The memo “Unleashing U.S. Military Drone Dominance,” addressed to senior Pentagon leadership, combatant commanders and directors of defense agencies, referred to uncrewed systems as “the biggest battlefield innovation in a generation.”

“Our adversaries collectively produce millions of cheap drones each year. While global military drone production skyrocketed over the last three years, the previous administration deployed red tape. U.S. units are not outfitted with the lethal small drones the modern battlefield requires,” Hegseth wrote.

The directive calls for approving “hundreds” of American products for purchase by the U.S. military, arming combat units with a variety of “low-cost drones made by America’s world-leading engineers and AI experts,” and more widely integrating UAS into training exercises.

Here are some key deadlines that the SecDef laid out for Pentagon leaders:

• No later than Sept. 1, the Army, Navy, Marine Corps and Air Force must establish “deliberately screened, active-duty experimental formations purpose-built to enable rapid scaling of small UAS across the Joint Force by 2026, prioritizing initial fielding to U.S. lndo-Pacific Command units,” per the memo. “Within 30 days, the Office of Strategic Capital and Department of Government Efficiency will present options, including advance purchase commitments, direct loans, or other incentives … that accelerate the growth of the U.S. industrial base to outfit our combat units with cheap and effective U.S.-made UAS. To maximize these investments, each Military Service will establish, resource, and empower unsubordinated program offices solely focused on UAS, with an immediate priority towards small UAS. These program offices will compete to determine best practices in rapid acquisition and industry engagement with operational units. Drone dominance is a process race as much as a technological race. Major purchases shall favor U.S. companies, informed by Blue List ratings and strategic guidance.”
• By Jan. 1, 2026, responsibility for publication and maintenance of the Blue List of DOD-approved unmanned aerial systems, components and software will be transferred from the Defense Innovation Unit (DIU) to the Defense Contract Management Agency. “The Blue List will become a digital platform that will continuously update an aggregate list of all certified U AS parts and systems, those with follow-up requirements, the latest user ratings, and all vendors approved to certify UAS parts and systems for the Blue List. The DCMA and the DIU will inform and align vendors on evolving Blue List expectations and develop a ratings system to identify best-in-class systems across the Joint Force. The Blue List will be dynamic, retaining all previous component and supply chain findings, and including updated performance evaluations from testing and key lessons learned from training. The Blue List will be searchable using artificial intelligence tools,” according to the memo.
• Within 60 days, the secretaries of the military department have been tasked to identify programs that would be more cost-effective or “lethal” if replaced by drones.
• Within 90 days, the secretaries of the military departments, in consultation with the Pentagon’s research and engineering directorate, have to jointly designate “at least three national ranges, with diverse terrain (including at least one with over-water areas) for deep UAS training, with low/no inter-service cost transfer,” per the memo, which noted that units operating UAS will “access DoD grounds with abundant airspace and spectrum allocation.”
• Next year, Hegseth said he expects to see UAS capabilities integrated into “all relevant combat training, including force-on-force drone wars.” And by 2027, all major training events across the Department must integrate drones.
• By the end of 2026, “every squad” is to be equipped with “low-cost, expendable drones,” with priority going to Indo-Pacific combat units.

“Our adversaries have a head start in small UAS, but we will perform a technological leapfrog and establish small UAS domain dominance by the end of 2027. We will accomplish this urgent goal by combining the Nation’s best qualities, including risk-taking. Senior officers must set the tone. Accelerating this critical battlefield technology requires a Department of War culture,” Hegseth wrote.

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“The Department of Defense must be able to procure, integrate, and train using low-cost, high-performing drones manufactured in the United States,” President Donald Trump wrote in the directive.

This new EO comes at a time when autonomous systems are increasingly proving to be game-changing on contemporary battlefields. Yet despite major investments, all of America’s military services are confronting serious challenges in adopting and deploying different-sized and affordable drones for widespread use.

DefenseScoop asked former defense officials and national security experts to share their analyses regarding the order, in separate conversations following its release last month.

“At first glance, the EO is directionally sound — it signals a strategic interest in accelerating the adoption of commercial unmanned aerial systems in the U.S. and reducing barriers to their use, particularly for testing and training,” Lauren Kahn, senior research analyst at Georgetown University’s Center for Security and Emerging Technology, said. “That’s a positive step.”

