Top 5     US-Iran talks collapse as UAE suspends trade with Tehran (France 24) U.S. President Donald Trump said Tuesday no talks with Iran were planned and insisted the Strait of Hormuz remained open despite reduced shipping traffic. Oman and Iran neared a deal on the waterway as a projectile struck a vessel, while the U.A.E. said two Iranian ballistic missiles landed in or near its waters.       Airmen rescue 5 Navy sailors in California with HH-60Ws (Military Times) Airmen in two squadrons deployed to rescue five Navy personnel following an aircraft incident in California last week.       US-led drills to end six days early, South Korea says, amid Trump push for Kim Jong-un talks (The Guardian) South Korea’s joint chiefs of staff said the Ulchi Freedom Shield exercise would end on Aug. 21 at the request of the U.S.       Pentagon threatens to cut federal funding to 30 universities over foreign academic partnerships (The Guardian) Harvard, Yale, Stanford and others face directive to review and cut alliances Pentagon deems national security risk.       Who decides what works? Inside VA’s mental health treatment playbook (Military Times) For veterans seeking treatment for PTSD, depression, anxiety or substance use disorders, the question sounds simple: If a treatment exists, why can’t I get it through the VA?   Operation Timeline     The human impact of policy changes at the DOD and VA (The War Horse) An ongoing timeline of the Trump administration’s actions focusing on the military and veterans.   Your Military     US judge orders release of woman accused of vandalism at World War II Memorial (Reuters) A U.S. judge ordered on Monday the release of a Kentucky woman who was accused of vandalism at the World War II Memorial ?in Washington last week, court records showed.   Army     US Army requests 133,000 GMLRS rockets by 2034 (Military Times) With questions about stockpiles swirling, the U.S. Army is issuing a call to ramp up production of ground-launched rockets.       Army buys Virginia facility to stable The Old Guard’s caisson horses (Military Times) Celebrities come and go in Middleburg, Virginia, a Piedmont hamlet of fewer than 1,000 people, where horses outnumber the residents ten to one and beagles and foxhounds abound.   Navy     Navy investigating power failure aboard destroyer in South China Sea (Task & Purpose) Navy officials are investigating how the destroyer USS Benfold lost power for several days last month, prompting the ship to be towed to Subic Bay, Philippines, for repairs, said Cmdr. Matthew Comer, spokesperson for the 7th Fleet.   Marine Corps     ‘As close as it gets’: Bodycam footage shows Marine pilot walking away from crashed F/A-18 Hornet (Military Times) Newly released bodycam footage shows a bloody-faced U.S. Marine Corps pilot encountering local authorities after ejecting from a F/A-18 Hornet in Washington state two months ago.   National Guard     Montana National Guard sergeant receives Soldier’s Medal for saving injured hikers (Stars and Stripes) U.S. Army Brig. Gen. Trenton J. Gibson, adjutant general of the Montana National Guard, presents the Soldier’s Medal to U.S. Army Sgt. Adam M. Lee during a ceremony at the Belgrade Armory in Belgrade, Mont., on Sunday, Aug. 16, 2026. (Courtesy Photo via U.S. Army)   Defense Industry     How US military funding propelled China’s robot dogs (Reuters) China’s Unitree Robotics — among the world’s biggest producers of humanoid and quadruped robots — based designs for its most successful robot dogs on innovations funded by the U.S. military, according to a former U.S. defense technology official and three top researchers involved in the project.       New details emerge about Ukraine’s homegrown 'equalizer' glide bomb (The War Zone) As its defense against Russia grinds on and with the future of foreign military assistance never assured, Ukraine is ramping up procurement of its new, domestically produced “Equalizer” aerial glide bomb, according to the Ukrainian military. Brave1, the Ukrainian defense technology incubator, on Tuesday provided us with some new details about this weapon, which extends the range and accuracy of so-called dumb bombs by adding guidance kits and pop-out wings.       DARPA came close to finding a drone that can lift four times its own weight (Defense News) The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency concluded its Lift Challenge last week, and although none of the participants achieved the desired goal of building a drone capable of lifting four times its weight, they came close.       South Korea’s highly mobile 155mm artillery system wins US Army Howitzer contract (The War Zone) The U.S. Army has chosen Hanwha Defense USA to advance to the next phase of its Mobile Tactical Cannon (MTC) program. The company will now provide prototypes of its wheeled 155mm K9 Mobile Howitzer for further testing. This, in turn, could lead to its adoption as a replacement for the Army’s existing towed 155mm M777 howitzers.   Israel-Gaza-Lebanon-Syria     Israel strikes air base in Syria, drawing ire from the US (The New York Times) The attack was the latest in a series of Israeli military interventions in Syria over the past two years.       