About 2,800 people were injured, about 200 of them critically” with injuries mostly reported to the face, hands, and stomach, he added.

The 10-year-old daughter of a Hezbollah member was killed in east Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley when his pager exploded, her family and a source close to the group said.

Iran’s ambassador to Beirut was also wounded in a pager explosion but his injuries were not serious, state media reported.

In neighboring Syria, 14 people were wounded “after pagers used by Hezbollah exploded,” Britain-based war monitor, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

The Israeli military said it had “no comment,” when contacted by AFP about the pager blasts.

The post Nine Dead, 2,800 Wounded in Lebanon Pager Explosions Blamed on Israel appeared first on The Defense Post.

The contract, which must still be approved by the US Congress, covers Bucharest’s purchase of 32 F-35A aircraft and related equipment, produced by the US aerospace and defense giant Lockheed Martin.

“This proposed sale will support the foreign policy goals and national security objectives of the United States by improving the security of a NATO Ally that is an important force for political and economic stability in Europe,” a State Department statement said.

The contract announcement comes as Ukrainian pilots began training this week at a special center in Romania on F-16s, US-made fighter jets that Washington has approved Kyiv to use to repel Russia’s invasion.

Romania occupies a strategic position at the gateway to Ukraine and the Black Sea, and aims to become an international hub for F-16 training.

It inaugurated an F-16 training center at its Fetesti air base in November 2023, pledging to also train Ukrainians there.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken met his Romanian counterpart Luminita Odobescu on Thursday, thanking Bucharest for delivering a Patriot missile defense system to Ukraine.

The State Department also announced the approval on Friday of a $4.1 billion sale to Japan of a KC-46A aerial refueling tanker.

The post US Approves $7.2B Sale of F-35 Jets to NATO Ally Romania appeared first on The Defense Post.

In a rare joint trip, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken took the nine-hour train from Poland to Kyiv alongside Foreign Secretary David Lammy, whose two-month-old Labour government has vowed to keep up Britain’s role as a key defender of Ukraine.

The visit comes as President Volodymyr Zelensky ramps up his requests to the West to provide weapons with more firepower and fewer restrictions.

US President Joe Biden, asked in Washington whether he would let Ukraine use longer-range weapons for strikes on Russian targets, said: “We’re working that out right now.”

In Moscow, the Kremlin promised it would respond “appropriately” if Washington eases its restrictions.

Biden, while strongly supportive of Ukraine, has previously made clear he wants to avoid devolving into direct conflict between the United States and Russia, the world’s two leading nuclear powers.

Blinken, speaking Tuesday in London alongside Lammy, said the United States was committed to providing Ukraine “what they need when they need it to be most effective in dealing with the Russian aggression.”

But Blinken, who is paying his fifth trip to Kyiv since the invasion, said it was also important to see if Ukrainian forces could maintain and operate particular weaponry.

Pressed later in an interview with Sky News on whether the United States would green-light long-range weapons, Blinken said: “We never rule out, but when we rule in, we want to make sure it’s done in such a way that it can advance what the Ukrainians are trying to achieve.”

Fears From Iran Missiles

Asked how Moscow would respond to such a development, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters Wednesday: “It will be appropriate,” without providing specific details.

He said the authorisation of Ukrainian strikes on Russian territory would serve as “further proof” of why Moscow launched its offensive, which he said was itself an “answer” to the West’s support.

Ukraine enjoyed a fresh boost late Tuesday when the International Monetary Fund said it reached a staff-level agreement that could open the door to $1.1 billion for the country, which is weathering Russian attacks on infrastructure as winter sets in.

But on the military front, the United States said it believes that Russia could start firing short-range Iranian-made missiles into Ukraine within weeks.

Cash-strapped Iran went ahead with the sale despite repeated warnings from Western powers, which on Tuesday announced new sanctions on the cleric-run state.

The Iranian shipments have raised fears that Moscow would be freed up to use its long-range missiles against comparatively unscathed areas in western Ukraine.

The United States earlier this year gave its blessing for Ukraine to use Western weapons to hit Russian forces when in direct conflict across the border.

But Ukraine last month launched a surprise, daring offensive directly into Russian territory in Kursk, hoping to restore morale and divert Moscow as Russian troops trudge forward in the frontlines of eastern Ukraine.