David Rothzeid — a venture investor at Shield Capital, Air Force reservist and Defense Innovation Unit alum — echoed that sentiment, saying he views the EO “as a positive and timely move that supports both national security and the U.S. innovation ecosystem.”

“It sends a meaningful demand signal to American entrepreneurs and primes the broader market to accelerate development,” he told DefenseScoop. “That said, although the EO is well-aimed, its long-term impact will depend on execution.” 

A longtime procurement official, Rothzeid previously led acquisition pathways at DIU. He argued that the DOD at this point needs to “avoid repeating past mistakes where adversaries seized technological leads due to” slow adoption and over-classification postures at the Pentagon. 

“For example, the proliferation of Chinese-created DJI drones in both consumer and defense sectors continues to exacerbate our domestic sourcing. By failing to incubate and scale domestic alternatives earlier, we inadvertently ceded a portion of the Group 1 UAV market to foreign influence,” Rothzeid said, referring to drones on the small end of the spectrum.

Tucked into the new EO is a line that directs the department and military leadership to identify programs that hold potential to be “more cost efficient or lethal” if replaced by drones — and to submit a report to the president on their findings within 90 days of its publication.

“This is included as almost a throwaway because DOD has been doing that during its budget and strategy review,” Mark Cancian, a senior adviser at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, told DefenseScoop.

He pointed to the Army terminating its Apache attack helicopter replacement program, noting that determination was “likely driven by a desire to use drones.”

“Other examples are the large increase in funding for the [Air Force’s] collaborative combat aircraft — a drone that would accompany manned aircraft — and endorsement of the Replicator program, which seeks to develop drone swarms and was started by the Biden administration,” Cancian said.

In Kahn’s view, that specific provision regarding recommendations on drones to replace legacy weapons “risks becoming a box-ticking exercise if services nominate programs they were already planning to retire.”

“However, if taken seriously and used to spur some of the efforts already underway in the department to accelerate the adoption of cheaper, attritable, drones and other precise mass capabilities, it could help rebalance a force still over-invested in costly, vulnerable legacy systems,” she said.

“As Ukraine and Israel have shown in recent days with Operations Spider’s Web and Rising Lion, low-cost UAS can impose asymmetric costs and scale far faster than exquisite platforms — making them strong candidates to replace select ISR, strike, or base defense assets. Still, systems shouldn’t be replaced just for the sake of it; the goal is a high-low mix where attritable drones complement, not supplant, more advanced capabilities,” Kahn told DefenseScoop.

Despite being titled “Delivering Drones to Our Warfighters,” Section 9 of the order spotlights elements that she considers more associated with airspace issues and training — and “less about breaking down challenges the department faces when it comes to acquiring, sustaining, and rapidly scaling UAS, and other emerging capabilities.”

Khan further noted that the EO “entirely overlooks” unmanned surface vehicles, unmanned underwater vehicles, and other autonomous and remotely crewed systems.

Meanwhile, “a welcome provision is the push to allow all platforms on the Blue UAS list to operate on military installations without requiring policy exceptions,” she told DefenseScoop.

Managed by DIU, Blue UAS is a Pentagon program that is designed to help the department rapidly pinpoint and approve secure commercial drones for government use.

“That’s the kind of specific change that can have outsized operational impact by enabling more rapid experimentation and deployment. However, it largely emphasizes access to airspace — an essential and persistent issue, particularly when it comes to deconflicting some of the challenges of airspace above military installations that the DOD itself faces,” Khan said, adding that the directive “largely targets known, second-order problems rather than the deeper, more significant structural barriers the DOD faces when adopting UAS at scale.”

Tom Adams, director of public safety at DroneShield, also said the EO marks a step in the right direction, but suggested more needs to be done.

“[There] were some noticeable gaps in the language related to the authorities for public safety, and critical infrastructure, for example, that I believe is meant to be addressed with more formal legislation,” he said. “I’m looking forward to seeing how Congress tackles this issue that is so crucial to the security of the homeland.”

Rothzeid also spotlighted the directive’s Blue UAS provision in his discussion with DefenseScoop. To him, it’s “critical” for DOD to expand that list and update it with newly approved industry-made capabilities more frequently. 

