pieces

Spain’s “no” to the F-35 has led to a curious agreement. The US is going to send you its Harriers like Ikea: in pieces to assemble

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In 1982, during the Falklands War, the British had to modify and move several Harriers were hurriedly shipped to the South Atlantic. Some arrived at the area of ​​operations transported on adapted merchant ships and were prepared for combat during deployment, an example of the extent to which this aircraft has always been associated with logistical solutions. unconventional. An emergency solution. The Spanish Navy faces a countdown that has been conditioning its future for years. Maintaining aviation on board the Juan Carlos I is considered an essential strategic capability, but the problem is that the Harriers that make it possible are reaching the limit. end of useful life and the natural relief, the F-35B, continues out of plans of government procurement. Faced with this situation, Defense has opted for a formula as pragmatic as it is unique: prolonging the life of current aircraft until 2032 through a massive reserve of spare parts coming from the last American Harriers that are being retired from service. Harrier Av 8b The Harriers arrive, but not to fly. The operation has something of a logistical paradox. Spain is going to receive five AV-8B Harrier complete from the United States, but none of them are destined to join the flight line. Its mission will be much less visible and perhaps more important: to become a gigantic reserve of components. Although initially it was studied to take advantage of the transatlantic voyage of the Juan Carlos I to transport them, finally the devices will be dismantled at origin and sent to Spain andn separate packages. They will arrive practically as a kit of parts to assemble from the famous Swedish furniture store, although in this case ready to be cannibalized in Rota and keep the fighters of the 9th Squadron operational for the next few years. While others advance, Spain stretches the calendar. The decision reflects the particular situation in which the Navy has been left. USA will officially retire its Harriers this year and Italy plans to do the same before the end of the decade, both replacing them with the F-35B, the only real heir to the short takeoff and vertical landing capabilities of the veteran British-American aircraft. Spain, on the other hand, is preparing to become the last relevant operator of the model. The refusal to buy The F-35 has forced additional time to be sought for a fleet that should have begun its transition to a more modern successor years ago. The Spanish industry gains prominence. This scenario is also driving an unusual industrial effort. The Navy and Airbus have extended contracts maintenance of the Harriers and significantly increased the work hours dedicated to inspections, repairs and recovery of components. The objective is not only to maintain the current aircraft, but to develop in Spain a technical capacity capable of sustain a fleet increasingly scarce in the world. The fewer operators left, the greater the importance of having knowledge, tools and own spare parts to continue maintaining the devices in flying condition. The price of postponing the decision. All this effort has a very specific objective: to prevent Spain from losing its ability to operate aircraft combat from the sea before having an alternative. However, it also shows the provisional nature of the solution. The American Harriers that will cross the Atlantic will not do so to reinforce the Spanish embarked air force, but to feed the specimens that are already in service. If you like, it is a quite revealing image of the current moment: while other allies replace their old planes with a new generationSpain tries to gain a few more years by assembling the Marines’ latest Harriers and transforming them into a floating parts warehouse. In a way, the negative to buy the F-35 has led to an agreement as peculiar as it is symbolic: receiving the fighters retired from the United States disassembled… ready to assemble, disassemble and reuse as the survival of the fleet demands. Image | RawPixel, Michael Pereckas In Xataka | The US opted for the quality of the F-35 rather than quantity. China opted for the opposite and it is already a problem In Xataka | Europe has asked its military experts how to become independent from the US for the next war. The answer is déjà vu: the F-35

Amazon had everything ready to attack the Starlink monopoly. Until Blue Origin exploded into pieces