British media reports said Biden, who meets Prime Minister Keir Starmer on Friday, was set to end objections to letting Ukraine fire long-range Storm Shadow missiles into Russia.

Britain has repeatedly pushed the United States, by far Ukraine’s biggest military supplier, to be more forward on weapons.

One key ask by Ukraine is to loosen restrictions on US-supplied Army Tactical Missile Systems, or ATACMS, which can hit targets up to 300 kilometers (190 miles) away.

In a joint letter to Biden, leading members of Congress from the rival Republican Party asked him to act on ATACMS immediately.

“As long as it is conducting its brutal, full-scale war of aggression, Russia must not be given a sanctuary from which it can execute its war crimes against Ukraine with impunity,” said the letter signed by Representative Mike McCaul, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee.

Republicans, however, are deeply divided over Ukraine, and a victory in November by Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump over Biden’s political heir Kamala Harris could dramatically shift US policy.

Trump aides have suggested that if he wins, he would leverage aid to force Kyiv into territorial concessions to Russia to end the war.

The post US, UK Top Diplomats in Ukraine to Discuss Long-Range Weapons appeared first on The Defense Post.

Israel and Iran-backed Hezbollah have been trading near-daily cross-border fire, with the Lebanese militant group saying it is acting in support of its Palestinian ally Hamas in the ongoing war in Gaza.

“We have enough forces to deal with Gaza and we should concentrate on what is going on in the north,” Gantz said, speaking in Washington at a Middle East forum where he also said Iran and its proxies were “the real issue.”

“The time of the north has come and actually I think we are late on this,” the former army chief and centrist politician added.

Gantz said Israel had made a mistake in evacuating much of the north of the country as hostilities with Hezbollah flared following the October 7 Hamas attack that triggered the Gaza war.

“In Gaza, we have crossed a decisive point of the campaign,” he said. “We can conduct anything we want in Gaza.”

“We should seek to have a deal to get out our hostages but if we cannot in the coming time, a few days or few weeks, or whatever it is, we should go up north.”

“We are capable of… hitting the state of Lebanon if needed,” he said.

“The story of Hamas is old news,” he added, saying instead that “the story of Iran and its proxies all around the area and what they are trying to do is the real issue.”

Gantz left Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu‘s government in June over its lack of a post-war plan for Gaza.

The October 7 Hamas attack on Israel resulted in the deaths of 1,205 people, mostly civilians, including some hostages killed in captivity, official Israeli figures show.

Militants seized 251 hostages during the attack, 97 of whom are still held in Gaza, including 33 the Israeli military says are dead.

Israel’s retaliatory offensive in Gaza has so far killed at least 40,972 people, according to the health ministry in the Hamas-run territory.

The UN human rights office says most of the dead are women and children.

Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant also referred to the situation on the Lebanese border Sunday during a tour of the Netzarim Corridor in central Gaza, telling troops “we are preparing for anything that may happen in the north.”

“The shift of the center of gravity can happen quickly and can also involve you in a short period of time,” Gallant said, according to a statement issued by his office.

The post Israel Needs to Shift Military Focus to Lebanon: Gantz appeared first on The Defense Post.

After days of destructive incursions by soldiers backed by armored vehicles and bulldozers, residents who had earlier fled began returning to their homes in the camp, a bastion of Palestinian armed groups fighting against Israel, AFP journalists said.

On August 28, the army launched a military operation in several cities and towns of the northern West Bank, including Jenin.

It said in a statement on Friday that Israeli forces “have been conducting counterterrorism activity in the area of Jenin” without confirming a withdrawal.

“Israeli security forces are continuing to act in order to achieve the objectives of the counterterrorism operation,” the statement said.

Over the course of the operation in Jenin, Israeli forces killed 14 militants, arrested 30 suspects, dismantled “approximately 30 explosives planted under roads,” and conducted four aerial strikes, the statement said.

One Israeli soldier was killed in Jenin, where most of the Palestinian fatalities have occurred.

Hamas, whose October 7 attack on southern Israel triggered the ongoing war in Gaza, and Palestinian Islamic Jihad have said at least 14 of the dead were militants.

