Unlike many of the publications in government tech space, Breaking Defense has been rapidly expanding. The past year has seen the publication growing, both in the size of its news staff and the types of content they produce – such as weekly videos.
On this episode of “Gov & Beyond,” hosts Luca Pagni and Joyson Cherian spoke with Breaking Defense’s Publisher and Managing Editor David Smith and the publication’s Editor In Chief Aaron Mehta about this recent expansion, as well as their respective backgrounds and work experience, the topics that grab their attention and the challenges facing reporters covering the Pentagon in the Trump 2.0 era. We also hear about movies they love and songs they hate.
As you’ll hear in the podcast, both David and Aaron hold strong opinions regarding their work and don’t hesitate to share them. This is a refreshingly free and open interview that should hold interest for anyone who follows what’s happening at the Pentagon.
How They Got Here
Both David and Aaron have worked in Defense-related media for decades. David worked for publications like The Journal of Defense and Diplomacy and Jane’s before getting tapped as part of the team that would launch Defense News.
Aaron started his journalism career at a nonprofit investigative newsroom called the Center for Public Integrity, working next to hard-nosed reporters who went on to win Pulitzers. When the newsroom fell on hard times and was targeted for layoffs, Aaron ended up joining David at Defense News – even though he acknowledges that he knew next to nothing about the subject matter at the time (it turned out that the staff had to fill the slot with someone immediately or lose the headcount; timing is everything!).
Following a period in which David worked at a variety of other publications before landing at Breaking Defense, the two were reunited when Aaron joined in 2021.
Their pride in their work, their team and the journalism-driven culture at Breaking Defense is obvious. “We have a staff of stars and rising stars,” David said. “…We are the largest newsroom in the world dedicated to defense…I tell people we’re the mother of all disruptors, because we disrupt the defense media pretty much. And it’s all based on our culture and our values.”
Don’t “Snow” Them
While Aaron made it clear that he is open to pitches from vendors, he’s also extremely discerning about what types of pitches merit his and his staff’s attention. Vendors who want to pass the smell test should take time to study the publication, the topics the staff covers and make sure they have something substantive to say. “We’re not going to be snowed, frankly, by people just putting their people out there to talk about how great their company is,” he said. “…We’re just not going to fall for that, guys. We’re too intelligent for that.”
“The biggest thing to me is, if you’ve got something and you think it’s interesting, reach out to the relevant reporter. Don’t just hit the editors. Because if you send me something about the Army, I’m just going to forward it to our Army team.”
The Wrong Policy
In what I found to be one of the more provocative segments of the podcast, Aaron voiced strong views on recent demands by the Pentagon requiring reporters in the building to sign a document which effectively outlawed any attempt by members of the press to seek information from members of the military or department civilians without prior authorization. Like most credible media organizations, Breaking Defense refused to sign. Aaron argued that the policy works to the detriment of not just the media and news consumers, but to the Pentagon as well.
Aaron noted that, historically, the presence of media has benefitted the Pentagon. “Because we are helpful in countering disinformation. We are helpful in sharing the military story, both to the public and to the military itself, when there’s something that needs to be communicated to them,” he said.
He also asserted that the policy has not kept him and his staff from gathering the news. “People who are inside the building – who understand the value of this and understand that there should be some sort of outside voice watching what the Pentagon is doing with $1 trillion of your money and putting people’s lives at risk – have continued to help us out, and I expect will continue to help us out,” he said.
For the full interview with David and Aaron, listen to the podcast below or read the transcript.
Timestamps
0:37 – David and Aaron’s journey of covering defense
8:17 – The evolution of defense
25:07 – The largest newsroom dedicated to defense
29:02 – The rearming of Europe and other areas of focus in 2026
31:06 – Relevance and personalization are critical to pitching Breaking Defense
36:34 – How Breaking Defense is navigating the Pentagon ban
44:21 – The winning recipe for contributed thought leadership
48:14 – “The Break Out” and other dynamic content
52:15 – Put chicken on pizza and you might be sleeping with the fishes
54:40 – Don’t bring tripe, whale or injera to the next office party
56:23 – Pop music and Journey’s “Don’t Stop Believin’” are on their skip list
58:00 – Staying in touch with David and Aaron
Transcript
Intro: Welcome to Gov & Beyond. I’m your host. Luca Pagni, here with my cohost Joyson Cherian. This podcast features conversations with the newsmakers and influencers at the center of today’s public sector news cycles from our studio at W2 Communications, let’s go Gov & Beyond.
Luca Pagni (LP): Welcome, everyone, to “Gov & Beyond.” I’m your host. Luca Pagni, here with my cohost Joyson Cherian. We’re excited to be joined today by Breaking Defense’s Publisher and Managing Editor David Smith and Breaking Defense’s Editor in Chief Aaron Mehta. Welcome to the show.
David Smith (DS): Thanks for having us.
Aaron Mehta (AM): Thanks.
LP: David, Aaron, would love to start off by learning more about your respective backgrounds, careers and roles at Breaking Defense. David, let’s start with you.
DS: Well, I’ve been kicking around doing this for 30 years. I’ve come to the point where I’ve accepted my eccentricities. I’m willing to admit I’ve been kicking around doing this for 30 years. So it’s been a long time. I started out real early on at like a little station in Cincinnati called WKRP. No, I started out in the Journal of Defense and Diplomacy in McLean. I did a little bit of everything. From there, I went to Jane’s for a couple of years, and then I got recruited to come over when Defense News was launching and to do all the circulation and marketing there. So I was on the team that launched Defense News. I was the guy who kind of mapped out the international expansion of it as well, did the circulation and marking there, ended up taking on a role overseeing all of it for what was at the time Army Times Publishing, including Military Times, which [was] the brand I came up with. Prior to that, it was Army Times. So the Military Times.
I did that for a long time, started SpaceNews, kind of came up and conceived and developed Space News. At that time, also started C4ISR Journal. At one point in time, I got kind of turned on by what was going on at that time. That was the big revolution in defense was C4ISR. And then I left to go to TIBCO Software as director of government communications for TIBCO for about a year or so, which really kind of turned me on to the network sector. And I became kind of an evangelist on defense network marketing, if you will. And I went over to 1105 [Publishing] and they had a moribund brand called Defense Systems. And in the years that we were there, I took that to kind of like the top position in the market. It’s since faded. People probably don’t know what Defense Systems is now, but at one time, it was a thing.
