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The Duffel Brief · the free edition, Monday, Wednesday and Friday

Vol. 15 · No. 132 · Thursday, 5 November 2026

Pentagon

Pentagon confident U.S. will be ready for 2027 war with China by 2035

Officials cite historically proven American strategy of entering wars completely unprepared

Hegseth wears Eisenhower's globe as Halloween costume

Spirit Halloween store to become pop-up ICE detention center

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Vol. 15 · No. 132

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Vol. 15 · No. 132 · Deployed worldwide

Thursday

5 November 2026

1340 Zulu

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· Page 2

'Top Gun: Maverick' filming halted after entire fleet of CGI F-35s grounded

Filed · 1532

NORFOLK, Va. — Filming of the highly anticipated sequel to 1986 hit "Top Gun" was halted last week after the entire fleet of CGI F-35s was grounded, sources confirm today.

"Top Gun: Maverick", which began filming in mid-August aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln, stars Tom Cruise returning to his iconic role as U.S. Naval aviator Pete “Maverick” Mitchell. The film is rumored to center around F-35s going head-to-head against unmanned enemy drones.

The movie's director, Joe Kosinski, made the tough call to shut down filming while CGI experts could create a virtual Congressional oversight committee to raise digitized funds and lobby for a functional version of the troubled fighter jet in all 50 states.

"These things are nearly worthless," said Kosinski. “I tasked the tech guys with creating a computer-generated, highly versatile aircraft that would make for an effective war-fighting platform depiction. They modeled it on the real-life F-35s, and the result has been disastrous."

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