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The Pentagon’s Drone Revolution Starts With Soldiers

Welcome to The Iron Triangle, the Cipher Brief column serving Procurement Officers tasked with buying the future, Investors funding the next generation of defense technology, and the Policy Wonks [...] More

The Bells are Ringing Again, and This Time Sweden is Inside the Alliance

On August 25, CIA Director John Ratcliffe landed in Moscow. He met Russian officials, warned them against attacking NATO, raised Moscow’s support for Iran, and flew home. Allies and Kyiv were briefed [...] More

More from Joey Gagnard

The Gulf Bought Its Air Defense From Kyiv. We Sold Them The Radar.

Chief Warrant Officer 5 (Ret.) Joey Gagnard concluded nearly three decades of service in the U.S. military, retiring from the special operations [...] More

How About Equipping Local Law Enforcement with a Better Anti-Drone Arsenal?

During the week of March 9, drones came over Barksdale Air Force Base in waves. Barksdale is the home of the 2nd Bomb Wing, one of the places this [...] More

The New Fault Line: Israel and Turkey on a Collision Course

On March 25, 2025, Israeli aircraft struck a set of Syrian airfields. The targets were not Syrian assets, instead they were the sites Turkey had [...] More

America’s Export Controls Are Becoming a Strategic Liability

Welcome to The Iron Triangle, the Cipher Brief column serving Procurement Officers tasked with buying the future, Investors funding the next [...] More

The West Needs to Prepare for a Russian Defeat in Ukraine

We are good at winning wars and generally bad at what comes after. Far from a partisan observation; this is a pattern with receipts. We removed [...] More
Defense Department Showcases Multi-Domain Autonomous Display In Pentagon's Courtyard

Can the Pentagon’s New Innovation System Deliver?

Five months after Secretary Hegseth's sweeping innovation overhaul, the Pentagon's new acquisition architecture is beginning to take shape—but key [...] More

Sweden and Denmark are in a Position of Power Over Russia

Two straits, six thousand kilometers apart, are defining the global balance of power in 2026. The first, Hormuz, is closed by force and heavily [...] More

A Bridge Too Small: Why $49 Billion Can’t Fix a $1.5 Trillion Problem

Welcome to The Iron Triangle, the Cipher Brief column serving Procurement Officers tasked with buying the future, Investors funding the next [...] More

America’s Drone Strategy Has a Supply Chain Problem

In this issue we will discuss implications of the Drone Dominance Program, how weakness in the U.S. industrial base has been laid bare, and how the [...] More