Latest news with #DarylCaudle
Yahoo
3 days ago
- General
- Yahoo
Minute with the Commander: Memorial Day
PORTSMOUTH, Va. (WAVY) — Memorial Day is a holiday that every American can get behind. It's a day to remember those who gave their lives to preserve our freedom, from the American Revolution to the deserts of Iraq and Afghanistan. We remember it by spending a Minute with the Commander. Each month here on WAVY-TV 10, Admiral Daryl Caudle, commander of U.S. Fleet Forces Command will address a different topic important to our military community. This month we reflected on the importance of Memorial Day. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Bloomberg
5 days ago
- Politics
- Bloomberg
Navy Admiral Caudle Confident in US Quality Amid China Shipbuilding Concerns
US Navy Admiral Daryl Caudle, Commander of the US Fleet Forces Command, joins Balance of Power during Fleet Week to talk prioritization of US shipbuilding, the rise in military recruitment and the status of US forces in the Red Sea. (Source: Bloomberg)
Yahoo
08-04-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
US Navy unveils newest Virginia-class fast attack submarine USS Iowa
The Navy formally unleashed its newest Virginia-class fast attack submarine, the Iowa, in a commissioning ceremony Saturday in Groton, Connecticut. The 377-foot vessel, built by General Dynamics Electric Boat, can dive to depths of more than 800 feet below the surface and maneuver at speeds of over 25 knots, or nearly 29 miles per hour. Iowa is equipped with Tomahawk cruise missiles and a nuclear reactor plant that eliminates the need for refueling, according to a Navy release. And as a Virginia-class, the boat was built with flexible design features, including an expansive lock-in/lock-out chamber for special operations divers and a reconfigurable torpedo room. The submarine can also deliver unmanned undersea vehicles. 'Make no mistake, naval warfare is evolving. Where battleships once ruled the seas, it is the silent strength of submarines that provides our Navy with an unmatched strategic advantage,' Navy Secretary John Phelan said at the commissioning ceremony. 'This is not just a milestone for USS Iowa, but a critical step forward in strengthening our Navy and ensuring America's global maritime dominance.' The newly commissioned sub, which carries a crew of 135 sailors, is the service's first vessel to be named after the state since the famed World War II-era battleship Iowa (BB-61). 'In this coming year, this crew of proud American sailors will put this warship to sea and carry the name 'Iowa' to the far-flung corners of the globe projecting combat power for decades to come,' Adm. Daryl Caudle, U.S. Fleet Forces commander, said at the event. 'It is the fearless warriors before me that turn this piece of metal weighing almost 8,000 tons — with hundreds of miles of fiber, cable and piping systems — into a combat ship, a warship designed to decisively win our nation's battles. Your preparation and execution to get this ship to commissioning day is nothing short of amazing.' U.S. Navy fast attack submarines enable sea control, power projection, maritime security, forward presence and deterrence, the service release stated, with capabilities to carry out operations spanning anti-submarine, anti-ship, strike, special operations, intelligence, reconnaissance, mine and surveillance missions. 'This event is significant for both the life of a submarine and for the amazing people from the Hawkeye State,' Iowa commanding officer Cmdr. Gregory Coy said. 'To the plank owners, the shipbuilders, the commissioning committee, and our Navy and Submarine Force leaders, this is your submarine.'
