Small Wars Journal

Access National Security News HERE. Access Korean News HERE. National Security News: 1. US special forces rescue second missing F15 airman from Iran in ‘one of the most daring operations in history’, says Trump 2. The Iran War Is Making the American Economy More Dominant Than Ever 3. Top Aides Advise Trump Blasting Iran’s Infrastructure Is Fair Game 4. The U.S.-Europe Alliance Is Reaching …
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The post 4/5/26 National Security and Korean News and Commentary appeared first on Small Wars Journal by Arizona State University.

Access National Security News HERE. Access Korean News HERE. National Security News: 1. Opinion | The North Korea Lesson for Iran 2. Hegseth’s ‘paranoia’ over being replaced explains purge of top general — as ally emerges for Army secretary’s role 3. Trump’s Budget Has New Vision for U.S. Government, but Not the Deficit 4. Golden Dome, out-years and lots of missiles: Details of Trump’s …
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The post 4/4/26 National Security and Korean News and Commentary appeared first on Small Wars Journal by Arizona State University.

Access National Security News HERE. Access Korean News HERE. National Security News: 1. Hegseth Removes Army Chief in Latest Purge of Military’s Top Ranks 2. Hegseth Fires Army Chief Amid Battle With Its Leaders 3. Hegseth forces out Army’s top general, two other senior officers 4. Kellogg Calls NATO ‘Cowards,’ Proposes New Alliance Including Ukraine 5. Control Over Strait of Hormuz Will Determine Who Wins …
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The post 4/3/26 National Security and Korean News and Commentary appeared first on Small Wars Journal by Arizona State University.

This older Pineland Underground episode from the John F. Kennedy Special Warfare Center and School dives into Robin Sage with an insider perspective, offering a sharp look at how unconventional warfare is actually trained and assessed. The conversation cuts through myths and explains how Special Forces candidates operate in a realistic, community-based exercise that feels closer to real missions than …
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The post Robin Sage and Unconventional Warfare | The real story of the Special Forces culmination exercise appeared first on Small Wars Journal by Arizona State University.

Michael Chambers of U.S. Army News reports that the Army has approved the M111 Offensive Hand Grenade (OHG) for full release, marking the first new lethal hand grenade fielded since the Vietnam-era Mk3A2. Developed at Picatinny Arsenal, the M111 replaces an aging system long hamstrung by safety concerns, including its asbestos-based body. The new grenade uses a plastic casing “that …
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The post M111 Grenade Approved, Replacing Vietnam-Era Design appeared first on Small Wars Journal by Arizona State University.

Abstract The diffusion of Artificial Intelligence (AI) technologies is transforming both the urban environment and warfare. Thus, cities are becoming “surface of attacks” in the context of “AI augmented warfare”. But Cities are also being “AI augmented”. Thus, they support the diffusion of the competing Chinese and US AI technologies. This means that nowadays, the interactions between AI, war, and …
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The post AI, Warfare, and Augmented Cities appeared first on Small Wars Journal by Arizona State University.

Executive Summary The United States–Israel war against Iran, initiated in February 2026, represents one of the most consequential — and strategically flawed — military undertakings in recent American foreign policy history. Launched without clearly articulated end-state objectives and premised on dangerously optimistic assumptions about Iranian fragility, the conflict has rapidly evolved into a multidimensional crisis threatening to destabilize the entire …
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The post Winning an Unpopular War? The United States–Israel War Against Iran: Strategic Miscalculation, Escalation Dynamics, and a Lose–Lose Dilemma appeared first on Small Wars Journal by Arizona State University.

Editors’ Note: This article is the third in a series of IWar transformation papers that adds supporting fires and expands lodgment in the information space. This article is intended to inform Small Wars Journal readers and contribute to an ongoing professional discussion on the Army’s transformative approach to information warfare. Introduction In his excellent podcast on the Pacific War, Supernova …
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The post Cloud-Seeding a Revolution appeared first on Small Wars Journal by Arizona State University.

Access National Security News HERE. Access Korean News HERE. National Security News: 1. America’s Best New Weapon in Iran Is a Drone Inspired by Iran 2. Opinion | Bomb Iran but Blow Up NATO? 3. Marines scramble to reassure families after report of ICE at boot camp 4. China Is Building Another Massive Base in the South China Sea 5. Pentagon, Boeing announce plan to …
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The post 4/2/26 National Security and Korean News and Commentary appeared first on Small Wars Journal by Arizona State University.

