F-35 pilots will eventually be able to control a small group of drones flying nearby from the air, performing sensing, reconnaissance and targeting functions

drones may be fully operated from the cockpit of advanced fighter jets such as the Joint Strike Fighter or F-22

For instance, real-time video feeds from the electro-optical/infrared sensors on board a Predator, Reaper or Global Hawk drone could go directly into an F-35 cockpit, without needing to go to a ground control station.

“It’s almost inevitable people will be saying, ‘I want more missiles on board to get through defenses or I need some EW [electronic warfare] countermeasures because I don't have the payload to carry a super big pod,’”

“A high-powered microwave may have some potential that will require a dedicated platform. The negative side is you have to watch out that you don’t overload the pilot,”

drones could be programmed to fly into heavily defended or high-risk areas ahead of manned fighter jets in order to assess enemy air defenses and reduce risk to pilots.

The early phases of this kind of technology are already operational in the F-35 cockpit through what is called “sensor-fusion.” This allows the avionics technology and aircraft computer to simultaneously organize incoming information for a variety of different sensors

Another advantage of these technological advances is that one human may be able to control multiple drones and perform a command and control function – while drones execute various tasks such as sensor functions, targeting, weapons transport or electronic warfare activities.

Zacharias explained a potential future scenario wherein one human is able to control 10-- or even 100 -- drones.

Britain is to deploy troops, tanks and jets to Eastern Europe to deter Russian aggression.

In the biggest military build-up in Eastern Europe since the Cold War, an armoured force will be deployed to Estonia.

RAF planes are also being dispatched to patrol Romanian airspace for the first time.

The moves are designed to stop Moscow taking over or undermining its former Eastern European satellites as it has with Crimea and Ukraine.

Speaking at Nato headquarters in Brussels, the Defence Secretary added: ‘This is Britain stepping up in Nato, beefing up the reassurance that we are able to offer.

'Although we are leaving the European Union, we will be doing more to help secure the eastern and southern flanks of Nato.’

An MoD spokesman added: ‘The UK is stepping up its package of measures to support its allies in Europe, in the face of a more assertive Russia.’

He added: ‘Right now we are still in the cold phase of the war, which may or may not turn into a hot war.’

Footage emerged yesterday of Russian emergency workers wearing protective suits and gas masks as part of their doomsday exercise – the biggest in decades.

Mr Putin has demanded sufficient bomb shelters to protect the entire population of Moscow.

In early October, Russian military analysts reported that a group of designers working for the navy were completing work on a completely new high-speed torpedo. The widely known Shkval ("Squall") torpedo, which for a long time was a global leader in terms of speed and the destructive force of its warhead, will be replaced by a new torpedo, called Khishchnik ("Predator").

The project is classified. It is only known that it is being developed by the Elektropribor design bureau, which specializes in aviation technology.

One thing is certain: In terms of its main specifications, the Khishchnik will exceed its famous predecessor, the Shkval.

An ordinary torpedo has a speed of no more than 87 mph, which allows a ship targeted by it to maneuver and avoid being hit. The Shkval, however, leaves the enemy practically no chance: Its speed is nearly three times the speed of a standard torpedo. This means that a targeted ship has just a third of the standard time for maneuver. In real naval combat, that means a nearly inevitable hit.

The Shkval torpedo remains one of the top-secret Russian military designs. Although it has been in operation for nearly 40 years, some of its technical characteristics continue to be classified. It is therefore not surprising that it was Shkval-related documents that featured in an early 2000s spy scandal involving U.S. businessman Edmond Pope.

That said, most of the attempts to replicate this torpedo abroad have failed. It was only in 2005 that the German Navy received an underwater rocket with specifications close to those of the Shkval, though even then it failed to beat its Russian equivalent in terms of speed.

And yet the Shkval has considerable potential for improvement. It has a relatively short firing range and the depth capability of its carrier is limited. This makes a Shkval-enabled submarine susceptible to active enemy defense. A torpedo traveling at a high speed generates noise that makes it easy to detect it. Finally, it does not have a homing guidance system.

The pirates were finally ready to make a deal.

After holding 26 sailors from the Naham 3 hostage for nearly five years, the Somali criminals agreed in August to hand them over to charity Oceans Beyond Piracy (OBP) in exchange for relatively small compensation. As a first step, they sent the photo above, which shows each hostage holding up a specified code word. As a second step, they signed a contract.

“We got a final proof of life to prove that the crew were alive … then we basically issued them a contract,” said John Steed, who heads the Hostage Support Partners program for OBP.

On October 22, all 26 hostages were released, ending the second-longest captivity ever by Somali pirates.