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On April 20, 2023, the inaugural flight of SpaceX’s Starship took place. Less than four minutes later, the space vehicle explodedbut that was not what was amazing. The amazing thing was that all the company staff celebrated that explosion applauding wildlyas if it had been an extraordinary success. And the truth is that it was, because this launch was part of the company’s incremental philosophy: it doesn’t matter if the rockets explode, because (for the moment) that is what they have to do. When the Blue Origin rocket exploded last weekthere was very little to celebrate. And that is a big difference between both companies. This was not an explosion “by design”. There is a critical difference between the Starship prototype explosions and that of the New Glenn: intent. While SpaceX uses its tests to push its rockets to the limit and learn from those often controlled destructions, the New Glenn that exploded a few days ago was theoretically a production vehicle intended to complete operational missions. It’s one thing to lose a rocket with no payload that is designed to learn from mistakes, but quite another to lose one with a payload that real customers depend on. Blue Origin runs out of ramp. The economic impact of this accident goes beyond the cost of the lost vehicle. The fundamental problem is that Blue Origin currently has only one operational launch pad for the New Glenn, the LC-36, and damage to the tower and support systems could paralyze the company’s activity for months. In a recent update the company indicates who is already working on that ramp “And we have a good reconstruction plan in place.” Bad news for Kuiper. This explosion has also left in the air the deployment of the first 49 satellites of Amazon’s Juiper network, which depended on this launch. The company needs to put thousands of satellites into orbit to compete with Starlink, and every month of delay in the New Glenn is a month of advantage for Elon Musk. NASA and the lunar calendar. But the New Glenn is also a key piece for the logistics of NASA’s Artemis missions. The explosion may force the space agency to rethink its priorities and even delay missions to the Moon planned for the coming years. NASA is running out of plans B, and is increasingly dependent on a single supplier (SpaceX) when that is precisely what Blue Origin could have mitigated. Reliability pays off over time. We have a good example of SpaceX’s trial and error strategy with the Falcon 9. Today it is one of the most reliable rockets in the world with a success rate of over 99%: to date it has carried out 644 missions, of which 641 have been successful. Failures like that of September 2016 They served to learn and mature, and a decade later the Falcon 9 have become almost “boring” due to their reliability. Blue Origin seems to have wanted to skip stages by coming to market with a product that wanted to be perfect, but reality has shown that it is very difficult to achieve that reliability without stumbling. And this setback has been big. The opportunity cost. It is estimated that the economic losses of the destroyed vehicle they hover 150 million dollars, but the true cost is in the penalties for delays and the loss of confidence of future customers. The technical and reputational debt that Blue Origin faces is notable, and it remains to be seen how a company that needed success more than ever will react. Monopoly by accident. The clearest consequence of this setback is also striking: the winner is SpaceX, which is even more dominant than it was in the space launch market. The explosion of the New Gless is terrible news because it eliminates competition, and without a rival that can guarantee launches, access to space will continue to be a bottleneck controlled by a single company and, of course, by its founder, Elon Musk. The tycoon, yes, published a message in X upon hearing about the explosion saying “I’m sorry to see this, I hope you recover quickly.” Image | Blue Origin In Xataka | In 2018, Elon Musk put his own car into orbit. Eight years later it is still circling the Earth

In 1967, Canada built futuristic homes like Lego pieces. Half a century later they still don’t know how to repair them

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When Moshe Safdie designed Habitat 67 As an architecture student, he had a revolutionary idea: he used thousands of Lego pieces to test how housing modules could fit together in three dimensions. Decades later, the architect himself I kept remembering who even emptied entire Lego stores in Montreal to build the models. And maybe that was the problem. Reinvent the home like Lego. In the early 1960s, Western cities were trapped between two models that seemed inevitable: huge blocks of impersonal apartments or endless car-dependent suburbs. A young architecture student named Moshe Safdie He believed that there was a third way. His idea was apparently simple and radical at the same time: build prefabricated homes by stacking concrete modules as if they were giant lego piecesso that each family could have light, a terrace, vegetation and the feeling of an individual house within a large urban structure. The project ended up becoming Habitat 67, the great futuristic icon of the Montreal Expo. What Canada presented to the world as the definitive future of cities ended up being one of the most fascinating and problematic works of architecture of the 20th century. Habitat 67 was a utopia. The image of the building continues to look futuristic even today: 354 huge concrete modules prefabricated, each weighing about 90 tons, stacked in irregular shapes on an artificial peninsula facing the St. Lawrence River. Safdie was obsessed with solving a problem he considered central to the urban future: how to maintain density from the city without sacrificing privacy, nature and the feeling of home. His motto was “For everyone a garden”. Each apartment had to have its own garden, cross ventilation, open views and elevated pedestrian streets instead of closed corridors. Inspiration came from both the Pueblo homes of the American Southwest and the japanese metabolism that we talked about a few days ago, an architectural movement that imagined buildings made up of modular cells capable of growing and reorganizing like living organisms. The big problem: making it cheap. The paradox of Habitat 67 is that it was born precisely to make urban housing cheaper… and ended costing a lot more than expected. Safdie imagined that industrial prefabrication would allow apartments to be manufactured in a chain quickly and efficiently, but the reality It was very different. The complex required an extremely sophisticated assembly system, a factory installed within the work itself, gigantic cranes and very complex technical connections between modules. Each box had to leave the factory practically finished, with windows, wiring, bathrooms and kitchens incorporated before being lifted into its final position. The reduction of the original project (from 1,200 planned homes to just 158) shot even more the costs. The experiment designed to democratize the city ended up becoming a too expensive complex even for the middle class it sought to attract. Leaks and mold appear. As time went by, the other great enemy of Habitat 67 appeared: the water. The stepped structure full of terraces, gardens and joints between modules generated a waterproofing nightmare. The concrete began to leak constantly in Montreal’s extreme climate and water ended up penetrating walls and ventilation systems. Some residents reported serious problems moisture and mold for years. The repairs they were never simple because the building does not function like a conventional block: each module is a structural part of an extremely complex three-dimensional framework. Half a century later, restorations are still almost surgical. In the major rehabilitation carried out for the 50th anniversary, it was necessary to remove outer layersre-insulate huge surfaces and redesign entire systems to protect the structure from Canadian winters. From social dream to elite symbol. Another of the most striking ironies of Habitat 67 It is its social evolution. What was born as a manifesto for accessible urban housing ended up becoming one of the directions Montreal’s most exclusive. The original rents were already prohibitive in the 60s and subsequent privatization converted the apartments in luxury properties. Today some units reach millionaire prices and the monthly maintenance costs are very high. The “city for all” ended up being an enclave for cultural elites, businessmen and architecture lovers. Yet even its critics admit that the building accomplished something extraordinary: demonstrating that dense housing could be emotionally distinct from the repetitive blocks that dominated modern urbanism. He never completely died. The most fascinating thing is that, despite all its problems, Habitat 67 continues to exert a gigantic influence on architects and urban planners. decades later keep inspiring modular projects, terraced complexes and new ideas on how to combine urban density and quality of life. Even today’s digital tools have resurrected the original never-built project. In recent years, Safdie Architects and Epic Games they virtually recreated the gigantic “Project Hillside” which the Canadian government cut due to lack of money in the 60s. Thanks to Unreal Engine, drones and hyper-realistic models, the architect was able to tour for the first time the complete version of the modular city that he had imagined as a young man. There is something deeply symbolic in that image: Habitat 67 was so ambitious that not even the technology of its time could do it. fully viable. Maybe that’s why it continues to fascinate today. Because it seems like a relic of the past… but also a vision of an urban future that we still don’t know how to build without collapsing due to leaks, crazy costs and eternal repairs. Image | Parcours riverain – Ville de Montréal, Thomas Ledl, Vassgergely In Xataka | In 1970 Japan built homes of the future where each capsule would be replaceable. Half a century later he discovered that no one knew how to repair them In Xataka | The incredible story of the tallest building on the planet that ended up becoming the largest swimming pool in the Soviet Union

