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Manufacturing problems are dashing the U.S. Army’s plans to boost production of urgently needed 155-mm howitzer shells , a Pentagon watchdog warned.

Despite a goal of 100,000 rounds per month by October 2025, the Army had only managed to produce 36,000 rounds per month as of March 2026, according to a report published this month by the Department of Defense Inspector General.

Shell production requires first building the projectile at a metal parts factory, followed by packing the shell with explosives at another facility. But this means “projectile metal part production is the limiting factor for reaching the 100,000 round-per-month goal for 155-mm artillery rounds,” the report noted.

The Army has not been able to forge enough metal parts to ramp up production of projectiles. In particular, “at a contractor-owned, contractor-operated facility in Mesquite, Texas, the contractor has been unable to produce any projectile metal parts that meet contract specifications,” the report reads.

After investing $469 million, the Army opened a modular metal parts factory in Mesquite, Texas in 2024. The Universal Artillery Projectile Lines facility — operated by General Dynamics Ordnance and Tactical Systems — was supposed to use “modern manufacturing practices, high levels of automation and digital data capture ability” to forge large numbers of large-caliber metal parts for shells, the Army announced at the time.

That optimism proved premature.

Officials at the Army’s Capability Program Executive Ammunition & Energetics, or CPE A&E, “issued the contract and accepted the risk associated with purchasing and adapting unique production equipment which had not been proven to meet U.S. specifications,” the IG report said.

To save time, the Mesquite factory tried to adapt manufacturing lines originally designed to make parts for the M107 155-mm shell — which dates back to 1958 — rather than the newer M795.

CPE A&E “accepted the risk associated with the contractor’s plan to purchase and adapt M107 metal part production equipment to produce a newer variant of the 155-mm projectile metal parts at different specifications,” said the report.

The report noted that some Army officials had concerns regarding an older ammunition plant in Scranton, Pennsylvania, that included “separate ongoing problems with the contractor in terms of responsiveness, equipment maintenance, and timeliness. Those officials expressed concern to the evaluation team that ACC [Army Contracting Command] did not open the contract for the Mesquite facility to competition from other contractors.”

The bottleneck at the Mesquite plant left the Army’s three existing plants in Scranton, Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, and Ingersoll, Canada, to try to pick up the slack.

Amid voracious expenditure of 155-mm rounds by Ukraine that depleted U.S. stockpiles, DoD issued a congressionally-mandated plan in 2022 to modernize howitzer ammunition production. DoD’s 2025 National Defense Industrialization Strategy Implementation Plan aimed at churning out 100,000 155-mm shells per month by October 2025.

The Army’s efforts have borne some fruit, with production nearly tripling to 14,000 shells per month to 36,000. By modernizing the Iowa Army Ammunition Plant and creating two new facilities in Kansas and Arkansas, the Army hopes to load, assemble and pack 140,000 155-mm rounds by December 2027.

In the meantime, the IG suggested the Army could get a refund.

The report recommended that the Army review the contract for the Mesquite facility to determine how the money was spent and whether the DoD can recoup any funds and also “determine whether the Mesquite contract was appropriately issued.”

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The Rivelia Start is De'Longhi's smallest automatic coffee maker

It has a menu of 10 coffee drinks, including cold brew

It's on sale now in the UK for £599.99 (about $800 / AU$1,160)

De'Longhi makes some of the best espresso machines I've tested here at TechRadar, and as the owner of a small kitchen, its latest model has particularly piqued my interest. The De'Longhi Rivelia Start is the company's smallest fully automatic coffee maker.

The Rivelia Start is a successor to the 2024 De'Longhi Rivelia , which our tester Josephine Watson gave a full five stars thanks to its consistently well-extracted espresso, clever Bean Adapt technology that optimizes brew settings to suit your preferred beans, and LatteCrema Hot system, which creates thick and creamy foam for milky drinks.

