• Satellite images show us the high-tech weapons that China wants to showcase at a parade next week.
• Among them are a slew of different anti-ship missiles, including some variants with new capabilities.
• Their range and power mean China likely designed them with possible threats like the US Navy in mind.

Satellite images and open-source footage are giving us a glimpse at the high-tech arsenal China plans to showcase in its September 3 military parade.

Business Insider obtained images of a large, open-air staging ground at a parade village in Changjing, northwest Beijing, which has been used before for Victory Day rehearsals.

The images, taken this month, show dozens of mobile systems, advanced munitions, and armored vehicles parked in the staging area. Bloomberg first reported on the weapons spotted in these photos.

Among the weapons is a lineup of new-generation anti-ship missiles, ranging from subsonic to hypersonic, built to counter surface vessels such as aircraft carriers, frigates, and destroyers from afar.

Their appearance, alongside those of China's land-attack cruise missiles, is a further sign that Beijing intends to use its Victory Day parade to project military might that can match Washington's capabilities in the region.

These missiles are "clearly developed with the aim to suppress the US Navy in the Western Pacific" or deny access to the region, Tianran Xu, a senior analyst for Pax Sapiens' Open Nuclear Network, told Business Insider in an email.

The parking space holds some of the PLA's most advanced weapons and munitions

The coming parade marks the 80th anniversary of the end of the Second Sino-Japanese War in 1945. It is expected to be a headline event for the People's Liberation Army and China's leader, Xi Jinping.

"Our overall impression is that this parade will showcase the new lineup of PLA equipment," wrote Xu. "With emphasis on emerging technologies and trends, precision strike, unmanned warfare capabilities, to meet the needs of a high-tech high-intensity war."

Advanced drones, the emerging tool of warfare, feature in the village

This image of the parade village appears to show several significant pieces of large uncrewed equipment, such as the GJ-11 and GJ-2 reconnaissance and attack drones in the upper-right corner.

Several vehicles on the left of this image also appear to show ground vehicles mounted with what may be uncrewed surface vehicles, which are essentially sea drones built to fight on water.

3/9 Parade: PLAN USV pic.twitter.com/jYEH19hUM2

— luritie (@luritie) August 17, 2025

These are likely mobile launchers for new and advanced anti-ship missiles

This corner of the staging area shows 20 vehicles likely mounted with Beijing's anti-ship weapons, some of which may be new, Xu said.

"China is expected to reveal several new types of advanced anti-ship missiles of different types," he wrote.

These include the YJ-15, a ramjet-powered supersonic missile, and another missile that uses a glide boost vehicle to maneuver at hypersonic speeds. Some images appearing to show truck-mounted missiles at parade rehearsals, with markings for designations such as the YJ-15, have emerged on social media.

Business Insider could not independently verify these images.

Various new missiles (ship UVLS launch?) confirmed, my 2c on roles:
- YJ-15, ramjet compact supersonic?
- YJ-17, waverider hypersonic glide?
- YJ-19, ?maybe scramjet hypersonic?
- YJ-20, biconical hypersonic/aeroballistic? Possibly seen before from 055..

Via REautomaton, SDF pic.twitter.com/9061QDAi09

— Rick Joe (@RickJoe_PLA) August 17, 2025

Expected entries in the display arsenal include the YJ-18C, a stealthy, subsonic missile, and the YJ-21, a hypersonic missile that can be launched from a plane or ship to hit moving vessels.

Photos appearing to show these missiles at rehearsals were also posted on Chinese social media.

YJ-21
CJ-1000
YJ-18C
CJ-20A
图源见水印 pic.twitter.com/L88uFhSsWi

— 理智π (@Rational314159) August 24, 2025

Such missiles are likely built to fight the US Navy and its allies

With these newer missiles included, China is readying a full arsenal of domestically made weapons for the world to see, Xu said.

"Few countries have developed so many anti-ship missiles that cover all imaginable categories," he wrote.

The parade would thus likely feature weapons on every rung of the anti-ship missile range: from subsonic missiles with stealth capabilities, such as the YJ-18C, to those that can travel at supersonic speeds, such as the YJ-15, to hypersonic missiles that can maneuver at faster than five or even 10 times the speed of sound, such as the YJ-19.