And I went back to Army Times, and I took over C4ISR Journal again and made it C4ISRNet. And it became a nice piece of success there. And then ultimately, you know, that company had its ins and outs, as everybody’s kind of aware of. And you know, I ended up guiding the company during its transition in private equity, the polite way to put that. I subsequently left there and came over to Breaking Defense and kind of applied everything that I had known and learned, hard lessons, over years of corporate media, private equity media, and kind of did…This is the first time I’ve ever been able to run something the way I really want to do it and with all the beliefs and values that we can imbue in it. And it’s honestly the best thing I’ve ever done in my career, incredibly proud and honored to work with everybody on our staff.
Aaron is the most amazing editor I’ve ever worked with, and an awesome partner in this. And I just, I love every second of it, and I love all of our people. And we’re cooking, and we’re doing really well. We’re number one in the defense market now, certainly by, you know, any rational business analysis. And you know, we have the world’s largest newsroom dedicated to defense. I think, I believe our newsroom exceeds the number that Defense News had at its apogee, in its glory days. So we’re really doing that. We have full time bureaus in Asia, the Middle East and Europe, and we have an amazing business team. And, you know, it’s a unique formula. I tell Aaron, and I joke, it’s an alchemy. We have an alchemy at Breaking Defense, and that’s really what’s fueled our growth and rise. And there’s a nice road ahead for us as well. So we’re super excited about everything that’s happening here.
LP: That’s awesome. Aaron?
AM: Yeah, so I started out, I graduated college in 2007 which was a great time to be entering the workforce, as you guys might imagine. So ended up getting an internship that turned into a four-year gig with a nonprofit investigative newsroom called the Center for Public Integrity, which tragically has been murdered by malpractice over the last couple of years and officially closed this year. But it was a great place to kind of get my start, because working next to folks who won Pulitzers, who would go on to win Pulitzers, and just kind of soaking in stuff from them over a four-year period as kind of the junior guy in the totem pole. And then as nonprofits tend to do, and as CPI unfortunately tended to do historically, there was a bit of a downturn, and I decided I had to get out of there before I was hit by the next round of layoffs. Went out with some of the guys on the team after one round of layoffs, had a bunch of drinks at a very low rent bar, came home, opened up Journalism Jobs, and the first thing I saw was a gig for a publication called Army Times. So I just sent it in. Didn’t really expect to hear him much back. And then got a note back saying, “Hey, you know, happy to have you come in and talk for this gig. But actually, we want you to also talk to Defense News, which is our co-publication.” So I went in there, talked to them. They said, “Hey, we’re hiring for an aerospace reporter. What do you know about airplanes?” And I said, “Absolutely nothing. I just like it when they don’t crash out of the sky when I’m on them.” And apparently that was enough to sell me, because they ended up hiring me. Found out years later that, apparently they’d been told if they didn’t hire somebody in the next two weeks, they were going to lose the position. So it’s all about luck sometimes.
So I did that job for three years, and then we had some shuffling and I fleeted up to what we call the Pentagon job, which is literally being in the building and kind of leading our coverage of high-level Pentagon international relations stuff. And was in that job for six years. Had a great team there, a lot of great times there. Worked with David when he was my boss’s boss, after we got shifted first from Gannett, and then it became Tegna, which was a spinoff. And then Tegna sold us to a private equity group. And David got us through kind of the worst of that transition. And you know, we interacted quite a bit there, because one of the things I like about David is he’s not just on the business side, but he actually reaches out and wants to know about the people who are doing the actual news. So then, you know, there was a period where David was off kind of working on Breaking. I was still at Defense News. And then in early 2021, he reached out to me and said, “Look, would you have any interest in coming over and taking over the shop here?” And at the time, that was something I’d kind of been realizing I was gaining an interest in, was becoming an editor. I was a pretty good reporter, but I was never the best reporter. But what I’ve felt was my best skill was kind of getting everyone on the same page and developing stories. We had a very collaborative team at Defense News at the time. That’s something that I ended up doing a lot of, wanted to explore more, and this seemed like a great opportunity. So in July of ‘21, headed over here, and it’s been a real whirlwind. We can get into some of the growth later on, but it’s really just an absolutely amazing job to have, and I feel very lucky by the people who put their trust in me to do it.
Joyson Cherian (JC): Perfect. David, something you said a moment ago caught my ear when you were talking about C4ISR. You mentioned it as the topic of interest at the moment, which leads into our next question very well. The world of defense is always rapidly evolving, but especially this year. How have you seen it evolve throughout your careers?
DS: It’s, you know, it’s a really remarkable thing. And we’ve actually, Aaron and I talked about this, you know, in passing conversations over the last few months how much change has happened. And so what’s happened in our world, both in the defense market and also in media. And it’s been a companion kind of a shift.
So for many, many years, 20, 25 years, I don’t know what it is, 20 years at least, right? You know, you had this print model and I’m going to talk about these things in parallel, because I think they actually are in parallel. Yeah, this defense model is based on print and, you know, the print magazines and newspapers and all this kind of stuff. And at the same point in time, you had a defense industry in the Cold War, and just immediately after the Cold War, that was kind of a really large, you know, it had a ton of different companies in it. And, Long Island of all places was a real center of and Boston was a real center of defense.
And so what happened over a period of time is that quote unquote “peace dividend” and Eric can talk about, like, The Last Supper where they got together and said, “You guys got to consolidate.” The industry just kind of shrank up, and it consolidated just incredibly. It was always there, and it was always solid. It’s always, I tell people, people have been throwing stones and hurling spears at each other since the ancient times, defense is a permanent kind of a business, which is unfortunate in one way but also reality. It’s always going to be there but it definitely tightened up. And in Europe, for instance, if you took a look at Europe, Europe used to have national champions and national industries – you know, the UK, GEC-Marconi, Vickers Shipbuilding, Vosper Thornycroft, Westland Helicopters and every country’s like that. And Europe just whittled down to a handful of multinational companies.
