The INSIDER daily digest -- July 1, 2025

This Tuesday INSIDER Daily Digest has news on a recent Marine Corps amphibious warfare exercise on the East Coast, plus coverage of the Pentagon's crackdown on IT management and consulting contracts and more.

We start off with a deep dive into a recent exercise where Marines were able to embark on amphibious warships and practice a full-scale, ship-to-shore landing alongside international allies, working through maneuvers and logistics critical to a real amphibious assault:

Atlantic Alliance 25 gives Marines rare opportunity to practice key ship-to-shore operations

CAMP LEJEUNE, NC -- On a hot morning in late June, U.S. and Dutch landing craft sped toward a hostile shoreline and dropped their bow ramps, sending Joint Light Tactical Vehicles rumbling into the surf and Marines leaping into the shallow seawater and storming up the beach in an amphibious assault.

A recent Defense Department memo follows several May 27 directives from Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth that terminated several ITC&MS and A&AS contracts and gave the "Department of Government Efficiency" the authority to review most of DOD's unclassified contracts:

Duffey approves DOGE-led crackdown on IT management and consulting contracts

New Pentagon acquisition chief Michael Duffey has issued a memo outlining guidance for implementing the Trump administration's policy requiring justification for awarding many contracts involving information technology consulting and management services, as well as advisory or assistance services.

Document: DOD memo on IT management and consulting contracts

The service's Rapid Capabilities and Critical Technologies Office is developing a "rapid timeline" for building and testing prototypes of the Common Autonomous Multi-Domain Launcher (CAML):

RCCTO to rapidly prototype CAML variants

The Army is speeding along prototype builds for a robotic, maneuverable launcher that can play both offense and defense with cross-domain fires, according to a recently released solicitation for industry proposals.

The Space Force will be in charge of developing the Golden Dome missile defense system:

Space Force, not MDA, tapped to lead SBI development; industry proposals due mid-July

A behind-the-scenes bureaucratic turf war over who should lead the Pentagon's space-based missile defense effort appears to have been settled: the Space Force -- not the Missile Defense Agency -- will spearhead development of interceptors to support the Trump administration's Golden Dome initiative.

The reconciliation bill portion of the Army budget covers integrated air and missile defense, munitions and supply chain, cyber, unaccompanied housing and depot maintenance:

LTAMDS, PrSM among host of Army missile programs banking on reconciliation

The future of roughly a half-dozen Army missile procurement programs rests on the passage of the GOP reconciliation bill before Congress.