Steed walked us through the harrowing story of the Naham 3 and the tense process that led to their release.

“We’ve basically pulled off something that a special forces from a government would be pretty proud of doing,” he said.

The Naham 3, a Taiwan-owned fishing vessel with a crew of 29, was hijacked south of the Seychelles in March 2012. The boat’s captain, Chung Hui-teh, reportedly tried to fight off pirates with a chair but was gunned down.

The rest of the crew, who came from Cambodia, China, Indonesia, Philippines, Taiwan, and Vietnam were held aboard the damaged ship, which was tied to another hijacked and damaged ship, the Albedo. When the Albedo sank, the crew of the Naham 3 helped save some of the other hostages from drowning.

In August 2013, the pirates abandoned the Naham 3 and moved the crew to a holding spot on land. At some point, two more hostages died from illness.

Steed, a retired British colonel, started working with a negotiator for the pirates about three years ago. During this time, he convinced them to let a doctor visit the hostages. He also started working with “tribal elders, religious leaders, the local community, and the regional government” to pressure the pirates to take a deal.

In an August 2015 statement, Steed said “negotiations have stalled due to unreasonable demands made by the pirates.”

By August 2016, however, the pirates appeared to be open to negotiations. They provided proof of life for the hostages and then they signed a contract.

“We basically issued them a contract, and the pirate leaders signed,” Steed said. “It was witnessed by one hostage from each country, it was witnessed by the religious leaders, and so on. Though it obviously was not a binding contract, it does tie everybody into the deal and makes them, in our view, behave honorably.”

Steed himself wasn’t at the contract signing. In fact, he never met the pirates.

“I communicated with the pirates on many occasions but not face to face,” Steed said. “They wouldn’t come anywhere near us.”

When Steed and his team arrived, they were met by a community leader, a sheikh, and the chief of police, who led them to a small building at the edge of the airstrip. All 26 hostages were safely inside.

“It was a pretty emotional meeting,” Steed said. “It made me cry. I don’t cry easily.”

For years the influence of the CIA in Hollywood was hidden and unacknowledged. Now it’s more of an open secret; not publicized, but pretty easy to read up on if you care. Just ask the spy agency’s Entertainment Industry Liaison.

CIA’s man in Hollywood wants to help actors, authors, directors, producers and screenwriters “gain a better understanding” of the intelligence agency in order to ensure “accurate portrayals” of its activities. It even wants to help fire up the neurons and actually give you some good ideas if you’re coming up short in that department. Indeed, the CIA provides “inspiration for future storylines” and lists them on its website. Of course, it’s all in the interest of creating authentic and balanced portrayals of US intelligence agencies and the US military. And they’re quite busy, too. Between 2006 and 2011, the CIA public relations office had input into at least 22 film and movie projects.

Movies like Top Gun in the 1980s and Zero Dark Thirty more recently were made in consultation with the Pentagon and White House. The result of this “creative input for Pentagon assistance” bargain created an entertainment culture “rigged to produce relatively few anti-war movies and dozens of blockbusters that glorify the military” and which amounts to “government subsidized propaganda,” Sirota wrote.

The CIA has had a hand in creating TV shows like 24, Homeland and Alias. The Americans — an FX show about two Russian spies living undercover in the US — was created by a former CIA agent, and the agency reportedly approves the scripts for each episode.

The liaison’s “current pick” for a possible future movie project is about one Ryszard Kukliński — a Polish colonel and spy for NATO who spent years passing secret Soviet documents to the CIA. I wonder why they’d be interested in that sort of thing right now. It couldn’t be anything to do with deteriorating relations between Russia and the West, could it?

US State Department has actively sought out the biggest players in Hollywood and tried to enlist their help with what they called “anti-Russia messaging” for the public’s consumption through innocent entertainment. In other words, the government asked Hollywood for help producing propaganda — although I’m sure the State Department would call it something nicer.

Negative depictions of Russia in American and British news and entertainment media are hardly new — but at least as far as I can tell, there’s certainly been an uptick over the past 12-18 months, and it coincides nicely with a major US government-led anti-Russia messaging campaign which has also spilled over into much of Western print and broadcast media.

In the Netflix political drama House of Cards, Pussy Riot — the real ones this time — got their own cameo alongside evil Putin (not the real one). But even when there isn’t a major storyline attached to Russia, somehow the country frequently gets thrown in anyway. Russia is still the go-to country when there needs to be a joke about scary or immoral foreigners. There are endless examples.