Aziz Taleb, a 48-year-old father of seven, returned to his family home of 20 years to find soldiers had raided it.

“Thank God (the children) left the day before. They went to stay with our neighbours here,” he said as he surveyed the damage, glass crunching under his feet.

‘We Didn’t Want to Leave’

Imra Itisadeh, a 60-year-old Jenin resident, returned to her house in the camp on Friday to find one of its walls partly collapsed and rubble on her car.

“At first, we didn’t want to leave. Later, (the army) pressured us, and we had to leave our homes. I left with my husband” on foot, she said, adding that she suffers from high blood pressure and heart trouble.

Two of Itisadeh’s children remained in the house with their families and soon ran low on nappies, milk, and water.

“It’s very difficult, and we are suffering greatly in the camp,” Itisadeh told AFP.

Many homes in the Jenin camp were damaged or destroyed by army bulldozers and pavement was stripped from the roads.

Residents used bulldozers of their own to begin clearing the rubble on Friday after Israeli armored vehicles left, AFP journalists reported.

The early trickle of returning residents soon turned into a flood, and soon children were playing in the streets.

Hundreds of camp residents attended funerals of those killed during the operation, carrying bodies in processions punctuated by chants and gunfire.

Israel has occupied the West Bank since 1967, and its forces regularly make incursions into Palestinian communities, but the latest raids, as well as hawkish comments by Israeli officials, signaled an escalation, residents said.

Itamar Ben-Gvir, Israel’s far-right national security minister, said in a post on X on Friday that he had asked Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to make the defeat of Hamas “and other terrorist organisations” in the West Bank one of the aims of the war in Gaza.

Since the war began on October 7, Israeli troops or settlers have killed at least 661 Palestinians in the West Bank, according to the Palestinian health ministry.

At least 23 Israelis, including security forces, have been killed in Palestinian attacks in the territory during the same period, according to Israeli officials.

The post Life Returns to Raided West Bank City as Israeli Army Withdraws appeared first on The Defense Post.

US President Joe Biden condemned the “deplorable attack,” which Kyiv said hit a military training facility and a nearby hospital, though authorities did not say how many of the victims were military or civilians.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky vowed to hold what he called “Russian scum” accountable while rescuers worked to clear the rubble.

“According to the information available now, this Russian strike killed 51 people,” Zelensky said in his evening address.

“The number of injured is 271. We know that there are people under the rubble of the destroyed building. Everything is being done to save as many lives as possible,” Zelensky said.

Washington, Berlin, and London all condemned the strike.

Biden vowed Washington would continue military aid to Kyiv, “including providing the air defense systems and capabilities they need to protect their country.”

British Foreign Secretary David Lammy called the attack a “sickening act of aggression,” while German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock said the brutality of Russian President Vladimir Putin “knows no limits.”

Putin traveled to Russia’s Vladivostok on Tuesday, the Kremlin said, after concluding a visit to Mongolia.

The trip was his first to an International Criminal Court (ICC) member since it issued a warrant for his arrest related to the war in Ukraine.

‘Full Investigation’

The strike triggered anger on Ukrainian social media after unconfirmed reports said it had targeted an outdoor military ceremony, with many blaming reckless behavior from officials who allowed the event to take place despite the threat of Russian attacks.

Zelensky said he had ordered a “full and prompt investigation into all the circumstances.”

Two Russian ballistic missiles hit the hospital and educational institution, partially destroying one of the buildings, Zelensky said.

The strike took place in the morning in Poltava, a city with a pre-war population of around 300,000 people, some 300 kilometers (190 miles) east of Kyiv.

“The window blew open. Dust was everywhere. I just had time to tell my sister that a rocket was flying,” said Yevgeniya Chyrva, a resident in a building damaged during the attack.

The defense ministry said that the time between the alarm and the arrival of the missiles was “so short that it caught people in the middle of evacuating to the bomb shelter.”

The Poltava military communications institute, founded in the 1960s when Ukraine was part of the USSR, specializes in training telecommunications specialists.

“One of the institute’s buildings was partially destroyed, and many people were trapped under the rubble,” the defense ministry said.

An AFP journalist on the scene saw several ambulances heading towards the affected site shortly after the attack on the military institute.

Rescuers were still at work after managing to save 25 people, including 11 trapped under the rubble, the defense ministry said.

