Latest news with #strategicdeterrence
Yahoo
4 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Northrop Grumman Corporation (NOC): A Bull Case Theory
We came across a bullish thesis on Northrop Grumman Corporation on Stock Analysis Compilation's Substack. In this article, we will summarize the bulls' thesis on NOC. Northrop Grumman Corporation's share was trading at $568.48 as of July 24th. NOC's trailing and forward P/E were 20.98 and 21.37 respectively according to Yahoo Finance. A security guard patrolling a defense facility, protecting critical technologies. Northrop Grumman Corporation stands as a mission-critical defense powerhouse, distinguished by unmatched technological leadership, deep government relationships, and a portfolio of long-cycle programs that create durable growth and shareholder value. As a premier global aerospace and defense company, Northrop Grumman has positioned itself as an indispensable partner to the U.S. Department of Defense and allied governments, with a strategic focus on space, strategic deterrence, and advanced digital capabilities. The company's enduring competitive moat is built on unrivaled expertise in highly specialized, restricted domains, particularly stealth technology, exemplified by its role as the prime contractor for the B-21 Raider, the next-generation strategic bomber. Such franchise programs provide exceptional revenue visibility and decades of sustainment, protected by formidable barriers to entry, including proprietary intellectual property, a cleared and highly skilled workforce, and decades of flawless execution on classified programs. Northrop Grumman's portfolio is tightly aligned with the most enduring and well-funded U.S. defense priorities, making it a direct beneficiary of secular defense spending trends and insulating it from the cyclical swings that affect more commoditized defense hardware. Its Space Systems segment plays a pivotal role in missile defense, satellite programs, and space exploration, while its Mission Systems segment leads in advanced cyber, electronic warfare, and command-and-control solutions. The company's predictable, robust free cash flow reflects the long-cycle nature of its programs and supports disciplined capital allocation, balancing reinvestment in technological leadership with shareholder returns through growing dividends and significant share repurchases. This combination positions Northrop Grumman as a uniquely resilient and elite enterprise at the forefront of the defense industry. Previously, we covered a bullish thesis on Northrop Grumman Corporation (NOC) by Daan Rijnberk in March 2025, which highlighted its leadership in stealth technology, strong backlog, and capital returns supported by rising defense spending. The stock has appreciated about 15% since as the thesis played out. The thesis still stands as defense demand visibility remains firm. Stock Analysis Compilation shares a similar but emphasizes unmatched technological leadership and deep government ties. Northrop Grumman Corporation is not on our list of the 30 Most Popular Stocks Among Hedge Funds. As per our database, 54 hedge fund portfolios held NOC at the end of the first quarter which was 54 in the previous quarter. While we acknowledge the potential of NOC as an investment, we believe certain AI stocks offer greater upside potential and carry less downside risk. If you're looking for an extremely undervalued AI stock that also stands to benefit significantly from Trump-era tariffs and the onshoring trend, see our free report on the best short-term AI stock. READ NEXT: 8 Best Wide Moat Stocks to Buy Now and 30 Most Important AI Stocks According to BlackRock. Disclosure: None. Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data


South China Morning Post
6 days ago
- Politics
- South China Morning Post
Talisman Sabre: Australia, US push Pacific deterrence amid China's security overtures
For the first time in its history, Australia 's flagship military exercise has moved beyond its own shores, drawing in Pacific island nations as Canberra and Washington push to 'regionalise' strategic deterrence across the Indo-Pacific. Neighbouring Papua New Guinea (PNG) is hosting parts of this year's Talisman Sabre exercise , which began on July 13 and runs until August 4, with activities involving Australian and US troops. 'This is an important demonstration of the deepening integration between Australia and Papua New Guinea's Defence Forces', senior Australian naval officer Vice-Admiral Justin Jones said in a statement, referring to the two countries' militaries. This year's iteration of Talisman Sabre, featuring more than 30,000 personnel from 19 nations, is the largest in the exercise's history. A French servicemen wears a badge displaying the emblem of the 2025 Talisman Sabre exercise aboard the French patrol vessel Auguste Benebig in Sydney on July 13. Photo: AFP Military contingents from Fiji Tonga and a host of other partners – including Canada, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Japan, New Zealand, the Philippines, Singapore, South Korea, Thailand and Britain – are taking part in a series of complex drills encompassing live-fire exercises, air combat and maritime operations such as amphibious landings.

