Tag: drones

Chinese Lab Creates Mosquito-Sized Spy Drones

Chinese state media reported on Friday that the National University of Defense Technology (NUDT) in Hunan has created a surveillance “microdrone” the size of a mosquito.

“Here in my hand is a mosquito-like type of robot. Miniature bionic robots like this one are especially suited to information reconnaissance and special missions on the battlefield,” NUDT student Liang Hexiang told the state-run China Central Television (CCTV).

The device Liang showed off had a stick-thin body, three hairlike “legs,” and tiny leaf-shaped wings. The report did not go into details about its range, endurance, control systems, or surveillance capabilities.

Drones that could be mistaken for insects are a holy grail for the fast-growing surveillance robot industry. The Wyss Institute at Harvard University unveiled its “RoboBee,” a microdrone with superficial similarities to China’s mosquito drone, in 2019.

RoboBee is allegedly about half the size of a paper clip, weighs a tenth of a gram, and flies by contracting tiny artificial “muscles “ with jolts of electricity. At present, the microdrone can only operate within the carefully controlled confines of its laboratory, but its developers hope it will someday be capable of navigating in the outside world with senses comparable to a real bee.

The designers of RoboBee hope the fully independent version of their creation could assist with environmental monitoring, search and rescue, and even pollination of crops, much as real bees do. Of course, it requires little imagination to see how microdrones could be weaponized for surveillance or assassination.

According to Chinese state media, the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) already has some drones that weigh less than a kilogram, fly in AI-controlled swarms, and can carry small explosives.

Under current definitions, a “microdrone” is any unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) that weighs less than 250 grams (a little under 9 ounces).

Most existing microdrone designs are fairly slow because their tiny frames cannot carry engines that generate much thrust, but in May a student at the Chinese University of Hong Kong in Shenzhen set a world speed record with a palm-sized drone that flew at over 211 miles per hour.

The smallest drone currently employed by Western armed forces is the Black Hornet 4, a Norwegian design that looks like a palm-sized toy helicopter. The Black Hornet 4 boasts thermal imaging and low-light optics. It comes in a travel case that is small enough for soldiers to carry on their belts.

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Tehran dismantles Mossad sabotage network behind suicide drone attacks

Iranian security forces have announced the thwarting of Mossad-operated drone production plots aimed at undermining the country’s air defenses and military capabilities as part of Israel’s war against the country. 

According to Iranian media reports, authorities raided a three-story building on the outskirts of Tehran on 15 June, uncovering a facility for assembling drones and explosives.

Iranian police released footage showing a large cache of small drones and explosives seized by authorities at the site on Sunday. 

Footage from Sunday also showed an Iranian police officer chasing a truck filled with drones, which was eventually intercepted and seized. 

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Spy Satellite Uncovers Massive Stealth Flying Wing At Secretive Chinese Base

China is well aware that Western spy satellites, including those operated by the U.S., maintain constant overhead surveillance of high-value military assets, such as bases and research facilities. 

The deliberate exposure of a previously unseen, large, low-observable flying-wing HALE (High-Altitude Long-Endurance) unmanned aerial vehicle at the Malan test facility may not have been an accident. 

Instead, it appears to be a deliberate act of signaling by Beijing to the Trump administration, highlighting the rapid acceleration of China’s next-generation air combat capabilities at a time when the global security environment is rapidly deteriorating.

With the war in Ukraine ongoing and tensions in the Middle East escalating into a hot crisis, Beijing’s timing suggests an intent to assert technological parity and deterrence against the U.S. Broadly speaking, the world is entering a more dangerous and unstable era — a shift from a unipolar world with the U.S. in control to a bipolar geopolitical order, where volatility is expected to intensify throughout the 2030s.

The War Zone’s Tyler Rogoway cited new satellite spy images via Planet Labs that show the previously unseen HALE drone at a secretive test base near Malan in Xinjiang province. 

“Specifically, the craft was parked outside of a sprawling new facility that was built very recently to the east of the base, connected to it by a very long taxiway leading to a security gate,” Rogoway said.

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Fake meetings, secret drones, smuggled missiles: How Israel’s Mossad covertly infiltrated Iran to launch unprecedented attack

Israeli spies smuggled missiles and secretly hid explosive drones deep inside Iran in a series of covert operations leading up to Friday’s deadly onslaught – before tricking military leaders into gathering for a meeting so they could be wiped out.  

Intelligence agents with Mossad, Israel’s top spy agency, started infiltrating the heart of Iran several months back in order to pull off the surprise attack aimed at obliterating Iranian nuclear and military facilities, as well as a swath of top military commanders.

