“In the early hours of Operation Epic Fury last month, a deployed [Fly-Away Kit] successfully detected and defeated sUAS operating over a strategic U.S. installation,” Guillot said in his written statement ahead of a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing Thursday.

Although he did not give details about the installation threatened, Guillot revealed that the threat was defeated by USNORTHCOM’s counter-drone Fly-Away Kit.

The FAK is produced by Anduril and was “designed specifically to detect, track, identify and mitigate drone incursions at military installations within the United States,” USNORTHCOM previously said. The kit is manned by a team of 11 soldiers who became operational as a rapid counter-drone response force last November.

The Defense Department’s lead counter-drone task force, Joint Interagency Task Force 401, did not provide specific details about the location or nature of the incident but told Military Times that the unit will continue to monitor the situation.

“We are aware of the action reported by U.S. Northern Command, and we continue to work closely with them on how best to array our c-UAS capability to defend the homeland,” a spokesperson for the JIATF-401 told Military Times.

“We also work with our law enforcement and interagency partners to monitor and investigate illicit drone use around military installations and other defense critical infrastructure. Our top priority is the safety of our service members and civilian personnel that work and live on the base.”

The FAK features an enhanced array of sensors to detect rogue drones, including Anduril’s Wisp, an AI-infrared system with 360-degree motion sensor; a Heimdal mobile sensor trailer that uses thermal optics and radar; and Pulsar, an AI-enhanced electromagnetic warfare platform.

It uses a self-guided drone interceptor called Anvil to home in on and ram drones out of the sky.

USNORTHCOM expects to receive more of the kits in late spring, according to Guillot’s written testimony.

During the committee hearing Thursday, in response to questions from Sen. Eric Schmitt, R-Mo., Guillot also revealed that the U.S. has seen a spike in drone intrusions over military installations over the the last year.

“Some of that might be due to the fact that we have more detection capability now than we did in the past, and then our ability to defeat them has improved,” Guillot said. “Whereas a year ago, almost every one that was detected was not defeated. Now about a quarter of the ones that we detect we’re able to defeat.”

Guillot stated that he works closely with U.S. Strategic Command to ensure that submarine silos, aircraft bases and other key locations have adequate protection from potential threats posed by small unmanned aircraft systems.

Meanwhile, as a deterrent to drone intrusions, the Defense Department, along with the Federal Aviation Administration and other federal agencies, announced a zero-tolerance policy toward unauthorized drone flights in restricted airspace, with penalties including fines of over $100,000, criminal charges and imprisonment.

During Operation Skyfall held at Grafenwoehr Training Area, soldiers of the 2-159th Attack Battalion, 12th Combat Aviation Brigade, used the Boeing AH-64E Apache to pursue and attack Unmanned Aircraft Systems.

It is not the first time that the Army has ever practiced using Apaches against drones. In December, the service held an air-to-air combat training exercise in Yuma, Arizona, that saw the Apaches destroy a a variety of drones in flight using a 30mm fragmentation round called the APEX.

The exercise in Germany, however, marks the first time that the U.S. Army has wielded Apaches for this purpose in Europe. It is a significant move due to the relevance of anti-drone training for NATO allies.

Soldiers of the 12th CAB train regularly alongside British, Dutch and Polish NATO forces. They remain in Germany as “a tactical necessity,” the service said in a statement last month.

Operation Skyfall is aimed to advance NATO’s Eastern Flank Deterrence Initiative, or EFDI, to protect countries in Eastern Europe from incursions.

The Apache has proved well-suited to chasing and killing drones as it can fly at speeds of over 180 miles per hour and is more nimble at maneuvering than many larger fixed-wing aircraft.

Many pilots within the 12th CAB’s attack unit, known as the “Gunslingers Battalion,” had never previously used Apache helicopters in this manner.

“Most pilots in our unit and across the Army have never engaged in air-to-air with the Apache, so this is a new engagement profile for us that we have to develop tactics, techniques, and procedures for,” said Maj. Daniel Murphy, operations officer for the battalion, in a statement.