His pieces now support a million-dollar business.

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He Airbus A380 It was born to be many things at once: a demonstration of European industrial muscle, a response to the growth of air traffic and a different way of imagining great long-haul trips. For years we saw it as the double-decker that promised to change the economics of denser routes, but the market ended up moving in another direction. The interesting thing is that his story did not end with the closure of the production line in 2021. Now, some of its value is showing up where it was least expected: on planes that no longer fly. The explanation begins in a very specific tension in the market. In April 2025, VAS Aero Services noted that delays in deliveries of Boeing 777Xdelayed until at least 2026, were increasing dependence on the A380 to meet the demand for large long-haul aircraft. The company then estimated that there could be up to 175 units of the model in operation worldwide, a figure that helps understand the pressure on the inventory of certified used parts. The question is not just how many A380s remain in service, but how such a dedicated fleet is maintained when the aircraft is no longer in production and the supply chain increasingly relies on certified used material. The focus is on that market, where recovered parts can re-enter service after the corresponding processes. This detail changes the reading of the retired aircraft: it stops being only an asset at the end of its useful life and begins to function as a source of components for other operators. In a limited fleet, each recoverable item carries more weight. The business is also in the planes that no longer fly In practice, this economy of the retired A380 involves converting a complete aircraft into a parts catalogue. Airbus has selected the aforementioned VAS Aero Services to manage the disassembly and redistribution of certified used material from several units that are decommissioned. The plan announced by the company involves working together with Tarmac Aerosave in Tarbes, France, and placing the recovered parts in Europe to serve the market. EMEA. The firm, an independent subsidiary of Satairan Airbus Services company, acts here as a bridge between retiring aircraft and operators in need of spare parts. The VAS information does not put a total figure on the resulting catalogue, but it does point to especially relevant elements: the engines of these aircraft will be offered for rent and can also be used as a source of used parts in demand. Simple Flying adds two pieces of information that help understand the size of the business: a set of superjumbo landing gear weighs about 5,443 kg and can fetch several million dollars on the secondary market, while a Rolls-Royce Trent 900one of the engines used in the A380, can be sold in service condition for about 10 million dollars. As we can see, each retired aircraft becomes more than just scrap. The company itself expresses it in quite clear terms. Tommy Hughes, CEO of VAS, assures that they early identified the A380 platform as a “growth opportunity in the aftermarket” and that they continue to invest in A380 aircraft at the end of their useful life to make critical components available to the global market of large aircraft operators. In the same communication, the manager adds that the time has come for a program focused on retiring the A380 at the end of its life and “monetizing the residual value of its parts in serviceable condition.” The paradox is powerful because it returns the A380 to an unexpected place. The plane that was born to redefine great long-haul travel ended up being too big for many of the airlines that had to support it, but its retired units still retain value in an industry that needs keep existing fleet operational. We are not facing a complete vindication of the program, nor before a second youth without nuances. We are looking at something more concrete and perhaps more revealing: even one of Airbus’ biggest setbacks can continue to generate business when dismantled piece by piece. Images | Airbus | Engine Alliance In Xataka | Boeing is losing ground to Airbus on all fronts. Including Italy’s air tankers