“There are new players with innovative UAS platforms popping up in the space all the time — and while it’s important to make sure UAS platforms are secure and compliant — being more flexible to let new vendors in will accelerate the pace of innovation by widening the number of platforms DOD can procure rapidly,” he said.

Rothzeid offered several other suggestions, beyond what was covered in Trump’s order, that could help the military more rapidly field combat-ready drone systems. 

He recommended DOD improve companies’ access to testing ranges, particularly for drones that are built or modified to withstand interference from electromagnetic sources for emergency response or other purposes.

“Startups consistently face delays and red tape when trying to test their systems in realistic electromagnetic environments. This is a critical gap, especially considering that several U.S. platforms sent to Ukraine failed due to inadequate battlefield resilience,” Rothzeid said.

He additionally urged the Trump administration to ensure that the demand signal from the new EO is supported by budget allocations in the near term to enable its implementation. 

“Ultimately, policy without procurement falls flat. If this EO is to deliver on its promise, DOD will need to match it with funding, contracting pathways, and accountability to ensure real dollars flow to companies building these next-generation systems,” Rothzeid told DefenseScoop.

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The Biden administration has committed more than $65 billion worth of security assistance to Kyiv since Russia’s full-scale invasion nearly three years ago, including thousands of UAS platforms via presidential drawdown authority and USAI funds.

As Joe Biden’s presidency nears its end and President-elect Donald Trump prepares to take office next week, DefenseScoop has compiled a rundown of the various drones that Washington has acknowledged committing to Ukraine thus far.

Phoenix Ghost family of systems

In the early months of the war, the Pentagon made headlines when it announced that it was sending secretive “Phoenix Ghost” systems to Ukraine. For a long time, U.S. defense officials were tight-lipped about the capability, which is a kamikaze drone, or loitering munition, that attacks its target by crashing into it. Its development was overseen by the Air Force’s Big Safari office — which works on special projects — in partnership with AEVEX Aerospace.

In October 2024, AEVEX revealed that Phoenix Ghost is a family of systems, not a single drone model.

One of them is a loitering munition called Dominator, a Group 3 UAS (the Pentagon characterizes drones by groups on a scale of 1-5, based on size and other factors, with Group 1 on the smaller end and Group 5 on the larger end) with 5-plus hours of endurance, a range of about 500 kilometers, a top speed of 55-plus knots, and a 37-pound frag or penetrator payload capacity. The system is 5 feet long with a 15-foot wingspan and weighs about 100 pounds with a gas engine. It can be launched and recovered from a short runway or pneumatically, and operate in GPS-denied environments, according to the manufacturer.

The system can also perform intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR), communications relay, “full spectrum” electronic warfare and cyber missions, the company says.

Other platforms in the Phoenix Ghost family include the Disruptor — a Group 3 drone with a configuration-dependent range of 600 to 1,150 kilometers, that uses a pneumatic launcher or rocket-assisted take-off and can carry a 50-pound payload — and the Group 2 Atlas, which has a couple hours of endurance, 50-plus knot top speed, and 120-plus kilometer range with an 8-pound payload, according to AEVEX.

The vendor’s loitering munitions “achieve autonomous flight through algorithms and sensor fusion, enabling them to navigate, make decisions, and complete missions without direct intervention,” according to a company website, which noted that the platforms use visual-based navigation to “autonomously identify and follow landmarks or features in their environment, enabling precise positioning and pathfinding without reliance on GPS.”

Switchblades

The Switchblade 600 is a kamikaze drone that has a 40-plus kilometer range, 40-plus minutes of endurance, a “sprint speed” of 115 miles per hour, and can carry an anti-armor warhead, according to manufacturer AeroVironment. The all-up round weighs about 65 pounds.

“Equipped with … high-resolution EO/IR gimbaled sensors and advanced precision flight control, Switchblade 600 empowers the warfighter with quick and easy deployment via tube-launch, and the capability to fly, track and engage non-line-of-sight targets and armored vehicles with precision lethal effects without the need for external ISR or fires assets,” per the product description. “Patented wave-off and recommit capability allows operators to abort the mission at any time and then re-engage either the same or other targets multiple times based on operator command.”

The tube-launched Switchblade 300 Block 20, meanwhile, can be deployed in less than 2 minutes and has a range of 30 kilometers, upwards of 20 minutes of endurance, and a “sprint speed” of 100 kilometers per hour. The all-up round weighs only about 7 pounds, according to the vendor.

