(Zero Hedge)—Aviation observers have spotted a supersonic unmanned aerial vehicle under the fuselage of a People’s Liberation Army Air Force (PLAAF) bomber, Defense Blog reports. The new drone can conduct strategic aerial reconnaissance across southeast Asia.
Images of the WZ-8 reconnaissance drone attached to a Xian H-6 bomber surfaced on social media platform X last week. The rare sighting reminds us that PLAAF, the third largest air force in the world, is quickly modernizing its aircraft fleet to include drones as tensions with the US over Taiwan remain high.
Maybe this is the first real image of a WZ-8 under a H-6MW.
(Image via @種花家de小姐姐 from Weibo) pic.twitter.com/XctC1mMjka
— @Rupprecht_A (@RupprechtDeino) April 19, 2024
First revealed to the public in 2019, WZ-8 provides pre-strike targeting information and/or post-strike assessments. The drone can also conduct strategic aerial reconnaissance across southeast Asia, including Taiwan and South Korea.
In a separate Defense Blog report, citing classified papers obtained by The Washington Post, a fleet of WZ-8 drones are stationed in newly built hangars in the Lu’an airbase in eastern China. This base allows the supersonic drones to be easily deployed to Taiwan and South Korea for intelligence-gathering missions while flying at an altitude of 30 kilometers – untouchable to some of the world’s most advanced air defense systems.
As the world’s AI superpowers, China and the US, gear up for potential drone wars in the Indo-Pacific region, the rapid advancement of swarm technology will be critical for winning the next major conflict, along with hypersonic weapons. The deployment of these technologies comes as war rages on in Eastern Europe and flares up in the Middle East. Banker Jamie Dimon recently warned the world faces “risks that eclipse anything since World War II.”
Independent Journalism Is Dying
Ever since President Trump’s miraculous victory, we’ve heard an incessant drumbeat about how legacy media is dying. This is true. The people have awakened to the reality that they’re being lied to by the self-proclaimed “Arbiters of Truth” for the sake of political expediency, corporate self-protection, and globalist ambitions.
But even as independent journalism rises to fill the void left by legacy media, there is still a huge challenge. Those at the top of independent media like Joe Rogan, Dan Bongino, and Tucker Carlson are thriving and rightly so. They have earned their audience and the financial rewards that come from it. They’ve taken risks and worked hard to get to where they are.
For “the rest of us,” legacy media and their proxies are making it exceptionally difficult to survive, let alone thrive. They still have a stranglehold over the “fact checkers” who have a dramatic impact on readership and viewership. YouTube, Facebook, and Google still stifle us. The freer speech platforms like Rumble and 𝕏 can only reward so many of their popular content creators. For independent journalists on the outside looking in, our only recourse is to rely on affiliates and sponsors.
But even as it seems nearly impossible to make a living, there are blessings that should not be disregarded. By highlighting strong sponsors who share our America First worldview, we have been able to make lifelong connections and even a bit of revenue to help us along. This is why we enjoy symbiotic relationships with companies like MyPillow, Jase Medical, and Promised Grounds. We help them with our recommendations and they reward us with money when our audience buys from them.
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Even our faith-driven precious metals sponsor helps us tremendously while also helping Americans protect their life’s savings. We are blessed to work with them.
Independent media is the future. In many ways, that future is already here. While the phrase, “the more the merrier,” does not apply to this business because there are still some bad actors in the independent media field, there are many great ones that do not get nearly enough attention. We hope to change that one content creator at a time.
Thank you and God Bless,
JD Rucker