The surprising thing is not its pieces, but how they work

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It was in the middle of the Cold War when Western engineers who managed to examine captured Soviet equipment they were surprised finding surprisingly simple circuits and unrefined finishes, but yes, designed to continue working even in extreme conditions where more advanced systems would have failed. That scenario halfway between simplicity and effectiveness left a lesson that decades later makes sense again. Open a missile and understand war. Analysis of remains of North Korean missiles used in Ukraine has offered (one more time) an image as unexpected as it is revealing about the evolution of modern war, by showing that apparently sophisticated systems hide a reality much more hybrid. Just like have reported Since the kyiv government, Ukrainian engineers and scientists have disassembled and studied these projectiles after their use in combat, finding a surprising combination of elements that don’t fit with the classic idea of ​​advanced weaponry. That contrast, between what it seems and what it really is, has become a key clue to understanding how current military balances are changing. Technology from another era in the midst of globalization. To be more exact, the missiles analyzed, mainly the KN-23 and the KN-24reveal a very clear pattern: they are built with manufacturing methods reminiscent half a century ago at the very least, with rudimentary welding, basic materials and simple technical solutions such as the use of graphite to withstand heat. However, inside it appears a completely different element, with commercial electronics from multiple countries, integrated into its control systems to make up for the lack of its own technology. The result is a weapon that mixes the old and the modern in a way that is as unexpected as it is functional. Bigger, less efficient. According to has explained the Ukrainian ministry, technical limitations are evident, since these missiles use less efficient fuels and require significantly larger motors to reach distances comparable to more advanced systems. This lack of sophistication also translates in reliability problemswith failures in flight and premature explosions detected on multiple occasions. Even so, all these shortcomings do not make them irrelevant, but rather an example of how less refined engineering can remain useful if it fulfills its basic objective on the battlefield. The real problem. Be that as it may, and despite their apparent low quality, these missiles continue representing a danger more than significant, since their ballistic nature makes them difficult to intercept and requires the use of advanced air defense systems like the patriot. In turn, this creates a strategic paradox in which relatively simple weapons force the use of resources much more expensive to neutralize them, replicating the same economic imbalance that is already observed in drone warfare. In other words, they don’t have to be perfect to be effective. Adaptation on the ground. Furthermore, they said in kyiv that the use of these systems is also linked to a tactical evolution on the ground that we have been countingone where North Korean forces deployed alongside Russia have been adjusting their way of fighting after suffering significant losses. In this way, they have gone from massive attacks to operations smaller and more flexiblesupported by drones and better coordinated with artillery, in a process of direct learning from the battlefield. If you will, this adaptation also reinforces the idea that the current war not only transforms technology, obviously, but also the way in which it is being used. The new norm. Ultimately, the last unboxing of missiles illustrates a deeper change where war no longer depends solely on the most advanced technology, but on the ability to combine resources available effectively. Blending ancient manufacturing methods with accessible global electronics proves that innovation doesn’t always mean sophistication, but intelligent adaptation. In that context, what Ukraine has found inside these North Korean missiles is not only a technical curiosity, but a clear sign of where modern warfare and its resources are heading, one where imperfect systems coexist, but sufficient and capable of generating real strategic effects. Image | Ukrainian M., Lightrocket In Xataka | A disturbing idea has begun to take hold in Europe: Ukraine has turned Russia into a fearsome air force In Xataka | Cities such as London or Madrid appear on Russia’s new objective map. The reason: drone production