And so that was kind of a tough time in media, the defense model, the media model, at the same time, kind of was shifting, and online was coming around quote unquote “online.” Remember when we called it online? And it took a lot of the existing media companies, just gave them a left hook, because they were concerned about things like cannibalization. And, you know, some of them were just in complete denial. At one point in time, we had a leader at Defense News, said, “Oh, this internet thing’s a fad.” So I was never in that camp. So what happened over a period of time, then things shifted. And the media really kind of got shook up. And that went on for a long time.
And then there was something that I certainly got turned on to, which was the network-based revolution, the net-centric revolution. And, you know, Admiral Cebrowski first kind of opined that back in the day, I can’t even remember what year it was. But it really drove, it was the IT business, and it was really shifting the nature of defense. And suddenly networks were the source of military advantage. Platforms weren’t, or rapidly becoming. That was a hard thing for defense to get its hands around. It was a hard thing, and still is a hard thing for DOD to understand procurement processes in the information age, which is a quaint term, “information age.” now. But that was a real challenge.
Then you had this consolidation, etc. So there was this vibrant sector of kind of IT-ish companies. And some of them were, as IT companies, dedicated ISR-type of companies in intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance. It’s a very vibrant little community and sector. It was different, unique. It had different proclivities, different programs, different procurement practices. So you had the traditional and this kind of new wave thing. And a lot of these companies were and are commercially driven. So they’re outlets, they’re adjuncts to a commercial company. TIBCO Software where I worked was a great example of that. And, you know, a lot of them were, “How do you get into government? How do you figure this out?” So there’s a lot of, like, tension, and a lot and, not tension in a bad way, but there’s just this kind of strange thing. It was different. It was weird. It was different. It was hard for traditionalists to embrace. And so at one point in time, somebody asked me about net-centric. Why net-centric works? No one calls it that, because it’s happened. There’s no net-centric transformation. It’s done. And so that all led us in many ways, and companies started to embrace that. And that was a very successful kind of sector in the business.
One thing interesting about that was the networks revolution was the first revolution in military affairs, as they call it, that wasn’t led by the military. So if you take a look back in the day, mechanized warfare was a military development, aviation, to a large extent, was spurred by the military back in the ‘20s, right on through. And then all of a sudden, you came in this network revolution that was being driven by what was happening outside of defense. And a great example where there are programs where the military tried to replicate this in their procurement system that they had. And they realized that the commercial sector is way out ahead of them on these things. And so it’s kind of adapting and adopting those processes. And that’s a process we’re still under today. Hegseth is talking about how to commercialize approaches in defense procurement, for instance. But that’s not a new discussion. That’s been something that’s been aimed at for a long time.
So then it went along and it went along. And then…so this [is] interesting today, it started opening up what has happened especially with the drone warfare scenario, which has really transformed defense. And Aaron can talk a little bit more about that. But that’s really changed the nature of the defense business. And in addition to which, AI, which is fundamentally transforming defense since we’re in the thin edge of the wedge on that, that is really opening things up. And the network piece of this as well, the defense networks continues. This whole thing has come around. So when you walk around AUSA, the big Army show, you look around there, and it’s like companies you’ve never seen before, and new entrants, and this whole kind of Silicon Valley startup kind of proposition that’s going on. And it’s really interesting. For the first time in defense in many, many years, the industry itself is growing in volume of companies that are involved. It’s a challenge to primes. It’s a challenge in Europe, now that they’re trying to kind of rearm and resuscitate their defense industries, which they, frankly, let whither. There’s a lot to disagree with Trump, but he was right that Europe kind of abandoned its defense stance at one point in time, and they’re trying to get that back together now. So you see, this is a really vibrant time in this industry. It’s really an interesting time. There’s new companies popping up. There’s new ways of doing things. There are new ways of approaching things. So that’s kind of the path of the market that I see going forward. There’s tremendous growth ahead.
I think the AI piece of it is a really big deal. We are about to, in 2026, launch a new channel just devoted to AI alone. And we’re the only Defense media with a full time reporter on AI, and that’s Sydney Freedberg. He’s really brilliant. So that’s kind of my take on it. And I’ll pass the baton to Aaron on his take from a more topically oriented aspect.
AM: [Laughs] Yeah. I mean, just to David’s point on the media, because I do think that’s an important part of this. I mean, I remember, I think it was until 2013 or 2014 that The Washington Post had a separate newsroom for digital to the point where the digital team was stationed literally across the river in Arlington, because they were so not considered actually part of The Post. Which is just an insane thing to think about, that they literally kick these guys to a different state than the actual Post newsroom. Obviously, that’s changed since then, to David’s point.
I think topically, there’s a number of big things that have happened. The biggest one that kind of early in my career, which I can really track, is actually space. When I started, I was the air and space reporter, and I was about I was about 92% air and 8% space – mostly when there was the big Space Symposium or something important was popping up. It was very much backwater. Obviously, that’s changed to the point where Space Force was created. And at Breaking Defense, we have a full time reporter covering space, Theresa Hitchens, who’s been doing this since the ‘80s and knows more about space than any of us will ever forget, you know, ever learn. But the first big story I covered on space back in late 2012 – and this was something I covered through 2015 – was SpaceX, this young upstart trying desperately to the point where they sued the U.S. government to get Air Force contracts, because the Air Force wasn’t going to let SpaceX in, and they didn’t trust their new stuff. I remember I interviewed Gwynne Shotwell, who’s the head of SpaceX, really the person who’s run it and built the company, a number of times where, again, they were literally suing the Air Force over this to force their way in. Now you think about 1) the role of space being so important, 2) the idea that SpaceX is now the absolute dominant force. The United Launch Alliance, which is the group that they were saying had a monopoly on launch, is still actually behind SpaceX now and trying to get certified for new launches. SpaceX owns Starlink, which provides this internet service all over the place. The idea that SpaceX could not be trusted by the U.S. military and had to sue its way in seems insane a decade later. And that shows you how much that’s changed.
