Russia’s Strategic Missile Forces to Go All-Digital by 2020

The Russian Strategic Missile Forces will completely switch to digital data transmission technologies by 2020, spokesperson of the Defense Ministry Maj. Dmitry Andreev told journalists.

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“With the current pace of modernization in the armed forces, communication systems will be all-digital by 2020,” Andreev said.

Report: Iran ‘sanitized’ Parchin nuke site before inspection

The report by Fox News said that a “containment vessel” for testing nuclear equipment was removed from Parchin. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) had earlier confirmed that the “vessel” was at the site.

A source told Fox News the missing device was also used to test triggers that could detonate a warhead. The source added that removal of the equipment would have made it more difficult for inspectors to test for radioactive residue.

US confirms it will place 250 tanks in eastern Europe to counter Russian threat

The United States will place 250 tanks, artillery pieces and fighting vehicles in seven eastern European countries as a bulwark against Russian aggression, it was confirmed on Tuesday.

Ash Carter, the US defence secretary, said Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia, Bulgaria, Romania and Poland will host equipment in order to reassure Nato countries alarmed by Russian action in Ukraine.

Leaked photos suggest PLA developing mobile landing platform

 

China appears to be developing a Mobile Landing Platform (MLP) similar in concept to that being built by the United States, reports the Beijing-based Sina Military Network.

Photos of a Chinese military vessel resembling the US Navy’s MLP were recently released by the Chinese military magazine Modern Ships, leading to speculation that China is trying to develop its own “floating base.”

Report: Germany classified list of companies that helped build Syria’s CW stockpile

 

The weekly Der Spiegel said Berlin received the list from the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons that was assigned the destruction of the CW stockpile and facilities of President Bashar Assad in 2013. About 1,400 Syrians were said to have been killed in Assad’s CW attacks.

“Berlin immediately classified the list and has since kept it under lock and key,” Der Spiegel said. “The government says that releasing the names would ‘significantly impair foreign policy interests and thus the welfare of the Federal Republic of Germany.’”

PLA needs bigger guns and tanks for its growing soldiers

The People’s Liberation Army is replacing its weapons because its young soldiers are getting bigger, the PLA Daily has reported.

The average PLA soldier is now 2cm taller and his waistline 5cm wider than the average soldier two decades ago, a report by the General Armament Department’s chemical decontamination institution revealed.

It did not state the average measurements of height and waistline.

The report said that because many of the army’s current weapons were designed based on soldiers’ sizes some 30 years ago, a soldier of normal build today would feel cramped in the tanks and find the firearms too short to use.