Core defence spending for 2027 ~€109bn in 2027 (~£93bn or $124bn) and total defence-related spending including Ukraine/security items ~€130bn (~£111bn or $148bn) www.reuters.com/business/ger...

And yet when it comes to Eurobonds or most other forms of common European borrowing (so that other countries who can't get good terms on their loans for defence can do re-armament for the good of all of Europe) Germany is 'NEIN, NEIN, NEIN, borrowing is a sin!!' www.ft.com/content/7287...

QED how France does things.

Nice, very nice. Denmark 🇩🇰 did the right thing in the first place by tasking Air Greenland 🇬🇱 for surveillance, SAR support, inspection & transport missions across 🇬🇱, Arctic & North Atlantic. And now PAL Aerospace 🇨🇦 (a specialist in the domain) helping with that palaerospace.com/greenland-mi...

Yet another British origin company gone and with it IP matters, export and integration stuff, all gone. Yes UK has some regulatory and security veto/control rights but sovereign industrial control is gone. It's like the sale of DBD to Renk last week but worse, given what Ultra Maritime does.

Democrats in US should be doing hardball stuff with pro-democracy effects at the system level. In the sense that it's not enough to win power, like it's been demonstrated with both Obama and Biden. You have to force the opposition to change, esp after Trumpism cult

Could be party-system reform by constitutional means. If successful and Fidesz become a normal party, rather than Orbanism cult, in about 3-4 elections from now change it back to no limits (after consultation and comparative review, etc, etc) with majority that includes new Fidesz

The irony of Trump calling FIFA to overturn a red card for Balogun because he knows the U.S. can’t win without Balogun, who only qualifies for the U.S. team because of birthright citizenship, which Trump just tried to overturn.

Nobody understands Hungarian other than Hungarians.

So basically Japanese-linked vessels think Iranian clearance is safer/more reliable than trying to use the Omani/US-backed route without Tehran’s consent. Surely there's a fee involved as well www.reuters.com/world/asia-p...

🔥🛢️Right now, Ukrainian drone attack Russia’s Omsk Oil Refinery, located around 2,500 km from the front line. This is Russia’s largest refinery, with a processing capacity of around 21 million tons of crude oil per year — almost 8% of the country’s total oil refining.

China wants everybody to know that its sea based nuclear deterrent is real @m514ever.bsky.social

Spain never stopped the re-armament plan, just did it as industrial policy. The umpteenth reason why myopically looking at % GDP all the time is stupid. Italy is the same

Related: Poland internal politics drama is going to be exhausting from now till Nov 2027. It's like US, there's hardly any period between elections where it's not campaigning and positioning for next elections.

FINCANTIERI 🇮🇹 becoming an underwater operator as well. Nice bit of industrial policy www.fincantieri.com/en/newsroom/...

This is why we call it the Extremely Large Telescope! This photo shows the massive, 39-metre-diameter structure that will hold the main mirror of our ELT.   798 mirror segments will sit here, working together as a single mirror, in what will be the biggest optical telescope on Earth. 🔭 🧪 1/3

This was so good as usual with @justin-br0nk.bsky.social. Going into detail about why Gripens are important for Ukraine, why Meteor that comes with Gripen matters and what's the situation on the ground in Ukraine. People who really know their stuff can explain it clearly

Is the hacking new? Or is the news here that stuff is out for sale on the dark web? There was reporting in June on Fortinet FortiGate firewalls/VPN appliances being compromised and on SantaAd trying to sell FortiGate VPN data www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2026/07...

Germans new EV subsidy is succeeding to rekindle the market whilst helping to support ....China's, not Germany's own, EV production. Germany failed to equip its new EV subsidy scheme with buy-EU/buy-ally clause a few months ago - a stunning own goal. Oops 1/

This article is complete wrong. Even the gutter Brexit-y press in its heyday might would have blushed at lying like this, about Europe, about France, blaming others for what is a UK sour grapes. 5 people + an editor on this article 🧵 www.ft.com/content/9077...

Meta conducted a secretive program that directed hundreds of contractors to pose as teenagers while bombarding its competitors’ AI models with disturbing prompts ranging from suicide to cannibalism futurism.com/artificial-i...