Throwback Thursday starts here, and we are returning to the Special Operations Journal archives to revisit hard-hitting ideas that still shape how we think about competition today. In “SOF Utilization in Contemporary Competitive Spaces” (Special Operations Journal, 2020), Major Craig Thompson pushes beyond broad discussions of hybrid warfare and gets into the mechanics of how Russia actually competes and how …
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The post Throwback Thursday: From Competitive Spaces to Cognitive Warfare—The Enduring Role of SOF appeared first on Small Wars Journal by Arizona State University.

Trier—” Augusta Treverorum”, as the Romans called it, or “The Rome of the North”, as historians call it today—is one of the most interesting places to evaluate the role of the United States in the world, and to question the future of the world it created in the wake of the Second World War. A little history first.  Augusta Treverorum …
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The post Empires Rise and Fall. Will Ours? appeared first on Small Wars Journal by Arizona State University.

Recent U.S. military operations in Venezuela, culminating in the capture of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and Washington’s declaration that it will “run” the country pending transition, mark a dramatic escalation in hemispheric intervention. Framed by the U.S. administration as a law enforcement action rather than an act of war, the operation revives enduring tensions between domestic executive authority, international law, …
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The post Venezuela at a Crossroads: Cautionary Lessons on Intervention appeared first on Small Wars Journal by Arizona State University.

It reads like a law school exam question. The Motor Tanker (M/T) Eagle S, a Cook Islands flagged vessel owned by a UAE company, departed a Russian port headed for Turkey. With a crew composed of a Georgian captain and first officer, as well as an Indian second officer, reports quickly emerged that she had dragged anchor on December 24, …
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The post Dragging Anchor, Dodging Jurisdiction: Rethinking Deterrence for Hybrid Maritime Threats appeared first on Small Wars Journal by Arizona State University.

Access National Security News HERE. Access Korean News HERE. National Security News: Apologies for my tardiness. I was traveling most of the day so I am behind. 1. You Don’t Think There’s a Plan? Really? 2. Trump says US may exit Iran war soon, threatens to quit NATO as oil crisis escalates 3. Hegseth Doubles Down on Iran Pressure 4. President Trump says US …
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The post 4/1/26 National Security and Korean News and Commentary appeared first on Small Wars Journal by Arizona State University.

Operating on the Margins: SOF in the Gray Zone, edited by Howard Coombs and Christopher Marsh, Canadian Special Operations Command (2023). “This volume examines ‘gray zone conflict,’ or the space between peace and war in which state and non-state actors engage in competition. Even with the February 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, this interpretive paradigm retains great utility and helps …
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The post Operating on The Margins | Canadian Special Operations Command appeared first on Small Wars Journal by Arizona State University.

Modern armed conflict is often used to shape battlefields before violence occurs. Influence is decided by how people interpret uncertainty, threat and intent. In How to Create a Conspiracy Theory: What Information Warriors Need to Know, I argued that conspiracy theories function as cognitive environments rather than collections of false claims. They impose order on ambiguity, assign agency to events and …
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The post From Creating to Engineering: Conspiracy Theories in Information Warfare appeared first on Small Wars Journal by Arizona State University.

The term “rogue state” entered U.S. foreign policy discourse during the late Cold War period to describe governments viewed as operating outside the restraints expected within the international system. In its early usage, the label was applied primarily to states whose threat derived from the pursuit of weapons of mass destruction, the sponsorship of international terrorism, or both (most commonly …
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The post Is the United States Drifting Toward Rogue State Perception? appeared first on Small Wars Journal by Arizona State University.

In an audacious political gamble, Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi called for a snap election on January 23, 2026, just three months after becoming the country’s first female prime minister. Her Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) was still reeling from scandals and the recent collapse of its coalition with Komeito. The gamble paid off brilliantly, with Takaichi pulling off the largest …
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The post “Japan First” in the Indo-Pacific: Takaichi’s Shift from Pacifist Constraint to Allied Mobilization appeared first on Small Wars Journal by Arizona State University.

Access National Security News HERE. Access Korean News HERE. National Security News: 1. Opinion | ‘I Will Support and Defend’ 2. Opinion | Why Not Declare War? 3. Opinion | Operation Epic Fury Should Make China Very Afraid 4. Opinion | You May Already Have Won the Iran War 5. Trump Tells Aides He’s Willing to End War Without Reopening Hormuz 6. Japan Is Fortifying This …
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The post 3/31/26 National Security and Korean News and Commentary appeared first on Small Wars Journal by Arizona State University.

WASHINGTON – On Monday, President Donald Trump threatened to destroy all desalination plants in Iran. Strikes on water infrastructure relied on by civilians would violate international law, legal experts say. Unless a plant supplies water only to a military base, said Marko Milanovic, a professor of public international law at the University of Reading, ordering such a strike would be “manifestly …
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The post Trump’s threat against Iran desalination plants would be a war crime, legal experts say appeared first on Small Wars Journal by Arizona State University.