from virtual astronauts to saliva on pieces of paper

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Conducting experiments in space is complicated. There are not many resources, much less study subjects. Therefore, sometimes these must be the experimenters themselves. This is precisely what the crew of Artemis II will have to do in the next 10 days. if everything goes well. One of its missions will be to carry out experiments on how the conditions of outer space affect human health. And they will prove it on themselves. Background. It is well known that stays in space, no matter how short, can affect human health. Just look at the recent example of the astronaut who lost his speech on the International Space Station (ISS). for reasons still unknown. For this reason, a good part of the experiments carried out in these facilities are aimed at exactly that: analyzing how issues such as microgravity, isolation or cosmic radiation affect human health. Interesting discoveries have been made, but the reality is that carrying out experiments in low Earth orbit, where the ISS is located, is not the same as on the Moon. A mission to protect them all. Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, Christina Koch and Jeremy Hansen They will have several missions in their 10 days of travel. To begin with, they will have to test the proper functioning of the ship and its viability for the lunar landing that will take place on Artemis III. They will also take photographs of the far side of the Moon and other measurements of scientific interest. And, finally, they will serve as study subjects in a series of experiments on the effects of space on human health. This time yes: further from low Earth orbit. space dream. The first study that they will carry out in this sense will be ARCHeRa set of experiments aimed at analyzing how space affects factors such as sleep, stress, cognition and teamwork. To monitor it, they will wear activity bracelets, whose measurements will be added to those taken on Earth both before and after the mission. The combination of all this information will be very useful to understand how the isolation and stress of a mission like this affect the astronauts’ minds. Immune health. On the International Space Station it has been proven that some viruses, such as varicella zoster, are more likely to come out of latency. These are viruses that the immune system is not able to completely eliminate, but rather remain latent in the body. In the case of varicella zoster, for example, they stay on their nervesimmersed in a kind of lethargy from which they may never emerge. If they do, it is usually due to a lowering of their defenses. Therefore, it is believed that space could affect the immune system. To check this, Artemis II crew members will take samples of wet saliva and blood before and after their trip. They will also take dried saliva samples during the duration of the mission.. Astronaut depositing dry saliva sample Dry saliva is obtained by depositing the sample on sheets of paper specifically for this purpose. Not just any role is worth it. It is the best way to store saliva samples in space, where they cannot be refrigerated normally. Once all samples are analyzed, the goal will be to study immune biomarker levels for possible declines caused by space. Virtual astronauts to examine radiation. It is also important to check how radiation affects the health of astronauts. On trips like this, they will not leave the ship, which has adequate shields so that the radiation does not cause them damage. However, in future moon landings, especially if lunar bases are established, that feared exposure to radiation could occur. To study what the effects would be and design effective protection systems, AVATAR has been launchedan experiment that consists of manufacturing a virtual astronaut for each of the crew members. Artificial bone marrow All of them have provided samples of cells from their bone marrow that have been grown on a chip the size of a USB memory stick. Thus, a small artificial bone marrow has been obtained with the characteristics of each of them. These will be exposed to radiation while the astronauts remain safe. Because it is a part of the body with many dividing cells, it is especially susceptible to radiation. Therefore, you can see much better what the effects would be. In addition, they can be compared with cell samples taken from the astronauts themselves once they return from the mission. Measures for the future. All these experiments will serve to better protect astronauts who travel to the Moon in the future. For example, measures could be sought to address sleep problems or suits that better protect against radiation. In addition, thanks to the AVATAR system, the chips could be sent before the astronauts go to space. Thus, the specific effects on their health would be checked and appropriate first aid kits would be designed for each of them. All this will be possible thanks to the fact that Wiseman, Glover, Koch and Hansen will simultaneously act as scientists and study models. Images | NASA | Emulate | freepik In Xataka | Artemis II will take NASA to the Moon half a century later. He will do it with the help of the University of Seville

nuclear microreactors made like Lego pieces

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The artificial intelligence revolution has an Achilles heel that is not in the code, but in the networks. In this scenario of “energy hunger”, an Austin company called Aalo Atomics has decided that the solution is not to wait for the State to build infrastructure, but to manufacture its own nuclear reactors like someone making Lego pieces. A unique structure. If decades ago the message “Hello World” marked the beginning of the computer age, today the “Aalo World” aims to mark the beginning of the Second Atomic Age. According to a company press releaseAalo Atomics has begun construction of an experimental reactor, the Aalo-X, under the Department of Energy’s (DOE) Nuclear Reactor Pilot Program. The ambition is such that, as reported by NucNetthe company has already shipped the first five test modules (the Aalo-0 prototype) from its factory in Austin to the Idaho National Laboratory (INL). The goal is to have everything ready by July 4, 2026. The “Bring Your Own Energy” model. AI data centers have sparked a new business fever: the “bring your own energy”. Giants like Microsoft, Google or Amazon can no longer depend on an American electrical grid that, although should add 80GW of capacity per year, barely reaches 65GW due to bureaucracy and bottlenecks. This is where the star product comes in: the Aalo Pod. According to the company’s technical informationit is not an eternal “construction project”, but rather a mass-produced product. Each “Pod” will generate 50 MW and is designed to be adjacent to data centers. By not requiring external water sources for cooling – thanks to their air condensers – these plants can be located in arid or remote areas, directly feeding the servers without going through the saturated electrical grid. “Lego” engineering. The key to Aalo Atomics’ success lies in three pillars: Products, not projects. According to Matt LoszakCEO of Aalo Atomics, the historical mistake of the sector was to build each plant as a single civil work. His XMR concept (Extra Modular Reactor) allows parts to arrive on site as finished and tested blocks, ready to be connected. Sodium technology. Unlike conventional plants, sodium allows the reactor operates at atmospheric pressure. This eliminates the need for expensive, gigantic containment domes. To avoid incidents like the one at the Monju plant (Japan) in 1995, Aalo Atomics has developed double-walled steam generators and an AI-powered autonomous maintenance robot that remotely detects and seals leaks. Passive security. The design, led by Yasir Arafat (CTO of Aalo Atomics), uses a fuel that expands naturally if the temperature rises too high, stopping the reaction by physical laws, without the need for human intervention. An extensive collaboration network. Dubbed the “Aaloverse”, it has woven an ecosystem of 127 suppliers in 35 states that transcends the energy sector to integrate the current kings of silicon. Microsoft and NVIDIA not only appear as potential clients, but as technological partners for the development of a “digital super operator”. This artificial intelligence platform, supported by NVIDIA’s computational muscle and Azure tools, seeks to automate the enormous bureaucracy of nuclear permits and manage the reactor with a minimal human workforce, turning the plant into an autonomous system capable of predicting failures before they occur. For this digital vision to be translated into real energy, Aalo Atomics has resorted to the reliability of traditional heavy industry, closing alliances with giants such as Baker Hughes and Siemens for the supply of turbines and generators. This strategy, together with a historic contract with Urenco, accelerates its arrival on the market and guarantees enriched uranium for the Aalo-X reactor in 2026, breaking dependence on foreign supplies and shielding the energy sovereignty of future data centers. Towards a Second Atomic Age? Aalo Atomics faces a challenge that the industry considered impossible: going from the founding of the company to nuclear fission in less than three years. However, with $136 million in financing and the first hardware already on Idaho soil, doubt is giving way to expectation. If they manage to turn on Aalo-X in the summer of 2026, they will not only have built a reactor; They will have inaugurated a model where nuclear energy is as modular, scalable and private as the servers themselves that today try to decipher the future of humanity. The race is on and, for now, Idaho’s clock is ticking. Image | Aalo Atomics Xataka | The boom in companies developing SMR reactors is no coincidence: it is just what the military wanted

