Defense & Combat
Military drone news from UASFeed — UAS programs, battlefield lessons from Ukraine and beyond, loitering munitions, and how uncrewed systems are changing combat.
-
Defense & Combat
Bayraktar TB3: How Turkey Built a Carrier Drone After Losing Its F-35s
Turkey's Bayraktar TB3 is the world's first fixed-wing UCAV to operate autonomously from a short-deck amphibious assault ship — a direct consequence of Ankara's expulsion from the F-35 program and the subsequent pivot to indigenous drone aviation.
-
Defense & Combat
China's GJ-11 Sharp Sword: From Stealth Prototype to Deployed Combat Drone
China's GJ-11 'Sharp Sword' flying-wing stealth UCAV has moved from a 2013 technology demonstrator to official PLAAF formation footage, high-altitude border deployments, and a folding-wing carrier variant. A full technical breakdown of the world's most advanced non-NATO stealth combat drone.
-
Defense & Combat
China’s WZ-7 Soaring Dragon: The HALE Drone Reshaping PLA Surveillance
China’s WZ-7 Xianglong is the PLA’s operational high-altitude ISR drone — a joined-wing platform purpose-built for Pacific and Indian Ocean surveillance. Documented sorties from Tibet to the Sea of Japan and a naval variant wired to feed anti-ship targeting data mark it as the backbone of China’s kill-chain architecture.
-
Defense & Combat
ScanEagle and RQ-21A Blackjack: Inside Insitu’s Runway-Free ISR Platform Family
From a commercial fish-finder drone to front-line ISR in Ukraine, the Insitu ScanEagle and RQ-21A Blackjack are defined by a single design constraint: no runway needed. Here is how the platforms work, where they’ve fought, and why the formula endures.
-
Defense & Combat
Russia's Geran-2 Factory: How Alabuga Became the War's Highest-Volume Drone Plant
Russia's Geran-2 loitering munition—a rebranded Iranian Shahed-136—is now manufactured at 170 units per day from a 17-facility complex in Tatarstan. This explainer traces how the Alabuga Special Economic Zone became the production system behind the conflict's most-fired strike weapon, and why layered Western sanctions have not stopped it.
-
Defense & Combat
Russia's S-70 Okhotnik: Inside the Stealth UCAV That Shot Itself Down
Russia's most advanced stealth UCAV was destroyed by what open-source analysis indicates was likely its own Su-57 escort over Donetsk in October 2024. The armed wreckage handed NATO a technical intelligence windfall — and exposed a program running three production-deadline slips behind schedule.
-
Defense & Combat
Watchkeeper WK450: Britain's £1.35 Billion Tactical Drone, Explained
The British Army's Watchkeeper WK450 spent fourteen years reaching full operational capability, lost eight of fifty-four airframes, and cost £1.35 billion before being retired nearly two decades ahead of schedule. A deep read on what went wrong — and what it means for Western tactical-UAS procurement.
-
Defense & Combat
Ukraine's Lyutyi Drones Set Moscow's Largest Oil Refinery Ablaze on Night Nine of Capital Strikes
Ukrainian Lyutyi strike drones hit the Gazprom Neft Moscow Oil Refinery in Kapotnya on June 16–17, 2026 — the ninth consecutive night of drone attacks on the Russian capital — igniting the ELOU AVT-6 processing unit and halting operations while G7 leaders debated ceasefire terms in France.
-
Defense & Combat
Air-Launched Effects and Drone Motherships: How Stacking Range Reshapes Aerial Warfare
Air-launched effects (ALE) divorce mission risk from platform cost by stacking a mothership's standoff range on top of a drone's own reach — letting aircraft dispense swarms deep inside defended airspace without entering it. From DARPA's Gremlins to China's Jiutian, the concept is going mainstream.
-
Defense & Combat
Wing Loong and Rainbow: China's MALE Drone Arsenal Explained
China's AVIC and CASC have placed combat-capable MALE drones in more than a dozen countries Washington would never supply. Here's how the Wing Loong and Rainbow (CH) families compare, what they've done in combat, and why they keep winning export contracts.
-
Defense & Combat
MQ-1C Gray Eagle: The Army's Only MALE Drone, Caught Between Congress and Obsolescence
The MQ-1C Gray Eagle is the U.S. Army's sole medium-altitude long-endurance drone — a Predator descendant rebuilt around Army logistics, manned-unmanned teaming, and ground-force integration. Now Congress and Army leadership are openly fighting over whether it has a future.
-
Defense & Combat
IAI Heron and Heron TP (Eitan): Inside Israel's Dominant MALE/HALE Drone Dynasty
From a fiberglass Scout that dismantled Syrian SAM batteries in 1982 to a 26-meter turboprop platform operating above commercial airspace today, Israel's Heron family traces the arc of modern persistent ISR — and why Israel controlled 61% of global drone exports for three decades.
