*A Pentagon watchdog report found that in the roughly two years since it was built, an ammunition plant in Mesquite, Texas, has not produced any parts for 155mm artillery rounds, hindering the Army’s goal to help backfill stocks of ammunition provided to Ukraine after Russia invaded in 2022. *
*Over the past four years, the Pentagon depleted its inventory of 155mm artillery by 3.6 million rounds, according to the report. The report does not note how many rounds are in the stockpile. *
More than 3 million rounds were given to Ukraine through weapons packages committed by the Biden administration. Roughly 112,000 rounds were used for training and testing, and another 218,000 were sold to other countries.
The Defense Department’s aim was to produce 100,000 rounds a month of 155 mm shells by October 2025. But as of March, the Army was producing only about 36,000 rounds per month, the DOD inspector general said in a new report. The current shortfall stems largely from the failure of a $469 million contractor-operated plant in Mesquite, Texas, to produce a single shell meeting Army specifications, the IG said.
More crappy defense products like F-35 & Gerald Ford aircraft carrier. I understand the US Navy is looking at producing a Trump class battleship.
Ludicrous
4 Likes
Wall Street’s short-term incentives have decimated our defense industrial base and undermined our national security.
Americans invented the telephone business and until recently dominated production and research. But in the last 20 years, every single American producer of key telecommunication equipment sectors is gone. Today, only two European makers—Ericsson and Nokia—are left to compete with Huawei and another Chinese competitor, ZTE.
This story of lost American leadership and production is not unique. In fact, the destruction of America’s once vibrant military and commercial industrial capacity in many sectors has become the single biggest unacknowledged threat to our national security. Because of public policies focused on finance instead of production, the United States increasingly cannot produce or maintain vital systems upon which our economy, our military, and our allies rely. Huawei is just a particularly prominent example.
China has taken over EV manufacturing.
Soon AI will follow.
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/07/20/technology/china-us-ai-race.html
Chinese companies are offering artificial intelligence that is nearly as good as the leading U.S. technologies, but it’s still America’s race to lose.
In recent weeks, China has appeared to erode that sizable lead. The competition came into sharper focus last week when a Chinese start-up released a system nearly as powerful as the leading American technologies but costing a lot less.
2 Likes
We literally just shuttered a plant for telecom materials supply. The sole customer finally closed up shop.
I hear the tariffs are making great progress, tho!
1 Like