Yahoo
28-03-2025
- Yahoo
Coyote, Roadrunner Loitering Drone Interceptors To Arm U.S. Navy Destroyers
When the U.S. Navy's supercarrier USS Gerald R. Ford deploys later this year, its strike group will include Arleigh Burke class destroyers armed with Raytheon Coyote and Anduril Roadrunner-M counter-drone loitering interceptors. Last year, TWZ laid out a detailed case for arming American warships with swarms of drones to provide a valuable additional layer of defense, as well as enhance their strike, intelligence-gathering, and networking capabilities. You can read that in-depth exclusive feature here. was the first to report on the planned integration of the combat-proven Coyote and the Roadrunner-M, which the U.S. military is buying steadily more of, onto Navy Arleigh Burke class destroyers. This has come in response, at least in part, to lessons learned from U.S. operations against Iranian-backed Houthi militants in and around the Red Sea. Since October 2023, the Houthis have been launching long-range kamikaze drones, as well as cruise and ballistic missiles, at foreign warships and commercial vessels, as well as targets in Israel. 'We're going to be deploying the Ford Strike Group with two additional missile systems on our destroyers – the Roadrunner system and the Coyote system – both specifically designed to go after UAVs [uncrewed aerial vehicles],' Navy Adm. Daryl Caudle, head of U.S. Fleet Forces Command, told reporters last week, according to The counter-drone version of Coyote, also known as the Coyote Block 2, and the Roadrunner-M are both jet-powered drone-like loitering interceptors. Roadrunner-M has the additional ability to return to its point of launch to be refueled and reused if it is not expended in the course of a mission. When it comes to both Coyote and Roadrunner-M, a mixture of sensors are used to cue them to their targets, or at least the general target area, before their onboard seekers kick in. The U.S. Army currently fields Coyote Block 2 as part of the mobile and fixed-site versions of its Low, Slow, Unmanned Aircraft Integrated Defeat System (LIDS). Versions of LIDS have been deployed to sites in the Middle East, Africa, and Europe and have seen combat use in at least some of those locales. The U.S. special operations community is known to have fielded Roadrunner-M in a land-based configuration, though details of its use to date are limited. What exactly the integration of counter-drone systems using Coyote or Roadrunner-M onto the Arleigh Burke will consist of, including whether or not they will be tied in with the Aegis Combat Systems on those ships, is unclear. When reached for more information, a spokesperson for Raytheon (now formally RTX) directed TWZ to contact Naval Sea Systems Command (NAVSEA). TWZ has also reached out to NAVSEA and Anduril for more details. The Navy currently has a total of 74 Arleigh Burke class destroyers in service, a fleet that includes multiple subvariants. They are all equipped with Mk 41 Vertical Launch System (VLS) arrays (though with differing numbers of total launch cells) that can fire various kinds of missiles, including Standard-series and Evolved Sea Sparrow Missile (ESSM) surface-to-air types, as well as Tomahawk land-attack cruise missiles. Some versions also have additional launchers for Harpoon or Naval Strike Missile (NSM) anti-ship cruise missiles. Depending on the particular subvariant, the Arleigh Burkes also have either launchers for RIM-116 Rolling Airframe Missiles (RAM) or 20mm Vulcan cannon-armed Mk 15 Phalanx Close-in Weapon Systems (CIWS) for close-in defense against aerial threats, including drones. Those in the 'Rota' configuration have both. The Navy is now moving to replace the Phalanxes on all of its destroyers with RAM launchers. The Arleigh Burkes also have 5-inch main gun in a turret on the bow, which can be used to engage aerial targets, along with ones at sea and on land, as you can read more about here. Coyote and Roadrunner 'are part of that attempt to get after the cost curve, give our commanding officers more options to engage the threat and ultimately be more effective in defending the high-value unit,' Navy Capt. Mark Lawrence, commander of Destroyer Squadron Two (DESRON 2), also told reporters earlier this month per In January, the Navy said its warships operating in and around the Red Sea had fired 120 Standard Missile-2s (SM-2), 80 SM-6s, a combined total of 20 ESSMs and SM-3s, as well as 160 5-inch rounds against aerial threats launched by the Houthis (and likely by Iran), over the preceding 15 months. SM-2s each cost around $2.5 million, while more capable SM-6s have price tags of around $4.27 million. The price for each ESSM is around $1.5 million. SM-3 variants, which are higher-end interceptors capable of knocking ballistic missiles during the midcourse portion of their flight, cost between $12.5 million and $28.7 million depending on variant. The RIM-116s that Arleigh Burke class destroyers are also armed with run just under $1 million apiece. You can read more about these missiles and their costs here. For comparison, the cost of a single Block 2 Coyote is reportedly around $100,000. Anduril has previously said that Roadrunner-M's unit cost is in the low hundreds of thousands of dollars. In addition to offering a valuable lower-cost-per-intercept option, especially against long-range kamikaze drones that might cost as little as $50,000, arming Arleigh Burkes with Coyote and/or Roadrunner-M will also give the destroyers valuable additional magazine depth. As TWZ wrote in the feature about adding various types of drones to the arsenal of American warships last year: 'When used in large numbers, these drones, cooperatively swarming or not, can deplete a ship's defensive arsenal, attacking from multiple vectors. Close-in weapon systems can quickly run out of ammunition and need reloading, leaving the ship's inner point defense layer degraded and thus making the vessel more vulnerable. Even American and allied warships facing off against the Houthi drones have had to use close-in weapon systems to take them down.' 