Two days ago we reported that Blackstone was selling its stakes in a trio of data centers across Northern Virginia for $3.5 billion, cashing out of part of a bet it made less than three years ago. According to Bloomberg, Digital Realty Trust would pay $1.2 billion of cash and offer $2.3 billion of its shares (which the PE giant has largely cashed in by now) to Blackstone funds; in exchange, the data center company will acquire Blackstone’s 80% interest in two 96-megawatt data centers in Manassas, Virginia, and a 50% interest in a 96-megawatt center in nearby Sterling. We said that "the question is why did Blackstone decide to pull the cord now, just as fresh doubts are creeping whether the Mag 7s will continue funding the AI expansion with virtually unlimited capex." Two days later we have an answer.

The digital ink is barely dry on its Virginia data center sales, and we learn that Blackstone’s QTS (QTS Realty Trust) is again quietly fading its AI exposure by walking away from plans to build its portion (which at this point is the only portion left after its partner already pulled out days ago) of a 2,100-acre data center campus in Virginia - also known as Prince William Digital Gateway which would house as many as 37 data-center buildings - handing a win to residents who fought for years to topple the project. The data center developer had planned to transform more than 800 acres in Northern Virginia’s Prince William County, a project that would have spanned 22 million square feet, making it the largest data center campus in the world. Located on the edge of an historic Civil War battlefield and on what used to be land protected from development, the project ignited strong pushback from homeowners and has been stalled by lawsuits.

As part of Wall Street’s broader push into data centers, investment has poured into Northern Virginia, which is considered the country’s largest data center market, and is better known as "Data Center Alley". But in a strategic U-turn, in recent days QTS executives decided that it isn’t worth pressing forward in court, the Bloomberg sources said. The firm’s attorneys plan to inform the court of their decision as soon as this week, the people said, asking not to be named discussing non-public information. QTS’s rapid growth has made it a poster child of how private equity has fueled the data center industry’s breakneck expansion. Those ambitions are colliding with public anxiety over strains to electricity grids and home prices from AI data centers. The retreat may be the final blow to Virginia’s “Digital Gateway” project, a mega site roughly twice the size of New York’s Central Park with city-sized power needs. The initiative was supposed to bring in some $100 billion in spending and create one of the world’s largest technology corridors. Not any more. The project had sparked contentious, drawn-out public hearings. A clerical blunder related to a key zoning meeting created setbacks for developers. Already, Brookfield-backed Compass Datacenters, which was supposed to build on more than 800 acres at the site, had pulled out in May.

The U-turns by both firms, Bloomberg writes, amount to one of the most dramatic retreats by developers from a data center project. It’s a reminder of how tech firms’ race for the computing infrastructure to support AI advances is increasingly facing the same bottlenecks, from power shortages to supply crunches, we have been warning about for the past two years and which Citadel Securities warned about just yesterday. Organized opposition is mounting, forcing firms and developers to be more deliberate about where they choose to build. This is precisely what we warned one year ago would happen as more grassroots organizations pushed back against the relentless data center rollout. At least we haven't gotten to the arson stage (yet).

To account for the costs of such build outs, Virginia recently passed a budget with an energy consumption tax on data centers, and more states are threatening moratoriums on new development. Data centers - and how their costs and benefits are shared - are now emerging a major swing issue in the lead up to the US midterm elections. These hurdles raise questions for investors over whether the AI build out can keep going at this pace. For community organizers and residents that spent the last five years opposing the Digital Gateway, QTS’s pullout will now validate a playbook that involved pressure campaigns on local politicians and legal attacks. It will also unleash even more powerful blowback nationwide against these unwanted developments. As Bloomberg recalls, hundreds of proponents and critics showed up at a 27-hour zoning hearing in 2023 to lobby authorities on the project. After county officials narrowly voted to approve the conversion of agricultural and semi-rural land for data centers, community organizers and residents pursued lawsuits. The outcome of the meeting - and whether the county properly advertised the event - was at the center of legal challenges. The lawsuits hinged on one detail: The first two newspaper notices publicizing the hearing weren’t separated by at least six days, as state and local codes required at that time. While it is unclear if Blackstone agents had tried to "grease" the zoning board's palms to quietly fast-track the data center, in the end the outcome was catastrophic to the builders.