Some of you are still posting about politics and I need you to understand that Bluesky is now a Cabo Verde stan platform thank you for your attention

I didn't realise until now that we need Julia reporting more, much more on NATO. From Brussels. Let's get all the dish and the thing that doesn't get reported. Clearly everybody is happy talking to her.

This is the massive 700000 sqm factory that PLD Space 🇪🇸wants to build for its rockets. www.informacion.es/economia/202...

Now apparently it's for real (early ECB exit). Unclear what role in the presidential campaign www.politico.eu/article/chri...

My European Rockets page has been refreshed. It’s still a work in progress, but it now serves as a much more comprehensive overview. And yes, the image does need to be changed. That's on my snag list. If you have any suggestions, let me know. europeanspaceflight.com/european-roc...

RFA ONE Block 2 hardware! This is the largest component of the future variant, the first stage tank, which the company says was recently completed by its supplier, ZEPPELIN, and delivered to RFA. The RFA ONE Block 2 rocket will feature a reusable first stage. Video credit: RFA

Peter Harrell, who is great on trade stuff now has a substack peterharrell.substack.com/p/america-at...

Past caring Sorry to say this on the eve of a national celebration, which is about all the people not just the current bullies running the country...but we are where we are

This is formal Commission proposal to designate five cross-border defence-industrial programmes as 'common interest' projects under EDIP, making them eligible for EU seed funding and future EU-level support. 🧵

Why Stephan Miran's justification of Trump's tariffs puts the U.S. in the untenable (and unsustainable) position of the world's robber baron. My latest www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/t...

Have at it people. Inspired by the Tyler Cowen Emergent Ventures model with funding coming 90% from foundations/charitable funds, the rest from individuals mostly UK-based. Not purely British funding but that doesn't matter britishprogress.org/news/fast-gr...

Dublin system for dealing with migration wasn't efficient at all! New system (Asylum and Migration Management Regulation) kicked in 1 July 2026. We'll see in a year's time what changed ec.europa.eu/eurostat/en/...

Nice to get the full assembly video! Kourou can theoretically do this every 15 days if there were all the parts available for an Ariane 64 every 15 days (currently only 11/year). www.youtube.com/watch?v=7FfR... @transport.esa.int

9/ The share of intermediate inputs used by EU manufacturing sectors that originate in China either directly of indirectly varies by sector. China supplies about a third of the foreign intermediate inputs used in machinery and motor vehicles.

Great post on outsample.substack.com/p/china-supp...

Not sure I understand why PM/govt of Moldova fell. Maia Sandu has a press conference in a few minutes so we’ll see

NICE Raising the cost effectiveness threshold - increases average cost per treatment was part of that USA/UK pharma deal. NHS funds are finite so approving more expensive drugs means less money for other services. www.gov.uk/government/n...

“According to DOT&E Action Officers, the significant workforce reductions resulted in them being assigned more programs, programs in warfare areas for which they lack subject matter expertise, or both" breakingdefense.com/2026/06/rece...

Good interview with Attal www.youtube.com/watch?v=5I4x...

Why must we live in the era of stupid headlines and article titles? The article is about how liberals should not cede 'natural law', 'the common good' or moral constitutional language to conservatives (like Vermeule, for ex) www.newyorker.com/news/the-led...

Good interview from the spokesperson for the Attal campaign www.crif.org/articles/ent...

Nothing surprising in what McSweeney acknowledges here but good to see it acknowledged anyway. If only to underscore what follows, with another team that will be ill prepared for power www.dailymail.com/news/article...

Finally @justin-br0nk.bsky.social can write articles about Gripen and Ukraine in the present tense! Achievement unlocked www.calibredefence.co.uk/what-does-th...

Deskilling happens horrifyingly fast and is really difficult to reverse!

France does defence funding via 7y piece of legislation called LPM (Loi de Programmation Militaire), the most current version of which runs 2024-2030. LPM can be upgraded at any point and it was indeed upgraded by €36bn for the next 4y just the other day DIP was also published the other day SO...

‼️ Lots of interesting graphs and tables in this new IISS report on the drone overflights 'campaign' in Europe. The analysts have for instance attempted to match incidents with the paths of various shadow fleet vessels - see examples ⬇️ 🔗 www.iiss.org/research-pap...