Category: Security

Source: United States Army

PICATINNY ARSENAL, NJ – The U.S. Army’s Capability Program Executive Ammunition and Energetics (CPE A&E), headquartered at Picatinny Arsenal, NJ, is spearheading a major transformation of the nation’s small‑caliber ammunition industrial base, advancing one of the Army’s highest modernization priorities. Central to this effort is the delivery of next‑generation 6.8mm cartridges that will equip soldiers with increased range, accuracy, and battlefield lethality as part of the Next Generation Squad Weapons (NGSW) program.

The NGSW program, featuring the M7 Rifle, XM8 Carbine, and M250 Automatic Rifle, represents the Army’s most significant small‑arms upgrade in decades, replacing the M4 Carbine and M249 Squad Automatic Weapon. These new weapons, enabled by advanced 6.8mm cartridges, are designed to provide decisive overmatch in operating environments.

To accelerate production and strengthen readiness, Project Manager Maneuver Ammunition Systems (PM MAS), in partnership with Project Lead Joint Services (PL JS), has established an interim 6.8mm manufacturing capability at the Lake City Army Ammunition Plant (LCAAP) utilizing a mix of new and repurposed equipment. As of March 2026, operating contractor Olin Winchester is producing and delivering 6.8mm ammunition from this capability. The Army is also supplying projectiles from this interim line to SIG Sauer to support additional cartridge deliveries while LCAAP expansion continues.

CPE A&E is executing a long-term modernization strategy to ensure the Army’s ammunition needs are met well into the future. A key milestone was the February 2025 groundbreaking for a new 450,000‑square‑foot 6.8mm production facility at LCAAP. This state-of-the-art complex will house advanced manufacturing systems for every component of the 6.8mm cartridge and serves as a cornerstone of the Army’s organic industrial base modernization. Construction remains on schedule, with production equipment installation anticipated to begin in 2028.

“CPE A&E is leading the development, procurement, and fielding of cutting-edge ammunition and energetics ensuring the Army and its international partners maintain a significant technological advantage,” said Col. Jason Bohannon, Capability Program Executive Ammunition and Energetics. “The work being executed is foundational to advancing the Army’s modernization goals and ensuring combat readiness across the force.”

Source: United States Army

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Army is implementing significant updates to its retention program in fiscal year 2026, reinforcing a performance-based approach that directly benefits Soldiers who maintain high standards, develop critical skills and commit to long-term service.

The updated program shifts reenlistment incentives toward a quality-centric model that prioritizes readiness, critical military occupational specialties and individual performance. While all eligible Soldiers may reenlist, incentive levels will now vary based on performance and Army needs.

“The primary mission of the revamped program is to maximize precision and quality in retention to meet end strength goals and drive readiness,” said Col. Angela Chipman, chief of the U.S. Army military personnel accessions and retention division. “This approach allows the Army to better recognize and retain Soldiers who consistently perform at a high level.”

For Soldiers who train hard, seek growth and take pride in their work, the updated system offers clearer returns on effort.

Under the FY26 framework, the Army will reduce reliance on short-term extensions and place greater emphasis on longer reenlistment contracts, reflecting the Army’s increased investment in advanced skills and long-term readiness.

At the center of the updated retention program is the Quality Tiered Incentives Program, or QTIP. The system evaluates Soldiers within cohorts of the same rank and MOS using a standardized, data-driven approach.

QTIP measures performance across three weighted categories: physical fitness, technical expertise and command assessment. Army Fitness Test scores, documented qualifications and leader evaluations of performance and potential all factor into a Soldier’s tier placement.

Soldiers who maintain strong fitness, pursue professional development and demonstrate consistent reliability will rank higher within their peer groups and qualify for enhanced incentives.

The Army will also place greater emphasis on reclassification into priority and shortage MOSs. Soldiers willing to transition into critical roles while maintaining strong performance metrics will be among the most competitive for bonuses and reenlistment incentives.

Beginning in December, the Army will train career counselors, command teams and personnel sections on the updated retention framework. Soldiers approaching their reenlistment window are encouraged to engage early with leadership and career counselors, ensure records are accurate and pursue opportunities that enhance readiness and competitiveness.

The message is simple: Soldiers who invest in themselves will see the difference at reenlistment, while strengthening the Army’s ability to meet future challenges.