In March, Virginia courts upheld an earlier ruling that the zoning approvals were invalid because the public notices for the meeting fell short of rules. “While we still believe this project offered significant benefits for the region and our neighbors, recent legal actions and compounding regulatory hurdles have effectively closed a viable path forward,” Compass Datacenters President AJ Byers said in a statement following the ruling. After Compass bailed on the project, that left QTS as the lone developer. It was the only party that petitioned for an appeal of the case in Virginia’s Supreme Court. Originally, the firm’s executives were concerned about the prospect of setting a legal precedent on the back of an administrative oversight. After Compass’s retreat, QTS lost a partner who would share the costs of upgrading various utilities needed for the massive developments, said one of the people familiar with the matter. QTS decided it was not worth proceeding with the project.

Blackstone, which acquired QTS in 2021, is a major financier of data centers, with a portfolio of more than $150 billion of such assets around the world. The increasingly bitter political and grassroots pushback against new data center construction explains why Blackstone has been getting cold feet just as the AI bubble is peaking, first selling existing data centers and now walking away from upcoming projects. A recent Gallup poll found that 7 in 10 Americans oppose constructing data centers for artificial intelligence in their local area, including nearly half, 48%, who are strongly opposed. Barely a quarter favor these projects, with 7% strongly in favor. Half of opponents mention data centers’ excessive use of resources, including 18% each mentioning their use of water and energy. Sixteen percent mention a related environmental concern of pollution, including noise pollution and air and water pollution. About one in five opponents are concerned with the impact on local quality of life, including increased population, increased traffic and preferring that the land be used for other purposes. A similar share mention potentially negative economic consequences, including higher utility bills, cost-of-living increases, and the cost of building the data centers (which could involve the use of taxpayer funds). Most of the remaining opposition stems from general or specific concerns about artificial intelligence.

Blackstone, which manages more than $1.3 trillion, bills itself as the largest global provider of data centers, and also owns some of the utilities that power them. It acquired QTS in 2021 and bought Australian computing provider AirTrunk in 2024. In May, the firm held an initial public offering for Blackstone Digital Infrastructure Trust Inc., its data center acquisition vehicle, which aims to buy already built and leased properties benefiting from the artificial intelligence boom. And now that the protest movement knows how to push back against uninvited Wall Street occupants, thanks to the BlackStone capitulation, expect an exponential increase in legal (and other) attempts to hinder the rollout of data centers across the US, assuring that the AI supercycle, which is already years behind schedule with just half of the data centers meant to be built in progress and on time, will expect to see an avalanche of delays and cancellations assuring that the return on debt-funded capex will be even less as eventual launch dates gradually move ever further into the unknown future.

Soaring demand for rocket motors used to power missiles and other weapons has spurred new thinking about supply chains. Seeking big returns, Silicon Valley-style startups are now taking on defense companies that have long dominated the industry, pulled into the competition by a need for production speed, high volume and lower costs, according to 10 industry executives, experts and U.S officials interviewed by Reuters. The U.S. has plowed through over 50,000 rockets, missiles and other projectiles propelled by rocket motors since the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022 through the U.S. attack on Iran, Pentagon data shows. Washington is setting aside $53 billion and simplifying procurement rules to increase critical missile and rocket production. CEOs from Lockheed, Boeing and Raytheon parent RTX, among the largest military contractors, have warned that solid rocket motor shortages were hurting missile production. Now, defense entrepreneurs must prove they can deliver.