“Cursor-on-target GPS coordinates provide situational awareness, information collection, targeting and feature/object recognition, that together deliver the actionable intelligence and precision firepower needed to achieve mission success across multiple domains,” per a product description.

Altius-600

The Altius-600, originally built by AREA-I — which was acquired by Anduril — is a tube-launched drone that weighs up to 27 pounds, has an endurance of up to four hours, and can be deployed from ground vehicles, aircraft and other platforms. It’s able to carry mission-specific payload configurations that can contribute to ISR, electronic warfare, counter-UAS or “kinetic” engagement, according to a product description.

The platform’s autonomous capabilities allow one operator to control multiple assets, according to the Anduril.

“Altius-600 launches from a variety of platforms and altitudes, providing increased capabilities to any mothership,” per a product description.

Jump 20

The JUMP 20 is a Group 3, fixed wing, vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL) platform that can provide advanced multi-sensor ISR capabilities, according to manufacturer AeroVironment.

The drone has 13-plus hours of endurance, a range of 115 miles, and a payload capacity of up to 30 pounds, according to the company.

“Runway independent, the system can be set up and operational in less than 60 minutes without the need for launch or recovery equipment,” per a product description.

Black Hornet

Black Hornet nano drones and their ISR capabilities provide dismounted soldiers with “covert situational awareness,” according to manufacturer Teledyne FLIR.

The “extremely light, nearly silent” pocket-sized systems transmit live video and HD still images back to their operators, according to a product description.

Scan Eagle

Scan Eagle is a long-endurance ISR platform that’s launched by a catapult. The Group 2 UAS can operate at altitudes up to 19,500 feet and has an endurance of about 18 hours. It has a maximum payload weight of 11 pounds, according to manufacturer Insitu, which is owned by Boeing.

“Field-swappable payloads can be rapidly reconfigured to support a wide range of missions—electronic warfare, ISR, comms relay, overwatch and targeting,” per a product description.

Penguin

Edge Autonomy makes multiple variants of the Penguin long-endurance UAS, which can be tailored for different configurations.

The catapult-launched Penguin C Mk2 has an endurance of 20-plus hours, a 180-kilometer range, and a flight ceiling of 13,000 feet, according to the manufacturer.

“A crew of two can operate the Penguin C Mk2 and all the necessary equipment, including the pneumatic launcher. The whole system is packed in several ruggedized containers and weighs up to 265 kg (585 lb), all of which can be transported in a single minivan, pickup, or helicopter and assembled in under an hour,” according to a product description.

There’s also a VTOL variant of the Penguin C — which has 12-plus hours of endurance — and another system known as Penguin B.

The Pentagon has not identified which variant was sent to Ukraine.

Raven

The hand-launched Raven has a range of 10 kilometers, upwards of 75 minutes of endurance, is 3 feet long and weighs less than 5 pounds. It can be operated manually or programmed for autonomous navigation, according to maker AeroVironment.

The system “is ideal for low-altitude intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance missions that depend on rapid deployment,” per a product description. “Lightweight and simple to operate, the Raven is rucksack portable and can be hand-launched for day or night observation. The Raven has an optional stabilized gimbaled payload and delivers real-time color and/or infrared imagery to the ground control and remote viewing stations.”

Puma

Puma small UAS, manufactured by AeroVironment, can be hand launched and it’s designed to perform ISR missions.

The Puma 3 AE, a Group 1 drone, has a 20-kilometer link range, is less than 5 feet in length, weighs about 15 pounds, and has up to 3 hours of endurance, according to the company

The system “features a reinforced airframe with an optional under wing transit bay for secondary payloads and third-party applications,” per a product description. “Available kits and accessories expand the operational capabilities by providing vertical take-off and landing in constrained area operations and GPS-denied navigation in contested environments.”

The Puma LE, a Group 2 drone that weighs about 23 pounds, can also be launched by hand and has up to 6.5 hours of endurance. The system is about 7 feet long, according to AeroVironment.

The drones have a 60-kilometer range when assisted by the company’s long-range tracking antenna.

DOD has not disclosed which variant was committed to Ukraine.

Cyberlux K8

CyberLux does not provide images or specs about the K8 on its main UAS product page.

