Uncrewed Systems and the Transformation of U.S. Warfighting Capacity

MICK RYAN

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I recently had the priviledge to work with retired United States Air Force Lieutenant General Clint Hinote in producing a report on the future of uncrewed systems, and how the U.S. Department of Defense might undertake a range of reforms to fully realise the extraordinary potential of these air, land and maritime systems. Before his retirement, Lieutenant General Hinote (as the Deputy Chief of Staff for the Air Force) led a 400-person organization to become “Air Force Futures,” responsible for planning and integration for the future U.S. Air Force.

Therefore, I was honoured to work with such an experienced and intellectual warfighter in developing and publishing this report for the Special Competitive Studies Project.

A key finding of our paper however is that these uncrewed systems alone are not what is currently transforming the character of warfare. Instead, the shape of modern war, and conflict in the future, will be transformed by the interaction and orchestration of three distinct yet connected systems. As we note in the paper:

It is only when drones are combined with the democratization of digitized command and control systems and new-era meshed networks of civilian and military sensors that transformational change will occur. These three elements comprise a transformative trinity explored later in this paper, and it is only within this construct that drones will fully realize their potential for defense and other national security applications.

We were able to employ our observations and analysis from the ongoing wars in Ukraine and Gaza, and to also use our knowledge of developing systems and warfighting concepts that exploit the three elements of the transformative trinity examined in the paper.

Three Crucial Areas for Transformation

In our findings, we propose a variety of potential changes and evolutions in the current approaches of the U.S. military services. These fall into three categories:

Personnel. People are at the heart of all military capability, and are crucial to realizing the full benefit of uncrewed systems. As militaries seek people who can make this possible, they will need to consider how the widespread use of uncrewed systems will affect recruiting, training (individual and collective), education, culture, promotion and leadership development models.

Procurement. In order to field large numbers of uncrewed systems within the tranformative trinity, explored in our report as well as defensive systems to degrade enemy use of these systems, military institutions must identify equipment requirements, apply funds for procurement action, and agree to contracts for the right equipment and services. In each of these areas, uncrewed systems drive unique challenges.

Processes. Transformation in military affairs is often about changes and evolution in processes. Key military processes include tactics, doctrine, organization, support agencies, learning and adaptation in military institutions. Through transformation in these processes, Allied militaries have an opportunity to shape these emerging technologies, and provide foundations for their use, in ways that favor their strengths, with the result being a significant advantage in combat.

Recommendations to Transform and Improve Military Effectiveness

We concluded our report with a variety of recommendations for how uncrewed systems, working in the construct of the transformative trinity described in the report, can transform the U.S. military and ensure its effectiveness and success in 21st century conflict.

Some of the key recommendations of our report include:

1. The Secretary of Defense should establish a temporary, cross-service task force to explore the warfighting implications for service and joint personnel as well as new training models to enable a much different ratio of uncrewed systems in military operations.
2. The Undersecretary of Defense for Acquisition and Sustainment should consider acquisition strategies that separate the design of uncrewed systems, as well as a range of hard- and soft-kill systems to counter them, from the ability to manufacture them in the procurement process.
3. DoD should explore the development of an alliance variation of the transformative trinity under an AUKUS-like model.
4. The Deputy Secretary of Defense should create a single common-access portfolio for uncrewed systems to allow different organizations to share classified information and collaborate on the development of these systems.
5. The Secretary of Defense and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff should direct the Joint Requirements Oversight Council (JROC) to oversee the Joint portfolio of uncrewed systems.
6. DoD organizations, including the Services, should fund and execute experimentation with prototypes to develop new warfighting concepts for uncrewed systems, as well as their hard- and soft-kill counters, that draw on the lessons of Ukraine and Israel, as well as anticipate technological developments.
7. In concert with evolving warfighting concepts, DoD organizations, including the research laboratories, should experiment with the orchestration of uncrewed systems (i.e. ‘swarming’) across the domains.
8. As part of the DoD ‘Hedge Portfolio,’ the Secretary of Defense should direct the Office of Strategic Capital (OSC) to incentivize private investment in companies that design and produce uncrewed systems.
9. Instead of specific requirements, DoD acquisition executives should adopt trade-off ranges to evaluate the performance of uncrewed systems.
10. Closely related to the consideration of key trade-offs, DoD acquisition executives should adopt a key performance parameter for uncrewed systems that compares the fully-burdened cost of mission achievement with cost imposition.

Meeting the Challenge of Transforming our use of Uncrewed Systems

If the U.S. military can achieve an optimal blending of new-era technologies with new ideas, new organizations, and empowered leadership, it and Allied militaries will be able to build and sustain a strategic edge over potential adversaries. And, it must be done at a pace not seen since the end of the Cold War.

The speed at which Russia, China and others are able to develop, deploy and evolve their warfighting capabilities at scale must drive the U.S. and its allies and partners to implement a different strategic tempo in order to build and sustain a warfighting advantage.