Pleasing the Pentagon brings huge benefits, including contracts with a government agency that has an annual budget of more than a trillion dollars and a seal of approval other governments want to see before buying from new contractors. But challenges are ahead. All the new entrants will need to produce enough of the new weapons to meet growing demand. Many new entrants are making rocket motors for existing missiles, some are making the entire missile, but none of the companies have scaled up production to replace legacy contractors. Legacy solid rocket motor makers Northrop Grumman and L3Harris said they have been pushing their own research and development to pull these new technologies like 3D printing and new mixing technologies.

FROM STEERING CARS TO STEERING MISSILES

California-based Castelion, which makes solid rocket motors and hypersonic weapons, turned to the auto industry for sophisticated electronic components used in advanced driver assistance systems and electric vehicles to help steer its missiles to targets. These auto industry processors, known as Field-Programmable Gate Arrays, can be bought at a tenth of the cost and obtained six times faster than comparable versions used in the aerospace industry, Chief Operating Officer Sean Pitt said. The oil and gas industry has been another important supply chain resource for Castelion. Rather than sourcing high-pressure metal tubes from aerospace vendors with long lead times, the company is using high-temperature, stress-rated precision machined tubes used to help crack open rocks in the fracking process. These tubes are built to handle heat and pressure levels comparable to what is required for a rocket motor, but are sold by far more vendors, at lower prices, than the aerospace industry equivalent, Pitt said. Castelion, recently valued at nearly $3 billion, has won big Pentagon contracts to make over 500 hypersonic weapons.

Mixing rocket motor propellant is another area of innovation for startup Anduril. The company, among the more successful recent defense industry entrants with several billion dollars of contracts under its belt, is using a pharmaceutical industry technique to mix chemicals used in rocket motors. Anduril, valued at $61 billion, has purchased Colorado-based FlackTek’s bladeless mixers capable of processing multi-hundred-kilogram propellant batches in minutes rather than hours. Anduril says the machine delivers more than a tenfold increase in production throughput compared to its previous mixing systems. The bladeless mixers produce more than 24 times the output of conventional industrial mixers, which are more like a giant kitchen mixer with paddles that require time for cleaning. The same bladeless centrifugal technology is used to produce precision compounds including liposome-based cancer treatments — applications where batch consistency and contamination control are as unforgiving as in weapons production.

Still, challenges lie ahead for new entrants trying to break into the solid rocket motor business. Tom Karako, director of the Missile Defense Project at the think tank Center for Strategic and International Studies, said they include “the painstaking, multi-step manufacturing process of casting, curing, baking, x-raying and sanding that solid-fuel rocket motors require — followed by rigorous inspection.” Curing ovens and X-ray equipment remain a bottleneck for the industry, Karako added.

3D PRINTING TO CUT PRODUCTION TIMES

Innovations have already had a dramatic impact on arms production. A 2024 case study from traditional rocket maker Northrop Grumman estimated that replacing conventionally machined metal tooling with 3-D printed polymer tools reduces the amount of time it takes to create a production line from roughly a year to about six weeks, enabling a new rocket motor to be developed from scratch much more quickly. X-Bow Systems is a New Mexico-based company that specializes in low-cost solid rocket motor (SRM) production through a process that utilizes 3D printing of propellants and motors. The technology has the potential to reduce the time and cost of SRM production drastically. X-Bow has also said it can shorten the creation of a new production line — which makes 3D printed motors — from a three- to six-year timeline to about 12 months. X-Bow already has a $191 million Pentagon contract for hundreds of solid rocket motors. Texas-based Firehawk Aerospace, founded in 2020, also uses 3D printing to manufacture SRMs at a fraction of the cost of traditional production methods. Firehawk says its manufacturing process cuts rocket fuel production time from up to 60 days to just 7 hours, at one-tenth the traditional cost. It enables custom designed missiles to be test-ready in a matter of months. Firehawk is backed by funding from venture capital firm 1789 Capital, a fund where President Donald Trump’s son is a partner.

