Donald Trump Jr says 'maybe one day' he'll run for US president
Donald Trump Jr. speaks during a session in the Qatar Economic Forum in Doha on May 21, 2025.
The eldest son of US President Donald Trump, Don Jr, said Wednesday he could run for president "maybe one day", after previously denying he was considering a White House bid.
Asked during a forum in Doha if he would consider entering a presidential race to succeed his father, Don Jr first chuckled before suggesting it was possible.
"It's an honour to be asked and an honour to see that some people are OK with it," he said during a panel discussion at Bloomberg's Qatar Economic Forum as some in the audience applauded.
"You never know," he added.
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IOL News
3 days ago
- IOL News
As the fight moves beyond the front, Ukraine devises drone hunters
A technician prepares a Shrike drone at the Skyfall military technology company in Ukraine. Image: Andrew Kravchenko/Bloomberg Olesia Safronova and Aliaksandr Kudrytski A battle is shaping up in the skies over Ukraine and Russia, as the ingenuity of drone engineers on both sides opens up new opportunities and threats far behind the front lines. This was on full display on Sunday when Ukraine launched a dramatic series of strikes deep in Russian territory, damaging a significant portion of the Kremlin's strategic bomber fleet. Around the same time, Russia unleashed one of the biggest drone and missile attacks against Kyiv. The escalation has touched off a new round of innovations: Ukraine is now developing a generation of drones designed to identify and shoot down other unmanned aerial vehicles. The goal is to target Iranian-designed Shahed drones, which have a triangular frame and are mass produced in Russia. Oleksandr Kamyshyn, an adviser to Ukraine's minister of strategic industries, said in a recent interview Ukraine is scaling up production of weapons that have had success shooting down the Shahed-style drones around Kyiv and the surrounding region. The issue has taken on added urgency as Russian barrages grow in ferocity ahead of peace talks this week in Istanbul. In May, Russia demonstrated it can launch hundreds of Shaheds on a regular basis, signaling its growing capacity. The escalating drone attacks have stretched Ukrainian air defense systems thin and led to a higher number of civilian deaths since US President Donald Trump began pressing for an end to fighting in February with calls to the leaders of Russia and Ukraine. A Shrike drone during testing in Ukraine. Image: Andrew Kravchenko/Bloomberg The proliferation of cheap drone technology in recent years has radically altered battlefields, with traditionally powerful militaries often on the losing end. The low-cost weapons can take out equipment with much higher price tags, including tanks, ships and even other more valuable drones. This trend was highlighted by the operation on Sunday that struck four Russian airbases, including one in eastern Siberia. The attacks damaged about a third of Russia's strategic bombing fleet, according to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy. Ukraine assessed the damage to be at least $2 billion, according to a Security Service official who asked not to be identified as the details are not public. A similar dynamic was at play in Yemen, one of the poorest countries in the world, where Houthis successfully targeted US surveillance drones with surface-to-air missiles. Houthi militants shot down at least seven Reaper drones, each costing about $30 million, in a six-week period during the US bombing campaign, the AP reported in April. Trump soon after ordered a halt to the campaign and announced a ceasefire with the group. Defending against drone attacks is historically expensive. Israel, which has the world's most successful battle-tested air defense system, relies mainly on pricey missiles to shoot down threats. In May, the Israeli Defense Ministry acknowledged that it deployed laser weapons during its ongoing war to stop 'scores' of aerial attacks, including from drones. Laser systems, like interceptor drones, have much lower operational costs. Three domestic producers make Shahed hunters that cost around $5,000 each, according to Kamyshyn, the industry minister's adviser. Executives interviewed for this article said some interceptors under development can cost as little as $300 a piece. Ukrainian Vampire hexacopter bomber drones at the Skyfall military technology company. Image: Andrew Kravchenko/Bloomberg The strategies they use and their degree of autonomy varies. Some seek to explode near an enemy drone to knock it down, while others fly like a bullet and need to score a direct hit. What they have in common is they are relatively cheap. Shaheds, estimated to cost about $35,000, are Russia's preferred one-way attack drones, according to the Center for Strategic and International Studies. Origin Robotics, a Latvia-based drone maker, is among the many companies seeking to counter Shaheds. Origin will send test drones to Ukraine in June that explode in the vicinity of incoming UAVs to take them out. 'Once it gets close enough to a target, a warhead detonates and the target is hit with fragmentation,' Origin Chief Executive Officer Agris Kipurs said in an interview at a drone conference in Riga last week. 'It is exactly used for that type of a target: large armed loitering munitions.' While the economic calculus is in Ukraine's favor, drones aren't successful enough yet to replace other air defense systems, according to Bloomberg Intelligence analyst Wayne Sanders. The idea to build drone interceptors has found support at the highest level of Ukrainian leadership. Zelenskiy discussed Russia's battlefield tactics and increasing aerial barrages with his war council last week, and ordered his top military commanders and intelligence chiefs to investigate countermeasures. 