📝 🇺🇸 Can the U.S. Build Trump Class Battleship in 2.5 Years?

The Constellation-class frigate, which utilized an existing design to save time, has faced delays of over 3 years, with its first ship now expected 7 years after the initial contract.

For comparison, the Zumwalt-class destroyers, which were smaller at 15,000 tons, took 5 to 7 years per ship to build while suffering from massive cost overruns and tech-integration failures.

Government Accountability Office (GAO) findings indicate that Navy lead ships since 2007 have averaged 8 to 19 years from contract award to fleet delivery.

https://clashreport.com/defense/articles/can-the-us-build-trump-class-battleship-in-25-years-upbdf8x9u5g

🇺🇸 Data Set 8 of the Epstein Files show that a victim stated that Trump and Epstein raped her, and that a Limo driver heard Trump in the back speaking to “Jeffrey” about “abusing girls”.

The victim then “committed suicide” in January of 2000 after reporting the incident.

Police didn’t believe it was suicide.

https://www.justice.gov/epstein/files/DataSet%208/EFTA00020517.pdf

📎 Brian Krassenstein

🇨🇳 🇫🇲 🇺🇸 China is methodically chipping away at America’s Pacific defense architecture, and Yap’s Woleai airfield is the latest warning sign.

Despite the Federated States of Micronesia’s Compact of Free Association with Washington, Beijing has secured a deal to refurbish the airfield — just 450 miles from Guam.

That puts a potential dual-use Chinese facility inside the second island chain, complicating US plans for agile air dispersal in a Taiwan war.

Interior, regional commands, and legal advisers have all failed to enforce CoFA protections, risking billions in US investments and eroding America’s positional advantage in Micronesia.

The Chinese activities at Woleai, to be clear, are not a surprise. It ranks almost as bad as the 2022 secret security pact the Chinese secured with the Solomon Islands.

Left unaddressed, US leadership responsible for the region will continue to fail in identifying and addressing problematic Chinese encroachment and influence in Micronesia.

The consequence of continued inaction will render years of effort and billions of dollars in military investment and planning useless.

📎 Byron Wan

🇸🇦 🇮🇷 🇦🇪 Very interesting signal of rapprochement between Saudi Arabia and Iran. The Emiratis are increasingly emerging as the largest menace in the Gulf.

🇾🇪 Mustafa Noman, deputy foreign minister in the Saudi-backed "recognized Yemeni government", said in a recent Al-Arabiya interview that he does not exclude the possibility of a wide-ranging alliance with Ansarallah aimed at preserving Yemeni unity.

📎 Dilawar Karwan

⚖️ 🇺🇸 👨‍⚖️ Significant loss for Trump administration at Supreme Court, which rules that Trump lacked authority to federalize and deploy the National Guard to execute laws in Illinois.

📎 Kyle Cheney

SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES

No. 25A443

DONALD J. TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED
STATES, ET AL. v. ILLINOIS, ET AL.

ON APPLICATION FOR STAY

[December 23, 2025]

https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/26438519/25a443-order.pdf

🇸🇴 AS has been spotted in settlements around Warsheikh for the past two days. Until now, the nature of their presence had remained unclear, as recently as last June, militants were seen in some of these areas, which were considered a grey zone (unclear control).

This time however AS appears to have dug in and consolidated control over the settlements of Masaale, Jabad Godane, and Cilaanley.

The government responded by sending troops toward the area, and airstrikes were also reported.

However, these actions did not succeed in removing AS or changing the situation on the ground that much.

📎 AAGA_CAWLLAN

🛢 🇮🇷 🚢 Tanker Trackers on X:

"Although (to our best knowledge) BELLA 1 (9230880) still hasn't been seized, she faces another challenge."

"She has been in transit for 39 days, and at 11kn average speed, she has maybe another 28-35 days of fuel available unless her speed drops. This might happen if the US Coast Guard aborts the pursuit."

