The Chinese military publicly revealed for the first time a road-mobile heavy strategic intercontinental ballistic missile dubbed the DF-61 at the large-scale military parade in Beijing this week. It was among several nuclear missiles that were on display alongside a slew of other high-tech arms, including tanks, warplanes and drones.

The DF-61 appears to be one of the new missiles mentioned in annual Pentagon reports on the Chinese military and represents a significant upgrade to China’s nuclear forces. National Security Correspondent Bill Gertz reports that prior to this week, the DF-41, introduced during a military parade in 2019, was Beijing’s most advanced long-range missile.

The upgrade is a key part of what U.S. military officials have called China’s massive and ongoing nuclear weapons expansion. The commander of the U.S. Strategic Command said in 2021 that China was in “strategic breakout,” making alarming advances in nuclear power capabilities that required an urgent U.S. response. The clearest indication of the breakout has been the construction of more than 300 nuclear missile silos at three bases in western China.

Russia is denying allegations it carried out a cyberattack on European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen’s airplane. The Kremlin said Thursday that the allegations are fake and underscore Western Europe’s paranoia that Moscow is engaged in large-scale anti-Europe subterfuge that includes cyber operations.

Ms. Von der Leyen’s trip to Bulgaria was interrupted last weekend after her aircraft lost access to its GPS navigation system, forcing pilots to use paper maps to land. No one was injured during the incident. Bulgarian authorities say the plane’s GPS was neutralized through “blatant interference” and the Kremlin was the key suspect. 

Bulgaria’s Air Traffic Services Authority says it has noticed a marked increase in similar incidents since Russia began its war with Ukraine in early 2022. European authorities have recorded an overall increase in jamming and spoofing events over the past three years, especially in countries neighboring Russia.

Expensive labor and an undisciplined process have hampered U.S. shipbuilding, according to retired U.S. Navy Rear Adm. Mark Montgomery, who also says shipbuilding costs have skyrocketed in the U.S. while peer nations have created more efficient and more affordable production systems. 

Mr. Montgomery details issues challenging the future of U.S. naval dominance in an exclusive Threat Status Influencers video interview, asserting that “the problem is multifaceted.” 

Despite the protection afforded by the Jones Act, a 1920 law that requires vessels operated between U.S. ports to be built domestically, owned by U.S. companies and staffed by Americans, U.S. shipbuilding capacity has shrunk dramatically over the past 50 years. Stringent regulations, aging infrastructure and high labor costs have left most U.S. shipyards inactive.

According to a Signal Group report from April, U.S. shipyards account for less than 1% of commercial vessel production worldwide, while China, Japan and South Korea make up 90% collectively.

South Korea’s Hanwha Group has announced it will pump $5 billion into upgrading the infrastructure of the Philadelphia Shipyard that it purchased last year for $100 million, as part of a plan to expand the company’s global defense and shipbuilding activities.

The financial package was announced on Aug. 27 during South Korean President Lee Jae-myung’s visit to what is now the Hanwha Philly Shipyard. It coincided with the christening of the “State of Maine,” the U.S. Maritime Administration’s third National Security Multi-Mission Vessel.

The ceremony followed summit talks at the White House with Mr. Trump. Earlier, the Lee administration had pledged $150 billion in American shipbuilding investments. The $5 billion for Hanwha Philly will be used to install two additional docks and three quays to increase capacity at the shipyard. The new owners are also reviewing plans for the construction of a new assembly facility.

Shaking off its “navel-gazing-style obsession with the inner workings of Earth’s climate, NASA is once again focusing its attention on its original mission of sending humanity outbound into space,” writes Frank Perley in a Washington Times column. “A round of applause is in order; the American spirit to pioneer is stepping toward the stars for the ultimate adventure.”

NASA faces a 52% slash in funding for skyborne study of Earth’s climate, putting such satellite research subjects as sea-level and carbon-dioxide measurements on the chopping block. But, Mr. Perley writes, “as painful as these cuts appear, untouched by the budget blade would be the agency’s core aims: missions considered essential for manned flights to low earth orbit, the moon and, eventually, Mars, where the hoped-for establishment of colonies would transform humanity into an interplanetary species.

“The Trump administration’s plan to refocus NASA on human space exploration is a sensible effort to maintain America’s lead in the race to populate space,” writes Mr. Perley, a former senior editor and editorial writer for The Times’ opinion pages. “With China intent on its own astronauts soon claiming swaths of lunar real estate for its own, there is little time to waste.”

• Sept. 4 — Disruptive Technology for Future Warfare, Institute for National Strategic Studies

• Sept. 4 — The Digital Front Line: Building a Cyber-Resilient Taiwan, Hudson Institute

• Sept. 5 — Truth and Trust in the AI Supply Chain, Atlantic Council

• Sept. 9 — Will ‘Peace’ in Ukraine Lead to More War? Chatham House

• Sept. 9 — From Monroe to the Golden Age: Charting America’s Path in Latin America, Alexander Hamilton Society

• Sept. 20-21 — AFA National Convention 2025, Air & Space Forces Association

• Sept. 22-23 — Cyber Defense Summit 25, Mandiant & Google Threat Intelligence

• Sept. 23-25 — National Cyber Summit