“Lightweight and man-portable, Cyberlux UAS solutions are capable of beyond line-of-sight engagements that are enabled by first-person view (FPV) command and control. Military customers have options including the integration with Battle Management Systems (BMS) as well as fire-and-forget technologies substantially resistant to EW,” the company states on its website.

In a Nov. 15, 2024, shareholder update, company CEO Mark Schmidt noted that the firm has “evolved” the original K8 drones into newer configurations that are part of its “X” series, noting that the manufacturer had “ongoing activity in Ukraine working to secure additional contracts” for its UAS and other business units.

One of the vendor’s X series drones, the X-8.10, has a range of about 6 miles, a payload weight of 6 pounds, a max speed of 86 miles per hour, and an endurance of 12 minutes when carrying a payload, according to a product description.

The company did not respond to a request for K8 product info and imagery.

The Wall Street Journal published a story about the company in March 2023 that included a photo of the K8.

‘Other UAS’

The latest DOD fact sheet on Ukraine security assistance, published Jan. 9, referenced “Other UAS” on the list of equipment that’s been committed to Kyiv. Pentagon officials have not provided additional information about those platforms. The department has previously cited operational security reasons for not providing certain information about the military systems going to Ukraine.

What’s next?

It remains to be seen whether the next U.S. administration, set to take power on Jan. 20, will commit additional drones to Ukraine. President-elect Donald Trump said he aims to quickly bring an end to the war after he’s back in the Oval Office.

Meanwhile, Ukraine has a strong industrial base for manufacturing its own UAS, and it can keep churning them out on a large scale. Other European nations have also contributed high-tech drones to Kyiv’s arsenal, and they may continue on that course even if Washington stops sending systems.

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As highlighted in the Pentagon’s latest China’s Military Power Report — a congressionally mandated, annual study that details the breadth of Beijing’s military strategies, capabilities and modernization efforts — the People’s Liberation Army Air Force (PLAAF) “is modernizing and indigenizing its aircraft and unmanned aerial systems, rapidly matching U.S. standards.”

During a briefing with reporters ahead of the 182-page document’s publication, a senior defense official said the reference to matching American standards is specific to China’s advancements in UAVs, rather than the PLAAF as a fighting force writ large.

“They’re definitely continuing to improve their capabilities, but we would not assess that they have caught up with or surpassed the U.S. Air Force” technologically as an armed service, the official said. “That would go beyond the judgement that we reach in the report.”

The assessment comes as organizations across the DOD work to develop and buy their own unmanned systems across multiple domains. Notably, the the Pentagon next year plans to field thousands of attritable drones of various types to counter China’s military build up in the Indo-Pacific as part of the department’s ambitious Replicator program.

China is moving forward on its “comprehensive” UAV modernization efforts, as indicated by a number of increasingly modern systems designed for operations across theater and echelon levels, according to the new report.

The nation has marked several key milestones in the last three years, such as airshow displays and operational appearances of several new systems, the document noted. Those platforms include the WZ-7 Soaring Dragon drone, as well as the new WZ-8 reconnaissance UAS and a redesigned version of the GJ-11 stealth unmanned combat air vehicle.

While the People’s Liberation Army is continuing to use its uncrewed aerial systems to conduct intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance missions, Beijing is also expanding its employment of large drones for other operations such as “anti-submarine roles, firefighting, and weather modification,” according to the report.

At the same time, China is using industry air and trade shows to showcase its growing number of manned and unmanned systems that can be teamed together during combat.

“In these concepts, PRC developers are demonstrating an interest in additional growth beyond ISR and [electronic warfare] into air-to-air and air-to-ground combat, with substantial development efforts to produce swarming capability for operational applications,” the Pentagon report stated. “PRC researchers have disclosed the development of a future multi-domain kill-web designed to target penetrating counterair by coordinating across aircraft, sensors, and missiles.”

The Chinese government is also prioritizing the development of AI-enabled technologies for autonomous vehicles, predictive maintenance and logistics, automated target recognition and other military tools, according to the DOD.

“To actualize the level of AI integration that the PLA is envisioning, Beijing recognizes the need to leverage developments from across its commercial and academic sectors. By 2030, the PLA expects to field a range of ‘algorithmic warfare’ and ‘network-centric warfare’ capabilities operating at different levels of human-machine integration. [Chinese Communist Party] leaders believe AI and machine learning will enhance information, surveillance, and reconnaissance capabilities and enable a range of new defense applications, including autonomous and precision-strike weapons,” Pentagon officials wrote in the report.