In NBC’s Scandal, one character suggests Putin might randomly invade Belarus. In CBS’s Madam Secretary, one character spews the line: “I can’t go back to Russia, it’s a pigsty.” In the recently released movie Bad Moms, one of the bad moms, protesting something or other which I can’t recall, shouts “What is this, Russia?” The short-running show Allegiance was entirely about a Russian sleeper cell in the US which was suddenly reactivated and whose members — now fully adapted to blissful life in America — no longer wanted anything to do with Russia. How original.

NBC’s Blacklist has given us multiple Russian baddies and the sitcom 2 Broke Girls has made its fair share of Putin jokes. The third installment of The Purge introduced us to a gang of menacing Russian “murder tourists” who take advantage of the annual 12-hour period during which any crime, including murder, becomes legal. I could go on, but you get the idea: Russians are bad.

"When they see Peshmerga female fighters, Daesh militants start to panic and try not to engage in an open fight with us, as death from the hand of a woman is considered by them as humiliating and disgraceful,"

WASHINGTON (Sputnik) — The Stryker upgrade includes the integration of a Kongsberg MCT-30mm weapon system with a remotely operated unmanned turret and hull modifications, the release said.

"Following the 2015 Russian invasion of Ukraine, US Army leaders in Europe identified a capability gap that threatened our forces in theater," Army Vice Chief of Staff Gen. Daniel Allyn stated in the release on Thursday. "The Russians, it turns out, had upgraded and fielded significant capabilities while we were engaged in Iraq and Afghanistan."

A small group of Houthi rebels, operating inside of Saudi Arabia, lay in an ambush for the KSA military conducting routine operations.

Patience and discipline are both required in order for an ambush to go off correctly. You have to wait for the exact right moment to engage, and in that moment you have to succeed. If you fail in the initiation of your ambush, it will ultimately fail.

The footage below is a prime example of an ambush done right. Houthi rebels, who have been waiting in the rocks for who knows how long, line up a perfect RPG shot. Once they attack, the unprepared KSA forces are overwhelmed, and defeated quickly.

The initiation phase of an ambush is the most important part of the attack. You are required to get as much of the enemy in your kill box as you can. With the initiation, you have to inflict as much damage as possible. In those early seconds, your operation will succeed or fail.

Shock is the deciding factor. If you can effectively surprise your enemy, and immediately make him lose his will to fight, you will be victorious.

Malaysia will sign a contract to purchase Littoral Mission Ships from China when Prime Minister Najib Razak visits Beijing next week, according to a Facebook posting by the country's Ministry of Defence.

The text of a speech to be delivered by Malaysian defense minister Hishammuddin Hussein was posted on Facebook on Tuesday, but was later removed after Reuters asked a defense ministry spokesman for comment.

The purchase of the patrol vessels, if it proceeds, would be Malaysia's first significant defense deal with China and comes amid rising tensions in the South China Sea and as the United States and China compete for influence in the region.

Malaysia's ties with the United States became strained after the Department of Justice filed lawsuits linked to a money-laundering investigation at state fund 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB), which Najib founded and had overseen as chairman of its advisory council.

Najib is traveling to China on Sunday for a week-long visit.

"On November 5, 2016, the Defence Ministry will sign a contract for the procurement of Littoral Mission Ships (LMS) with SASTIND (the State Administration for Science, Technology and Industry for National Defense), which is an important part of the schedule during the Prime Minister's official visit to China," the Facebook post quotes Hishammuddin saying.

However, a video recording of the speech at the Malaysian defense ministry by Hishammuddin does not mention this contract.

Last week, Malaysia announced a 2 billion ringgit ($476.19 million) cut to its 2017 defense budget from last year's levels.

A project to develop an amphibious corps was among those jettisoned, said Euan Graham, director of the international security program at the Lowy Institute, a Sydney-based think-tank.

"It was the U.S. marines who were liaising with the Malaysians on that," Graham said.

"So a U.S.-backed initiative has effectively died now," Graham said. "At the same time, a new bridge has been opened to China. If you put those together, whether it's been by Malaysia's design or not, it does send a combined signal of pulling back from the U.S. and outreach to China."

Yemeni rebels have launched one of their longest-range strikes against Saudi Arabia, firing a ballistic missile that was shot down near Mecca, the Saudi-led coalition fighting them said on Friday.

The coalition has been carrying out a bombing campaign against the rebels since March last year and there have been strikes towards the bases from which the raids have been mounted.

Saudi Arabia has deployed Patriot missiles to intercept the rebel fire.

Houthi rebels launched the missile "toward the Mecca area" on Thursday evening from their Saada province stronghold just across the border, a coalition statement said.

"The air defence was able to intercept and destroyed it about 65 kilometres (40 miles) from Mecca without any damage."