“We’re looking forward to sharing what we learn so we can continue developing the EFDI alongside our NATO allies.”

The new training will provide “a blueprint for Allied aviation units“ across Europe, the Army has stated.

The service also noted that this training is “more critical than ever as Poland prepares to become the second-largest operator of Apaches in the world.”

Last November, Boeing announced that 96 Apaches would be produced for the Polish Armed Forces under a $4.7 billion U.S. Army Foreign Military Sales contract, with deliveries expected to start in 2028.

The California-based Coast Guard cutter Munro announced the news after returning Sunday from a 119-day deployment that began in November of last year.

Sailing in the Eastern Pacific, the Munro spotted a go-fast smuggling boat and took up what became an intense pursuit.

A Scan Eagle surveillance drone participated in the pursuit alongside an MH-65 helicopter of the Coast Guard’s Helicopter Interdiction Tactical Squadron. The Scan Eagle, which has a low-stealth profile and a relatively small size, operates autonomously and with extreme endurance.

After firing warning shots, the helicopter disabled the vessel’s engine with gunfire, ending the pursuit. Six suspected drug smugglers were arrested.

A record haul of 22,052 pounds of cocaine was recovered from the vessel, with an estimated street value of over $250 million.

“The service, our nation and our families can be extremely proud of Munro,” Capt. Jim O’Mara, the cutter’s commanding officer, said in a statement.

“This crew rose to every new challenge thrown at them with professionalism and persistence, and they achieved historic results. This was a one-of-a-kind deployment for us, but it is also just one part of a much broader campaign and U.S. national strategy.”

O’Mara said the long deployment had been hard on crew members’ families, but he expressed gratitude for the support from home and pride in the crew’s unprecedented accomplishments.

“Our families had to adapt to each new twist, just like all military families do across the Armed Forces. It is tough on them,” he said. “But when they hold strong at home that keeps us motivated and focused on our mission.”

Video released Wednesday shows the next-gen munitions being launched in open desert terrain from M142 High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems as part of Operation Epic Fury. The operation against Iran has seen a variety of precision munitions launched from land, sea and air, according to CENTCOM.

“I just could not be prouder of our men and women in uniform leveraging innovation to create dilemmas for the enemy,” Adm. Brad Cooper, CENTCOM commander, said in a release.

The PrSM is enhanced with GPS capabilities to navigate in flight and can accurately strike targets from around 250 miles away. Its warhead is designed to deliver a fragmentation effect when it explodes, increasing power on impact. The missile, meanwhile, is reportedly built to withstand turbulent in-flight conditions.

The PrSM is among a wide array of advanced technological assets the U.S. military has deployed during its ongoing operations in Iran.

Other notable weapon deployments in the ongoing conflict include Patriot Interceptor Missile Systems and THAAD Anti-Ballistic Missile Systems. LUCAS one-way attack drones were also used for the first time in combat by the U.S. Special Operations Command-led Task Force Scorpion Strike.

Specific details about the targets engaged by the PrSMs have not been provided as of publication.

Prior to its combat debut, the U.S. Army was working with Lockheed Martin to ramp up production capacity for the munition, Defense News reported last October.

The Army tested its short-range and long-range capabilities on White Sands Missile Range in April and September of last year. Tests saw the munitions fired from HIMARS systems as well as the M270A2 Multiple Launch Rocket System, or MLRS.

Operation Epic Fury has seen over 2,000 military targets across Iran destroyed, the Pentagon said, including a naval frigate that was sunk in the first torpedo kill by a U.S. Navy submarine since World War II.

Announced today, the autonomous systems manufacturer will provide two types of its Switchblade family of loitering munitions to the Army, including the Switchblade 600 Block 2 and the Switchblade 300 Block 20 variants.

Loitering munitions are Unmanned Aircraft Systems that represent a blend of FPV drones and guided missiles. Known as “kamikaze” or one-way attack drones, they can seek targets and hover for long periods before zeroing in and exploding on command.