Israel moves AH-64 Apaches closer to critical northern front (The War Zone) The Israeli Air Force is repositioning one of its AH-64 Apache squadrons from Ramon Air Base in the Negev to Ramat David Air Base in northern Israel, bringing a portion of the service’s attack helicopter force significantly closer to the Lebanese and Syrian fronts. The AH-64 has been of central importance in recent IAF operations, and the shift makes the relatively small Apache fleet better positioned for rapid-response missions, including greater persistence over the northern battlefield.   Ukraine     Zelensky formally taps Khmara as defense minister, ruling out Fedorov's return (The Kyiv Independent) President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Aug. 18 formally nominated acting Defense Minister Yevhen Khmara, a former top Security Service of Ukraine officer, to serve as minister in full capacity.       A warehouse burns near Moscow. In Ukraine, drone crews prepare to strike again (The Associated Press) Waves of Ukrainian drones targeted the massive logistics center outside Moscow overnight. The next morning, it was still ablaze, dark smoke rising into the sky from what was one of Russia’s largest retail warehouses.   International     Iran’s attacks on ships in Hormuz mount, testing US military restraint (The Wall Street Journal) The Trump administration, focused on economic pressure, has sidestepped provocations in the strategic waterway that are keeping traffic to a trickle.       Military moves in Middle East raise questions about US commitment to Pacific (Stars and Stripes) Recent military moves have raised questions about the U.S. commitment to the Pacific as the primary region of superpower rivalry in the world.       Fighting in southwestern Somalia kills dozens of people, including 4 civilians (The Associated Press) Hours of fierce fighting between government troops and militias that killed dozens of combatants in Somalia’s southwestern city of Baidoa also left at least four civilians dead and 98 others wounded, a hospital official said Tuesday.   Military Culture & History     National Military Monument to remain through Veterans Day (Stars and Stripes) The monument dedicated to the more than 41 million men and women who have served in the armed forces will remain on the National Mall through Nov. 12.   Video     "Damn, bud. You got to fly higher." Sheriff bodycam footage shows pilot after fighter jet crash (Defense News) Video from the Yakima County Sheriff's Office showed a bloodied F/A-18 Hornet pilot after he hit trees on a low-level training operation and had to eject.   Commentary & Analysis     In cutting joint drills, Trump has given South Korea’s president what he wants. So why does Seoul look so uneasy? (The Guardian) President Lee Jae Myung has long pushed for stronger homegrown defences, yet Donald Trump’s move has sparked alarm in some quarters.       How feasible is a European nuclear deterrent without Washington? (War on the Rocks) In 2025, James Cameron wrote, “Eurodeterrent: A Vision for an Anglo-French Nuclear Force,” where he argued the United Kingdom and France should cooperate to develop a nuclear deterrent umbrella for Europe, independent of Washington. A year later, after French President Emmanuel Macron’s landmark nuclear speech, we asked him to revisit his argument. Image: SAC Rob Bourne/MODIn your 2025 article, you argued that, given Europe’s perceived uncertainty about the U.S. commitment to its security and defense, the United Kingdom and France should cooperate to develop a nuclear deterrent umbrella independent of Washington. In July 2025, the United Kingdom and France signed the Northwood Declaration, and       The return of the essential art: Electronic warfare and the lessons of the Russia-Ukraine war (The Cipher Brief) For three decades, the Alliance operated under a dangerous assumption: that the electromagnetic spectrum was a permissive sanctuary. Lulled into complacency by counter-terrorism campaigns that allowed precision strikes and networked command to go largely unchallenged, we forgot how to fight in the dark. The Russia-Ukraine war has violently corrected that amnesia.       Where did Venezuela’s oil billions go? (The Cipher Brief) “We’re taking a lot of oil from Venezuela, and we’re getting along great with them. Billions and billions of barrels of oil is coming out of Venezuela, one of the most fertile places for oil in the world. And as you know, it was a forty-eight minute war, lasted forty-eight minutes. And we paid for the war with what we’ve taken out many, many, many times. Where have you heard that before? You haven’t heard that before. It’s the old fashioned way. Right? It’s the old fashioned way. To the victor belong the spoils. Right?”       AI and the risks of tearing down an old system (War on the Rocks) Operation Epic Fury made clear that AI is now at the heart of American warfighting. Central Command used Claude through Palantir’s Maven Smart System platform to generate and prioritize roughly 1,000 targets in the first 24 hours of the campaign, at an operational tempo that more than doubled the opening phase of the 2003 Iraq invasion.