"These formidable capabilities are obviously an overkill for the Taiwanese navy vessels and are clearly intended to suppress and destroy the surface combatants of the USN and allied forces in the Western Pacific," Xu wrote.

I missed the new toys :(

So it's called YJ-20 (seen from 🚀 from type 055 and H-6)

YJ-17 Hypersonic HGV

YJ-19 scramjet Hypersonic CM

New YJ-18C

Not limited to just navy https://t.co/7NkPm4Gdpj pic.twitter.com/pjIBK0n9Xi

— Húrin (@Hurin92) August 27, 2025

A long-range underwater drone resembles Russia's Poseidon

One potential highlight at the parade is what appears to be a long, underwater drone shaped like a torpedo.

Xu said its appearance is similar to that of Russia's Poseidon, a nuclear-powered drone that is said to be potentially nuclear-armed. Running on nuclear power extends Poseidon's range dramatically, and there are fears that it could be used to covertly launch a stealthy nuclear attack on the US western seaboard.

It's still unclear precisely what this Chinese weapon is, and Xu said it's not apparent if the drone is nuclear-powered or can be nuclear-armed.

"But it most likely has the ability to conduct long-range maritime-surveillance or strike mission," he wrote.

Unverified photos that appear to have been taken from the ground show what the munition could look like. A second version, appearing to be covered in a tarp, can also be seen in the satellite image.

Showing off ICBMs and land-attack cruise missiles

Another corner of the staging area appears to show 16 vehicles mounted with tarp-covered munitions.

Xu said these are likely China's intercontinental ballistic missiles, such as the solid-fuel DongFeng-41. The three-stage rocket has a maximum operational range of roughly 9,300 miles and is reported to be able to deliver multiple warheads at a time.

Some unconfirmed photos posted on social media also appear to show munitions such as the DF-100, a supersonic cruise missile for land attacks, being transported for rehearsals.

China's display of might would come as relations with the US and Taiwan grow fraught

China has been ramping up its military activity near Taiwan in recent years, both as a sign of its displeasure with Taipei's current government and as a show of force.

In April, the Chinese People's Liberation Army conducted a two-day exercise in the Taiwan Strait that included testing a precision strike, mounting a joint blockade, and asserting operational control of the region. Taiwan and the US criticized the military exercise, calling it irresponsible and provocative.

While US foreign policy is unclear on whether Washington would defend Taiwan from invasion, much of China's military power is geared toward countering American power in the Indo-Pacific.

In the last 10 years, Beijing has unveiled intermediate-range missiles that it says can reach as far as Guam, which hosts a key US base and is 2,500 miles from China's shores. The capability has led analysts to regularly refer to such munitions as "Guam Killers."

Meanwhile, the Pentagon has outlined China as its "pacing threat" for weapons development and force posture.

By displaying its latest munitions, Xu said, China would be trying to reinforce a message that it has the means to strike US assets in the region.

"In my opinion, the parade sends strong deterrence signals to the Pentagon," he wrote.

Still, showing off weapons doesn't mean China possesses them at scale

While China's desired message might be that it can deny the US Navy in the Pacific, weapons displayed in a parade might not necessarily be seen by all as a sign of strength, Benjamin Blandin, a military researcher at the Yokosuka Council on Asia-Pacific Studies, told Business Insider.

The sheer variety of newer weapons on display indicates that China is pursuing many different projects simultaneously, which Blandin said could call into question whether Beijing can cope with seriously developing all of them.

The US is also working on new, advanced munitions, but at a slower pace. Maj. Gen. Cameron Holt, previously the deputy assistant secretary for Air Force acquisition, said in 2022 that China was acquiring new equipment "five to six times" faster than the US.

Blandin added that China may also take time to turn the new munitions into an arsenal ready for war.

"China has made a routine of displaying new capabilities that are years away from large-scale deployment, if not at the prototype stage," he said.

