Mark T. Esper
After more than two years of conflict in Ukraine, it is obvious how lower-cost, more easily producible, advanced technologies — notably unmanned systems — are giving the Ukrainian military an asymmetric advantage against a much larger and more heavily armed foe.
While many aspects of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine resemble World War I — trenches, barbed wires, heavy exchanges of artillery — the innovative use of drones has been game-changing. Unmanned systems are altering the character of warfare, and the ongoing integration of AI and robotics will further accelerate this dramatic shift. It is why these were my top modernization objectives during my tenure as Army secretary and secretary of defense.
The potency of unmanned systems is most pronounced when it comes to small aerial drones — essentially robots — that are used today to conduct the same tasks that soldiers performed in the past: reconnaissance, surveillance, targeting and direct attack. But they do it far more efficiently and accurately. For instance, when I was a platoon leader decades ago, it typically took a couple infantrymen to destroy a tank at a max range of 3,750 meters. Today, an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) can do the same at far greater distances, with better success, and at much less cost.
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