The spy agency planted the explosive drones inside Iran ahead of time as they laid the groundwork for the major strikes, according to Israeli security sources.  

Agents also managed to smuggle precision weapons into central Iran so Israel could target Tehran’s defenses from within.

The stealth campaign, dubbed Operation “Rising Lion,” was eventually conducted in three separate operations early Friday – with the airstrikes each targeting specific weaponry and defense systems in Iran, one Israeli security source told The Post.

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Department Of Homeland Security Q-9 Reaper Drones Are Orbiting Over Los Angeles

U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) has been flying its Predator B drones, also known by their military designation as MQ-9 Reapers, over Los Angeles as part of the U.S. government’s response to the unrest there, the agency confirmed to us on Wednesday. The flights are in response to protests that escalated to violence on multiple occasions, following a massive operation by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) last Friday.

Persistent aerial surveillance like this has long been controversial, with civil rights advocates saying it violates the right to privacy and undermines the Constitution. At the same time, the fact that a drone is doing it largely evokes a uniquely upsetting response. While using the Reapers over urban locales is rare, it’s not unprecedented, and manned platforms do this kind of work every day across the country.

CBP’s Air and Marine Operations (AMO) “MQ-9 Predators are supporting our federal law enforcement partners in the Greater Los Angeles area, including Immigration and Customs Enforcement, with aerial support of their operations,” spokesman John Mennell told us Wednesday afternoon in response to our query earlier this week. “Additionally, they are providing officer safety surveillance when requested by officers. AMO is not engaged in the surveillance of First Amendment activities.”

CBP had been mum about the issue for days, even though open-source reporting on social media had already presented compelling evidence of the drones’ orbits. On June 9, user @Aeroscout on X posted air traffic control (ATC) audio stating that two “Q-9s” – call signs TROY 703 and TROY 701, had passed each other in airspace over Yuma, Arizona, as one was replacing the other over Los Angeles. @Aeroscout had previously posted ATC audio of TROY 701 checking in on Los Angeles Center Sector 09. A short time later, Alaska Flight 1020 was given a traffic advisory for “drone traffic.”

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US Army rolls out $13M smart rifle scopes that auto-target and take down enemy drones in combat

The US Army is giving its soldiers a high-tech edge in the fight against drones, and it’s called SMASH.

During a live-fire training exercise on June 6 in Germany, a soldier with the 3rd Squadron, 2nd Cavalry Regiment used the SMASH 2000L smart scope mounted on an M4A1 rifle to target drones in the sky.

The demo was part of Project Flytrap, a multinational training event.

The SMASH 2000L, made by Israeli company Smart Shooter Ltd., is no ordinary sight.

It uses cameras, sensors, and artificial intelligence to track targets and decides the perfect time to fire, according to reporting from Army Recognition.

Once a drone is locked in, the system controls the trigger and only fires when a hit is guaranteed.

In May, the Army awarded Smart Shooter a $13 million contract to begin delivering these scopes to troops under its Transformation In Contact (TIC 2.0) program.

The goal is to quickly get new, useful tech into soldiers’ hands.

The smart scope weighs about 2.5 pounds and fits onto standard-issue rifles.

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UK pledges 100,000 new drones for Kiev

he UK has pledged to supply 100,000 new drones to Ukraine by April 2026, in addition to the 10,000 UAVs it sent last year. The announcement coincides with Britain’s newly unveiled Strategic Defense Review, which proposes steps to rearm its military in light of what it paints as a threat posed by Russia.

London has allocated £350 million ($470 million) from its £4.5 billion Ukraine military package to fund new drone deliveries to Kiev, according to a government statement on Wednesday. UK Defense Secretary John Healey is expected to detail the initiative at the upcoming Ukraine contact group meeting in Brussels.

“Ukraine’s Armed Forces have demonstrated the effectiveness of drone warfare,” London stated, admitting that Kiev’s demand for UAVs has provided a boost to the UK’s economy.

It also unveiled plans to use Ukraine’s drone experience to train its own military. In order to “learn the lessons from Ukraine,” the UK would allocate over £4 billion for autonomous systems and drones for its armed forces.

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World’s first drone combat textbook lands in Russian schools to train 1 million kids

Russia has formally introduced drone operations into its national school curriculum as part of a comprehensive initiative to train a new generation of unmanned systems operators. 

On Monday, Russian drone manufacturer Geoscan announced the release of the country’s first state-approved school textbook on unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), designed for use in 8th and 9th-grade classrooms.

Titled “Unmanned Aerial Vehicles: 8th and 9th Grades,” the publication is now included in the federal list of approved teaching materials, following formal certification by the Russian Ministry of Education. 