RNZ News
16-07-2025
- Politics
- RNZ News
'Building deterrence': PNG to host part of Australia's largest military exercise
(l-r) HMAS Canberra and USS Rafael Peralta conduct maritime manoeuvres off the coast of Queensland, during Exercise Talisman Sabre 2021. Photo: Talisman Sabre / LSIS Ernesto Sanchez For the first time, Papua New Guinea will host a training activity as part of Australia's largest military exercise, which one Pacific defence expert says is about "building strategic deterrence" in the region. Exercise Talisman Sabre , which began its eleventh iteration on 13 July, has over 30,000 personnel from 19 countries taking part, including Papua New Guinea, Fiji and Tonga. The war-fighting exercise involves live-fire drills, air combat and maritime operations, including amphibious landings. Massey University's associate professor in defence and security studies Anna Powles told Pacific Waves that the exercise is taking place during a period of "really unprecedented geopolitical tensions in the Indo-Pacific". "There is a very strong sense amongst a number of those countries participating, particularly Australia and the United States and others, that the Indo-Pacific may well become the location for conflict in the near future," she said. "These types of exercises, including those smaller Pacific militaries in the exercise, is all about building strategic deterrence across the region." On Saturday, the Financial Times reported that US defence official Elbridge Colby asked for clarification from Australia and Japan about what role they would play if the US and China went to war over Taiwan. Australia's Acting Defence Minister Pat Conroy told the ABC that he would not "engage in hypotheticals" or "disclose confidential discussions". Powles said Exercise Talisman Sabre was also significant for the Pacific because of Papua New Guinea hosting part of the event. She said it is becoming increasingly common to include the defence forces of Papua New Guinea, Tonga and Fiji in such bilateral combined training activities, noting they also participate in New Zealand's Exercise Southern Katipo. "What we are seeing increasingly now is a growing sense of wanting to include, like-minded defence partners in these exercises, such as exercise Talisman Sabre, because it is part of growing capabilities and interoperability with Pacific countries." She said relationships between the Pacific Island defence forces and those of Australia and New Zealand have been longstanding.
Yahoo
14-07-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
Dyess Airmen train for combat readiness at Peterson SFB
PETERSON SPACE FORCE BASE, Colorado () – Aircrews and maintainers from the 28th Bomb Squadron recently completed a training exercise at Peterson Space Force Base, Colorado, as part of ongoing efforts to sustain readiness for Air Force Global Strike Command. Flying out of Peterson SFB, the Dyess-based B-1B Lancers supported initial qualification, re-qualification, and instructor upgrade training, ensuring aircrews maintain combat capability across multiple skill levels. 'It's a mindset change': Retired major general outlines nuclear future for Dyess with arrival of B-21 The exercise was made possible with vital assistance from the 28th Bomber Generation Squadron, whose maintainers enabled the squadron to execute operations seamlessly from the off-station location. Training in unfamiliar environments is essential to preparing aircrews for real-world missions. The exercise reinforces Air Force Global Strike Command's commitment to providing safe, secure, and effective strategic deterrence—anytime, anywhere. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.


Russia Today
07-07-2025
- Politics
- Russia Today
Forget nukes. This is Russia's new deterrence weapon
Just before dawn on November 21, 2024, a fireball streaked across the sky over the Dnieper River. It wasn't a meteor. It wasn't a drone. The explosion that followed – precise, deep, and eerily silent on the surface – tore through the massive Yuzhmash defense facility in southeastern Ukraine. Footage of the strike spread within hours, picked apart by open-source analysts and intelligence services alike. But it wasn't until Russian President Vladimir Putin confirmed it that the world had a name for what it had witnessed: Oreshnik – a new kind of Russian ballistic missile. Capable of reaching speeds above Mach 10, surviving reentry temperatures of 4,000C, and delivering kinetic force that rivals tactical nuclear weapons, the Oreshnik isn't just fast. It's different. In less than a year, it has moved from classified prototype to serial production, with confirmed plans for forward deployment in Belarus by the end of 2025. Its emergence suggests that Russia is rewriting the rules of strategic deterrence – not with treaty-breaking escalation, but with something quieter, subtler, and potentially just as decisive. So what exactly is the Oreshnik missile? Where did it come from, what are its capabilities – and how might it reshape the battlefield? RT explains what's known so far about Russia's latest breakthrough in non-nuclear strategic weaponry. The missile that struck the Yuzhmash facility in Dnepropetrovsk (known in Ukraine as Dnipro) left behind no scorched landscape, no flattened perimeter. Instead, analysts examining satellite imagery noted a narrow impact zone, structural collapse below ground level, and almost surgical surface disruption. It wasn't the scale of destruction that stood out – it was its shape. This signature pointed to something new. According to available data and expert observations, the Oreshnik carries a cluster-type penetrative warhead, likely composed of multiple high-density submunitions. The detonation occurs only after the payload burrows into its target – a design meant to maximize internal damage to hardened military infrastructure. Putin has stated that Oreshnik's warheads can withstand reentry temperatures up to 4,000C. To survive such heat and remain stable at terminal speed, the payload would need to be encased in advanced composite materials – likely drawing on recent developments in heat-resistant ceramics and carbon-carbon structures used in hypersonic glide vehicles. One of the defining features of the system is its ability to maintain hypersonic velocity during the final phase of flight. Unlike traditional ballistic warheads that decelerate as they descend, Oreshnik reportedly retains speeds exceeding Mach 10, possibly Mach 11, even in dense atmospheric layers. This enables it to strike with massive kinetic energy, increasing penetration and lethality without requiring a large explosive charge. At such speeds, even a non-nuclear warhead becomes a strategic weapon. A concentrated high-velocity impact is enough to destroy command bunkers, radar sites, or missile silos. The weapon's effectiveness doesn't rely on blast radius, but on precise, high-energy delivery. That makes it both harder to detect and harder to intercept. In doctrinal terms, Oreshnik represents a new category: A non-nuclear strategic ballistic missile. It occupies the space between conventional long-range strike systems and nuclear ICBMs – with enough reach, speed, and impact to alter battlefield calculations, but without crossing the nuclear threshold. Though the Oreshnik missile system entered the public spotlight in 2024, its technological roots trace back decades. The architecture, design philosophy, and even its name follow a lineage shaped by one institution: The Moscow Institute of Thermal Technology (MITT). Founded during the Cold War to develop advanced solid-fueled missile systems, MITT has long been responsible for some of Russia's most sophisticated mobile strategic platforms. These include the Temp-2S, Pioner, and later, the Topol family – Russia's first mobile intercontinental ballistic missiles. The naming convention has remained surprisingly consistent over the years. Most of MITT's missiles are named after trees: Topol (Poplar), Topol-M, Osina (Aspen), Yars (a type of ash), Kedr (Cedar). The new system, Oreshnik (Hazel), fits within that tradition – both symbolically and organizationally. Analysts believe that the Oreshnik may be based in part on the RS-26 Rubezh, a mobile ICBM developed by MITT and tested from 2011 to 2015. The RS-26 was essentially a shortened version of the Yars ICBM, designed to deliver high-precision strikes at intermediate ranges. Development was quietly paused in the mid-2010s – likely in response to the constraints of the INF Treaty, which prohibited land-based missiles with ranges of 500-5,500km. That treaty is no longer in force. After the US formally withdrew in 2019, Russia was free to resume development in a domain that had been frozen for decades. The appearance of Oreshnik just five years later suggests that its core components – propulsion systems, targeting modules, and mobile chassis – were already well advanced. What began as a one-off operational strike has since evolved into a full-scale weapons program. In June 2025, during a meeting with graduates of Russia's top military academies, Putin announced that the Oreshnik missile system had entered serial production. 'This weapon has proven itself extremely effective in combat conditions, and in a very short time,' he stated. The speed of this transition – from battlefield debut to mass production – is notable. It suggests that both the missile system and its supporting infrastructure had been maturing quietly in the background, likely building off earlier research conducted under the RS-26 program. Even more significant than the production itself is the plan for forward deployment. On July 2, 2025, during an Independence Day gathering in Minsk, Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko publicly confirmed that the first Oreshnik units would be stationed on in Belarus by the end of the year. 'We agreed with Putin in Volgograd,' Lukashenko said. 'The first Oreshnik positions will be in Belarus. You've seen how this system performs. It will be here before the year is out.' The move carries both logistical logic and strategic weight. Belarus has long provided heavy-duty mobile chassis for Russian missile systems – including the one used by Oreshnik. That industrial synergy makes Minsk a natural hub for deployment, but this is more than technical convenience. With a minimum range of 800km and a maximum reportedly almost 5,500, the Oreshnik stationed in Belarus would place virtually all of Central and Western Europe within reach. For Russia, it represents a non-nuclear forward deterrent. For NATO, it introduces a new class of threat – one that is fast, precise, and difficult to intercept, yet remains below the threshold of nuclear retaliation. In practical terms, this also opens the door to a possible joint Russian-Belarusian command structure for missile operations outside Russian territory – a development that would further formalize military integration between the two states. For decades, the term 'strategic weapon' has been synonymous with nuclear arms – tools of last resort, deployed not for use but for deterrence. Oreshnik changes that equation. By combining intercontinental reach, hypersonic speed, and precision penetrative capability, the system introduces a new tier of force: One that sits below the nuclear threshold, but far above conventional long-range artillery or cruise missiles. Unlike nuclear warheads, Oreshnik's payloads can be used without inviting global condemnation or risking escalation beyond control. Yet their destructive potential – especially against hardened military targets or critical infrastructure – makes them a credible tool of strategic coercion. This is the core of what we can call a 'non-nuclear deterrence doctrine': The ability to achieve battlefield or political objectives through advanced conventional systems that mimic the strategic impact of nuclear weapons – without crossing the line. In this emerging framework, Oreshnik is not just a missile. It is a prototype of future war logic: Fast enough to strike before detection, survivable enough to evade interception, and powerful enough to shape decisions before war even begins.