the pieces come from the most unthinkable place

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They have been so many the occasions in which Ukraine has intercepted a Russian drone, has opened it and has found that Moscow had little less than the name, that it seemed difficult for kyiv to be surprised again by an “unboxing” of the enemy. It so happens that Ukraine has been demanding help for weeks to combat a very special Russian missile. And when he managed to intercept one, the surprise came again. A modified shahed. The appearance on the Ukrainian front of a new armed Russian Geran-2 drone with an air-to-air missile It marked a new turn in the evolution of the conflict and in Moscow’s constant adaptation to a battlefield increasingly dominated by unmanned systems. According to Ukrainian military intelligence, this model (derived from the Iranian Shahed-136) has been seen for the first time equipped with a soviet missile R-60originally designed in the seventies for combat fighters. This is not a mere technical curiosity, but a deliberate attempt to introduce a direct threat against helicopters and airplanes Ukrainians dedicated to air defense and drone interception tasks, expanding the role of the Geran-2 beyond the classic suicide attack against ground targets. The military logic of the missile on a drone. The main objective of this modification, according to the Ukrainian evaluation, has been degrade effectiveness of Kyiv’s tactical aviation, forcing it to operate with greater caution against swarms of drones. In fact, this adaptation has been a pain in the ass for kyiv helicopters. As? By integrating an infrared-guided R-60 missile with a range of approximately 10 km, Russia introduces the possibility that a traditionally vulnerable drone, can fight back if it detects a nearby helicopter or aircraft through its cameras. This represents a clear trade-off: the missile takes up space and weight, which reduces the drone’s internal explosive charge and, therefore, its destructive capacity against ground targets, but in exchange increases its potential survivability and its value as an aerial deterrent tool. UK report on Shahed missile upgrade The “allied” pieces. And here comes the moment when Ukraine has returned to be surprised. One of the most sensitive elements of the GUR report is the confirmation, when dissecting this evolution, that this new Geran-2 contains the majority of components manufactured outside Russiaincluding elements from the United States, United Kingdom, Germany, Switzerland, China, Japan and Taiwan in the equation. This pattern, like we have been counting many times, it is not even much less newbut it once again highlights the limitations of international sanctions. Despite export controls and technological restrictions, civilian components (chips, sensors, electronic systems) they keep coming to the Russian military industry through gray markets, intermediaries or countries that evade or laxly apply control standards. Sanctions, loopholes and a doubt. Ukraine takes time alerting of the magnitude of the problem. In one of the massive attacks this fall, President Volodymyr Zelensky claimed that they had identified more than 100,000 components of foreign origin in a single package of 550 drones and missiles launched by Russia. The figure illustrates not only the persistence of gaps in the sanctions regime, but also the industrial scale that Moscow has achieved in the production and adaptation of drones, relying on technologies that, in theory, should be out of its reach. Testing ground. Although the use of armed drones with air-to-air missiles It is striking, the truth is that it is not completely unprecedented in this war. Ukraine has also experienced with the integration of surface-to-air missiles in naval drones, managing to shoot down Russian aircraft over the Black Sea. The conflict has thus become a real-time laboratory where both sides test improvised combinations of cheap platforms and inherited weaponry, adapting them to new missions with surprising speed. Drones as a strategy. we have been explaining throughout the months. The introduction of this armed Geran-2 coincides with a sustained investment of Russia in drone operations, both in national production as in the creation of new launch infrastructures. Beyond the immediate impact on the battlefield, the message is strategic: Moscow seeks to complicate every layer of the Ukrainian defense, even at the cost of sacrificing some of the destructive power of its drones, and demonstrates that, despite sanctions, it continues to find a way to combine foreign technologyinherited weaponry and mass production to sustain their war effort. Image | Kyiv City State Administration In Xataka | A day later the satellites leave no doubt: Russia fortified a bridge, and a Ukrainian drone made science fiction a reality In Xataka | If Europe thinks that the end of the war in Ukraine is the end of its problems with Russia, Finland has just woken it up

