“There's a lot of positive signaling, but we need to see the whites of the eyes: We need to see sustained, normalized demand,” said James Slider, CEO of Performance Drone Works.
Senior officials also revealed that the Defense Autonomous Working Group has been absorbed into a new Task Force Autonomous Warfare, which sits inside the Special Operations Command.
Traditional thinking about how to protect facilities must adapt to new threats such as drones or downstream attacks.
In exclusive comments to Breaking Defense, the Pentagon's comptroller acknowledged that some efforts may need to be pushed from FY27 into FY28 with help from lawmakers.
DAWG is Trump administration initiative that essentially absorbed the Biden-era Replicator initiative designed to acquire thousands of low-cost “attritable” drones, particularly for use in the Pacific.
“The cavalry arrived here to meet your cavalry in private industry to make sure that we are not drone sufficient, from parity, but drone dominant,” Pentagon R&E chief Emil Michaels said.
According to an internal memo obtained by Breaking Defense, the new role covers all ground vehicles, all small air vehicles and almost all sea vehicles, and reports directly to Deputy Defense Secretary Stephen Feinberg.
A decorated combat aviator and biotech CEO advocates preparing for novel viral threats before the next crisis.
“We found that these [civilian] officials can't effectively carry out the office's oversight responsibilities as they can't always get access to relevant program information or meetings,” GAO said while listing three recommendations.
The bulk of funding comes in the form of reconciliation, a bet the department also made for a proposed hike to its Office of Strategic Capital loan program.
Instead of needing a specially trained human to remote pilot each drone or robot-boat, the Pentagon wants any servicemember to be able to give orders in plain English.
Renamed the Defense Autonomous Working Group, the drone initiative is now conducting wargames and working on larger, longer-ranged attack drones, Adm. Sam Paparo and Pentagon CTO Emil Michael said.
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