Latest news with #CollaborativeCombatAircraft
Yahoo
09-07-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
F-22 Raptors Will Be First To Control ‘Fighter Drone' Collaborative Combat Aircraft
F-22 Raptor stealth fighters appear set to be the first operational airborne controllers for the U.S. Air Force's future Collaborative Combat Aircraft (CCA) drones. The service is looking to start adding tablet-based control systems and make other relevant modifications to the F-22s starting in the next fiscal year. This is on top of a host of other newly planned upgrades for the Raptor fleet to ensure the jets remain at the very tip of the service's spear for years to come, as you can read about more in TWZ's recent reporting here. The Air Force's budget request for the 2026 Fiscal Year includes an all-new line item for CCA-related modifications to other aircraft. Within that section is a call for just over $15 million in funding for what is currently named the Crewed Platform Integration program. Separate sections of the Air Force budget documents say the service currently has 143 combat-capable F-22s, with the rest of the total fleet of 185 jets being dedicated to training and test and evaluation duties. A significant number of the small, but highly capable and heavily in-demand Raptor force is typically down for maintenance at any one time, as well. It isn't clear exactly what will be used for communications between F-22s and CCAs under their control, but the F-22's hard to intercept and jam Inter-Flight Data Link (IFDL) that is currently used to share data between F-22s is very likely the solution. Work has also been done using the XQ-58 Valkyrie, which has served as a CCA surrogate, to bridge communication gaps between F-22s and F-35s, which could also be useful in future operational CCAs. In the 2026 Fiscal Year budget proposal, the Air Force is also asking for $870 million to continue work on the CCA program itself. Two prototype designs, General Atomics' YFQ-42A and Anduril's YFQ-44A, are currently in development as part of the first phase, or Increment 1, of the CCA effort. Requirements for a follow-on Increment 2 competition are being finalized now. Air Force officials have said they are looking to acquire between 100 and 150 Increment 1 CCAs, and around 1,000 of the drones, at least, across all the future increments. The current goal is for the first examples to enter operational service before the end of the decade. The service is also actively collaborating with the U.S. Navy and the U.S. Marine Corps on CCA-related developments, including a common command and control architecture. 'The Crewed Platform Integration program will procure and integrate kits for F-22 installation which will allow for F-22 control of Collaborative Combat Aircraft (CCA),' according to the Air Force's proposed Fiscal Year 2026 budget. 'The procurement effort includes, but is not limited to, tablets, cables, and associated materials; activities associated with system integration, assembly, test and checkout; certification; aircraft and CCA communications integration; software updates; systems engineering; training; support equipment; and Program Support Costs (PSC).' The budget documents also say that, of the roughly $15 million in Crewed Platform Integration requested, just over $12.2 million will go toward the procurement of 142 tablets and associated cabling. This would put the unit price of each of these installation kits at approximately $86,218. The 142 figure aligns with the total number of combat-coded F-22s currently in service. The F-22 is one of a number of platforms the Air Force has previously said it envisions controlling CCA drones in the future. The F-35 Joint Strike Fighter and the future F-47 sixth-generation fighter are also on that list. The service has said CCAs might be paired with a broader array of aircraft types, including B-21 Raider stealth bombers and aerial refueling tankers, down the road, as well. In the past year or so, Lockheed Martin, the prime contractor for the F-22 and the F-35, has touted work it has already been doing to enable those jets to serve in the aerial drone controller role. 'Lockheed Martin has demonstrated its piloted-drone teaming interface, which can control multiple drones from the cockpit of an F-35 or F-22,' the company said in a press release in January. 'This technology allows a pilot to direct multiple drones to engage enemies using a touchscreen tablet in the cockpit of their 5th Gen aircraft.' In terms of the physical architecture in the cockpit to allow pilots to control CCAs, tablet-like devices have already emerged as a user interface of choice, at least initially. Questions have been raised about the effectiveness of that control scheme, especially for single-seat combat jets, and multiple companies are exploring alternatives. The computer-generated video below from Collins Aerospace shows tablet-like devices and other means being used to control CCA-like drones. 