Source: United States Army

PRESIDIO OF MONTEREY, Calif. (April 20, 2026) — Emergency response on the Monterey Peninsula is a team effort, requiring constant coordination between agencies to ensure a rapid, effective response.

Those partnerships have been on display in recent weeks, from a childbirth call early on April 2 to a three-alarm fire at the Casanova Avenue apartment complex on March 9.

In the early morning hours of April 2, PoM firefighters responded to a medical call reporting a woman in labor. The crew arrived to find a full-term infant had been delivered moments before their arrival. Firefighters immediately transitioned to patient care, assessing both mother and newborn while coordinating with incoming medical personnel.

“You always prepare for everything,” said firefighter Andrea Kiser. “We bring all the equipment because you don’t know if you’re walking into a delivery or a complication.”

The infant, a girl weighing approximately 5.5 pounds, was assessed in excellent condition. Kiser accompanied the mother and newborn to the hospital, where both were reported to be in good health.

“Not every shift ends with a brand-new baby entering the world, so this one definitely brought some big smiles around the station,” said fire chief David Wilcox. “That’s the kind of call that reminds everyone why the job matters.”

Just weeks earlier, on March 9, PoM firefighters responded alongside multiple agencies to a three-alarm fire at the Casanova Avenue apartment complex in Monterey. Monterey Fire Department led the incident and directed crews to fight the fire and search for residents. Other agencies who responded to the call were from Seaside, Monterey County Regional Fire District, Marina, Salinas, North County, Hollister and Cal Fire.

“When the first crew arrives, they own the scene and start assigning incoming units based on what’s needed,” said Capt. Issac Johnson.

The response brought together multiple agencies operating under a unified approach, a routine reality for fire departments across the peninsula.

“We all work together regularly, so when something like that happens, it’s pretty seamless,” Johnson said.

That interdependence is formalized through the automatic aid and mutual aid agreements PoM maintains with neighboring jurisdictions, including Marina, Seaside and Monterey, as well as regional partnerships across the county. The agreements ensure the closest and most capable resources respond, regardless of jurisdiction, and allow agencies to coordinate personnel, equipment and resources when incidents require more.

“No single agency can meet every operational demand alone,” Wilcox said. “Our integration into the peninsula’s mutual aid network ensures both PoM and the surrounding community benefit from a unified, highly capable regional response.”

Training is just as collaborative as emergency response. The region’s highest risk remains a large-scale wildland fire, making interagency training critical to maintaining readiness across the peninsula. This week, April 20-24, PoM firefighters are participating in a wildland exercise led by Monterey Fire. The training takes place in Army housing on Navy property, forcing multiple agencies to practice together in a shared environment.

For deputy fire chief Travis Wondrash, that level of coordination is essential.

“Through the coordination and efforts of our partners, we’re able to get 70% of the department trained in two days,” Wondrash said. “Compared to taking nearly an entire month to accomplish that, this is a major win for us. It’s a big bang for the buck.”

Whether responding to emergency medical calls, structural fires or interagency wildland incidents, PoM firefighters serve as a vital link in the mutual aid partnerships that protect the Monterey Peninsula.

Source: United States Army

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U.S. Army Southern European Task Force, Africa

AGADIR, Morocco — More than 400 multinational service members are gathering to participate in the academic portion of African Lion 26 at Southern Zone Headquarters, Agadir, Morocco, April 20 to May 1.

The academic phase of the exercise features 22 intensive courses. These classes prepare multinational service members to use unmanned aerial systems, cyberspace defenses and satellite operations before they head into simulated combat.

“The academics portion of the exercise serves as a critical foundation for follow-on training and operations,” said U.S. Marine Maj. Keefe Murtaugh, AL26 academics coordinator and team two operations officer with Marine Corps Advisor Company Alpha. “The academic program is designed to enhance technical expertise, accelerate decision-making and improve operational effectiveness across all domains, three elements critical to shortening the decision cycle in modern conflict.”

Courses range from entry-level instruction to advanced operational planning, ensuring leaders at every echelon are equipped to contribute to mission success. Training on unmanned aerial systems spans both tactical execution and operational integration.

“The operator course is meant to instruct service members on how to conduct UAS operations, basic flight instruction,” Murtaugh said. “The planner course is really intended for noncommissioned officers, senior NCOs and officers to think about how to employ UAS from a day-to-day perspective.”