The 600 Block 2 was developed by AV in collaboration with U.S. Special Operations Command and is designed for use in a variety of remote and hostile environments. It can be used at sea and features advanced Artificial Intelligence capabilities that allow it to detect and lock on targets faster.

Its sister system, the 300 Block 2, is a “tank killer” loitering munition that can seek targets at extended ranges beyond line of sight. According to AV, the Army has ordered it equipped with an Explosively Formed Penetrator payload for the first time — a warhead that packs extra punch against armor. The system, designed for small units, is small enough to be carried in a backpack.

Last October, soldiers of the Army’s 1st Cavalry Division tested the Switchblade 600 system at Fort Hood, Military Times reported.

“This delivery order reflects the Army’s confidence in the next evolution of the Switchblade family and its relevance to modern, contested battlefields,” Brian Young, Senior Vice President of Loitering Munitions at AV, said in a statement.

“As we continue to invest in expanding Switchblade manufacturing capacity and accelerating delivery timelines, we are continuing to meet the growing demand for these products from U.S. and allied forces.”

Ursa Major, a Colorado-based defense manufacturer, debuted the HAVOC missile system on Tuesday.

The medium-range hypersonic system is powered by a liquid rocket engine, is able to alter its speed in flight and can be adapted for use with a wide variety of rocket motor systems from warplanes to vertical launch systems.

Additionally, the system can be deployed outside of Earth’s atmosphere, according to the company.

“Keeping pace with our adversaries requires more than exquisite systems. It requires speed to delivery, affordability, and the ability to build at scale,” Chris Spagnoletti, CEO of Ursa Major, said in a statement.

“The Ursa Major HAVOC Missile System delivers a highly capable hypersonic weapon designed from the start to be produced rapidly and in quantity, giving the warfighter a credible and adaptable capability.”

The system has a core module that makes it suitable for striking hypersonic targets as well, the company adds.

Hypersonic missiles, which fly at roughly five times the speed of sound, have become a priority across all U.S. military branches.

The Army, Air Force and Navy are all developing hypersonic missile programs, including: the Army’s Long-Range Hypersonic Weapon; the Air Force’s Hypersonic Attack Cruise Missile; and the Navy’s Conventional Prompt Strike programs.

While the services have aimed for hypersonic weapons since the early 2000s, development has lagged while Russia and China have gained advantages in this arena.

In a notable divergence, Russian and Chinese hypersonic missiles are designed to field nuclear warheads, while U.S. hypersonics are not.

“Most U.S. hypersonic weapons, in contrast to those in Russia and China, are not being designed for use with a nuclear warhead,” according to a Congressional Research Service report published last August.

The report predicted that U.S. hypersonics would “likely require greater accuracy and will be more technically challenging to develop than nuclear-armed Chinese and Russian systems,” while also noting that Russian and Chinese systems would have a potential advantage since nuclear weapons can inflict devastating damage without need for accuracy.

China has a robust hypersonic program and has conducted up to 20 times as many hypersonic missile tests than the U.S., and is also investing in underground facilities, per the report.

“Analysts disagree about the strategic implications of hypersonic weapons,” the report notes, adding that Congress has previously restricted funding due to concerns of nuclear escalation.

“Differences in threat perception and escalation ladders could thus result in unintended escalation,” the report concluded.

On hand to present awards to the winners, who were selected from more than 200 competitors during the Feb. 17-19 event, were Army Secretary Dan Driscoll and Maj. Gen. Clair A. Gill, commanding general of the U.S. Army Aviation Center of Excellence.

Driscoll, who flew to the Huntsville, Alabama, ceremony after participating in Ukraine-Russia peace talks in Geneva, Switzerland, spoke to Military Times about the significance of the event and how it will inform the future of drone warfare and the scaling of unmanned systems.

Scaling

In remarks shared ahead of the ceremony, Driscoll told Military Times that he hopes the Army will be in position to buy one million drones within the next 18 to 24 months.