“The PLA plans to use AI and machine learning to enhance missile sensors, which may make those missiles more accurate,” they added, noting that the People’s Liberation Army and other Chinese defense organizations have hosted artificial intelligence competitions and “used public purchasing platforms” to increase military access to civilian research and technologies.

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Deputy Secretary of Defense Kathleen Hicks first announced the Replicator effort in August, with the stated goal of delivering thousands of relatively low-cost, “attritable” capabilities in 18 to 24 months to help counter China’s military buildup. In December, the Office of the Secretary of Defense is expected to choose from a list of platforms proposed by the services and other DOD components for the initial tranche.

Replicator isn’t a program of record but rather an effort to give a boost to technologies that are already in the works so they can be fielded faster in larger quantities than they would otherwise if they weren’t given special attention.

“First of all, it’s exciting,” Assistant Secretary of the Army for Acquisition, Logistics and Technology Doug Bush said in an interview with DefenseScoop at the Reagan National Defense Forum. “The idea of the whole DOD, you know, needing to push the envelope and go faster on unmanned capability, I think is a good thing. Replicator is part of that. So yeah, the Army nominated several systems. And the process now is working through on picking.”

Specifically, the Army proposed unmanned aerial systems for the initiative, Bush acknowledged. However, he declined to identify the drones, and Hicks has called for secrecy about some aspects of Replicator.

“I can’t [say which group of UAS they are part of], OK. But [they’re] not super small. So, I think, more focused on things with a bit longer range, with a bit more punch than like, you know, a very small quadcopter. So, bigger than that,” Bush told DefenseScoop.

When asked if the platforms might be loitering munitions — also known as kamikaze drones or one-way UAS because the systems are designed to destroy their targets by crashing into them with a warhead — he said: “Bigger than a quadcopter, yes.”

OSD is expected to make its selections for the initial tranche of Replicator this month.

“They’re gonna do it in iterations here. But for the first tranche, you know, I think there’s a good chance there will be an Army one in there, that hopefully with additional funding it’s something we can go fast with. So the perspective I took was, the … deputy secretary certainly seems to want things that we can get into production and scale up quickly. So, we have some mature systems that we thought fit the bill. But the other services nominated things, too. So, you know, it will be up to OSD to pick,” Bush said.

However, the public might not find out soon which Army systems or other platforms proposed by the services were selected.

“I would not necessarily say the candidates will be announced,” Hicks told reporters during a Defense Writers Group meeting last month. “We’re being very careful, as you know, about the way in which we talk about Replicator. Our goal here is an operational goal, which is in addition to the acquisition cycle, and that operational goal is to create dilemmas for China and any other competitor who might look at this approach and try to undermine it. So, we will be very clear and transparent with Congress. I’ve talked to Congress in classified sessions on this. But how we choose to speak about it, in terms of the particular programs or projects that we’ll be accelerating through Replicator is to be determined.”

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The drone deployments came amid tensions over Tehran’s maritime activities and a push by the U.S. military to incorporate more robotic platforms into the joint force and team them with crewed systems.

“Last month, naval forces in the Middle East region successfully integrated unmanned platforms with traditionally crewed ships and aircraft to conduct enhanced maritime security operations in the waters surrounding the Arabian Peninsula,” NAVCENT said in a release Friday. “This operation bolstered presence in and around a critical chokepoint that in recent months has seen Iran unlawfully seize internationally flagged merchant ships.”

The operation — which included sailors, Marines, Coast Guardsmen and systems from Task Force 51/5 (amphibious/Marine), Task Force 52 (mine countermeasures), Task Force 53 (logistics), Task Force 55 (surface warfare), Task Force 56 (expeditionary), Task Force 57 (patrol/reconnaissance) and Task Force 59 (unmanned systems and AI) — occurred “over several days during routine patrols in and around the Strait of Hormuz,” according to the release.

The Navy is pursuing a variety of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), unmanned surface vessels (USVs) and unmanned underwater vessels (UUVs) as it moves toward a “hybrid fleet” of crewed and uncrewed systems. And it’s looking to combine them with artificial intelligence tools to enable computer vision, anomalous behavior detection, multi-system command and control, and edge intelligence, among other potential use cases.