• The US said on Thursday that it's moving ahead with selling 3,350 of its new ERAMs to Kyiv.
• It's a missile built to give Ukraine a low-cost, extended-range munition to sustain its fight.
• The $850 million package, mostly paid for by European countries, is awaiting congressional approval.

The Trump administration is pushing ahead with the sale of thousands of new American-made missiles built to deepen Kyiv's inventory of long-range munitions.

The State Department wrote on Thursday that it is proposing the sale of 3,350 Extended-Range Attack Munitions to Ukraine, alongside an equal number of embedded guidance and anti-jamming systems.

The whole package, including training and support for the missile, is estimated to cost $850 million. The statement said Denmark, the Netherlands, Norway, and the US Foreign Military Financing program would help pay for it.

"This proposed sale will improve Ukraine's capability to meet current and future threats by further equipping it to conduct self-defense and regional security missions," the State Department statement said.

Congress must still approve the sale for it to be final, though US lawmakers have never successfully blocked such proposed packages.

The official announcement follows a Saturday report by The Wall Street Journal citing two unnamed US officials as saying the munitions were approved and would arrive in an estimated six weeks.

According to the officials, the approval was delayed until after President Donald Trump met separately with Russian President Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy this month.

Work on the ERAM began during the Biden administration. The aim was to provide Kyiv with a large quantity of low-cost precision missiles.

When the US Air Force called for contractors in January 2024, it described what looked to be a small cruise missile that could be launched from aircraft such as the F-16 Fighting Falcon to attack ground targets.

Per the Air Force's request for information at the time, the ERAM is meant to have a range of about 287 miles and carry a 500-pound warhead at speeds of at least 460 miles per hour.

That means the ERAM packs much less firepower than the typical US cruise missile, such as the Joint Air-to-Surface Standoff Missile, which carries a 1,000-pound payload.

However, the request included an important highlight: Contractors had to be able to produce at least 1,000 missiles a year within two years of starting the project.

The State Department said that Zone 5 Technologies and CoAspire are the principal contractors for the ERAM.

Acquiring over 3,000 extended-range missiles would significantly scale up Kyiv's arsenal for attacking key Russian assets and positions. While Ukraine has domestically produced and received missiles with more firepower and range, the war has increasingly made clear that militaries cannot just rely on munition quality alone, but also need large quantities to sustain the fight.

A range of 287 miles covers more than a third of Ukraine's total span, and theoretically allows Ukrainian aircraft to attack anywhere within Russian-controlled territory.

Still, with the ERAM relying on US-made guidance systems, Ukraine may only be permitted to launch strikes with US approval. Kyiv could thus also be blocked from striking targets on Russian soil with the new missile.

The Journal reported on Saturday that the Pentagon had, since the late Spring, been blocking Ukrainian requests to fire the Army Tactical Missile Systems against targets in Russia, which the US had started allowing Kyiv to do last year.

The report came as the Trump administration has tried to bring Ukraine and Moscow to the negotiating table for a ceasefire.

• Another F/A-18 Hornet has suffered a mishap, this time in Malaysia.
• Video shows the fighter jet catching fire as it took off, forcing its crew to eject.
• The incident in Malaysia came one day after a US Navy F/A-18 crash off Virginia.

A Malaysian F/A-18D Hornet caught fire on Thursday night as it was taking off, the country's air force said.

Malaysia's air force, which owns eight of the US-made fighter jets, said in a statement that the aircraft had been involved in an "accident" at 9:05 p.m. local time.

The statement said the take-off incident happened at Kuantan Air Base, roughly 110 miles east of the capital of Kuala Lumpur.

Both the 34-year-old pilot and 28-year-old weapons system officer ejected and were later discharged from a military hospital, the air force said in a separate statement.

"Both officers are now in stable condition with no serious injuries," Gen. Muhamad Norazlan Aris said.

It's unclear what caused the mishap with the fighter jet, which entered service with Malaysia's air force in 1997.

Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim wrote in a statement on Friday morning that he had instructed authorities to "conduct a thorough investigation to identify the cause of the incident."

A viral video of the take-off incident appears to show the jet catching fire in a flash of light at the end of the runway.

Photos of the airfield posted by the Malaysian air force showed debris from the aircraft on and near a runway.