Advanced courses are expanding into emerging domains, including space, electromagnetic warfare and cyberspace, areas critical to maintaining an advantage in increasingly contested environments.

“This year features an advanced [electronic warfare] and space course,” Murtaugh said. “The students that went through the basic course here last year are determining how to integrate with satellite operations in a bigger way, which is something that we haven’t done before.”

The 10-day cyberspace operations course further underscores the exercise’s focus on innovation and investment in modern capabilities.

U.S. Army 1st Lt. Mason Elizondo, an AL26 cyberspace operations instructor assigned to the 183rd Cyber Protection Team, Army Reserve Cyber Protection Brigade, is directly contributing to that effort by training partner forces to defend critical cyber infrastructure.

“Today we are instructing the Moroccan partner force on the introduction to cybersecurity… how to posture themselves effectively for threat hunting and cyber and best cybersecurity practices,” Elizondo said.

The training is designed to empower partner forces with the tools and knowledge needed to operate independently and defend their own networks, an essential component of burden-sharing and long-term regional stability.

“Our goal is to instruct partner forces and get them into a good position so that they can conduct their missions effectively and protect their cyber key terrain,” Elizondo said. “We need to teach them and choreograph with them to make sure that they have their own priorities set straight so they can do their own threat hunts.”

Elizondo added that the instruction focuses on detecting and countering adversary activity across multiple platforms.

“I will be teaching the students how to hunt and detect persistence on a network from figuring out how attackers get into the network and how they stay on the network to anything from a Windows system to a Linux system or a cloud environment,” he said.

The multinational environment also enables a two-way exchange of knowledge, reinforcing innovation and adaptability across the force.

“They are incredibly proficient and incredibly knowledgeable,” Elizondo said. “We’re not just imparting knowledge on them, we’re also getting knowledge from them. We get to interact with all different types of partner forces.”

For Murtaugh, this collaborative approach is central to building interoperable forces capable of responding to shared challenges.

“We partner with foreign forces and help validate their doctrine, work through the planning process and make sure we can maximize interoperability,” he said.

The academic phase plays a vital role in preparing participants for subsequent exercise events, ensuring forces can effectively apply their training during planning and execution phases.

“The academics portion is critical because it’s helping a lot of these students refresh, or be introduced to some of the material that they’re going to apply during either the planning or execution for command field exercises,” Murtaugh said.

U.S. Army 1st Sgt. Travis Herman, Intelligence and Sustainment Company first sergeant, U.S. Army Southern European Task Force, Africa (SETAF-AF), said the experience reinforces shared goals among partner nations.

“This is my first time teaching in Africa,” Herman said. “I’m most excited about getting to know the Royal Moroccan Armed Forces, their culture and getting to see how they run things.”

Herman, who teaches the noncommissioned officer development course, said the training enhances readiness for both U.S. and partner forces.

“It is helping increase readiness with both them and us because it refreshes me on some foundations that I haven’t touched on in a couple years,” he said.

Through engagement with partner forces, Herman emphasized the common ground that underpins multinational cooperation.

“From training alongside our partners and our allies, I just continue to learn that we are more similar than we are different,” he said. “They want the same things that we want for our Soldiers, readiness.”

By combining academic instruction with multinational collaboration, AL26 strengthens deterrence, validates innovative approaches and empowers partner nations to build sustainable, independent capabilities, ensuring a more ready, capable and interoperable force for the future.

About African Lion

African Lion 2026 is U.S. Africa Command’s largest annual joint exercise, designed to strengthen collective security capabilities of the U.S., African nations and global allies. Co-led by U.S. Army Southern European Task Force, Africa (SETAF-AF) from April 20 to May 8, 2026, and hosted in Ghana, Morocco, Senegal and Tunisia, AL26 involves over 5,600 personnel from more than 40 nations, using innovation to drive partner-led regional security.

African Lion content can be found on the Defense Visual Information Distribution Service (DVIDS).

About SETAF-AF

U.S. Army Southern European Task Force, Africa (SETAF-AF) prepares Army forces, executes crisis response, enables strategic competition and strengthens partners to achieve U.S. Army Europe and Africa and U.S. Africa Command campaign objectives.

Follow SETAF-AF on: Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, LinkedIn & DVIDS

Source: United States Army

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U.S. Army Southern European Task Force, Africa

ROME — Senior enlisted leaders from Africa, Europe and the United States attended the Senior Enlisted Leader Forum, held in conjunction with the African Land Forces Summit in Rome, Italy, March 24.