The rebel Sabanews website said they fired a ballistic missile towards King Abdulaziz International Airport in Jeddah, west of Mecca.

Mecca lies more than 500 kilometres (more than 300 miles) from the border.

PhilippinePETALING JAYA: Kidnappings for ransom (KFR) has been a lucrative money-spinner for Islamic militant group Abu Sayyaf in the southern Phillipines according to a confidential report commissioned by the Philippines government.

The Abu Sayyaf received about 353 million pesos (RM30.6 million) in ransom payment for the first six months of this year, news agency Associated Press (AP) reported, citing the joint military and police threat assessment report.

“Lucrative payoffs from KFR had enabled the Abu Sayyaf to procure firearms as well as ammunition,” the government report said, highlighting that the 353 million pesos were mainly paid for the release of 14 Indonesians and four Malaysian crewmen.

The four Malaysians – Wong Teck Kang, 31; Wong Teck Chii, 29; Johnny Lau Jung Hien, 21; and Wong Hung Sing, 34 – were abducted from a tugboat by gunmen in international waters off Pulau Ligitan in Sabah on April 1 and released on June 9.

The gunmen had initially demanded a ransom of 300 million pesos for the release of the four, but the amount was subsequently dropped to 180 million pesos, according to various press reports following the release of the Malaysians.

Another 20 million pesos was paid for the release of a Filipino woman, Marites Flor, who was kidnapped last year with two Canadians and a Norwegian from a resort on Samal island.

According to AP, the report also highlighted that the Philippine military offensives has made some impact in reducing the number of actual Abu Sayyaf militants – from 506 in the first half of last year to 481 in the same period this year.

However, as a diversionary tactic , the Abu Sayyaf have increased the number of bombings carried out in the Philippines for the same period to 32, which is 68 per cent more than last year.

The Philippine military offensive has intensified since President Rodrigo Duterte took office in June, with a promise to destroy Abu Sayyaf and ruling out negotiations with the Islamic militants.

“The Abu Sayyaf shifted in targeting vulnerable foreign-flagged tugboats and their crew due to the focused military operations against the group,” the report said, adding the group was expected to intensify its kidnap-for-ransom assaults in the busy waterways around the southern Philippines, Malaysia and Indonesia.

Ka-52K attack helicopters deployed on the Admiral Kuznetsov aircraft carrier will test-fire the latest Hermes extreme-range anti-tank guided missiles for the first time in Syria in the battle with Islamic State, the daily newspaper Izvestiya reported.

"Tests in a combat environment will help finalize the missile system, which should become a standard weapon for Russia's Alligator military helicopters," the newspaper said, citing a source in the Russian military-industrial complex. "It was decided to test the Hermes in more difficult, ship-borne air operations."

What is the Hermes and what is it for?

According to Izvestiya, owing to the new weapon, the Ka-52K will be able to destroy enemy tanks, fortifications and manpower at a distance of 20 miles. The range of similar Russian and foreign systems (Ataka, Vikhr, Hellfire, and others) is less than 6 miles.

According to Viktor Litovkin, a retired colonel and military expert for the TASS news agency, the Hermes will be used to attack well-protected militant targets – arms and IED production facilities as well as command posts and temporary firing points.

"Based on its combat use, it will be decided whether to send the system back for revision or to adopt it," said Litovkin.

Features of the Hermes

As experts interviewed by RBTH noted, the missile's key feature is the ability to track and destroy over-the-horizon targets. Due to its infrared homing and laser guidance capabilities, it can hit enemy armored vehicles autonomously, even if they are out of sight of the helicopter crew.

"Similar tactical tasks can be performed by Israel's Spike-NLOS system, which is mounted on a wheeled chassis. However, Russia's Hermes can be deployed on ground tracked vehicles as well as on helicopters and ships. Ours is more universal," a source in the Russian Defense Ministry said in an interview with RBTH.

According to the source, the official data on the missile will be provided after its adoption.

"Now we can only say that its range is much greater than that of foreign anti-tank systems, the farthest of which hits targets 10 km away," or about 6 miles, said the RBTH source.

He added that the missile can be equipped with either a cumulative or high-explosive warhead.

Lithuanians have been handed manuals telling them what to do in the event of a Russian invasion, it has emerged.

The 75-page booklet, called 'Prepare to survive emergencies and war', urges citizens to 'have the will to resist' if Vladimir Putin's forces attack.

Extensive guides range from how to recognise Russian tanks to step-by-step survival tricks, including using condoms to help transport food and water.

It comes weeks after Russia deployed nuclear-capable Iskander missiles into its Kaliningrad outpost that borders the country and Poland - both NATO members.