Task Force 59, which reached full operational capability earlier this year under 5th Fleet, has been spearheading experimentation and deployment of these types of technologies, including commercial USVs manufactured by Saildrone and others.

The Navy recently expanded the unmanned systems and AI concept to 4th Fleet in Central and South America, and it’s expected to be adopted by fleets based in the Indo-Pacific as well.

“We have been operating UAVs and UUVs in the [Middle East] region for years,” Capt. Joe Baggett, director of maritime operations for NAVCENT and 5th Fleet, said in a statement. “Adding our new USVs, and then integrating all of these platforms into fleet operations, is how we expect to fly and sail well into the future.”

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The following is a Useful Fiction product designed to visualize how new unmanned technologies, and especially their proliferation to a wide array of state and non-state actors, could lead to both new threats and complicate our understanding of fast-moving crisis scenarios.

The intelligence analyst put her head in her hands, resting bare elbows hard on the desk, while her fingers massaged her temples. Her portfolio was the Middle East, which had been seemingly put on the back burner amidst the missiles flying across the Taiwan Straits. And then, in the span of a morning, everything had changed. Now, she needed to send a memo to her supervisor, who, in turn, would be sending that memo on to the Deputy Director for National Intelligence, who, in turn, had to do an emergency briefing for members of Congress. 

A deep breath.

“OK, OK,” said the analyst, looking at her watch to confirm the time she had left. Donald Duck’s arms marked that she just had under 20 minutes to explain that perhaps a new front had or hadn’t just opened up in what was looking like a global conflagration.

The old school watch was both irreverent and necessary, given how all outside digital devices were prohibited inside the workspace. She took a fortifying swig of coffee from a navy blue mug, the logo of her college starting to fade from years’ worth of scrubs in the office kitchenette sink. It was lukewarm, but there was no time to freshen it up.

She began typing…

(TS//SI//REL FVEY) DETERMINING PROXY FORCE ATTRIBUTION OF DRONE SWARM ATTACKS ON HQ NAVAL SUPPORT ACTIVITY-BAHRAIN

Run Date: 28 July 2025

(S//SI// REL) Based on current reporting, attacking elements targeting HQ NSA Bahrain have succeeded in breaching the facility’s security perimeter. At approximately 0050 ZULU 21 July, a flight of unmanned air systems began to assemble near the northern port area. Once the swarm reached approximately 100 UAS in number, it targeted the main gate and multiple points in the security fencing with persistent kinetic effects. The series of small explosions left major gaps, which were then exploited by multiple autonomous VBIEDs. They were engaged by the base security force and host nation law enforcement, but at least four of the vehicles were able to enter the facility. Following the model of the Denver and Edinburgh attacks, the driverless vehicles proceeded to target pedestrians and then smash into the entrances of the naval base’s buildings at high speed, including a fuel depot. Multiple explosions are confirmed at the facility.

On the monitor to the right of her main display, the analyst refreshed her feed, to see if any other reports had come in from agency partners. On the left, she had open a tracker of OSINT data. It displayed an aggregation of real-time social media feeds of video and still images trending in the region. It looked like a scrolling tapestry of shattered buildings. One feed had even already been able to provide a satellite image, showing there were five different pillars of smoke rising from the U.S. base. She edited back to change “multiple” to “at least five.”

(S//SI//REL FVEY) The attacking forces appear to have coordinated their attack with information operations to ensure maximum social media coverage. OSINT and SIGINT fusion reports indicate a subset of the drone swarm live-streamed their content to Twitch, YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, and Facebook. The host sites have already moved to block the imagery, but a network of accounts and bots are pushing them across the network creating a viral narrative in both Arabic and English.

She took a pause from furiously typing and wiggled her fingers to stretch them out. She then looked down to see how much time Donald had left for her.

Normally she’d walk over to her colleagues just a few desks away, to pulse their ideas, as the give-and-take of a conversation would often surface something you wouldn’t think of on your own. But everybody was too busy to talk things through.

The analyst reconsidered what she really had to write here. What was the most important thing the leaders needed to know? She tried to put herself in their shoes.

