See the Anduril and General Atomics drones the US Air Force just marked as the first-ever uncrewed fighter jets
The Air Force designated the first two uncrewed aircraft as fighter jets, the YFQ-42A and YFQ-44A.
The prototypes were designed as part of the USAF's next-generation air dominance program.
Dubbed "loyal wingmen," the combat aircraft are expected to bolster the Air Force's fleet.
The US Air Force marked two drone prototypes as fighter jets for the first time, ushering in a new era of military aviation.
General Atomics' XQ-67A combat drone was designated YFQ-42A, and Anduril Industries' aircraft was dubbed YFQ-44A. Y designates prototype, F for fighter, and Q means uncrewed, per USAF naming conventions.
Powered by jet engines, collaborative combat aircraft, as the Air Force calls them, were designed to fight alongside crewed F-22s and F-35s as " loyal wingmen" and carry out missions alone or in small groups.
The Air Force said they envision a single, crewed sixth-generation stealth fighter could control more drones using low-cost, less-sophisticated autonomous technology.
Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. David W. Allvin announced the historic designation in a keynote address at the Air Force Association Warfare Symposium earlier this week.
Though symbolic in nature, Allvin said granting the fighter designation to the two collaborative combat aircraft prototypes is "telling the world that we are leaning into a new chapter of aerial warfare."
Bolstering the US fleet with uncrewed fighters
The experimental autonomous weapon system was developed as part of the Air Force's Next-Generation Air Dominance program, its push to develop a sixth-generation fighter and create a hybrid crewed-autonomous fleet.
However, the ambitious next-gen initiative has been plagued by ballooning costs and development delays, raising concerns about the program's sustainability and prioritization within the Pentagon's budget.
The Air Force's fleet has shrunk over the last two decades to about 5,500 aircraft due to skyrocketing costs for developing and producing new aircraft. The service plans to buttress its existing airpower with CCAs, which would be cheaper to build and maintain.
Airmen could be trained more virtually so the crewed airframes would have fewer flight hours, and the aircraft's AI-driven software would bolster the fleet without risking human pilots.
The push to build the next-generation aircraft and aerial systems comes amid China's rapid build-up of its air force. Though China has less advanced systems compared to the US, the country is heavily investing in evolving its fleet and fortifying its airfields in the Indo-Pacific, threatening US airpower in the region.
A costly bid for next-gen aircraft
Former Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall previously said CCAs would cost a third of the price of crewed aircraft, estimating that one CCA would cost between $25-$30 million during a budget meeting with the House Appropriations Committee last April.
During a panel at the Air, Space & Cyber Conference last September, defense experts said CCAs could cost less than $1,200 per pound, whereas crewed fighters and intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance aircraft typically cost between $4,000 and $6,000 per pound.
"That's how you get the affordability, at the same time that you get the survivability," Robert Winkler, vice president of corporate development and national security programs at Kratos Defense, said during the conference.
Winkler added that while the airframe itself is affordable, the same can't be said about the drone's "exquisite" sensors, radars, and electro-optical cameras.
"Obviously, you don't want to have these aircraft get out there and just get all shot down," Winkler said. "And obviously, you don't want them to be 'silver bullets,' where they cost so much that you can't afford to lose them, so there is a right balance."
The Air Force aims to acquire 1,000 CCAs to use two for each of 500 advanced fighters, requesting $557.1 million from Congress to continue researching and developing the CCAs.
Congress instead suggested cutting the CCA funds from the $3.3 billion budget allocated to its NGAD program in 2025 after a contract for its sixth-gen platform was paused, though a final decision on the CCA budget has yet to be made.
The Air Force awarded initial contracts to five defense contractors — Anduril, Boeing, General Atomics, Lockheed Martin, and Northrop Grumman — to design a CCA concept aircraft.
Last year, Anduril and General Atomics were selected to produce prototypes for the first developmental phase of the program.
The Air Force plans to order more than 100 drones in the next five years, though the service hasn't ruled out the other companies to develop CCAs in future phases of the program.
According to the Congressional Research Service, preliminary work has already begun for the second phase of the CCA as the Air Force explores working with domestic and international manufacturers to develop a more complicated platform that incorporates stealth technology.
Anduril's Fury
The Fury, a large uncrewed aircraft, was developed by Blue Force Technologies, a North Carolina-based aerospace company that was acquired by Anduril in September 2023.
Powered by a single turbofan engine, the Fury was designed to reach speeds of over 650 miles per hour and operate at altitudes of up to 50,000 feet. Pending the aircraft's loadout, it can also tolerate thrusts of up to nine times the force of gravity at a ceiling of around 20,000 feet.
The American defense technology company said it chose to invest in the Fury and turn it into a "high-performance, multi-mission" fighter recently designated as the YFQ-44A. Anduril also said it plans to integrate its Lattice system, an open software program that uses AI to integrate data from multiple sensors, to enable the drone for command and control.
General Atomics' XQ67-A
The CCA concept designed by General Atomics Aeronautical Systems is based on its existing XQ-67A platform, which the company said focuses on "flexibility, affordability, and mission effectiveness. "
The XQ-67A primarily functions as an autonomous sensor platform with a modular design that can be adapted to each mission. The aircraft's specific dimensions have not been publicly disclosed, but its design resembles other combat uncrewed aerial vehicles, such as the MQ-25A Stingray and XQ-58A Valkyrie.
The YFQ-42A will be designed to "integrate seamlessly" with crewed jets, providing fighter capacity "at a lower cost and on a threat-relevant timeline," according to a company press release.
"These aircraft represent an unrivaled history of capable, dependable uncrewed platforms that meet the needs of America's warfighters and point the way to a significant new era for airpower," General Atomics said in a statement.
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