The other stuff David mentioned – network cyber absolutely has increased, again, from kind of a backwater, the nerds that the military didn’t really want to deal with, to being central. Drones – I mean, the Air Force throughout the war on terror, really, throughout the early 2000s, despised the fact they had to use drones. It was considered almost shameful and embarrassing. And drone operators still, frankly, are not given the same respect as fighter pilots are. But there was a real fight about using drones. Now you see, again, the Army Secretary saying we’re gonna buy a million drones over the next two years, and every unit should have drones in them. It’s just ubiquitous now.
The question with AI to me is how much it’s going to become ubiquitous versus how much it’s going to end up kind of being a trend for a bit that people throw on to say, “Hey, we’re going to talk about AI because it gets us money.” We’ve seen this with, frankly, things like “A2/AD” was a phrase, JADC2, the metaverse for about six months was the hot one. I do think AI is going to be more real than any of those ended up necessarily being, in part because it has so many applications in so many ways, especially back office and kind of on the networking, taking through data and making things as opposed to what I think some people are expecting, which is the Terminator, you know, decision making things. It seems like there’s a lot of distance to go before we get to where that’s even possible. But, you know, that’s potentially another giant change. And if AI really does become everything that people think it could be, that’s going to completely alter not just how the Pentagon thinks about its systems and planning, but also how the market responds to it.
DS: I also think the AI piece is also manufacturing. It’s going to have a real effect on manufacturing and manufacturing processes. During this whole thing, you know, the other thing that’s been interesting is the complete change in the media landscape. And for many, many years, trade media and consumer media were more or less parallel. It was like the trade media – and I personally don’t like the term trade media but I’ll use it – trade media, because we’re not trade media, we’re journalists and we report on important things. You know, this isn’t “American Turkey Farmer Magazine.” So the trade media kind of paralleled consumer. They had the same basic model, subscribers. It served an audience. They took advertising, what have you. And in that time, it’s really diverged, and consumer media has gone off in this direction, regrettable, I think, in terms of it’s been changed fundamentally by digital and, you know, their business model imploded. Classifieds went away. Local advertising essentially went away. It became a place of programmatic advertising, which is a plague upon journalism. It’s really just lowered everything to commodity level and clicks and nothing but volume. And so that’s kind of happened, and the whole landscape…but at the same point in time, trade media has gone off in a different direction. And I truly believe it’s one of the places where the traditional verities of journalism are still so very, very strong and vibrant.
And you know, the trade media, a lot of it’s changed. I tell people that it used to be for media that advertising was a strategy. We produce content, and we sell advertising. We don’t do that. We don’t sell out. That’s not our strategy. It’s a tactic. It’s an effective tactic. I mean, advertising has always worked. It still drives the internet. But it’s really about content marketing for us as well. So this combination of telling your narrative and being able to, because this is a day and age in which the power is shifted to the reader and they have a vote. You know, it used to be, “We should send magazines to people whether they wanted them or not, and we had our little BPA audit,” which is a really quaint thing when you think about it now. And really now it’s about engagement, and how to engage people. And readers are very savvy. They’re very quick to sniff out propaganda. So we don’t do industry propaganda. Our content marketing that we do is telling a story and telling a narrative on something. And so I think that’s one of the key star successes, you know. Yes, we do advertising, but it’s really not advertising based. It’s about a full kind of collaborative engagement with the client, always marked and caveat, you know, sponsored material. But at the same point in time, it’s something that we do fundamentally well, and at Breaking Defense in particular, we benefit from our tech backbone at Breaking Media. So we’re not just a traditional local inside DC endemic government media who is thinking the same way that they’ve been thinking. You know, we have New York City media chops I tell people. It’s our tech backbone, our campaign management, our technology is really top notch. We’re very design driven, so I think that that’s one of the things that’s benefited us. But we’re really…it’s important for us that journalism is always at the core of what we do. And it will always be at the core of what we do. And it’s the core of our entire success, is a rock bed, unalterable, eternal commitment to the quality of the journalism that Aaron and his staff produces, that will always be there. The models around that have shifted, but that is still there. And I like to think that Breaking Defense is a testament to the fact that that works.
LP: David, I know a bit ago that you were talking about how Breaking Defense is one of the largest newsrooms focused on defense, and I know that’s really come at a recent expansion of your staff. Can you tell us more about this growth and how it’ll impact Breaking Defense’s coverage?
DS: Yeah, I’ll say a note prior and what Aaron talked about his staff, who are just amazing. I love them all. We have a staff of stars and rising stars. It’s amazing. You know, I think the rock bed of what we do, and I would…point of pride: we are the largest newsroom in the world dedicated to defense, you know, so forgive me that. But everything we do…and people ask me the success and the success story of…Breaking Defense really has disrupted…You know, I tell people we’re the mother of all disruptors, because we disrupt the Defense media pretty much. And it’s all based on our culture and our values. As I said, journalism, treating people well, you know, empowerment, trust, responsibility and hiring just amazing people we trust, know and believe in. A lot of our folks are veterans of this business, and know a good thing when they see it and know what the right way to do things is. And then Aaron has just assembled an amazing team. So Aaron, why don’t you talk about our staff?
AM: Yeah. I mean, obviously echo everything David said about this team. I consider myself very, very lucky to be able to ride the coattails of people who are this smart and talented. You know, the joke I make about the size of the team is that it feels kind of like I’m the dog who chases the car and finally catches it and then realizes the car is not going to stop as I get dragged behind it. So, you know, when we started, when I started in July of ‘21, the team was four people, was one editor and three reporters, all in DC. So a little over four years later, we’re now up to 16 full time editorial staff, and that includes a videographer and four reporters abroad, plus a host of freelancers that we use regularly. And we publish about 150 op-eds a year. So there is a lot of growth that’s happened. The most recent hires we made were around September, where we kind of did a bit of an internal reshuffling and then made some additions. So we took Ashley Roque, who was our Army reporter and had been kind of part time also covering the Pentagon, and created for the first time a full time Pentagon role for us. And then we moved Carly Welch, who had been our networks reporter, into the Army role. And then we brought on Mark Pomerleau, who’s a veteran of the networks beat to take over the network’s coverage. We also brought in Rachel Cohen to be another editor to help us with the flow, and also all of the various newsletters and videos and kind of everything that we have going on. You know, it’s a lot of really talented people who…You know, one of our great strengths, I think, is collaboration. That’s where I’ve always found in my career my best stories came from, just working with other reporters and teaming up. And this is a group that’s very ready and willing to do that, that likes working together. They just genuinely like hanging out together, which is great. And you know, I think our coverage reflects that.