Hosted by U.S. Army Southern European Task Force, Africa (SETAF-AF) and sponsored by the Office of the U.S. Army Chief of Staff, ALFS annually brings land force leaders together to strengthen partnerships and address shared security challenges. The SELF, introduced seven years ago, reinforces that mission by focusing on the critical role of noncommissioned officers in shaping future forces and driving mission success.

“Forums like this allow us to synchronize efforts of leader development from across the African continent while building relationships that matter,” said U.S. Army Command Sgt. Maj. Chad Harness, senior enlisted advisor for SETAF-AF. “As we execute our eighth iteration of SELF, this is the largest forum we’ve done, which only codifies its importance as we build upon the NCO corps.”

This year’s forum marked the first time the SELF took place in Europe. Harness welcomed participants and emphasized the importance of senior enlisted leadership in building capable, adaptive formations prepared for modern warfare.

“The theme of this year’s ALFS conference was innovation,” Harness said. “For innovation to become positive change it must meet the demands of the operational environment and practical application by the end user. For that to happen across our partner forces, we need strong NCO leadership like I see at this event.”

Reinforcing the importance of enlisted leadership in executing strategy, Italian army Command Sgt. Maj. Michele Romano underscored the role of NCOs in mission success.

“The most expertly thought-out plan is only as good as the NCO corps that is interpreting and executing it,” Romano said. “Our strength as armies comes from the professionalism, discipline and adaptability of our NCOs.”

Building on that perspective, keynote speakers such as U.S. Army Command Sgt. Maj. Paul Fedorisin, senior enlisted advisor for 7th Army Training Command, and U.S. Army Command Sgt. Maj. Joshua Peterson, senior enlisted advisor assigned to the 173rd Mobile Brigade Combat Team, highlighted how disciplined, well-trained NCO corps across multinational formations enable operational effectiveness.

“A strong NCO corps is the backbone of any effective force, especially in multinational environments where trust and standards must be shared,” Peterson said. “When we invest in our enlisted leaders, we are investing directly in readiness and mission success.”

The forum gathered experienced sergeants major and senior enlisted leaders who shared insights drawn from decades of service. Expanding on the keynote remarks, discussions focused on leadership, readiness and innovation, with participants exchanging best practices for training and managing forces in an increasingly complex operational environment.

Echoing these themes, senior enlisted leaders from African partner nations contributed to the dialogue by sharing how they maintain discipline while fostering innovation and adapting to evolving threats.

“We face many of the same challenges, but forums like this give us new ideas and approaches we can take back to our formations,” said U.S. Army Sgt. Maj. Andrew Johnston, Security Cooperation Directorate sergeant major for SETAF-AF. “There is nothing to say that a corporal in Zambia isn’t the one who develops a solution to a tactical problem threatening all of us. I have worked with dozens of militaries over the years, and the best partners all have the same thing in common: a strong and empowered NCO corps.”

Adding to the collaborative environment, U.S. Army National Guard participants engaged with counterparts through the State Partnership Program, strengthening long-term partnerships and supporting the advancement of enlisted development initiatives aligned with U.S. Africa Command’s African Enlisted Development Program.

“The State Partnership Program allows us to build lasting relationships that go beyond a single exercise or event,” Johnston said. “Through the SPP program, partner and U.S. NCOs can engage and grow with each other over decades as opposed to years, building real partnerships and showing the U.S. commitment to security cooperation.”

The SELF supports this broader effort by enhancing partner force capability to address regional threats independently or alongside U.S. forces.

Concluding the forum, leaders emphasized that open dialogue and shared experiences remain essential to building trust and interoperability among participating nations.

“The relationships we build here are just as important as the lessons we share,” Harness said. “They are what enable us to operate together effectively in the future.”

The relationships formed and ideas exchanged in Rome will continue to shape how senior enlisted leaders develop their formations, contributing to a more secure and stable future across Africa and the rest of the world.

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About SETAF-AF

U.S. Army Southern European Task Force, Africa (SETAF-AF) prepares Army forces, executes crisis response, enables strategic competition and strengthens partners to achieve U.S. Army Europe and Africa and U.S. Africa Command campaign objectives.

Follow SETAF-AF on: Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, LinkedIn & DVIDS