'We have jets now to shoot down drones,' Zelenskiy said, adding that they faced a problem with the Shahed attacks. 'We are also moving in the direction of drone-drone interceptors.' Zelenskiy is also pushing allies for $30 billion by year's end to boost domestic weapons production. Drone hunters have other limitations, too. They can't defend against Russia's more capable missile systems, which are faster and carry more firepower than Shaheds. US-made Patriot missiles, which cost between $3 million and $6 million each, are the most effective way to target those weapons. 'The dependence on the US has been evident both in direct and indirect ways,' Sanders said. 'Direct funding of weapons capabilities, as well as indirect investments into Ukrainian manufacturing capabilities so that they could stand up their own industries.' Currently, the alternative to interceptor drones is often soldiers with truck-mounted machine guns, a low-tech solution with a poor success rate that gets worse when their targets fly at higher altitudes. Kyiv also uses its small fleet of F-16 fighters, donated from NATO allies, to shoot down drones. Ukraine has faced more than 20,000 long-distance drone attacks in the three-plus years of fighting. Russian technology isn't standing still either, according to Carl Larson, executive director of Defense Tech for Ukraine, an international group of volunteers providing equipment to Ukraine. Russian fixed-wing drones are now often equipped with rear-facing cameras and programmed to take evasive maneuvers if they spot a drone trying to intercept it, Larson said in an interview. 'It's immensely wasteful, inefficient and frankly difficult to physically hit a drone with another drone,' he said. Ukraine is developing fixed-wing drones that smash into Russian ones, as well as other drones that carry recoilless shotguns to shoot down enemy aircraft, Larson said. Skyfall, which is one of Ukraine's biggest drone producers, is tweaking its popular first person view model to intercept UAVs, according to a company spokesperson who asked not to be identified due to security concerns. FPV drones, like the ones used to target Russia's strategic bombers, have become an essential weapon for both sides in the war. They can travel at speeds of as much as 100 miles an hour with small explosive charges. Such drones have already caused a radical rethinking of how the front is organized, forcing soldiers to avoid concentrating in groups and pushing vehicles and other equipment much further behind the trenches to avoid getting hit. As FPVs are increasingly used to target other flying objects, they could change the skies as well. The drone-hunting version of Skyfall's Shrike FPV costs between $300 and $500, depending on the configuration, and can target reconnaissance and strike drones, the spokesperson said. In April, Ukraine's 63rd brigade operating along the front in the east of the country published a video that appeared to be Shrikes targeting a Supercam UAV and a Merlin, which is one of Russia's most sophisticated reconnaissance drones. The video couldn't be independently confirmed. The spokesperson said Shrikes can't target Shaheds, which travel at much higher altitudes. 'We're focused on interdicting the FPV suicide drones and the bomber drones,' Defense Tech for Ukraine's Larson said. While Europe and the US are good at building 'fancy and expensive systems,' Ukraine needs its own low-cost, scalable solutions to counter the Russian attacks, he said. | Bloomberg
IOL News
27-05-2025
- IOL News
Rand in favour as dollar drops on back of Trump's policies
South Africa's local currency is hanging on below R18 to the dollar on the back of a weaker US dollar – a position US President Donald Trump seems to favour. Investec chief economist, Annabel Bishop, said in a note that this was because the US dollar's weakness was a major support. 'The greenback has dropped sharply from recent highs, on concerns over US tariffs and the US President seen to favour US dollar weakness,' she said. The currency opened at R17.89 on Tuesday morning, more or less on par with where it has been over the past about two weeks. By mid-morning, it was at R17.93. South Africa's local currency is hanging on below R18 to the dollar on the back of a weaker US dollar – a position US President Donald Trump seems to favour. However, even as investors turn to riskier assets, the rand is only in ninth place in the Bloomberg emerging market currency basket ranker. Bishop noted that Trump apparently wants a weaker dollar for trade support. Recently, that country's President has been negotiating trade tariffs with several major markets, including South Africa, after shocking the world and US markets with high and unexpected import duties on April 2 – his so-called 'liberation day'. Trump later backtracked some of these taxes, dropping them to 10% for 90 days as of April 3, bringing a sigh of relief to markets. However, the rand's strength against the dollar is not reflected in other forex trades, noted Bishop and it has not gained as much as some other currencies, including those of the Philippines, Thailand, and Malaysia. Bishop also pointed out that the rand has weakened against the euro and against the UK pound. 'The rand has not strengthened on its own, but reflects US dollar weakness,' she said. Andre Cilliers, currency strategist at TreasuryONE, seems to disagree, stating that the rand is the 'star performer amongst emerging market and risk-sensitive currencies'. Bianca Botes, director at Citadel Global added that the rand is 'taking its cues from the global landscape and the South African Reserve Bank interest rate decision, which will be released later this week'. IOL
Daily Maverick
26-05-2025
- Daily Maverick
After the Bell: Who is afraid of Elon Musk?