Again, the expansion international last couple years was also big for us. We have two people in Asia, plus somebody in Lebanon covering the Middle East, and somebody in the UK covering Europe for us, you know. And those are all giant. You could have a defense trade publication just covering Europe, just covering Asia, just covering the Middle East, and we’re trying to do it all. And sometimes I would say the gator kind of bites us, as opposed to us biting the gator. But you know, we do our best, and I think what we do is pretty damn good.
JC: Aaron, I’ll pull on that thread a little bit further. Obviously, you’re talking about the staff that you added, the talents you have on board. But obviously that leads us into the topic of coverage. What are the topics that are currently peaking in your and your team’s interest the most, and are there any items that you’re looking for to cover more, covering more in the coming year?
AM: Yeah, you know, it’s funny, I was thinking about next year and trying to plan things out a little bit the other day, and one of my people pointed out, you know, we can try to plan but two months ago, we certainly didn’t. We’ll be talking about shifting aircraft carriers into SOUTHCOM and war plans for Venezuela. So especially in this news environment, trying to plan too far ahead can end up biting you in the butt, because you just don’t know what’s going to be coming around the pike.
One big trend that we are watching, which David talked about a little bit earlier, is Europe, and kind of the rearming of Europe. This has happened a couple of times where Europe says we are going to spend more and then it doesn’t really happen. They seem very serious about it this time. In particular, Germany is driving a lot of this. And you’re seeing Rheinemetall and the other German companies really acting like they expect this to be real, which makes me think it’s going to be real this time. And that could have long term impacts on the U.S., defense industry, and how we approach coverage, in terms of focusing on Europe, and kind of the blowback to U.S. long term. So that’s kind of a trend that we’re going to be looking at, I think, in 2026 quite a bit.
But you know, we are fundamentally at our core we’re not a once a month news magazine, as some people are. We are very much in the news cycle, trying to drive the news cycle where we can by breaking news and keeping ahead of events, but also making sure that, you know, as things are happening, we’re not tying ourselves in knots and ignoring the important things. So we try to plan, but also try to remain as much flexibility as possible there. Because you don’t want to get caught focused on one thing and then something else entirely pops up and you feel like you have trouble pivoting.
LP: That definitely makes sense. And you know, with such a large team, we’re sure that you and the rest of the team get hundreds, I, you know, dare even say thousands of pitches on a daily basis. Can you tell us a little bit more about the types of resources that you all like to speak with?
AM: Yeah, it’s, it feels like thousands sometimes. You know, the big thing for us is we are not, and I don’t mean to speak egotistical, but we’re not small fry when it comes to the defense world, right? We know our stuff. We’re not going to be snowed by, “Oh, my executive was a Navy Seal, and he could talk to you about big defense issues.” Like, okay, we could do that, or we could talk to the sources that we know and trust, who are probably more informed. And we’re not going to be snowed, frankly, by people just putting their people out there to talk about how great their company is, because, you know, we’re aware there are a lot of good companies out there. We can kind of judge for ourselves honestly if this is real or not. And a lot of the pitches we get are things like, “Hey, there was a drone strike in Ukraine. Would you like to talk to the founder of this drone company that you’ve never heard of who can talk about why what we need are a drone that sounds exactly like what we’re selling?” We’re just not going to fall for that, guys. We’re too intelligent for that. So appreciate you got to do it, but save it. Guidance I always give to people on pitches is, you know, if things aren’t personalized, they just go right in the trash. If it’s a very clear like, “Hello comma,” and then you’re off to the races, if you guys can’t even bother to look at our site – we have an “about us” page at the top of the site, and everyone’s picture and emails there – if you can’t be bothered to even bother doing that, then we’re not going to bother reading your stuff.
Relevancy is the biggest thing. If you’re pitching something that is not actually defense or is only tangential defense, it’s probably not going to go because we have too much going on. Just covering our core stuff is a full time job. Anything else is good, and we like to get to it where we can to expand. National security is not just the Pentagon after all. There is a lot of other stuff out there that ties into it, but it’s got to be really relevant for us to get into that. So, you know, the biggest thing to me is, if you’ve got something and you think it’s interesting, reach out to the relevant reporter. Don’t just hit the editors, because if you send me something about the Army, I’m just going to forward it to our Army team. But two, say, “Hey, here’s who I am. Would love to hop on the phone or grab coffee. Understand if you’re too busy for that. Just want to let you know I might be reaching out in the future,” you know, just making a human connection or remembering that we react better to people than to bots is a big thing. The other thing is, if we figure out you’re using AI to write a pitch, it’s just right in the trash and probably spam, because that shows a lack of care and intelligence into what you’re pushing.
DS: You know, I’ll add something just from observation of 30 years and advice to the public relations professionals. The key thing is relationship. And we got, I got a lot of companies that they come to us, “I sent a press release in.” And you know how many press releases are sent in? And I realized that a lot of PR people, you know, their job is to issue press releases. And their press releases have fleeting relevance. And, you know, like we have an update to our army helmet that no one’s bought yet. You know, that kind of a thing. And that’s just not going to tip the scale. And the key thing is to know what news is, and to pick and choose what you’re going to pitch, make sure it’s newsworthy, there’s a news angle, and to have a relationship with a reporter. It’s just the same thing as crisis communication. The time that you deal with crisis communication isn’t when there’s a crisis. It’s way prior. When you’ve established a relationship of trust with a reporter, where they respect and they trust what you’re saying to the point where they’re going to listen to you. So, like, the key thing is really relationships. It’s a relationship business. And know what to pitch and not pitch everything. And also don’t rely on press releases. It’s just like the worst thing – I send out 15 press releases. And I got [contacted by] this company recently, “I sent out press releases, and all these other places publish them.” All these other places also, like, they publish them because you advertise. You know, it’s pay for play, you know. And I looked at one of their sites, and they have 30 of these things about, like, an armor, a helmet upgrade of minimal importance, you know.