'Now, sending a flock after a ship, with many dozens of drones to defend against, could quickly become an impossible task, with the ship's defenses rapidly becoming overwhelmed and its magazines running dry. Considering the quantities involved, a ship may be able to readily defend itself against a limited number of drones, but many attacking at the same time from different vectors would be a different story, especially as some of the drones could be used as electronic warfare platforms and decoys, further challenging a ship's defenses.' That piece also more specifically noted: 'Higher-performance jet-powered anti-drone drones, like Raytheon's Coyote Block II or Anduril's new Roadrunner, are specifically designed to make faster intercepts of drones, including swarms. In the case of Coyote Block II, they have been successful in doing so. It's possible that these same drones could share launcher boxes with lower-performance, propeller-powered types. There are propeller-driven counter-drone configured drones, as well, for lower-performing threats that can be launched from CLTs [common launch tubes] and other similar systems. Any of these types, jet or propeller-powered, can also be equipped with electronic warfare payloads capable of 'soft kills' against drones, allowing a single drone to take down multiple threats.' While costing less than typical effectors, such as SAMs, Coyote and Roadrunner also offer something these weapons don't — the ability to loiter. This is a big deal as they can be dynamically tasked in real time and they can even be launched preemptively against potential threats. This offers a lot of flexibility for warship crews that don't currently have such an option beyond employing the ship's rotary-wing assets, if available. In the case of Roadrunner-M, it can be recovered and quickly used again. There is also the potential that these systems could be used to hit small surface targets, as well. The threats posed by uncrewed aerial systems to Navy ships, as well as U.S. military assets and critical civilian infrastructure on land, even far from traditional battlefields, are not new, as TWZ has long highlighted. Those dangers are only set to grow in scale and scope, thanks in large part to advances in artificial intelligence and machine learning, and to keep proliferating among state and non-state actors. That the Navy is only adding Coyote and Roadrunner-M to at least some Arleigh Burke class destroyers now highlights how the U.S. military continues to lag in addressing drone threats. TWZ also highlighted this in February 2024, when NAVSEA put out a broad call for potential new counter-drone capabilities that could be added to various Navy ships within 12 months, which may have contributed to the work being done now. The Navy is also pursuing new directed energy weapons, electronic warfare suites, advanced networked decoys, and other tools to help further expand the air and missile defenses on its ships. Other interceptors could also be on the horizon, including using the multi-mode AGM-179 Joint Air-to-Ground Missile (JAGM) in the air-to-surface role. JAGM's manufacturer, Lockheed Martin, has also been doing other work to demonstrate the missile's abilities in the counter-drone role, whether launched from the air or the surface. The company notably showed a model earlier this year of an Areligh Burke class destroy equipped with four-round launchers for JAGMs. The Navy's Freedom class Littoral Combat Ships also just recently gained the ability to fire radar-guided AGM-114L Longbow Hellfire missiles, which are no longer in production and that JAGM looks set to supplant, at incoming drones. All this also ties into larger concerns about the adequacy of U.S. stockpiles of surface-to-air missiles and other key munitions and the ability to readily replenish them, especially in the event a large-scale conflict against China breaks out in the Pacific. Last year, the head of U.S. Indo-Pacific Command (INDOPACOM) explicitly warned that operations in and around the Red Sea, as well as ongoing support to Ukraine in its fight against Russia, were creating readiness risks in his part of the world. At the same time, top service officials have stressed that captains and crews should not worry about taking whatever steps are necessary to defend their ships and the lives onboard, as well as other friendly forces. 'They have other things to worry about, like what's for breakfast,' Vice Adm. Brendan McLane, head of Naval Surface Forces, told TWZ and other attendees at the annual Surface Navy Association conference in January. 'The cost of the missile that they are going to shoot is not one of the things that they are worried about.' Still, Coyotes and Roadrunners are now set to give at least some Arleigh Burke class destroyers important added defenses against incoming drones, and could be a step toward fielding those capabilities more broadly across the Navy's fleets. Contact the author: joe@
