“Ukraine’s military struck two Russian plants producing and repairing military transport and cargo planes in the Ulyanovsk and Novgorod regions, the Ukrainian general staff said on Wednesday. It said in a statement that the attack on the Aviastar plant, part of Russia’s United Aircraft Corporation, in the city of Ulyanovsk, was carried out on 16 March. The plant produces Ilyushin-76MD-90A military transport planes, Ilyushin-78M-90A refueling planes, and provides maintenance for ‘Ruslan’ cargo planes, and is located about 800km (about 500 miles) from the Ukrainian border. … The attack on the 123rd aircraft maintenance plant in the city of Staraya Russia in the Novgorod region took place one day later, the general staff said.” (03/19/26)
“The FBI is investigating [sic] Joe Kent, the former director of the National Counterterrorism Center, who resigned earlier this week over opposition to the U.S. ongoing war with Iran, over allegedly leaking classified information, The Hill’s sister network confirmed on Wednesday. The agency’s [PR witch hunt] was [supposedly] underway before Kent, a top aide to Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, announced his resignation from the post on Tuesday, arguing that Iran did not pose an imminent threat to the U.S. and urging President Trump to change course regarding the Middle East conflict, a source told NewsNation. The FBI declined to comment when reached by The Hill.” ()3/18/26)
“The latest heavy fighting between warring parties along Sudan ’s border with Chad has killed 17 people and many wounded, a medical group said. The attacks on Monday in Tina left 66 people in serious condition, Doctors Without Borders, also known as Médecins Sans Frontières, or MSF, said in a post on X late Tuesday. The army said in an update that the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces, or RSF, had expanded its attacks on military areas in Tina, but that troops were able to repel them and forced them to withdraw.” (03/18/26)
“Cryptocurrency payments and gift card platform Bitrefill has blamed the North Korea-linked hacking group Lazarus for a cyberattack on March 1, 2026, that compromised parts of its infrastructure and cryptocurrency wallets. The attackers gained access to production keys, transferred funds from hot wallets, and exposed 18,500 purchase records containing emails, payment addresses, and IP addresses. Approximately 1,000 records included encrypted usernames. Affected users were notified. Operations have resumed, with the company announcing to cover losses from operational capital. The incident underscores the importance of vigilance regarding crypto and on-chain security.” (03/18/26)
“The Pentagon is making plans to have AI companies train versions of their models specifically for military use on classified information, according to the MIT Technology Review. If true, it wouldn’t come as a surprise, seeing as the US is aiming to become an ‘AI-first’ warfighting force, based on the statement released by Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth earlier this year. The department is already using AI models in the military: For instance, the US reportedly used Anthropic’s Claude to help with the capture of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and with its attack on Iran, even after President Trump ordered federal agencies to ban its technology. But models trained on actual classified data could give more accurate and detailed responses, say, for situations similar to what happened in the past that aren’t public information.” (03/18/26)
“Home loan applications decreased 10.9% for the week ending March 13, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association. The decrease comes after four consecutive weeks in which demand for mortgage applications was on the rise. The Market Composite Index, a measure of mortgage loan application volume, decreased 10.9% on a seasonally adjusted basis from one week earlier. On an unadjusted basis, the Index decreased 10% compared with the previous week.” (03/18/26)
“Wholesale prices rose sharply in February, providing another sign that inflation continues to percolate even aside from rising energy costs. The producer price index, a measure of pipeline costs that producers receive for their products, increased a seasonally adjusted 0.7% on the month, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Wednesday. Excluding volatile food and energy costs, the so-called core PPI increased 0.5%. Economists surveyed by Dow Jones had been looking for increases of 0.3% for both measures. For the all-items index, prices rose faster than the 0.5% pace in January. However, the core increase was less than the 0.8% for the prior month. On a 12-month basis, headline PPI inflation was at 3.4%, the most since February 2025, while core was at 3.9%, according to the BLS. The Federal Reserve targets inflation at 2%.” (03/18/26)
“Pakistan announced on Wednesday a pause in strikes against Afghanistan, saying the decision was made ahead of the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Fitr at the request of Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Turkey. In a statement, Pakistan’s information minister Attaullah Tarar said the pause in strikes on ‘terrorists and their support infrastructure in Afghanistan’ would take effect at midnight on Wednesday and remain in place until midnight on Monday. ‘Pakistan offers this gesture in good faith and in keeping with the Islamic norms,’ he said. However, he said, ‘in case of any cross-border attack, drone attack or any terrorist incident inside Pakistan,’ the operations would immediately resume with renewed intensity.” (03/18/26)
“A judge in the US has ruled that the effective closure of the Voice of America (VOA) last year was ‘illegal’ and that hundreds of its journalists should be reinstated. District Court Judge Royce Lamberth has given authorities one week to put the international broadcaster back on air. The VOA was set up during World War Two to counter Nazi propaganda. Just weeks after returning to office as president, Donald Trump issued an executive order to close the broadcaster which his officials accused of left-wing bias.” (03/18/26)
“Two Democratic lawmakers on Tuesday introduced legislation that would prohibit online prediction markets from allowing bets on government actions that could be easily gamed by insiders. The proposed Banning Event Trading on Sensitive Operations and Federal Functions (BETS OFF) Act, unveiled by US Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT) and Rep. Greg Casar [D-TX], would ban ‘wagering on government actions, terrorism, war, assassination, and events where an individual knows or controls the outcome.’ The lawmakers said the legislation was necessary due to suspiciously timed bets that were placed on the cryptocurrency-based prediction platform Polymarket related to imminent US military actions in Venezuela and Iran, raising concerns that Trump administration officials were using insider information to profit from life-or-death policy decisions.” (03/18/26)
