The Engine Gap: Who Can Cast, Machine and Test the Turbine

11/04/2026 The shipyards had their hull gap. The makers of cheap long-range weapons now appear to have an engine gap, and the evidence is stronger on the supply side than on any collapse in output. What the Geran line is actually made of Russia's jet-powered Gerans are a lesson in how little of the weapon is the weapon. Ukrainian military intelligence… Read more »

Order Within Chaos: Managing Disruption, Recognizing What Is Emerging

11/03/2026 Are we so absorbed in managing disruption that we miss what is forming inside it? It is the right question for my book called Mastering Chaos, and it sharpens the book's argument. A question worth taking seriously After reading my article, “The Forces of Change: Why the Post-Industrial Thinkers of the 1970s Still Matter in the Age of Chaos,” Deborah… Read more »

From Prototype to Production Line: France’s SMOKERS Tender and Saab’s CB90 CX Point to the New Small Combatant

11/02/2026 Two announcements on either side of Euronaval 2026 show European navies trying to answer the same question in different ways: how to put more expendable or optionally crewed combat capability on the water quickly, and how to produce it at the rate a long fight would demand. In France, the Direction générale de l'armement (DGA) has gone out to industry… Read more »

Canberra’s A$5 Billion Reshuffle: Retiring Platforms to Fund the Network

11/02/2026 By Robbin Laird Canberra is paying for autonomy by retiring platforms whose jobs it intends to spread across a network, and the two items the press picked up, the C-27J transport fleet and the Huon-class minehunters, show both the logic and the risk. Defence Minister Richard Marles says the government is reprioritising about A$5 billion of the Integrated Investment Program… Read more »

In Brief in October: Fifteen Short Reports on a Strategic Landscape in Motion

11/02/2026 In October, the In Brief section on Second Line of Defense took on a broader job. It still covers defense news, but it now also follows trends and developments that shape the strategic environment even when they don't look like defense stories at first glance. From October 18 through October 31, the section published fifteen short reports. They ranged from… Read more »

Bury the Dead and Feed the Living: Lisbon, November 1, 1755, and What Rebuilding Requires

11/01/2026 By Kenneth Maxwell At about 9:45 on the morning of November 1, 1755, All Saints Day, the earth beneath Lisbon began to move. The churches were full. Many of the faithful were at mass when the vaults and walls came down on the congregations. "I could hardly take a step without treading on the dead and dying," one eyewitness recalled.… Read more »