So it’s really about getting the senior offering, to make senior people in your company available to the reporter to talk to,understanding what it is, knowing your kit, know what you’re talking about. Because you’re about to talk to…you know, our reporters are – by the nature they cover the news every day – experts. Know what you’re talking about before you talk. I have this phrase, understand to be understood. And so those are key things. It’s a relationship business. And if you’re not developing relationships, and as Aaron said, if you’re not, it’s not a personal approach, it kind of falls flat.
LP: No, I’m glad to hear that you say that, because I know something that we always like to talk to our clients about is that it’s not necessarily a transaction. This is a give and take relationship, that what we can offer you is also inversely what you can expect from us. It’s not, you know, we’re not just smile and dial kind of mentality. But Aaron, I actually do want to come back to you for a second, just because you did bring up the Pentagon. But I do want to see has Breaking Defense had any difficulty with connecting with sources since the Pentagon ban.
AM: Yeah, just so to bring everyone up to speed, in case you haven’t been paying attention throughout this year, the leadership in the Pentagon has made it clear that they wanted to make it as hard as possible for those of us in the building to do our jobs. And this culminated in October, where they put in a rule saying that for us to keep our Pentagon badges, which we’ve had since the Eisenhower administration, press would have to sign a document which says, effectively, any attempt by press to seek information from members of the military or civilians working for the department without prior authorization is actually a crime. And you know, we will take away your badges if you do that. And, you know, their language in there potentially opened up threats under the Espionage Act for charging reporters for doing the very basics of our job. Frankly, it’s my belief that the leadership in the Pentagon knew this wouldn’t be acceptable for reporters, and it was not. I’m a member of the Board of Directors for the Pentagon Press Association. We have 110 members; 108 of them turned their badges in on October 7. Two members decided to sign. One was One America News. One was an Indian freelancer. Outlets such as Fox News, The Washington Times, Newsmax all said there’s no way we’re signing this and walked out with the other publications, including the entirety of the defense trade publication community.
So this was just never going to be acceptable, because we believe in the First Amendment and the right of the public to know. And more than that, the causes that this administration was saying were needed to kick us out of the Pentagon simply were not true. They claimed that we didn’t want to wear badges. We’ve always had badges. Those are the badges we had to hand in. They claimed that we could go into classified spaces. That’s simply untrue. What we had access to is the same spaces that the people who work at CVS, or the woman who sells bundt cakes inside the Pentagon, which is a real thing, had access to. So, you know, ultimately, they got what they wanted. We are out of the building. They’ve announced their own hand picked group of, frankly, quote unquote “reporters,” mostly right wing bloggers, including many of who have said, “Well, of course, we’re never going to go to the Pentagon, because that would require going to DC, and we’re not going to do that.” But they’re considered now the in-house press corps.
So that’s a long setup to say, has it impacted our ability to do our jobs? Not in terms of sourcing people. Understand that we play an important role in informing the American public. There is a reason why, again, back to the Eisenhower administration, multiple governments have said, “We want to make sure there are reporters embedded in the Pentagon.” It wasn’t because we had a gun to their head and, you know, somehow squatted on this territory, right? It’s because they wanted us there. Why do they want us there? Because we are helpful in countering disinformation. We are helpful in sharing the military story, both to the public and to the military itself, when there’s something that needs to be communicated to them.
And so again, for decades and decades, this is the job that we did. So people who are inside the building who understand the value of this and understand that there should be some sort of outside voice watching what the Pentagon is doing with $1 trillion of your money and putting people’s lives at risk, have continued to help us out, and I expect will continue to help us out. The same is true in industry. The same is true in the academia think tank community, although there’s been attempts to suppress that as well. Where it has proved to be a challenge is, frankly, for the Pentagon, when something happens.
A great example is that the day that we were getting kicked out, where we had to hand in our badges, all of a sudden, there was stuff on social media that Hegseth’s plane was damaged and might be going down over Europe. He was traveling at that time. What we did was what we always did, which is, you go next door to the Public Affairs room, which is right next to where the reporters were, and we said, “What’s going on?” And they said, “Guys, don’t worry. There was a small crack in the windshield. They landed already. It’s being repaired. Nothing to worry about here.” So then all the reporters went out and said, “Guys, there’s no story here. It’s all okay.” And we’re able to transmit that to the public. If we hadn’t been in the building, and we haven’t been since, then this type of thing can spread and it’s hard to knock down. Frankly, we’ve had trouble getting the Pentagon to respond to basic requests for information since we’ve left the building, and that impacts the Pentagon’s ability to control narrative, to help dispel bad information. That hurts them more than it hurts us at this point, but it does mean we’ve had to slow down in publishing some things because we want to make sure, as we always do, that we’re giving fair, accurate chance for commentary from the Pentagon.
So that’s the very long winded answer, saying, not going to slow us down. It is having an impact, or, I guess let me rephrase: It’s not going to stop us from doing our job. It is having an impact in slowing down some of our reporting. My hope is that one day we are back in the building and we’re able to remedy that, because I do believe it is in the best interest of the American public and the military for us to be in there.
DS: You know, I’ll say it in terms of “trade media,” quote unquote, as well. What has made the American military the best in the world, – outside obviously the fighting quality and spirit of our forces and the culture of our forces, I get that – but one of them has made the innovation and the ideas that they have driven. The U.S. military has consistently moved forward in terms of technological innovation. And as I said, the whole process on that over the years has been one where they’ve adapted and adopted. And media actually the information flow and the communication flow that the media has, and specifically trade media, it’s extremely important to that, and it’s really one of the hallmarks of America. And it’s one of the hallmarks of our strength as a military is the ideas and communication that flows back and forth between industry and the Pentagon and that shutting that down is inimical to progress.
