SOFREP Cartoon: U.S. Southern Command’s Pirate Upgrade
SOUTHCOM’s Pirate Upgrade. The mission is sus, but the fit is fire!
News
US Special Operations Forces Board a China-to-Iran Ship in the Indian Ocean
Some operations are designed to make headlines, but this one was built to make deadlines slip, shipments vanish from the ledger, and an assembly line in Iran go quiet weeks later when the missing parts never show.
Elftmann Tactical Triggers: The “Elf on a Shelf” Stocking Stuffer That Seriously Upgrades a Rifle
If you’re still scrambling for a gift, stop wasting time and buy an Elftmann drop-in trigger, because even though it’s a small part, it’s a big American-made upgrade that makes an AR run faster and cleaner without turning it into a fragile race gun, and they’ll stand behind that gift for life.
The Bolduc Brief: The Trump Administration’s National Security – Confrontational Tone Toward Europe and Normalizing Relations with Russia
Trump’s National Security Strategy reads like a needless pickaxe to America’s European alliances while offering a transactional “reset” with Russia that risks trading long-standing democratic commitments and regional stability for short-term political and economic convenience.
Morning Brief: Deadly Shooting at Brown, Gabbard’s Afghanistan Vetting Warning, Bangladesh Peacekeepers Killed in Abyei, and Gaza Power Struggles After Ceasefire
From Kabul evac fallout to a deadly ambush in Abyei and the mess of armed factions in Gaza, these stories all point to the same truth: rushed decisions and fragile ceasefires always get paid for by people standing post. Whether it’s Guard troops at home, peacekeepers abroad, or IDF units hunting bomb-makers, the work is still dirty, dangerous, and done without applause.
Evening Brief: Washington Flood Response, Army National Guard 388th Birthday, Ukraine Power Grid Attack, and UK Military Intelligence Overhaul
Floods in Washington, a brutal drone-and-missile strike in Ukraine, and a new UK intel superstructure all point to the same truth: when things go sideways, it’s the quiet professionals on watch, on shift, and on the ground who keep people alive. And on the Army National Guard’s 388th birthday, the message is simple: everyone loves the Guard the moment the mission gets real, because these citizen-soldiers show up, do the unsexy work, and hold the line.
ISIS Kills Two US Soldiers and an American Interpreter in Syria
Gunfire cracked a routine engagement into chaos outside Palmyra, killing two U.S. soldiers and a civilian interpreter and proving that even stripped of territory, ISIS still knows how to reach out and draw blood.
From Medal of Honor to Mandatory Safety Briefs: The True Story of Pvt. Joe Snuffy
A tired old NCO, explaining that Pvt. Joe Snuffy is both a real-deal WWII Medal of Honor badass and the eternal, cross-branch screwup whose chaos fuels every safety brief, empowers the E-4 Mafia, and keeps NCOs living on Motrin, Tums, and pure frustration.
The Bolduc Brief: Analyzing the U.S. National Security Strategy Under the Trump Administration
Trump’s National Security Strategy isn’t isolationism, it’s a hard pivot toward a narrower, transactional worldview where borders and identity politics drive the threat picture, “Western civilization” becomes a tribal banner, and allies are left wondering if they’re partners or just the next line item to be renegotiated.
SOFREP Cartoon: The Japan Factor Beijing Can’t Ignore
Japan’s commitments to Taiwan may stay deliberately foggy, but every new missile battery on the Ryukyus and every long-range purchase order in Tokyo forces Beijing to price Japan into the opening moves, because the “Taiwan problem” stops looking like a solo raid and starts reading like an alliance-triggered brawl.
Portable Morale: How Pin-Ups Went to War
Pin-up art did not start in WWII, but the war turned it into a morale weapon. From magazine centerfolds to bomber noses, these images reminded troops what “home” looked like, gave crews unit identity, and rode shotgun as lucky charms. The women in the pictures and the women painting them were part of the wartime machine.
Morning Brief: Grey Bull’s Venezuela Exfil, Peru’s K2 Tank Buy, and Ukraine’s Security Service Alpha Caspian Strike
Grey Bull Rescue founder Bryan Stern exfiltrated Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado in a donor-backed operation that treated high risk like routine. Meanwhile, Peru is buying K2 tanks and K808 armored vehicles from South Korea, and Ukraine’s SBU Alpha is linked in open-source reporting to a long-range drone strike claim against Russia’s Filanovsky Caspian oil infrastructure.