The air force statement said the plane had crashed during a routine training flight.

Malaysia encountered a separate take-off accident involving one of its Hornets during an aerospace exhibition in 2019, when the aircraft's left engine caught fire. Local media reported at the time that a foreign object had entered the engine.

A string of mishaps

The F/A-18 is a family of twin-engine fighter jets developed primarily by McDonnell Douglas — now Boeing — and first built for the US Navy and Marine Corps. They're designed to take off from both aircraft carriers and airfields and handle both air combat and ground attack missions.

The early Hornet models were later followed by the Super Hornet, a mainstay of US naval aviation even as the F-35 takes on more of a role in the fleet. The Hornets are also flown by American allies and partners.

The latest F/A-18 incident adds to a list of several recent mishaps involving the aircraft family. A day earlier, a US Navy F/A-18 Super Hornet crashed into the water off Virginia during a training flight. The pilot ejected safely, and the cause of the incident is under investigation.

In May, the US Navy lost another of its Super Hornets after it fell off the aircraft carrier USS Harry S. Truman. It was the second Super Hornet to roll off the same aircraft carrier, after a similar incident occurred in April while the Truman was taking evasive action against Houthi rebel fire in the Red Sea.

In December last year, another Super Hornet was mistakenly shot down by a US missile cruiser in a friendly-fire incident in the Red Sea. Each of the Super Hornets costs over $60 million.

The Thursday incident comes as Malaysia received US approval in June to purchase 33 secondhand F/A-18C and F/A-18D Hornets from Kuwait, which is phasing out the older fourth-generation fighter aircraft for a batch of Super Hornets and Eurofighter Typhoons.

Malaysia's air force also operates 18 Russian Sukhoi Su-30MKM fighter jets.

• A Ukrainian brigade said it used an FPV drone to deliver an escape bike to a trapped soldier.
• Its chief of staff said it took three tries with a Heavy Shot drone to make a successful drop.
• It's one of the first recorded instances of an FPV drone being used for such logistics in a warzone.

A Ukrainian brigade said it used first-person-view drones to deliver e-bikes to a surrounded soldier, marking a rare instance where such devices were used to airlift a vehicle in battle.

In a video published on Wednesday, the "Rubizh" 4th Brigade of Ukraine's National Guard said it dropped the roughly 88-pound e-bikes so the soldier could escape mostly Russian-controlled territory.

While the brigade didn't say in the video when the operation occurred, it said the soldier had been trapped at a shelter near Siversk, a town in Donetsk, where fighting is still ongoing.

"The enemy was in front, behind, and on both flanks. Completely surrounded," Mykola Hrytsenko, a junior lieutenant serving as the brigade's chief of staff, said in the video.

The soldier, whom the brigade identified by the call sign Tankist, was the only survivor of four Ukrainian soldiers fighting in the area, Hrytsenko said.

"The Siversk direction is known for incredibly difficult logistics. Almost none exists there. Guys have to walk six to seven kilometers on foot to reach a position," he said.

Hrytsenko said his team crafted an evacuation plan that involved heavy cargo drones, such as the Baba Yaga or Heavy Shot, carrying a bicycle with an electric motor to the exhausted soldier's position.

Such drones are typically used in Ukraine as bombers and are designed to deliver payloads of about 40 to 50 pounds, though they can also airlift cargo.

Carrying a nearly 90-pound e-bike, Hrytsenko said, would push the drone to its limits and shorten its range to roughly 2 kilometers.

It took three attempts, brigade says

Hrytsenko said his team initially lost two drones trying to deliver e-bikes to the soldier. The first was shot down with the bike, while the second crashed because its motors burned out, he added.

But the "Rubizh" brigade published clips of the third drone carrying the bike via a winch system and the soldier appearing to receive the bike. Business Insider could not independently verify the authenticity of the brigade's footage.

Hrytsenko said the bike's parts were disassembled and brought to a nearby position on the frontline. Afterward, the vehicle was put together and flown to the soldier, he added.

"Everyone in HQ was shouting and crying like we'd just launched the first plane in the sky," Hrytsenko said of the moment when the bike arrived.