And I remember many, many, many years ago, I was overseas. I was in a region even outside of Europe, and then we were talking about a story, and they said, “Oh, you publish a story,” he said. “And the story said something wrong happened?” And I said, “Yeah. It said something wrong happened.” And they said, “And they let you publish this?” And I said, “Yeah.” And they said, “Only in America!” And the difference was, the challenge is, you know that this is a country that would never achieve the level of effectiveness of their military, because they were trying to control the flow of information. They were trying to prevent the flow of insight. Innovation comes from insight. Innovation comes from experience. Innovation comes from communicating. And shutting that down is just, honestly, it’s counterproductive.”
LP: Definitely appreciate the insights there. And again, Aaron, want to actually take a slight step back just in terms of, you know, you mentioned that in a year, you can expect that Breaking Defense is going to publish, I think you said around 150 bylines. So do kind of want to see a little bit more about what are the types of contributed content that Breaking Defense looks for and what’s kind of that winning recipe to place thought leadership there?
AM: Yeah, probably 150; it might be more this year, much to the chagrin of my assistant editor, who is always on me to just kill as many op-eds as possible. So if you go to our “About Us” page which is literally just breakingdefense.com/about, you’ll see a link which says, “Want to submit an opinion piece? Click here for our guidelines.” And so the first thing I’d say is, I really encourage anybody who’s interested to go there, because you kind of get everything spelled out for you. My biggest things are, well,1) if it’s coming from industry, we set a very high bar for editorial op-eds. You know, happy to pass you along to David’s team, who does an incredible job with custom content, really great stuff, but for it to run through editorial, you know, if you’re a drone company and you’re pitching a piece about why drones are important, we’re just going to say, “No thanks.” Because, you know, we’re not looking to provide a ramp for people to market themselves. So, you know, that’s one big thing.
You know, thematically, to me, it’s two things. One is, it has to be a different discussion than we’ve seen before. If its drones are important to the future battlefield, for our readership that’s taken as is, and it was taken as is about three years ago. So that’s just not going to move the needle for me. And the other thing is, it needs to really make a point and have a solution. I’m not interested in pieces which are, “This is a problem.” I want a piece which says, here’s a problem, here’s why it’s a problem, here’s my proposed solution, and then also, ideally, here’s why the proposed solution might run into some headwinds but here’s my counter to those headwinds. You are making a point in our pages. Make a point, right? Don’t just say, hey, somebody should do something. You’re the someone who should come up with an idea for what to do. And to me, those are the core things. If I read something and it’s just something I’ve read before and it’s not proposing something new, it’s just going to be a pass for me. And I try my best. I try really, really hard and spend a lot of time, much to my wife’s chagrin, I spend a lot of time at night, usually catching up on these things, because I want to respect people’s time. So I try to read all of these and give them a fair shake. And ultimately, I want to be impressed, and I want to find something which makes me go, “I never thought about that,” or, “That’s a new angle,” or, “I haven’t seen that before.” Because, again, we publish a lot, I read a lot, and our reporters do a lot of reporting on these topics. And so you need to have something fresh and new to stand out.
DS: Which, again, goes to the point that I made, is that that’s why it’s important to have communication. And that’s why it’s important for the Pentagon, for instance, is you’re trying to pass ideas. You’re trying to create a new dynamic, a new way of looking at things. And that’s a big deal. And I think too, for op eds to get into the quote “the digital pages” of breaking edge, it’s a strenuous exercise. It’s something that Aaron and his team, each year, we put out a compendium of all the op-eds we run, and it’s even hard to pick the best of those. So yeah.
JC: We’ve seen Breaking Defense really take a step forward when it comes to dynamic multimedia content, including your weekly news show, the breakout. Can you tell us a little bit more about this and other multimedia properties that you’re producing?
AM: Yeah. David, you want to go first on this one?
DS: Yeah. Just thematically, you know, we have a huge digital video initiative going on. And I have a full time director of multimedia, plus two staffers who are kind of part time but actually sort of becoming full time in terms of executing those. And…two editors help out on the propagation and the distribution of those. So we started out this last January with “The Weekly Breakout,” a weekly show. And the idea of this show was to create something that wasn’t homework to watch, like, wasn’t some droning thing that lasted for 30 minutes where it’s like, “Oh my god, I have to watch this that.” It brings a little bit of fun and flavor into it. It’s easy to get through, tells you what you need to [know], and it’s out over in like five, maybe maximum, six, seven, whatever minutes. And that’s been hugely successful. And then, since then, Aaron joked with me, we hired somebody to do a weekly show; now we have three. So we have a show on Congress that is more news-driven in tempo, as opposed to, “It’s Tuesday. It’s going to be a show.” It’s kind of like it happens when news happens. We have a Middle East show as well, with our Middle East Bureau Chief, Agnes Liu. We do that kind of monthly. That’s more of a deep dive. That’s more of a kind of an in depth analysis of it.
We have a couple more planned. We’re doing a lot of what we call roundtable, serialized, topical video. We did one recently on Golden Dome, where we gather experts together and talk about, where is this, what is this, where is it going, what’s it about? You know, we did one on F-35. We’ve done one on, you know, on…
AM: Artificial intelligence.
DS: There you go. There you go. So we do a bunch of these, so much that I forget sometimes what the topics were six months later. But it’s a big, big deal, and it will never, video will never supplant what…we’re not trying to become ABC News, specifically not. There’s an entertainment and an information value to these. They’re not homework, they’re easy to get through, and we have a limit on the number we’re going to do. So it makes them premium. But you know, the basis of what we’re going to do is always going to be the written story, but it’s been really additive for us this year, and I think it’s something we’re very proud of. And we’re kind of proud of the fact that they’re not boring videos. That’s a big, big deal, you know. But Aaron, why don’t you take it from there?