They probably had access to all the same information that she was seeing online. What they cared about was “Who did this?” Unfortunately, it was not that clear. For all that it seemed like sci-fi still to the senior leaders, both the technology and the TTPs were just so common now.

(TS//SI// REL FVEY) Attribution and Origination

(TS//SI// REL FVEY) Attribution for the attacks remains unclear, in part due to the different national origins of the software and hardware used.

(TS//SI// REL FVEY) Based on flight control pattern and drone-to-drone guidance communications analysis by CRIMSON GLAZE, it is believed the UAS swarm is using a flight-control algorithm developed by a team at Skolkovo, the Russian AI incubator.

She scanned the SIGINT feeds further to see if anything out of the regional mobile communications traffic from currently targeted Russian and Chinese systems had any tells or giveaways. Something this audacious meant somebody was gloating somewhere. That was all too human, and the SIGINT might show who.

Nothing, however. Another way to think about it she realized, was who isn’t talking right now? But everyone knew now that going silent was just as much as a tell as waving an “I did it” flag outside your cave or headquarters building.

(TS//SI// REL FVEY) Use of this technology does not, however, determine attribution to any one threat actor. Past intelligence reports…

She made a note to attach a link to the prior report.

…indicate the flight-control algorithm developed at Skolkovo are widely available on the civilian market.

She stood out of her desk chair, both to stretch her back and try to get a new perspective. Down the hallway, what was playing on the TV mounted in the corner caught her eye. Permanently set to cable news, it showed a split screen of simultaneous convoys of SUVs darting away from the Capitol, while underneath text explained that the House and Senate leadership were at this moment racing in convoys of armored SUVs toward an undisclosed location, in light of the recent attack. That didn’t help her stress. All it meant is that she could see the audience of her yet uncompleted memo racing to wherever they would read it.

She sat back down.

12 minutes. Keep writing.

Just as she started to type, there was a pop-up notice of fresh information coming in via a U.S. Naval Intelligence analyst, who had the Iran portfolio. She read it as rapidly as she could. The time was worth it; this was exactly what she needed.

(TS//SI// REL FVEY) OSINT imagery shows that at least part of the UAS swarm featured small drone designs of Iranian origin. Current users of the technology include a mix of state actors, including Iran (the Iranian Revolutionary Guard/Quds Force, the Iranian military) and multiple arms sales recipients: Ethiopia, Russia, Sudan, Syria, Tajikistan, and Venezuela. Iran has also provided the system to multiple non-state actors, including Hezbollah, Hamas, Houthi (Ansar Allah), multiple groups in Iraq, including Kataib Hezbollah, Asaib Ahl al Haq, the Badr organization, and Kataib Sayyad al Shuhada. Each of the state recipients have also provided systems to their own non-state proxies; for example, the Wagner Group has also utilized the system in its operations in both Ukraine and Mali.

(TS//SI// REL FVEY) Local extremist groups in Bahrain, such as Saraya al Ashtar, have not previously operated the system; however, they have trained with the Iranian Revolutionary Guard and received other types of weapons through smuggling networks.

(TS//SI// REL FVEY) A complicating factor is that the small size of the systems has led to proliferation beyond these groups. Other users include even Sunni groups that Iran opposes, likely through theft and resale by individual members to illicit arms markets.

Now for the other part of the attack. This made the attribution even more difficult.

(TS//SI// REL FVEY) OSINT imagery shows the VBIED systems to be of civilian design; notable to the ongoing conflict in the Pacific, they are manufactured in China, with a software support architecture linking back to a state-linked enterprise. However, they are a common make available for sale in multiple countries.

She checked her watch again.

Three more minutes remaining to wrap up the memo and email it out. What conclusions could she add? Was there any “low confidence” assessment she could at least offer? The end users would certainly want that, but it could very well end up being a false lead, which, even worse, could send policymakers down the wrong pathway.

The analyst cursed to herself as she considered how much information was available at her fingertips, but how little they truly understood.

P.W. Singer is Co-Founder and Principal at Useful Fiction LLC, a firm that specializes in creating explanatory visions for clients that range from NATO to Fortune 500 companies. He is also a Senior Fellow at New America. August Cole is Co-Founder and Principal at Useful Fiction LLC and a fellow at the Brute Krulak Center for Innovation and Creativity at Marine Corps University. The two are the co-authors of the books Ghost Fleet and Burn-In. 

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