Government Reshuffle

Poltava’s governor, Philip Pronin, said his administration could not provide more details of the circumstances of the strike “for security reasons.”

Ukrainian MP Maria Bezugla, who regularly criticizes the country’s military leadership, accused high-ranking officials of endangering soldiers.

“These tragedies keep repeating themselves. When will it stop?” she posted on Telegram.

The attack came as Ukraine’s leadership signaled a major government reshuffle was underway, with at least six officials submitting their resignations Tuesday.

The Minister for Strategic Industries, Minister for Justice, and Minister of Environmental Protection were among those to step down.

Zelensky has ordered several reshuffles since the war began, sacking his defense minister last September after a series of corruption scandals and more recently replacing his top commander amid setbacks on the battlefield.

The move follows another recent scandal for Ukraine’s army command after a US-made F-16 fighter jet crashed in combat last week, killing the pilot.

The crash of the F-16 was a high-profile setback for Kyiv, which had lobbied the West to send the advanced fighter jet for months, and triggered the dismissal of the country’s air force chief, Mykola Oleshchuk.

The post Russian Strike Kills 51 in Ukrainian City appeared first on The Defense Post.

The defense ministry said it had struck “20 targets” in Asos, Gara, Hakurk, Metina, Qandil, and Zap.

It alleged they were “caves, bunkers, shelters, depots and installations” used by the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), which has waged an on-off insurgency against the Turkish state since 1984 and is blacklisted as a “terrorist organisation” by Ankara and its Western allies.

The Turkish army, whose incursions onto Iraqi soil are regularly condemned by Baghdad, said it had killed “numerous” militants in its latest assault.

On Saturday, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Turkey was determined to “eliminate” separatists, arguing that they were a threat to both his country and Iraq.

The PKK has a number of rear bases in Iraq’s autonomous Kurdistan region.

For the past quarter century, Turkey has maintained dozens of its own bases there.

The post Turkey Says Launched Fresh Air Strikes on PKK in N. Iraq appeared first on The Defense Post.

“Those who kill hostages do not want an agreement” for a Gaza truce, Netanyahu said in a statement, telling Hamas leaders that “we will hunt you down, we will catch you, and we will settle the score.”

Netanyahu said that Israel was “fighting on all fronts against a cruel enemy who wants to murder us all,” mentioning a shooting attack near the city of Hebron in the occupied West Bank earlier on Sunday that killed three police officers.

Hamas has not claimed the attack but in a statement called it a “heroic operation by the resistance.”

According to Netanyahu, “the fact that Hamas continues to commit atrocities such as those it committed on October 7 obliges us to do everything we can to ensure that it can no longer do so,” referring to the Palestinian group’s unprecedented attack on southern Israel that triggered the ongoing war in the Gaza Strip.

A senior Hamas official said that several of the six hostages found dead had been “approved” for release in the event of a truce deal, which has yet to be finalized despite months of mediation efforts.

“Some of the names of the captives announced as found by the (Israeli) occupier… were part of the list of hostages to be released that Hamas had approved” in a proposed exchange for Palestinian prisoners held in Israel, the official told AFP on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak publicly on the issue.

Israeli media reported that US-Israeli hostage Hersh Goldberg-Polin and two others whose bodies had been recovered from Gaza – Carmel Gat and Eden Yerushalmi – had been approved by Hamas to be released in the event of a truce deal.

The Hamas official said the six captives were “killed by the occupation’s fire and bombing,” an accusation denied by the Israeli military.

Military spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Nadav Shoshani in an online briefing with journalists that “according to our initial assessment, they were brutally murdered by Hamas terrorists.”

“We do know they were murdered by Hamas terrorists. We do know – I can tell you – there was no real-time fire engagement in the tunnel,” Shoshani said.

Claims by Hamas that the hostages were killed by Israeli forces were “psychological warfare,” he said.

The bodies were found in a tunnel in the southern city of Rafah, around one kilometer (0.6 miles) away from where troops had rescued alive another hostage, Kaid Farhan Alkadi, on Tuesday, according to Shoshani.

The post Israel Vows ‘to Settle the Score’ With Hamas After Hostage Deaths appeared first on The Defense Post.