The course will be delivered under the “Robotics” module of the subject Labor (Technology), Russia’s equivalent of technical education.

World’s first drone ops textbook

Geoscan said this is “the only school publication on unmanned aircraft systems that has passed state expertise.” 

The textbook was co-developed with Russia’s largest schoolbook publisher, Prosveshcheniye, and reflects 14 years of the company’s drone R&D and eight years of experience in educational robotics.

Head of Geoscan’s educational projects, Mikhail Lutsky, said the material was not abstract theory, but “tested in practice,” forming a “ready-to-use course” to build applied piloting and engineering skills among Russian youth. 

The course spans 34 academic hours and includes chapters on UAV classifications, design, electronics, manual control, autonomous programming, and career trends in drone aviation.

The initiative is part of the Russian government’s “Personnel for Unmanned Aerial Systems” program, which aims to train 1 million drone operators by 2030 across over 500 schools and 30 universities. 

In 2023, approximately 30,000 university students in Moscow and St. Petersburg began similar coursework. In parallel, military training in schools has begun incorporating basic combat drone instruction.

The political backdrop to this education push is significant. In November 2023, a foundation linked to President Vladimir Putin’s youngest daughter, Katerina Tikhonova, acquired a 10% stake in Geoscan. 

The company is currently under US sanctions, reflecting broader Western concerns about the militarization of Russia’s youth education and its use of dual-use technologies.

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Former CIA analyst: ‘100 percent sure’ CIA had some involvement in massive Ukrainian drone strike on Russian airfields

By now you’ve all heard something about Ukraine’s massive assault of killer drones that attacked Russian airfields housing Russia’s nuclear bomber fleet in Siberia and several other locations deep within the country’s heartland.

The mainstream narrative is that the operation took upwards of 18 months to plan and execute and was “personally overseen” by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

Sorry, folks, but I don’t buy it. This attack was not something a guy like Zelensky, whose skill set includes being a former homo-erotic dancer and actor, was prepared for.

The attack, according to mainstream reports, took out 41 aircraft or roughly 34 percent of Russia’s fleet of strategic bombers.

Yet, other knowledgeable sources, such as former British diplomat Alastair Crook, estimate the number of lost Russian bombers at closer to 7, or roughly 5 percent of the country’s overall fleet. The Western media is always going to take information from Kiev at face value, rather than question it or compare it to what the Russian media is reporting.

Anyway, it’s fair to say that whether it was 5 percent, 10 percent or 34 percent, what happened on Sunday in Russia was a major propaganda victory for Ukraine and an embarrassing intelligence lapse for Russia.

Will it change the trajectory of the war between Russia and Ukraine? Absolutely not. And that trajectory has been going in Russia’s favor for months.

But one big unanswered question is how much, if anything, was known about this attack in the bowels of the Washington deep state in Washington, D.C.

Did the president himself know about it? The official line is that he did not.

However, that doesn’t mean the U.S. government wasn’t involved.

As former CIA analyst Larry Johnson said Monday in an interview with Judge Andrew Napolitano, the U.S. government would likely strive to give the president plausible deniability for an operation like this, which took place some 2,700 miles inside Russia and away from the frontlines of the ongoing war.

In a NATO proxy war against Russia, with Ukraine serving as the proxy, somebody in Washington and/or London had to of been involved in an operation as sophisticated and strategic as the one that went down in Russia on Sunday, Johnson said.

“I guarantee you,” he said. “At least one, if not more officers, within the Central Intelligence Agency knew about this and may have even been involved with the planning for it and the operation of it.”

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Kiev attacked military airfields in five Russian regions – MOD

Military airfields across Russia have been attacked in a series of kamikaze drone strikes, the country’s Defense Ministry reported on Sunday, blaming the incidents on Kiev. Most of the strikes were successfully repelled, with some resulting in material damage, it added.

Airfields were targeted in the Murmansk Region in the country’s north, in Ivanovo and Ryazan regions in central Russia as well as in Irkutsk Region in Siberia and Amur Region in the Far East, the ministry said. All the attacks employed first-person view (PFV) kamikaze drones, with some of them being launched from territories in close proximity to the airfields, it stated.

Some of the culprits behind the attacks have been detained, the ministry said, without revealing the number of those arrested or their identities. The Russian military also said that the “Kiev regime” was ultimately responsible for the strikes, which they described as “terrorist attacks.”

In Ivanovo, Ryazan, and Amur regions, the attacks were repelled and resulted in no damage or casualties, according to the ministry. In Murmansk and Irkutsk regions, the strikes led to some aircraft catching fire, the military said. No casualties have been reported in any of the incidents, according to the ministry’s data.

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