more than 100,000 pieces were from their own allies

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A kilometer report could be made with the different analysis that has led out Ukrainian intelligence when a Russian artifact has been found. The drones have revealed on numerous occasions that, in war, international sanctions they don’t work of great deal. And not just drones, even in the tanks. Now, and after the brutal Russian offensive last Sunday, Ukraine has once again dissected the enemy. The surprise at this point is no longer “who,” but “how much.” The fragility of chains. one night of massive attack exhibited, with crude clarity, a paradox that has been brewing for some time in modern war: the destructive capacity of a State that declares itself sanctioned and isolated continues to depend (and to a large extent prosper thank you) to the circuits, chips and parts that circulate in civilian markets and manufacturers around the world. In the night assault that combined 496 attack drones and 53 missilesthe Ukrainian authorities counted 102,785 components of foreign origin embedded in the munitions and devices that tore the country’s sky; Of them, around 100,688 were on drones (among them about 250 powerful replicas of the Shahed type) and the rest distributed in Iskander (about 1,500), Kinzhal (192) and Kalibr (405). Zelensky has said That Ukraine does not only intend to point out culprits: it is a forensic exercise that reveals how everything, from a converter to a microcontroller, ends up accelerating the aggressor’s ability to persist. What and from where. The identified components cover parts that the civil industry mass produces: converters (analog and power), sensors, analog-digital converters, microelectronics and microcomputers, which, according to kyivcome from companies located in the United States, United Kingdom, China, Taiwan, Germany, Switzerland, Japan, Korea and the Netherlands. Ukraine has pointed out concrete examplessuch as British microcomputers for flight control, Swiss microcontrollers, German connectors, and has stressed that the greatest diversity and volume comes from from China and Taiwanwhich explains why, even when the most advanced parts are restricted, technological proliferation keep feeding arsenals. Sanctions, double use and illusion. The figures and traceability reveal the essential limitation of sanctions: the international export control regime collides with complex global chainsintermediary agents and pieces cataloged as “dual use” that circulate through civil markets and logistics centers that do not ask about the final destination. The compliance standards of companies and state controls are necessary but insufficient regarding re-exports, transshipments and suppliers that serve to non-military sectors. Furthermore, even large corporations do not have absolute visibility over the useful life and final destination of each component. The practical consequence is a war economy that thrives on the tenuous border between the legal and the hidden, between licit manufacturing and war use. Politics and geostrategy. If you also want, the ukrainian reaction It is political and operational: beyond reporting, kyiv transfers the data of the pieces and their origins to its partners to pressure for concrete measures. Zelensky demands to close “now” the flows of critical components and proposes additional restrictions, from boarding controls to logistical blockades. Experts from Ukraine itself they claim a coordinated decision at G7 level that addresses implementation gaps and harmonizes checklists, due diligence procedures and interdiction measures in ports and trade routes. Vladyslav Vlasiuk and other sanctions officials they underline that without systemic and synchronized action (inspections, conditional cargo insurance, monitoring of re-exports) the prohibitions would remain on paper. Industrial and ethical implications. It we have commented other times. The phenomenon also raises a question moral and practical for the industry: to what extent should a company assume responsibility for the end use of its products and what investments does this require in traceability, auditing and third-party controls. The technical answers there are (tracking servers, controlled party lists, customer integrity certifications), but they have costs that, in practice, fragment markets and raise prices. For allied governments, the solution is to tighten controls without suffocating critical civil chains. For the firms, for redoubling diligence and collaborating with the authorities. Industrialized war. In military terms, the availability of these components speed up production mass of drones and missiles, reduces manufacturing times and makes it more difficult to dismantle a threat that finds pieces in the global economy. The continuous waves of attacks that damage infrastructure civilians and kill or wound to non-combatants They demonstrate that pieces are not mere objects: they are damage multipliers. For Ukraine, the battle over sanctions It is, therefore, another front line, and its success depends both on the diplomatic and legal effectiveness of its allies and on the technical capacity to track and block logistical routes. Technological containment. They remembered the analysts at Insider that closing the gaps requires mixing diplomacy, intelligence and regulation: harmonizing control lists, coordinating port inspections, conditioning insurance and logistics services, and building international standards on industrial traceability. It also implies strengthening national capacities for alternative production (relocation of critical chains) and reducing dependence on strategic components in jurisdictions with less export control. However, no isolated measure will be enough: experience shows that flows adapt very quickly. That’s why Ukraine ask and need a G7 outreach strategy that combines smart sanctions, pressure on intermediaries, and a clear map of risks and responsibilities. An uncomfortable diagnosis. The verification of those more than 100,000 foreign components in a single attack is a clear photograph of how technological globalization has reconfigured conflicts: now the vulnerabilities are no longer just ammunition depots or bases, but supply networks, commercial contracts and neutral ports. The lesson for “friendly” governments of Ukraine is twofold: suppressing supplies is as important as supplying defenses, and for companiesacting responsibly is not only ethics, but collective security. In the end, the question this episode raises is not just technical (how to cut off that supply chain) but politics and morals: to what extent industrial prosperity can be sustained without control rules and without effective mechanisms that prevent a seemingly innocuous chip from ending up igniting large-scale violence. Image | National Guard of Ukraine In Xataka | Russia has an advantage over Ukraine: it is called … Read more