The brigade also showed surveillance drone footage of a soldier riding an e-bike through the battlefield.

Hrytsenko said that while the soldier later struck a land mine, he was able to walk several hundred meters to a nearby friendly position, where drone pilots flew in another e-bike so he could fully exit the combat zone.

"The operation cost us two lost e-bikes, around $100,000, and two lost HeavyShot drones, $15,000 each," Hrytsenko said.

The brigade said the soldier evacuated safely and showed interview clips of a man it said was Tankist. BI could not independently verify his identity.

Hrytsenko added that the e-bikes were funded via donations from volunteers, a common occurrence in Ukraine, where units have to crowdfund for drones and weapons.

"If you see a strange fundraiser for an e-bike, or a unicycle, don't be surprised. Maybe it will save a life," he said.

First-person-view, or FPV, drones have been used for many non-combat functions during the war, such as dropping small items on the battlefield or compelling soldiers to surrender via loudspeaker.

However, this marks one of the first times such a drone has been used to deliver a large asset like a vehicle during ongoing fighting. Given that the size of the payload may make a drone easier to spot while limiting its range, it's unclear if this tactic will become more commonplace.

• Ukraine is turning its frontline into a proving ground for the West's newest prototype weapons.
• If firms send in their new tech and train Kyiv's troops to use it, they'll send a combat report back.
• Kyiv hopes this will also pave the way for its local manufacturers to partner with more outside firms.

Ukraine is inviting foreign arms manufacturers to send weapons prototypes for its troops to test in battle against Russian forces.

Its defense innovation unit, Brave1, on Thursday launched "Test in Ukraine," a program that it said would trial the new tech in combat and produce a detailed report for the defense contractor.

"This is an opportunity to gain experience that cannot be simulated in laboratories," said Mykhailo Fedorov, Ukraine's minister for digital transformation, at an arms conference in Wiesbaden.

Among the program's listed top priorities are uncrewed aerial systems, robot ground vehicles, missiles, and laser weapons.

"Test in Ukraine" will require the contractor to teach Ukrainian troops how to use the prototype, though this can optionally be done online, Brave1 said in a statement.

After that, Ukraine will assume control over how the tech is used on its frontline.

"You hand over your product to Brave1, and we take care of the rest," the organization said on its website.

Kyiv also hopes to pair the foreign arms makers with its own manufacturers to produce the tested weapons locally.

Ukraine is already a testbed for many NATO weapons against Russian capabilities, from armored vehicles to long-range missiles to anti-tank munitions.

But the announcement comes amid some concern in the greater arms industry that contractors may be developing new weapons after studying the Ukraine war, but aren't testing them in combat.

"If you are a drone company and you do not have your kit on the frontline in Ukraine, you might as well give up," Luke Pollard, the UK's minister of state for the armed forces, said in May.

One British defense executive, Justin Hedges, told Business Insider earlier this month that drones have to be tested daily in combat to avoid becoming obsolete.

"If your system is not in day-to-day use on the frontline of Ukraine, it becomes very quickly out of date," Hedges told BI's Mia Jankowicz.

Drone warfare has evolved drastically over the last three years of the war. First-person-view UAVs have come to dominate the battlefield, but electronic warfare is increasingly stifling their effectiveness.

As a result, unjammable fiber-optic drones are now on the rise, forcing both sides to rely more on low-tech defensive measures such as 12-gauge shotguns to destroy drones kinetically and fishing nets to entangle them mid-flight.

Last month, Ukraine debuted a new type of rifle bullet that can discharge fragment spreads at greater range to counter incoming FPV drones. Russian troops were producing their own DIY version months ago.

Meanwhile, Ukraine is going all in on bolstering its defense manufacturing industry, offering its local weapons-making experience to Western countries while ramping up production of domestic arms.

Its new testing initiative could also provide additional weapons supplies for its troops fighting against Russia's war of attrition, both in manpower and matériel.

A spokesperson for Brave1 did not respond to a request for comment sent outside regular business hours. Russia's defense and foreign affairs ministries also did not respond to a similar request sent by BI.