Government purchasing patterns will always be a limiting factor for startups. The Pentagon has traditionally bought rocket quantities annually, resulting in unpredictable demand shifts from year to year. “How can we get good multi-year agreements that don’t roll off when administration changes?” said Lukas Czinger, CEO of Divergent Technologies, which makes parts for missiles. “That’s what businesses need to perform at low cost.”

The U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) says concerns it raised last year about the U.S. Navy’s E-130J Phoenix II program “have morphed into realities.” The timeline for moving from the development of the aircraft to putting it into actual production has already slipped by approximately one year. The E-130Js are set to supplant aging E-6B Mercury jets in support of the Take Charge And Move Out (TACAMO) mission. This involves providing aerial command and control support for nuclear ballistic missile submarines, including the ability to send them orders to launch strikes while they are submerged. Platforms tasked with nuclear support missions like TACAMO are commonly called ‘doomsday planes.’ GAO has provided a new update on the E-130J effort in its latest annual assessment of multiple high-profile U.S. military procurement programs. The Congressional watchdog released this report earlier today. In last year’s iteration of this report, GAO explicitly called into question the choice of C-130J-30 Hercules aircraft, a four-engine turboprop transport plane, as the basis for the E-130J, warning that it might “not meet operational availability requirements.” The existing 16 E-6B aircraft are based on the larger, jet-engined Boeing 707 airliner, which is now long out of production. It is important to note that the Mercury fleet also supports a U.S. Air Force nuclear mission set called the Airborne Command Post (ABNCP), and more commonly known by the nickname Looking Glass. In that role, the planes provide aerial command and control support to nuclear-capable bombers and silo-based Minuteman III intercontinental ballistic missiles. They are equipped to initiate the launch of Minuteman IIIs while in flight. The forthcoming Phoenix IIs will only be tasked with the TACAMO mission, something we will come back to later on.

“As we reported in last year’s assessment, the Navy awarded its contract despite significant technical risks it acknowledged the E-130J program faced. A September 2024 independent technical risk assessment highlighted the complexity associated with the program’s planned integration effort, which officials acknowledged could increase as they integrate additional technologies,” per GAO’s latest assessment. “Since our 2024 report, the program has delayed its low-rate production decision by approximately a year as these system integration risks have morphed into realities.” “For example, program officials said that contractors are now focused on modifying already-existing mission systems to reduce their weight, which the independent assessment anticipated would be necessary to accommodate them on the C-130J-30 airframe,” the report released today adds. “The program office stated that the E-130J program remains on track to recapitalize TACAMO capability through developing an MVP [minimum viable product], iterating system capabilities through software improvements, and establishing digital frameworks,” according to GAO. “The program office also stated that it is aligned with Secretary of Defense guidance through an acquisition approach that allows for tradeoffs and implementation of a modular open systems approach. The program office did not provide any documentation to substantiate any of these claims, which run counter to our own analyses of E-130J program documentation.” In its annual assessment last year, GAO said the Navy “acknowledges technical risk,” but also that the service had highlighted “risk reduction contracts with subcontractors to address obsolescence and size, weight, and power-cooling risks.”

