State of The Nation

  Large Language Models in Autonomous Weapons and the Coming Fratricide Incident Proceedings U.S. Naval Institute  |  Analysis & Commentary Vol. 152  |  June 2026 Technology & Weapons Systems Autonomous Systems & Artificial Intelligence The Department of Defense is integrating Large Language Models into autonomous weapons architectures faster than testing methodology exists to validate them. The specific failure modes of LLMs — hallucination, non-determinism, helpfulness-driven completion of missing data, and prompt injection vulnerability — are not engineering defects that will be resolved through iteration. They are properties of the architecture. A fratricide incident is not a risk to be managed. It is a timeline to be shortened or lengthened by the decisions made in the next eighteen months. Stephen L. Pendergast, IEEE Sr. Member (Ret.)  |  Senior ...

CVN-NEXT and the Lessons NAVSEA Keeps Not Learning Proceedings U.S. Naval Institute  |  Analysis & Commentary Surface Warfare / Acquisition The Navy is reviewing the design of its next two carriers before contracts are awarded — an admission that the Ford class as built is not what the Navy needs going forward. History suggests the review will produce incremental fixes where architectural reform is required. Stephen L. Pendergast, LT USNR, IEEE Sr. Member (Ret.)  |  Senior Engineer Scientist May 2026 Sources: USNI, CRS, GAO, DOT&E, NAVSEA BLUF — Bottom Line Up Front The Navy's April 2026 announcement of a design review for CVN-82 and CVN-83 — the fifth and sixth Ford-class carriers, not yet under contract — is a tacit acknowledgment that a program delivered $2.5 billion over budget with 23 unproven technologies, persistent EMALS and AAG unreliability, habit...

  Defense & Strategic Studies ◆ May 2026 Nuclear Strategy  /  European Security  /  Geopolitics De Gaulle's Defiance and Its Modern Vindication How the American betrayal of Britain after World War II, and the fire it caused at Windscale, taught France that nuclear dependency is nuclear vulnerability—and why Europe is now betting its survival on that lesson By analysis staff  ·  Peer-reviewed sourcing  ·  May 14, 2026 Bottom Line Up Front France's insistence on a fully sovereign, nationally controlled nuclear deterrent—a doctrine forged by General Charles de Gaulle from the compounded evidence of American betrayal of Britain and France's own humiliation at Suez—has evolved from Cold War eccentricity into Europe's most consequential strategic asset. The chain of causation is precise and documented: the U.S. McMahon Act of 1946 locked Britain out of the nuclear partnership both nations had built together ...