Türkiye Fields New SÜPER ŞİMŞEK Drones to Boost Multi-Role Air Combat and Strike Capability
Turkey inducted the Super Simsek into Turkish Air Force service — a jet-powered expendable drone that can be configured as a radar decoy, electronic warfare jammer, or strike weapon carrying a 35 kg warhead. Built by Turkish Aerospace Industries, the drone flies at up to Mach 0.85, has a range of 900 km, an endurance of around 80 minutes, and weighs 200 kg at maximum takeoff. Its signature amplifiers allow it to mimic the radar return of a larger aircraft, forcing enemy air defenses to treat it as a fighter-sized threat. Earlier in March, TAI released footage of an Aksungur UCAV carrying two Super Simseks under its wings, demonstrating a mothership concept where a larger endurance drone deploys smaller expendable systems into contested airspace, and a previous test showed the Anka III stealth UCAV autonomously releasing one at altitude.
The fielding reflects a shift toward layered drone architectures, where low-cost expendable systems handle the most dangerous tasks — suppressing air defenses, drawing fire, jamming radar — while more expensive platforms stay at safer distances. A single Super Simsek can force an adversary to expend a surface-to-air missile worth far more than the drone itself, or ignore it and risk that it carries a 35 kg warhead. Turkey plans to integrate the system into a broader network where the future KAAN fifth-generation fighter acts as a command node directing formations of manned and unmanned aircraft. For now, the immediate capability is more practical: a domestically produced, recoverable, multi-role drone that complicates enemy targeting and can be fielded in numbers.

SÜPER ŞİMŞEK tactical UAVs \\ Source: Turkish Aerospace Industries
\\ Signal Watch
New French Mataris MT-10 drone could turn every military vehicle into an independent strike unit \\ Army Recognition
KNDS France released video showing its Mataris MT-10 loitering munition launched from four different French Army vehicles: the Leclerc tank, Serval APC, Titus security vehicle, and Ultro UGV. The MT-10 weighs 3.8 kg, carries a 550 g fragmentation-incendiary warhead, has a range of 10 km, and can loiter for 30 minutes. It operates in GNSS-denied environments using a jam-resistant datalink and supports mid-flight abort and target reassignment. The integration is designed to give individual vehicle crews their own organic precision strike capability, removing the need to call for external fire support. The same munition works across all four platforms, simplifying logistics and training. Longer-range variants in the Mataris family extend to 25 km and 100 km.
Baykar unveils K2 Kamikaze drone with AI, swarming capabilities \\ Breaking Defense
The U.S. Navy conducted a three-day live-fire test of its prototype electromagnetic railgun in February 2025. It is the first confirmed firing since the Navy closed out the railgun program in 2021 and placed remaining hardware in storage. The test's exact purpose remains unclear — it may have supported hypersonic research rather than railgun development directly. A railgun is now planned as part of the armament for the Trump class large surface combatant (BBG(X)). Construction of the lead ship, USS Defiant, is not expected until the early 2030s. Japan has progressed further in parallel, completing the first confirmed at-sea railgun firing against a target vessel in 2025..
Railgun Being Fired By U.S. Navy Again After Abandoning It For Years \\ TWZ
The U.S. Navy conducted a three-day live-fire test of its prototype electromagnetic railgun in February 2025. It is the first confirmed firing since the Navy closed out the railgun program in 2021 and placed remaining hardware in storage. The test's exact purpose remains unclear — it may have supported hypersonic research rather than railgun development directly. A railgun is now planned as part of the armament for the Trump class large surface combatant (BBG(X)). Construction of the lead ship, USS Defiant, is not expected until the early 2030s. Japan has progressed further in parallel, completing the first confirmed at-sea railgun firing against a target vessel in 2025..