AM: Yeah. I mean, we just try to make them worth people’s while to watch. Video is such a growing dynamic part of the media landscape, it would be insane for us not to take part of it. Same time, you know, it’s something that’s always going to build off, as David said, our reporters and the work that they’re doing. So it’s always a balance between, you know, what’s too much because video takes a lot longer to write, to produce than a story does, right? And so it’s always a balance of everyone’s workload. But the fact that we’ve had such success with these is, I think, telling that people enjoy them and want more of them. And so, you know, we’ll see what 2026 brings. I was like 2025 was really for us, you know, I mentioned earlier, catching the car and the car keeps driving off. In this case, video was kind of like a, I don’t know, a fighter jet that we were kind of trailing behind with the engine blowing our faces off as we figured this out on the fly. But I think we’re in a good place now, and looking forward to expanding it a bit in the coming year.
LP: We’ll definitely be excited to see how it continues to evolve. And you know, David, Aaron, we’ve appreciated all of your insights thus far. Something that Joyson and I like to do to, you know, end the show with a little bit of fun and flavor, our fun get-to-know-you type questions where we get to learn a little bit more about our guests outside of the newsroom. So to kick things off, we’d love to hear what is one of your most frequently watched movies that, no matter what you’re doing, you will stop and go and turn that on or watch from wherever it is?
DS: I’m like a super history buff. So I watch obscure historical dramas. There’s one called “Black Robe,” produced by a Canadian company that’s really, really accurate, and that’s good. And I’ve watched “The Godfather” many, many, many times. I’m a huge fan of “Sopranos” because I actually grew up in a Sopranos episode in New Jersey. So, like all the references are like, you know, I can relate to a lot of those, the characters, you know, in my old neighborhood. So, yeah, so those are kind of my go-tos.
AM: David has very strong opinions about pizza as a result of his upbringing. Yeah, for us, it’s, you know, “Blazing Saddles.” Mel Brooks is basically the highest form of culture in my household. So you know, whenever that’s on, we cut through. But you know others, because I contain multitudes, the “Fast and Furious” movies almost always if, if they’re on and we’re flipping through and we come across one of those, it’s like, settle in. This is what we’re doing for the next hour and a half. It’s just pure dumb fun. And my wife and I kind of can’t get enough of them.
JC: Luca and I have a couple of colleagues from New Jersey. And let me just say, there have definitely been passionate discussions about pizza.
DS: Somebody tried to serve…I actually took a piece of chicken pizza. I was like, chicken doesn’t belong in a pizza.
AM: This is, by the way, when he says, “Somebody tried to serve,” he’s meaning me at a meeting last week. He’s just being polite.
JC: One of the things that Luca and I have learned during the podcast is, you know, when you ask the question like he just asked about something that people like, they will happily tell you about what they like, but if you ask them about what they hate, they are passionate about it. So with that, I’ll jump into my question, what food or dish do you hate? Could even be an ingredient. David?
DS: You know, I have a pretty diverse palette. I like most things. I can’t really think of anything. I went to France one time and had tripe, and I can tell you that that was something I’ll never try…I think I had to bite maybe two. And it’s like, no, this doesn’t work for me. But I generally like most foods. I don’t like lima beans, but who does?
AM: Yeah, travel wise, the thing that I had that just did not click for me, it was whale. I was in Norway, and they served whale. And it was just really greasy and kind of oily, just not a texture I really enjoyed. But I’ll say the most DC thing possible, and this is something that is a big thing in DC, and I just do not click with it at all, is that I just do not like injera, which is the spongy bread that served with Ethiopian food, which is a big thing here. The texture just turns me entirely off, and I just don’t get it. It does nothing for me. People in DC are really into Ethiopian food, because there’s a big community here. And it’s just not for me.
JC: Well, if it’s the texture, Aaron, I recommend injera chips, if you can find them, much the same flavor.
AM: All right, I’ll give it a shot.
JC: Perfect. Next question, if you never had to hear this song again, you would be extremely happy. What song is that? David?
DS: For me, I’ve taken a genre of Muzak. I’m not a huge fan of pop. I like jazz. I like blues. I actually have records back in the day that I play. But I’m not a big fan of pop music. I like country. But, you know, like all the pop music kind of just flows together. It’s here and it’s gone. I like music that’s got some tooth that’s lasting value. There’s some musicianship to it. And today, you know, this autotune stuff. And, you know, I just, my daughter plays pop music in the car, and I just, please, I just turn it off.
AM: Yeah, for me, it’s very specifically, “Don’t Stop Believin’” by Journey, and even just saying it kind of is going to conjure nightmares. It’s just one of those songs I just have never clicked with. It’s just always kind of annoyed me, but it has the extra kick of it is an absolute all time ear worm. And so I hear it, I’m like, “Ugh, this song,” and then it’s stuck in my head for three days. And for three days, I’m going, “Ugh, this song.” So that’s one that if I could just kind of snap away, I would be very content.
JC: So you’re saying you’re not just a small town girl.
AM: Boo! Boo this man!
LP: Joyson, you just had to go there.
JC: No regrets!
LP: David, Aaron, thank you both so much for your time today. If any of our listeners wanted to learn more about you and the work that you’re doing at Breaking Defense, what would be the best ways for them to reach you?
DS: Our website has all of our staff and our emails, and we’re more than happy to discuss. I mean, specifically, I’m also more than happy to, you know, mentor folks, younger people coming out of school. I think it’s really, you know, Aaron I talked about, it’s a noble thing to introduce people to defense journalism and the future of that. So, anybody who wants some input or some advice, we’re here to help.
AM: Yeah, I’ll just echo that. You know, building out the younger generation of reporters in particular is kind of becoming an issue that people in our profession are becoming more aware of. Because of the economics of journalism, because of the shrinking number of jobs, it’s just really hard for people to onboard at all into this. And so, you know, always happy to talk with people who want to get into this industry. In terms of reach out, as David said, if you go to breakingdefense.com/aboutus, you can find everyone’s contact information where we’re readily available. And you know, happy to discuss, as you mentioned. Prefer a personal email than a, you know, clearly just kind of a broadside from nowhere. But you know, I’m always tied to my email. I never get away from it these days, so eventually I will respond to you.
LP: Perfect. Well, thank you to everyone that tuned into this episode, and thank you, David and Aaron, for helping us go “Gov & Beyond.”
AM: Thanks, guys.
DS: Thank you for having us, and rock on!
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