“A lot of what we’ve been spending the last year doing is reorienting a lot of our systems so that a drone is not thought of as a piece of equipment that a soldier will have to sign out of an arms room and return, but more like an ammunition or a round that you take to a range,” he said.

Asked about his near-term goals for scaling drone production, Driscoll said the Army is currently focusing on assessing new drone technology for design and potential use.

“I think our near-term goals are more qualitative,” he said. “We as an Army have got to figure out how to reset how we think about purchasing things like drones, how we think about training on things like drones and how we think about repairing them on the edge.”

Driscoll maintained that there is no time to waste when it comes to building drones and integrating them throughout the force.

The existing ability of adversarial nations to build and deploy unmanned systems makes that evolution paramount, he said.

“We know if we look at our threats around the world, like in China or other nations that are producing 5 million to 15 million drones, we are short of that in both our commercial and military sector,” he said. “So, we need to get to a place where we can scale quickly to match them.”

A drone marketplace

Driscoll and Gill told Military Times that the Army is planning to launch a drone marketplace next month, which will allow private industry to market and sell drone innovations throughout the service.

Products will be rated and reviewed, with increased competition expected to drive prices down.

“We’re going to allow the consumers — that’s our soldiers and our units — to rate the equipment that’s being sold there,” Gill said. “It’s going to allow for a natural free market economy to drive the best product.”

Driscoll said that the combined efforts of soldiers and private industry, in addition to the efforts of lawmakers, will help the Army meet its goals to increase manufacturing.

“I think the urgency is there,” Driscoll said. “If you talk to members of Congress, whether it’s a defense prime or a startup, everyone knows we have to solve this problem. If you go speak to any of these soldiers out here, the talent and the innovation is there.”

The Army secretary added that the military’s sense of urgency has ramped up due to the rapid surge of threats unmanned systems pose to national security.

“What keeps me up at night is just the sheer magnitude of the problem that is required and the concept of these layered defenses,” Driscoll said.

“The biggest thing that we in the United States Army and as federal officials and Americans face, the biggest dilemma, is how broad of the threat exists and how you layer in solutions that can take into account how much territory is required to be defended.”

The winners

Driscoll and Gill presented award plaques to the winning soldiers, including a team assigned to the 2nd Cavalry Regiment that took home the prize for Best Tactical Squad.

Meanwhile, 1st Sgt. Javon Purchner earned the title of Best Operator for his drone racing skills, and the Army National Guard’s 28th Infantry Division clinched the award for Best Innovation for a drone-recovering UAS called Project R.E.D.

Driscoll thanked the competitors for exploring how to use drones “offensively, just as any threat against us might,” while drawing from his recent peace talk experiences in the days leading up to the event.

“We started the day in Geneva, and yesterday we spent a lot of time and the day before with the Ukrainians and the Russians,” he said. “One of the things when you spend time with them — beyond the peace talk portion — is them showing you just the violent videos of the drones they’re using, slaughtering the soldiers on the other side. … The videos are horrifying.

“The biggest thing I would convey from having spent a lot of time with the Ukrainians, the Russians, the Israelis, is drones are changing everything. They don’t think of them as an aviation asset. They don’t think of it as something only infantry have to deal with.”

Driscoll stressed that U.S. soldiers are helping mitigate such threats by training tactically with emerging technology.

“We desperately need you to go back to your formations, tell them what we got right,” he said. “Just as importantly tell them what we got wrong.”

During the Army’s first annual Best Drone Warfighter Competition in Huntsville, Alabama, the Fort Rucker-based aviation chief shared his insights about the impact of drones on military doctrine.

“The application of drone technology is only limited by your creativity,” he said. “It’s this constantly evolving game of technology and craftsmanship to create the desired effect that you want on the other end.”

While Army aviators are no strangers to unmanned systems, drones being fielded today are immensely different from those developed over the last two decades, many of which tended to be larger and required more manpower to operate, Gill said.