U.S. Navy prototype railgun during live-fire testing at White Sands Missile Range, February 2025 \\ Source: TWZ & USN
\\ Quick Links
RQ-180 Secret Stealth Drone Appears To Have Made An Emergency Landing At A Greek Air Base \\ TWZ
Japan’s “Platypus” EC-2 Stand-Off Jammer Flies for the First Time \\ The Aviationist
Kawasaki develops collaborative drone system \\ Defence Blog
Belgium’s ALX Systems Introduces Fully Belgian-Made Tactical Loitering Munition \\ Army Recognition
Big Drones Can Swarm Too: US Firm Pushes Unified Control System for Large UAVs \\ NextGen Defense
US scientists turn simple umbrella into strike drone-killer using ‘FlyTrap’ \\ Interesting Engineering
KNDS Presents Jaguar Armored Reconnaissance Combat Vehicle with Anti-Tank Power for Europe’s Land Forces \\ Army Recognition
Raytheon unveils new electromagnetic army vehicle \\ Defence Connect
American Rheinmetall tests drone hunter vehicle \\ Defence Blog
Belgium Unveils AI-Driven Military Equipment Identification App and Counter-Drone Systems at BEDEX 2026 \\ Army Recognition
France’s New Containerized Launcher Pushes Artillery Reach to 150-Km \\ NextGen Defense
UK and Germany to Launch 2,000 km Cruise Hypersonic Deep Strike Missiles for NATO Deterrence \\ Army Recognition
A New Kind of Warfighter Enters the Battlefield: Humanoid Robot Arrives in Ukraine \\ NextGen Defense
Norway could re-enter anti-tank mine market \\ Army Technology
EDA launches VLEO-DEF programme to design Europe’s first military satellite concept for Very Low Earth Orbit \\ Defence Industry Europe
Chinese defense firm claims it intercepted radio signals from US B-2 bomber over Iran \\ Interesting Engineering
France Introduces Telecom-Based Counter-Drone Network Using 19,700 Towers to Protect Critical Assets \\ Army Recognition
The Ukraine War and the need for active protection systems \\ Army Technology
“There are great aspirations for what has to happen within our innovation base and the impact it should have on our national defense. And we haven’t seen sufficient, in our judgment, movement there. The production, the modernization is not revealing itself across the force like we think it should.”
\\ Beyond the Beam
Palantir integrates AI into stratospheric ISR systems \\ Defence Blog
Space Force ‘Serious’ About Planning for Cislunar Operations \\ Air & Space Forces Magazine
China’s radar could identify decoy drones, real targets, swarm attack accurately with AI method \\ Interesting Engineering
Acoustic metamaterial can send complex signals directly between water and air \\ Tech Xplore
China’s gallium oxide semiconductor could enable more compact radar for stealth aircraft \\ Interesting Engineering

Baykar heavy K2 kamikaze drone \\ Source: Baykar Youtube
\\ Opportunity Intel
FAA seeks industry concepts for next-generation tower simulation training systems \\ Military Aerospace
Army (UK) explores new vehicle-mounted counter-drone system \\ UKDJ
FAA seeks industry input on post-quantum cryptography transition for air traffic control and IT systems \\ Military Aerospace
Army researchers shop industry for technologies in miniature electronics, sensors, and anti-tamper \\ Military Aerospace
Italy looks to acquire a containerized naval mine laying system \\ Naval News
Air Force Eyes Advanced Propulsion Tech with Program Worth Up to $16B \\ Air & Space Forces Magazine
NASA Glenn seeks industry input for ceramic matrix composite and open-fan propulsion studies \\ Military Aerospace
Army launches drone marketplace commercial solutions opening \\ Defense Scoop
Canada launches $40 billion plan to strengthen Arctic defence, infrastructure and economic development across Northern region \\ Defence Industry Europe
UK, Netherlands, Finland explore new defence financing, procurement plan \\ Army Technology
80% readiness requires 21st-century tools \\ Defense Scoop
Japan turns to dual-use technology to power a new defence industrial strategy \\ Defence Connect
US launches ‘America First’ arms export strategy, with major implications for allies like Australia \\ Defence Connect
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