The Rivelia Start offers all that in an even smaller package, and adds the ability to prepare authentic-tasting cold brew. De'Longhi promises that your cold brew will be "ready in under five minutes", which tells me that it's not just pouring a shot of hot coffee over ice, like some other machines I've tested recently. Instead, the coffee is extracted using ambient temperature water, which results in fewer bitter compounds being dissolved for a more mellow flavor.

The Rivelia Start can prepare hot milk foam, and you can upgrade it with a LatteCrema Cool kit if you want to make cold lattes and cappuccinos (Image credit: De'Longhi) The Rivelia Start's standard menu contains 10 drinks, but if you like the idea of an iced latte or cappuccino to help you stay cool in the summer months, you can upgrade your Rivelia Start with the optional LatteCrema Cool set, which lets you create chilled milk foam for six further drinks.

Personally, the feature I'm most excited about is the pair of swappable bean hoppers. My job sometimes involves drinking a lot of lattes, and I always prefer to switch to decaf in the afternoon so I can still sleep after a day testing drip and espresso machines. With the Rivelia Start, there's no need to purge one type of coffee from the hopper before refilling with another; just unscrew the whole thing and swap it for one filled with a different type of bean.

The De'Longhi Rivelia Start has a clear and simple interface with illustrated touch buttons (Image credit: De'Longhi) It's simple to operate too, with an interface of clearly-labelled buttons rather than a touchscreen, making it extra accessible for new users.

Its small size isn't the only thing that sets it apart from other coffee makers, either — it also comes in a palette of earthy colors that fit with the current trend for natural shades and textures, which makes a refreshing change from the stark black, white, and chrome that once dominated kitchen appliances.

It's available to buy now direct from De'Longhi in the UK for £599.99 (about $800 / AU$1,160) in two colors: maple brown and jade green. More hues will be available from third-party stores from September, and we're currently waiting for details of its international launch.

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Tucked away in Melino Groblje ("Mela's Cemetery"), one of the oldest cemeteries in the Serbian town of Kikinda, stands the grave of Dušan Vasiljev, a poet whose brief life left a lasting mark on Serbian literature. Located near the Holy Trinity Monastery, the modest white monument is easy to overlook among larger family tombs and weathered gravestones. Yet it marks the resting place of one of the most powerful literary voices to emerge from the turmoil of the First World War.

Dušan Vasiljev was born in Kikinda on June 19, 1900. Like many young men of his generation, his youth was overshadowed by war. The violence and devastation he witnessed profoundly shaped his worldview and became central themes in his writing. In a remarkably short life, he produced poetry, prose, essays, and literary criticism that captured the despair, moral confusion, and shattered ideals of postwar Europe.

Although Vasiljev died on March 27, 1924, at only twenty-three years of age, his work would later earn him a place among the most important Serbian expressionist writers. His poems spoke for a generation that had survived war but struggled to find meaning in its aftermath. Today, many Serbian readers know him best through his haunting reflections on suffering, injustice, and the human cost of conflict.

His grave reflects the simplicity of his life and the tragedy of his early death. A tall white cross rises above an inscription in Serbian Cyrillic that reads: "Under this honorable cross rests my son." Beneath it are the poet's name and the dates of his birth and death, followed by the signature of his grieving father, Kosta. The monument stands as both a family memorial and a quiet reminder of a literary career cut tragically short.

Unlike the graves of many celebrated writers, Vasiljev's resting place is not part of a major tourist destination. There are no large monuments, museums, or guided tours. Instead, visitors encounter a humble grave in a historic cemetery where local history, faith, and memory coexist. The setting feels particularly fitting for a poet whose work explored the fragility of life and the burdens carried by ordinary people.

For those interested in literary history, forgotten voices, and the lasting scars of war, the grave of Dušan Vasiljev offers a moving encounter with one of Serbia's most gifted and tragic poets. Hidden in the quiet paths of Melino Groblje, it remains a place where the memory of a lost generation continues to speak through stone and verse.