Author: Braxton Taylor

What is your gut reaction to the image below?Interest? Appreciation? Fascination?The POF-USA Tombstone 9mm is an extreme example, but it’s what you might call the logical conclusion of a much larger trend. It’s hard to say whether there’s a renewed interest in lever guns or the interest never really faded in the first place, but tricked-out, tactical, or otherwise modern models *are *new—and they appear to be here to stay.A Growing TrendMany signal their embrace of modern enhancements by blacking out the lever gun’s traditional wood stock and steel barrel. The first of these that I recall was the Rossi…

Updated: 6:51 p.m. ET.The White House says it has proposed the first trillion-dollar defense budget, but some senators and budget analysts aren’t buying it. “For Defense spending, the President proposes an increase of 13 percent to $1.01 trillionfor FY 2026,” White House budget director Russell Vought wrote in a May 2 letter to Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, who leads the Senate Appropriations Committee. That number includes funds that would come from outside of the normal budget-request process. In his letter, Vought wrote that “a portion of these increases” would be provided under the reconciliation legislation that House legislators are working on. That…

Come spring, most hunters are acutely aware of ticks—those little arachnids that seemingly fall from the sky once the weather warms and the leaves green up. Out West, the common Rocky Mountain wood ticks aren’t much to worry about (though they do still carry and transmit disease), but Midwest and Eastern hunters are all too aware of the tiny blacklegged variety of ticks that can carry life-crippling Lyme disease.Now, their range might be expanding. Last fall, a hunter in eastern Montana pulled a tick off his bird dog, but noticed it looked a little different than the area’s usual wood…

The latest iteration of the Army’s Project Convergence imagined that the National Training Center at Fort Irwin, Calif., had been captured by an enemy force, with the Army, Navy, Marine Corps, Air Force, and Space Force joining to take it back.Unmanned boats swarmed enemy ships off San Diego. Unmanned and manned aircraft blew up enemy air-defense positions. U.S. satellites used electromagnetic attacks to scramble enemy satellites. Long-range missiles hit enemy positions on the base itself just before troops dropped in from helicopters and rolled in with ground vehicles, under cover of attack helicopters. Then forces had to turn around and…

When people say they need to get faster at running, it can mean multiple types of running workouts required to build a base of endurance, a set mile pace and sprinting as fast as possible. The confusion with training often follows suggestions made to new runners about increasing speed. Speed is relative to the goal you have in front of you.The workouts below will help you differentiate the types of goals and training protocols to help you:How to Improve Your Mile PaceIf you want to ace a timed run over the 1.5- to three-mile distances used in most military running…

The China Intelligence is an occasional series that draws on open-source material to report on China and its military.Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) are reshaping modern warfare—from the battlefields of Ukraine to the contested skies over the South China Sea—and spurring Beijing to upgrade its counter-drone capabilities aggressively. Recent demonstrations featuring high-power microwave systems and AI-assisted autonomous interceptors reveal an evolving PLA strategy designed to neutralize mass drone swarms and first-person-view (FPV) attack drones. China now appears to be adopting a multi-layered defense approach that integrates electronic warfare, directed-energy weapons, and AI-driven interception systems, combining both kinetic and non-kinetic solutions.The successful and varied…

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The concealed carry market continues to gather much interest. From compact, snub-nosed revolvers to double-stack 1911s with double-digit magazine capacities, there is something here for anyone who wants to have a defensive handgun on them wherever and whenever possible.  Beretta | 80X Cheetah Tactical UrbanA threaded barrel and an extended, 15-round magazine add versatility to this proven platform. Put a suppressor on it for safe and comfortable range work, and carry it with the thread protector on for a reliable CCW pistol on your hip. ▶Vertec frame▶Frame-mounted decocker/safety▶Reversible magazine release▶Interchangeable grip panels SpecificationsCaliber: .380 ACPMagazine Capacity: 15 roundsBarrel Length: 4.4…

SAN FRANCISCO — In his first major discussion as the top cybersecurity official in the National Security Council, Alexei Bulazel said he wants to normalize the use of offensive cyber activity as a tool of U.S. national power.At the RSAC Conference here, Bulazel — a former NSC cyber policy director in President Donald Trump’s first term — told an audience of cybersecurity practitioners that the U.S. “could respond in-kind” to cyberattacks from China and other adversaries that have targeted various critical infrastructure systems across the nation.He said the U.S. could “punch back” and argued that earlier administrations had been more…

As predicted last month, President Trump’s White House will propose a trillion-dollar national security budget for the upcoming fiscal year, Bloomberg reported Thursday. Read over early budget documents posted Friday by the White House here. Trump’s budget would amount to a 13% rise in defense spending, which his team hopes will be coupled with a 23% cut to civilian spending. A note on procedure: White House spending proposals traditionally kick off annual budget negotiations, though Congress often goes its own way on a variety of issues that may not align perfectly with policymakers’ or appropriators’ goals. This year, Republicans control both the…