The Navy’s Fiscal Year 2027 budget request provides some additional context about the suite of systems the E-130J will need to perform the TACAMO mission. “A dedicated communications platform, TACAMO aircraft features the ability to communicate on virtually every radio frequency band from very low frequency (VLF) up through Advanced Extremely High Frequency (AEHF) using a variety of modulations, encryptions and networks, maximizing the likelihood an emergency message is received by U.S. strategic forces,” per the Navy’s budget documents. “Included in these efforts are Government and Contractor Systems Integration Laboratories, Contractor System Test Integration Laboratory, Government Furnished Property (National Security Agency approved encryption devices, Ultra High Frequency modems), High Frequency and the Advanced Extremely High Frequency solutions, Top Secret network development and building required infrastructure includes power generation systems, cooling, flight deck avionics, Electric Magnetic Pulse (EMP) hardening, cyber hardening, and structural modifications to support integration of E-130J mission system equipment.” A particularly notable and critical capability found on the existing E-6Bs is the ability to extend a five-mile-long antenna to communicate with submerged submarines. The E-130J will have a very similar, if not identical, antenna system to support the TACAMO mission. As it stands now, the Navy plans to acquire six pre-production E-130Js in Fiscal Year 2027 to support different aspects of the aircraft’s ongoing development. At least one initial example is already being built. Some portion of those test aircraft might eventually take on operational roles. In its latest report, GAO says a critical design review is expected to come at the end of next year. With the aforementioned delay, the decision to then move into low-rate initial production (LRIP) is now projected to occur in April 2029. The initial LRIP lot is expected to be between three and six aircraft, but the total expected size of the E-130J fleet is unclear. It is worth remembering that the Navy did previously operate modified C-130s in the TACAMO role before the first E-6A arrived in 1989. The Navy subsequently upgraded those aircraft in the late 1990s and early 2000s to the E-6B standard.

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The issue increasingly looming now is the age of the existing E-6Bs, which are becoming increasingly more challenging to operate and sustain. As noted, the Mercury fleet represents some of the very last 707s ever built before Boeing shuttered that line for good in 1991. The Navy’s plans to phase out the E-6Bs as the E-130Js arrive to help avoid any capacity gaps, which means the Mercury fleet will have to soldier on until that happens. Last year, the Navy confirmed that it had scrapped plans to convert an ex-Royal Air Force E-3D Sentry airborne early warning and control aircraft, another Boeing 707-based type, into a dedicated TE-6B crew trainer, something TWZ was first to report. The TE-6B was explicitly intended to help relieve strain on operational E-6Bs. The Navy is now utilizing a contractor-owned, but government-operated (COGO) Boeing 737NG airliner to help meet pilot training demands.

To reiterate, the current plan is also for the E-130J to only perform the TACAMO mission. The Air Force is now in the very early stages of a separate effort to acquire what it is currently calling Looking Glass-Next (LG-N) to take over that mission from the E-6B fleet. Part of that solution may entail integrating ABNCP-specific capabilities onto its future Boeing 747-based E-4C Survivable Airborne Operations Center (SAOC) jets. The E-4Cs are set to replace the service’s four E-4B Nightwatch aircraft, as you can read more about here. The existing E-4Bs already have a ‘doomsday plane’ role, but do not have the exact same mix of capabilities as the E-6B. The Nightwatch jets notably lack the ability to order launches of Minuteman III IBCMs while in flight. For the Air Force, the LG-N program is tied to larger nuclear command and control modernization plans, which might see more of these functions move to space-based assets, as well. All of this is also heavily intertwined with the ongoing development of the new LGM-35A Sentinel ICBM. Sentinel suffered huge setbacks, delays, and cost overruns, but primarily with the infrastructure side of the program, not the missile, as you can read more about here. When it comes to the Navy’s TACAMO modernization plans, challenges in integrating the necessary capabilities onto the C-130J-30 platform have now set back these efforts at least by a year.

U.S. Air Force B-52 Stratofortress bombers departed from RAF Fairford in the U.K. today, marking the end of a deployment to support the war against Iran. The flights come as the U.S. and Iran are still working toward a peace deal amid a shaky ceasefire occasionally marred by flare-ups of tit-for-tat attacks. However, there has been no mass bombardment of Iran since the April 8 ceasefire. The departure was captured in video and still images by local aviation photographers, two of whom shared their work with us. Andy Riddle told us that six B-52s left RAF Fairford today in two waves of three. The first left at 10:15 a.m. local time and the second at about 2:20 p.m., noted Riddle, whose work can be found on his @Andyyyyrrrr X account. As we noted at the time, at least three of the bombers arrived at Fairford on March 8. It’s unclear when the others arrived. Both U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) and Air Force Global Strike Command (AFGSC) declined comment.