“In the last five to 10 years I would say we have seen a complete shift in what drone technology is and how it can be used,” Gill said. The net result, he added, is that drones are “no longer just the purview of Army aviation.”

“I would argue now with the proliferation of small drones and how cheap and effective they can be that Army aviation is just one minor user now. … Everybody is going to have drones in the airspace to some degree.

“It’s going to change everything. The nature of war is the same. It’s always an endeavor of human conflict. But the character of war is just fundamentally different.”

Lessons from Ukraine

Drones have been used successfully as a force multiplier in a variety of global conflicts, from Nagorno-Karabakh in Azerbaijan to the Middle East and Ukraine.

While the U.S. Army is adapting its approaches based on observing other forces around the world, Gill stressed that there is no “one-size-fits-all” approach to drone warfare.

The U.S. Army must develop drone combat doctrine in line with its unique capabilities, he said.

“We’re not the Ukrainian army, nor are we the Russian army,” he said. “We just fundamentally operate differently.”

Gill told Military Times that observers from the Army Aviation Center of Excellence are currently embedded with Ukraine’s Security Assistance Group, or SAG-U, to study lessons from the conflict.

However, fighting methods from Ukraine should not be broadly applied to American forces, he noted, due to differences in U.S. tactics and capabilities.

“We would be fools not to pay attention and not to take a lot of lessons from them, which we’re doing, but we can’t take the wrong lessons,” Gill said. “Just because it didn’t work in Russia-Ukraine doesn’t mean it might not work for us.”

Project Victor

The tactical element of the Army’s drone competition gave soldiers the chance to test drone aviation abilities while leveraging field skills on a hunter-killer mission, during which each team was afforded a single reconnaissance FPV drone and up to five “killer” drones.

“That really is the application of the technology,” Gill said. “They have to be able to use the technology in the context of what it is that we do, not just fly the drone.”

The tactical challenge gave leadership an opportunity to observe with the aim of refining training, doctrine and approaches to drone combat operations.

Gill explained that restructuring within Army commands has allowed analysis teams to be established at each Army Center of Excellence, including those dedicated to aviation, maneuver and fires.

“We’ve restructured our subordinate teams and we have something called a Transformation Integration Directorate, TID, and within them they have a Transformation Lesson Learned Manager, a TLLM,” he explained.

These managers are responsible for evaluating all observations and establishing what lessons are useful to the Army before uploading them into a new database system called Project Victor.

Powered by generative AI technology, the system will give soldiers broad access to whitepapers, studies and useful information about operating drones in the field.

“That should be a database where any soldier can just go in,” he said. “That should be up and running by this summer.”

Enduring need for human pilots

Despite the nearly unlimited applications of drones in war, Gill emphasized that they will never replace the ability of humans and do not compensate for the skills of trained Army aviators.

“Ultimately, to put an assault force onto an objective, you need manned aviation,” he said.

Gill cited the recent operation to capture Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro as an example of the finesse Army aviators bring to the table.

“That was a very exquisite demonstration with some our best aviators and some of our best aircraft,” he said. “We continue to crank out the world’s best rotary aviators.”

The enduring need for human expertise was borne out in the tactical lane of the competition itself, as some teams experienced difficulty using the drones and soldiers tapped into combat training fundamentals for success.

“A lot of people seem to think that because we’re moving so quickly in the unmanned space that it means we’re moving away from the manned space,” Gill said.

“We need to have both.”

Project RED, which stands for Recovery Exploitation Drone, is built to fly over and inspect downed unmanned aircraft systems. The system uses artificial intelligence software to discern the difference between friendly and enemy drones. Using a robotic arm with a claw, it can pick up a fallen drone and transport it to troops for evaluation or repair.

The unit, part of the Pennsylvania National Guard, built the robotic arm using 3D printing. It is made of carbon fiber, and can easily be replicated.

At the awards ceremony Thursday, Army Secretary Dan Driscoll presented the winning service members with an honorary plaque. The team also received a drone prototype from the Army Research Laboratory and a one-year contract for the lab to help with design improvements for Project RED.