"Based on that, she will likely be heading southeast towards South Africa in order to reach the Middle East. This will allow her to remain offline from AIS. The Suez Canal is an AIS mandatory zone, as is the Strait of Gibraltar."

📎 Tanker Trackers

🚢 🇷🇺 🏴‍☠️ Flag-hopping shadow fleet starts to settle in Russia

▶️Shadow fleet ships are ending flag hopping in favour of direct Russian registration
▶️Russia’s ship register has increased in size by 40% since the invasion of Ukraine
▶️Shift towards Russia’s flag comes as EU is adding pressure on ship registers and seeking to board vessels

https://www.lloydslist.com/LL1155952/Flag-hopping-shadow-fleet-starts-to-settle-in-Russia

📎 Sal Mercogliano

⚓️ 🇺🇸 The United States Announces the Return of the Battleship [or is it a Cruiser]

In this episode, Sal Mercogliano — a maritime historian at Campbell University and former merchant mariner — discusses the announcement by the United States of a new large surface combatant, to be named USS Defiant, a battleship.

00:00 Navy Shipbuilding and Battleship Announcement
03:30 Composition of the U.S. Navy's fleet
05:22 Current Surface Ship Building Programs
11:45 What is a Battleship?
15:04 What is a Large Cruiser?
15:52 USS Defiant Specifications
21:43 Where can these ships be built?
23:28 What Is the US Navy missing?
27:07 Conclusion

📎 What's Going on With Shipping

🇺🇸 🇨🇳 FCC bans new DJI Chinese drones, citing national security

DJI, founded in 2006, quickly rose to become the world’s top consumer drone maker, with its capable and relatively affordable drones widely adopted by hobbyists, real estate agents and U.S. police and fire departments. There are no current figures on DJI’s total market share in the United States, but as of 2020, DJI held 77 percent of the American hobby drone market. A Bard College study released the same year showed that DJI drones accounted for about 90 percent of the drones in its database used by public safety agencies.

The determination means U.S. consumers will no longer be able to buy new models of DJI and other foreign-made drones. It comes after years of pressure from lawmakers and FCC officials, who have argued that DJI’s dominance of the consumer drone market exposes the United States to surveillance risks and gives Chinese firms control over a technology with potential future military applications.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2025/12/23/dji-drone-fcc-ban-national-security/

🇺🇸 ❌️ 🇪🇺 US sanctions Europe for censoring Americans.

The EU’s Thierry Breton, behind the Digital Services Act, is sanctioned for threatening Elon Musk before his interview with President Trump.

“Before the interview, Breton ominously reminded Musk of X’s legal obligations and ongoing “formal proceedings” for alleged noncompliance with “illegal content” and “disinformation” requirements under the DSA,” Under Secretary of State Sarah Rogers wrote.

Others on the sanctions list:

-Imran Ahmed, Center for Countering Digital Hate

-Clare Melford, Global Disinformation Index

-Anna-Lena von Hodenberg, HateAid

-Josephine Ballon, HateAid

📎 Lenka White

📈 Spot gold prices surge above $4,500/oz for the first time in history.

Gold is now a $31.5 TRILLION asset, nearly 7 TIMES larger than Nvidia.

📎 KobeissiLetter

🇺🇸 Genetic distance from America’s “heritage” stock predicts a linear relationship with Democratic voting preferences.

The genetic argument reinforces the claims of “Heritage Americans” that say that foreigners and immigrants are dispossessing the US.

📎 AF Post

🇺🇸 Nick Fuentes succinctly explains why White Genocide is the worst thing to ever happen to America, worse than 9/11.

"If the people are REPLACED, the nation dies!"

📎 Fuentes Updates

🇺🇸 🇨🇳 🇹🇼 The newly released China Military Power Report from The Dept of War confirms what Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang has denied: Chinese entities have skirted US export controls to procure high-end AI chips.

📎 Michael Sobolik