In our previous reporting, we pointed out that during their time at Fairford, the B-52s operated at a high tempo, striking targets inside Iran. All told, the U.S. claims it struck 13,000 targets, though there is no way for us to know how many involved B-52s from Fairford. You can see one of those jets leaded with stealthy JASSM cruise missiles in a photo shared with us by another local aviation photographer, who uses the @Saint1Mil X account. Meanwhile, a dozen B-1 Lancer bombers remain at the base, according to @Saint1Mil. Since the military won’t comment, we can’t say for sure why the BUFFs left Fairford, but the move comes after both the U.S. and Iran promised to hold off on further tit-for-tat strikes after the latest round that threatened the fragile ceasefire. The flights also took place on a day when the U.S. and Iran concluded a round of indirect talks. However, there were no signs that the parties made headway toward a lasting peace. Instead, they focused “on issues that they had supposedly resolved two weeks ago,” Reuters reported. “Sources said negotiators for the two countries spent two days in Doha discussing maritime traffic in the Strait of Hormuz and financial incentives for Iran, two pillars of the initial agreement ​they signed in June, rather than more difficult topics that framework was supposed to tee up.” The most difficult of these are the future of Iran’s nuclear ambitions and its stockpile of enriched uranium.

Despite the ongoing talks, President Donald Trump has repeatedly threatened to resume bombing Iran. He also has “weighed a return to all-out war with Iran, holding multiple conversations in recent days with Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Dan Caine on more strikes, but has decided to stick with diplomatic talks for now,” The Wall Street Journal reported, citing U.S. officials familiar with the discussion. The departure of the B-52s won’t preclude Trump from ordering a new round of strategic aviation attacks. Aside from the remaining B-1s, the Air Force can launch B-52s, as well as B-2 and B-1 bombers from the U.S. to strike Iran as it did during Epic Fury. However, having the B-52s stationed at a base like Fairford much closer to the action helps to cut down on flight times, wear and tear on the aircraft and crews, and increases the generation of sorties. As we have frequently reported, given that the U.S. began building up forces in the region in January, many of the ships, aircraft and troops will have to ‘retrograde’ out of the CENTCOM area of responsibility in the coming weeks and months. We’ve already seen aircraft like A-10 Thunderbolt II close attack jets, F-22s, F-15Es and other assets return from the region. As a result, the future of the American footprint there remains a question mark even as negotiations continue. Reinstating a large force once it has been even partially drawn down, assuming there is the will to do so, would take time and would put extreme stress on a force structure that has seen constant surges of deployments over the last year.

US troops could receive new weapons and tech with “undocumented shortfalls” after Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth reshaped a key Pentagon testing office last year by cutting nearly 100 civilian posts and leaving more work those who remain, according to a new government watchdog report. “The staff reductions since May 2025 constrain the depth and breadth of oversight that DOT&E [Director, Operational Test and Evaluation] can provide for DOD’s weapon systems,” said a Government Accountability Office (GAO) report released today. This includes oversight of major defense acquisition programs and others, such as middle tier of acquisition programs—a growing area within DOD,” the GAO said, referencing the Pentagon’s streamlined framework to rapidly develop and field new capabilities by bypassing traditional acquisition processes. The Pentagon did not immediately respond to Breaking Defense’s questions about today’s report.

GAO’s findings come just over a year after Hegseth inked a memo that reshaped the entire DOT&E office. At the time, he estimated that the changes would save $300 million per year, cut “bureaucratic overhead” and drive “greater efficiency.” The DOT&E office reorganization was intended to “support of an America First defense strategy,” Hegseth wrote at the time. “A comprehensive internal review has identified redundant, non-essential, non-statutory functions within [the office] that do not support operational agility or resource efficiency, affecting our ability to rapidly and effectively deploy the best systems to the warfighter.” GAO said that memo set off a cascade of second- and third-order consequences. Some DOT&E leaders were dual-hatted and given two jobs. The civilian workforce shrunk from 126 positions — of which 106 were filled at the time — down to 30. And the cuts reduced the number of “action officers” tasked with assessing weapons programs for flaws. “According to DOT&E Action Officers, the significant workforce reductions resulted in them being assigned more programs, programs in warfare areas for which they lack subject matter expertise, or both,” the government watchdog said. “They also said the workforce reductions and resulting loss of subject matter expertise increase the risk of weapon systems being delivered to the warfighters with undocumented operational shortfalls,” the GAO added, noting that expertise gaps in key fields like electronic warfare emerged.