The 28th Infantry Division was the only National Guard unit to field a team in all three categories — Best Innovation, Best Operator and Best Tactical Hunter-Killer Team — at the Army Aviation Association of America-sponsored event, which ran Tuesday through Thursday.

“Competing against the entire Army, putting in the work and coming out on top really speaks volumes to what the team has been doing and the hard work they’ve been putting in, and it highlights the Pennsylvania National Guard and what we’re able to accomplish,” said Chief Warrant Officer 3 Robert Reed, the team’s captain, in a statement.

“We’re excited to continue to have incredible support from state and division level leadership. They’ve been very helpful and very supportive of everything we’re doing, and it’s allowing us to highlight what we can do at our facility.

“And, I’m super proud of my entire team and everything they’re doing.”

The competition, launched on Tuesday, is an Army event sponsored by the Army Aviation Association of America. It drew over 800 attendees and competing teams drawn from every Army unit.

It mirrors existing Army competitions such as Best Sapper, Best Ranger and Best Sniper, with emphasis on drone warfare. Soldiers compete in three lanes for the titles of Best Operator, Best Tactical Hunter-Killer Team, and Best Innovation.

The lanes include a drone racing obstacle course, a cross-country field exercise in which soldiers pair up to take out targets, and an innovation lane which sees soldiers showcase drone technology they’ve developed to a panel of five judges.

Prioritizing soldier ideas

“These lanes absolutely inform and tell us what kind of skills we need to train to make them the best at what we expect them to do,” Col. Nicholas Ryan, director of Army UAS Transformation and Lessons Learned Manager at the Army’s Aviation Center of Excellence, told Military Times.

The focus of the competition is not on gaining points or acclaim but developing recipes for success in the unmanned domain, Ryan said.

All lanes focus on gathering input from soldiers about what drone technology is proving effective and why, encouraging participants to share solutions.

Additionally, the innovation lane gives soldiers experience with building and modifying their drone equipment – an essential skill in the fast-moving domain.

“That fabrication and modification aspect is also something we’ve taken from Ukraine because that’s what their operators do and it’s necessary for them to adjust their equipment to meet their mission demands,” Ryan said.

“It is now built into our UAS training courses teaching them how to 3-D print, how to design, how to code and how to build their own drones.”

What makes a good drone operator?

Soldiers competing in the Best Operator lane raced Neros Archer FPV drones. The Neros was chosen to establish a baseline for competitors to showcase their skills on a standard drone platform, offering a modular design that is easy to repair.

The lane saw soldiers fly drones through an intricate obstacle course and perform complex maneuvers.

While some operators were not used to racing, Captain Jacob Bickus, officer in charge of the Army Drone Team, told Military Times that hands-on practice is essential to build skills through familiarity.

“Even though it’s racing, it’s still good practice for them to build their skills,” Bickus said.

Asked what makes a good drone operator, Bickus told Military Times that the most important quality is to have an open mind.

“They have to be creative and innovative, and have an engineer problem-solving mindset because with these drones there are so many intricacies and knowledge you have to have to be able to proficiently operate them,” he said.

Drone swarms and autonomy

Future iterations of the Army competition event could incorporate drone swarm tactics, though that depends on the pace of developing technology, Ryan told Military Times.

“We absolutely want it in the Army, and want to use it in the Army. It’s not there just yet,” he said.

“That is absolutely a task and a requirement we do want to incorporate which we refer to as the one-to-many control, so one operator controlling many drones simultaneously.”

Drones are now an essential tool within the Army and the competition will help identify how the service can strengthen existing capabilities, Ryan explained.

“What we’re seeing is that is going to be a common capability and piece of equipment across every formation of every type and any group of soldiers,” Ryan said.

He added that fully autonomous systems may be suitable to performing some basic tasks for the Army in the future.

“There will be so many mission sets that drones can do and various types of technology across ranges of autonomy, and that’s something that we’re looking at very closely as well.”