British howitzers on the bank of the Nile opened fire on a tomb at half past one in the afternoon. It held the Mahdi, the Sudanese religious leader whose followers had taken Khartoum and killed Gen. Charles Gordon in 1885, months before the Mahdi himself died. To his followers it was a shrine, and its dome rose above the mud houses of Omdurman. A twenty-three-year-old cavalry officer named Winston Churchill watched the third shell hit and wrote of "a prodigious cloud of red dust, in which the whole tomb disappeared." The man giving the orders was Gen. Herbert Kitchener, forty-eight years old and six feet two, with a cast in one eye that made people feel he was looking straight through them. He had pushed a railway across the desert to reach this city. The next morning, September 2, 1898, the Mahdist army attacked his lines on the plain north of Omdurman. When it was over, about 12,000 of them lay dead, against 48 of Kitchener's men. Then he turned to the tomb. Kitchener feared it would become a rallying point for the Mahdi's followers, so he had it blown up. The Mahdi's body was dug up and beheaded, and the rest was thrown into the Nile. Churchill wrote that the head was carried off in a kerosene tin as a trophy. In London, Queen Victoria asked whether it had really been necessary. The skull was said to have been buried quietly at Wadi Halfa.

The Swedish Archer self-propelled howitzer is ultra-fast, highly mobile, long-range, and accurate — and it’s part of the Armed Forces of Ukraine’s arsenal. In service since 2023. Thank you, Sweden! 🇺🇦🤝🇸🇪 More details:

BIG | 🇰🇵🇰🇷🇺🇸‼️‼️ North Korea has positioned 122mm self-propelled howitzers just 1.5 kilometers from South Korea’s Aegibong Observatory, with their barrels pointed toward the South. The unusually exposed deployment comes alongside openly anti-American military slogans and visible troop exercises near the border. The artillery vehicles were reportedly spotted along the coast of Kaepung County, directly across from Gimpo in South Korea. Some carried slogans reading “Annihilate the U.S. imperialist aggressors,” while North Korean soldiers were observed conducting drills with red flags. Additional armored vehicles and activity involving the construction of fences were also reported in the surrounding area. The purpose and duration of the artillery deployment remain unclear. Positioning artillery in such a visible location could serve as a deliberate military signal toward Seoul and Washington rather than preparation for an immediate attack. The combination of southward-facing guns, military exercises, and ideological slogans reinforces Pyongyang’s confrontational posture. However, the proximity of armed units to South Korean territory also increases the potential consequences of miscalculation or an unexpected border incident, particularly in an environment where military tensions remain high. See the latest updates with us: @visionergeo

🚨🇨🇳 TAIWAN SEPARATISTS IN PANIC: CHINA GIVES TAIWAN-FACING BRIGADE ITS OWN PLZ-05 LONG-RANGE HOWITZERS China has pushed one of its most powerful artillery systems down from group-army formations to a heavy combined-arms brigade in the Eastern Theater Command. A brigade under the People’s Liberation Army’s (PLA) 71st Group Army received a batch of PLZ-05 155mm tracked self-propelled howitzers over the past two months, replacing older 122mm guns, and has already completed its first live-fire test. It is the first publicly confirmed case of PLZ-05s being assigned directly at brigade level. Instead of waiting for higher command to attach a separate long-range artillery formation, the brigade now controls its own heavy firepower. 🔸 Target coordinates from reconnaissance drones, radars and forward observers can be sent directly to the brigade’s guns, shortening the time between detecting a target and opening fire. 🔸 The PLZ-05’s automatic loader supports a maximum rate of around 8–10 rounds per minute. With BeiDou-guided WS-35 projectiles, it can strike targets at distances of up to 100 km, dramatically expanding the brigade’s reach compared with its older 122mm artillery. 🔸 Its tracked chassis allows the howitzers to move alongside tanks and infantry fighting vehicles across difficult terrain while providing greater crew protection than lighter truck-mounted guns. 🔸 The brown desert camouflage on the newly delivered batch suggests that the howitzers may have been transferred from the Western Theater Command, where lighter PCL-181 truck-mounted systems are better suited to long road movements and mountainous terrain. 🔸 The 71st Group Army belongs to the Eastern Theater Command, responsible for operations around the Taiwan Strait. In a conflict, its PLZ-05s could provide sustained fire against coastal defenses, artillery positions, command posts and supply hubs once these targets are within range. China is also testing an experimental 155mm naval gun. If it becomes compatible with existing army ammunition, the PLA Ground Force and Navy could eventually draw on a broader common stock of modern 155mm shells. China is giving frontline brigades firepower previously controlled at a higher level, reducing response times and allowing them to fight more independently. Could Taiwan’s defenses withstand sustained fire once PLA brigades bring their own PLZ-05s into range?

What characteristics do you need to become a successful researcher? Economic sciences laureate Peter Howitt shared his thoughts: "Curiosity is number one. And the ability to pursue through failure, because most of what I ever tried didn’t work out. So you just have to keep trying. There’s an old saying that if at first you don’t succeed you should redefine the question. Start looking somewhere else. Keep on searching around until you find something that really works. Persistence is important." Hear more in our interview with Howitt:

Tensions between North Korea and South Korea are running high this week after Pyongyang sent a letter to the UN Security Council, repeating accusations that Seoul fabricated a September landmine incident, and after a North Korean howitzer was spotted close to the border