Yahoo
28-03-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Roadrunner and Coyote: Navy Set to Deploy Land-Based Anti-Drone Systems at Sea
The Navy says it is working to reduce the growing costs of fighting Houthi drones launched from Yemen by placing two new experimental systems on destroyers that are slated to deploy later this summer. "We're going to be deploying the Ford strike group with two additional missile systems on our destroyers -- the Roadrunner system and the Coyote system -- both specifically designed to go after UAVs," or unmanned aerial vehicles, Adm. Daryl Caudle, the commander of U.S. Fleet Forces, told reporters last week. Ever since the Navy repelled its first wave of drone attacks from the Houthi rebels in October 2023, there has been a steady criticism over the fact that commanders were turning to multimillion-dollar missiles to down drones that cost fractions of that amount. The phenomenon became known as the "cost-curve problem." Read Next: Army US Allies Battling Swampy Terrain to Find 4 Soldiers Missing Since Tuesday in Lithuania "Those two systems ... are part of that attempt to get after the cost curve, give our commanding officers more options to engage the threat and ultimately be more effective in defending the high-value unit," Capt. Mark Lawrence, the commander of the destroyer squadron whose ships will employ the new systems, told reporters March 21. The USS Gerald R. Ford aircraft carrier, along with a group of destroyers, is set to deploy in the coming months, Navy officials have said. In January, the Navy revealed that, in 15 months of fighting the Houthis, commanders fired 220 missiles, including 120 SM-2 missiles -- the service's workhorse anti-air missile that has a range of about 90 miles. Officials didn't offer a breakdown of what the missiles were fired at. The SM-2 missiles alone run about $2 million a piece, while some of the newer missiles that were used against Houthi missiles can run as high as nearly $28 million a piece. While a precise cost total for munitions expended from October 2023 to January 2025 is hard to Tough calculate exactly, it's clear that the Navy has expended well over $500 million just in the cost of missiles. The Roadrunner and Coyote systems could reduce those expenditures, but they are not new. According to Capt. Ronald Flanders, a spokesman for the Navy's research and acquisition department, Roadrunner is itself a drone-type loitering weapon capable of targeting other drones and was first fielded by U.S. Special Operations Command. The head of the company that makes the Roadrunner described it to reporters in 2023 as "somewhere between a reusable missile and ... a full-scale autonomous aircraft." Meanwhile, Coyote is a similar system of launchable interceptor drones that was predominantly used by the U.S. Army to protect its bases. "Both these systems were originally designed for use over land; however, the U.S. Navy has tested and demonstrated these systems in the maritime environment," Flanders said. He was not able to provide a cost per interceptor or the range of either system in time for publication. The Navy has also been experimenting with laser-based weapons that could be used to take out drones, but those efforts have been going on for years without much success in scaling experimental efforts to more than one or two ships. In January, Caudle called the Navy's inability to scale up the weapon "embarrassing." In the meantime, Caudle also revealed that, thanks to a slew of analysis done on the now hundreds of engagements, the Navy is starting to revise its approach to just how many missiles it will fire to take down a drone. "We may have had a 'shoot two, look, shoot two more'" approach, Caudle said, before noting that the Navy has "been able to reduce that because that wasn't improving our probability of kill." However, Navy officials like Lawrence and Flanders are clear that the effort to find alternatives to missiles for anti-drone warfare isn't just about money -- it's about saving the missiles for more high-end threats. "We're trying to find ways to make sure that we're going to have the deep missile inventories we might need for other contingencies," Lawrence said. Rear Adm. Paul Lanzilotta, the commander of the USS Ford's strike group, also noted that Navy destroyers have also been employing their deck guns more regularly as well. "That is a very effective weapon -- it is not just for show," he said. Navy officials revealed in January that, in 15 months of fighting, Navy ships used 160 5-inch shells over the course of 380 separate engagements, though, like with the missiles, they didn't say what they were shot at. At the end of the day, however, Navy leaders stress that they are not trying to discourage commanders and crews from employing the "tried and true" SM-2 missile. In January, the commander of the service's surface forces, Vice Adm. Brendan McLane, said that warship commanders are not worried about munitions cost, "nor should they be." "They have other things to worry about, like what's for breakfast," he quipped. "While we work on fleet initiatives to really get more efficient, I'd say we remain laser-focused on staying effective," Lawrence said. Related: Navy's Fight in Red Sea Used 220 Missiles, But Officials Say That's Changing