I wonder a bit about why Musk is so determined to have Starlink operating here. He has already complied with regulations in other countries, and I obviously understand he would not want to give up any ownership. And why should he! But he looked almost unhinged when talking about our BEE laws at the Qatar Economic Forum last week and clearly doesn't like what South Africa has become. Friday's announcement by the communications and digital technologies minister, the DA's Solly Malatsi, that he is looking at relaxing the regulations around BEE ownership for satellite internet service providers certainly looks like it is tailor-made for Elon Musk. Coming just hours after that impossible meeting in the Oval Office — and amid indications that, in fact, US President Donald Trump brought up the Starlink issue with President Cyril Ramaphosa in their meeting afterwards — it's hard to escape the conclusion that one led to the other. advertisement Don't want to see this? Remove ads There is much to be concerned about here. Is it really the case that we decide to change our laws just because a current friend of the current US President wants us to? To put it another way, if Starlink were owned by someone else, would any of this be happening? Actually, yes, some of it probably would be. Starlink is not the only service of its type. Kuiper, driven by Amazon (owned by Jeff Bezos, another strong supporter of Trump), is also gaining ground and would want the same regulation relaxation as Starlink. What makes this all so much more difficult is that the idea of using transformation methods other than equity in this space has been around for a while. I cannot understand, given how prominent this issue had become, why Malatsi sat on his hands and appeared to do nothing. Now it really looks like this was the result of pressure from Musk and Trump. And now, of course, there is going to be quite a big fight. It is not nearly as simple as Malatsi, or even Ramaphosa, saying that they want this and it becoming so. advertisement Don't want to see this? Remove ads Firstly, everyone else in the sector who has been covered by the equity regulations in the past, and anyone who could be affected by them in the future, is going to have something to say. Some companies will compete against Starlink in the provision of internet access, not through satellites but via fibre and cellphone networks. They absolutely have a right to be heard here. And then there are politicians — Julius Malema and the EFF (who appear to think that Trump has somehow given them a new lease of life) could well oppose this move. Malatsi himself is now due to appear in Parliament on Tuesday to defend this process. Considering that both his party, the DA, and the president are likely to support him, he might well give quite a robust defence of his decision (and he'll say anyway that, in fact, this is just the beginning of a decision, all he's doing is asking for public comment). Much could depend on the attitude of the chairperson of the Portfolio Committee on Communications, Khusela Diko. She was one of the best communicators the ANC produced, and ended up as Ramaphosa's spokesperson. But during the pandemic, she had to leave her position after being accused of involvement in Covid-19 tenders. In the middle of the dispute, her husband passed away. Eventually, she was found not guilty of wrongdoing and re-entered politics through Parliament. Telecommunications is the ultimate network industry; if you make communication easier and cheaper, your economy grows dramatically. Our problems in this space are one of the reasons our economy has not grown properly for so long. advertisement Don't want to see this? Remove ads advertisement Don't want to see this? Remove ads Generally speaking, a service like Starlink that provides reliable internet services wherever you are should be a huge boon for a country as big as ours. But it is wrong to think Starlink and services like it are a silver bullet. They are too expensive compared with most other services, and are only really economically viable in places where there is no fibre (while fibre was first rolled out for companies and then in suburban areas, it is becoming much more common in township areas too). Yes, there are schools and police stations in many places that could benefit from the service, but it won't make a huge difference. Unless the cost comes down quite dramatically. I also wonder a bit about why Musk is so determined to have it operating here. He has already complied with regulations in other countries, and I obviously understand he would not want to give up any ownership. And why should he! But he looked almost unhinged when talking about our BEE laws at the Qatar Economic Forum last week and clearly doesn't like what South Africa has become. Thankfully, it seems unlikely that he could ever have a monopoly over the provision of internet services. Considering how his AI engine Grok was making up facts about 'white genocide' last week, this is a very good thing. advertisement Don't want to see this? Remove ads My own suspicion is that Starlink will come to South Africa and will comply with whatever non-equity BEE provision there is. But don't be surprised if there are several court cases first, as competing operators and competing politicians try to make mileage out of the fight. advertisement Don't want to see this? Remove ads Musk is a wonderful figure to oppose. And too many have too much to gain for this to be easy. DM