As the DOT&E staff shrunk, so did the list of weapons programs the office was charged with overseeing. In May 2025, for example, 173 weapons were on the office’s oversight list, but 90 programs were removed after Hegseth’s order, according to the GAO. Reasons given for removal ranged from program cancellations, to program mergers, to an internal decision that oversight was no longer needed, the GAO said, citing information from employees. The GAO report does not include comments from the Pentagon but notes that DOT&E is conducting an analysis of its workforce and workload in response to a congressional inquiry. Established by Congress in 1983, DOT&E’s job, in part, is to produce an annual report updating lawmakers about the progress and challenges facing multi-million and multi-billion dollar weapon development programs. It also serves as an advisor to the Joint Requirements Oversight Council.

A point of particular focus will be the aerial display, which is scheduled to include a full 98 fixed-wing aircraft this year, up from 65 in 2025. Front and center - quite literally - will be France’s most important partners on the European continent. According to the latest plans, the aerial parade will begin with nine French Alphajet jet trainers of the Patrouille de France flanked by two Ukrainian Mirage 2000B fighter jets. Immediately after will be a formation of two French Rafale jets - one of them from the nuclear forces, or Forces Aériennes Stratégiques - flanked by four key European partners’ air forces: German, Greek, British and Swedish fighter jets. An earlier version of the government’s envisioned lineup indicated that Berlin would send a Eurofighter, Sweden a Gripen, the UK an F-35 and Greece an F-4 to the parade. The most recent version does not specify the aircraft types. The symbolism is particularly significant for this formation, since all four countries have signed up to some variation of France’s promised forward nuclear deterrence scheme, which Macron launched in theatrical fashion while standing in front of a French nuclear submarine in March.

The initiative promises to extend France’s atomic umbrella over the European continent and has widely been read as a direct consequence of the United States’ disengagement from the old continent. It may also be read as a challenge or at least an alternative to the American domination of European nuclear deterrence. The U.K., which has its own nuclear weapons, has followed a separate track from the forward deterrence policy, but London, too, has significantly deepened its nuclear cooperation with France. The two countries’ deterrents remain independent but are coordinated under the Northwood Declaration framework signed in 2025. Notably absent from this year’s flyover is any contingent from the United States. During Trump’s first presidency, in 2017, the Air Force flew in the Thunderbirds’ F-16s, flanked by F-22 Raptors, while Trump and Macron looked on from below. This year, the focus is wholly European. In addition to the assertive motto, all guest nations will be European. In addition to the fighter jets, there will also be two German C-130 Hercules, as well as one British and one German A-400M Atlas cargo aircraft toward the end of the parade.

An earlier version of the agenda, since taken offline by the French Ministry of Defense, also indicated there would be a Danish F-35, Polish F-16 Fighting Falcon and Spanish F-18 Hornet participating alongside the French Rafale jets near the start of the procession. These were later removed from the program with no further explanation. European participation in the event in and of itself is nothing new. Last year’s festivities saw fighter jets from Switzerland, Belgium, Germany, Italy, Spain and the UK fly alongside French jets. Last year, however, they were flying mostly behind two French Mirage jets, in a formation called “air defense.” This year’s positioning alongside an explicitly nuclear-capable jet in a formation named “Entrée En Premier: Intervention” - which can be roughly translated to “First-Entry Strike Operations” - paints a more forward-positioned picture.