PLD Space has a detailed plan to become the European rocket factory. And the pieces have started fitting

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With Miura 1, PLD Space became the first private company in Europe to successfully launch a suborbital rocket. Since then, the Spanish company has stepped on the accelerator with a project in mind: launching Miura 5 in 2026. Today the first orbital rocket in Spain is not a project, but a tangible reality that is being assembled in Elche. PLD Space It has already manufactured All its components and prepares to start your engines for the first time. The Treprel-C roars in Teruel. A rocket is, in essence, an engine with a large fuel tank. Miura 5 will have five Treprel-C engines fed by turbobomba in its first stage, generating a combined thrust of 950 kN, 30 times more than Miura 1. The development of the most important component of the rocket advances to counterreloj. The company already tested in its test banks of Teruel’s airport combustion cameras, validating manufacturing technologies such as copper and nickel electrode. The turbobombs, the largest developed by a European startup, They were also tested with a complete ignition before its final integration into the engine. Elements such as gas generators and cryogenic valves were designed, manufactured and tested internally following the lessons learned during the development of MIURA 1. A process that has culminated with the start of the engine series manufacturing: there are already four engines of the Teprel-C family in production for the final qualification campaign. Aluminum plates have gained shape. Parallel to the development of engines, the construction of the rocket structure itself advances at a good pace. In a recent videoThe company details how its Elche factory has been working on the molding and the test of the metal structures (the fuel tanks) and of composite materials (the separation module between stages and the cofia that will protect the satellites of the customers). These components have already undergone all kinds: tests at room temperature, cryogenic, and with compression and flexion loads to ensure that the structure will support the brutal conditions of the launch. The idea is to refine the design with the results of the prototypes to maximize their performance. After validating the engineering models, PLD Space is now manufacturing the final qualification components, the step prior to the series production of Miura 5. The launch ramp is running. The company signed a development contract With the French Space Agency (CNES) to build its own launch complex in the European Space Port of Kouroou, in the French Guiana. The civil works will begin this summer in the same place where France launched its first rocket, the Elm-Diamant. The location is unbeatable: its proximity to Ecuador will allow optimizing the trajectories of Miura 5 and launching heavier loads with less fuel. But PLD Space does not conform and has also signed an agreement with Oman to build a Second launch base In the Etlaq Space Puerto. This movement will give direct access to the Mercado de Oriente. A plan to be the European rocket factory. At the same time that Miura 5 develops, PLD Space is raising an industrial complex to manufacture it in series. The company has designed a plan to climb its production to 32 units per year by 2030. This industrial effort is based on a supply chain of almost 400 partners, mostly Spanish and Europeans, which has invested 50 million euros Since the beginning of 2024. PLD Space has chained a series of crucial milestones that draw a very clear and ambitious roadmap, as European confidence demonstrates. Back of the European Space Agency. PLD Space is already officially one of the five companies preselected by ESA to guarantee sovereign access to space in Europe. The European Launcher Challenge has awarded contracts of up to 169 million euros to the five companies, among which are the French Maiaspace, the British Orbex and the Germans Isar Aerospace and Rocket Factory Augsburg. PLD Space has proposed to Miura 5 as its immediate operating pitcher already His future heavy and reusable rocket, the Miura Nextlike the next step. The ESA final decision will be taken in November 2025, but the pre -selection already positions the Spanish company as a key actor and an industrial leader in the European launch sector. Image | PLD Space In Xataka | 12 years after making fun of Spacex and his idea of landing rockets, Arianegroup is creating a European mini-falcon 9

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