'There's a lot of opinions amongst the Air Force about the right way to go [about controlling drones from other aircraft],' John Clark, then-head of Skunk Works, told TWZ and others at Air & Space Forces Association's (AFA) main annual conference in September 2024. 'The universal thought, though, is that this [a tablet or other touch-based interface] may be the fastest way to begin experimentation. It may not be the end state.' 'We're working through a spectrum of options that are the minimum invasive opportunities, as well as something that's more organically equipped, where there's not even a tablet,' Clark added at that time. 'We started with [the Air Force's] Air Combat Command with tablets … There was this idea that they wanted to have this discreet control,' Michael Atwood, vice president of Advanced Programs for General Atomics, also said during a past appearance on The Merge podcast in 2024. 'I got to fly in one of these jets with a tablet. And it was really hard to fly the airplane, let alone the weapon system of my primary airplane, and spatially and temporally think about this other thing.' The issues that Atwood named could be mitigated, at least to a degree, through improving the autonomous capabilities of future CCAs. However, officials across the U.S. military have repeatedly stressed that much work in that realm remains to be done. 'Let's get this thing out there. Let's start integrating. Let's then start working to [sic] warfighting functions of our CCA, and move forward,' Marine Col. Derek Brannon, director of the Marine Corps' Cunningham Group that is tasked with plotting out the service's overarching future aviation vision, said at the annual Modern Day Marine exposition in March. 'It's an exceptional piece of capability.' However, 'we still have a lot to learn to simply get to this thing airborne, flying, and executing next to an F-35, and not hitting each other,' he added. 'I know there's a lot of work out there, but that's important to make sure that we become lethal.' For the Air Force, in particular, significant questions remain about how it plans to just deploy, launch, recover, support, and otherwise operate CCAs, let alone employ them in tactical combat operations. The service has already been using a number of different drones, as well as the unique pilot-optional X-62A test jet, a heavily modified two-seat F-16D also known as the Variable Stability In-flight Simulator Test Aircraft (VISTA), to work on answering these questions. A group of six additional F-16s are being modified to further help with those test and evaluation efforts as part of a project called Viper Experimentation and Next-Gen Operations Mode (VENOM). Furthermore, the Air Force has established a dedicated CCA test force called the Experimental Operations Unit (EOU). In June, the service announced that it had expanded the EOU from a small detachment into a squadron-sized formation. Whether or not the unit has any flying assets now is unclear. Last year, the Air Force did say that it had approved additional CCA purchases to equip the EOU, but did not say how many of the drones would be headed to Nellis. Whether these will be YFQ-42As, YFQ-44As, or a mix of both, is also unknown. The Air Force is asking for close to $55.5 million and nearly $6.6 million to support the EOU and Project VENOM, respectively, in its 2026 Fiscal Year budget request. The service received around $44.5 million and $6.1 million for those two lines of effort in the 2025 Fiscal Year. In the upcoming fiscal year, the goal is for the EOU to 'continue to stand up as a fully manned squadron with investments in facility modifications, critical infrastructure, and equipment,' according to the Air Force's latest budget documents. The 'EOU continues to invest in ACP prototypes, modeling and simulation environments, and studies to refine integration of CCA into the force.' 'VENOM will conduct [a] government flight test campaign for risk reduction and maturation of enterprise autonomy skills toinclude integration of the latest autonomy reference architecture, testing of autonomy skills, and developing the autonomy testinfrastructure,' the budget documents add. 'Autonomy test infrastructure includes a digital autonomy test environment and common test tools to ensure integration between Vendors, Test Organizations, and Program Offices. Autonomy skills being matured include: 1) multi-ship behaviors 2) Defensive Counter-Air behaviors and 3) Offensive Counter-Air behaviors.' With plans now to add the tablet-based control systems to the bulk of the F-22 fleet, the Air Force looks to be further laying the groundwork to operationalize the lessons learned from the EOU and efforts like Project VENOM as it moves toward fielding its first CCAs. Contact the author: joe@
The Hindu
20-06-2025
- Business
- The Hindu
Drone makers battle for air dominance with 'wingman' aircraft
Defence heavyweights and emerging military tech firms used the Paris Airshow to showcase cutting-edge drones known as "wingmen": uncrewed aircraft designed to fly alongside next-generation fighter jets and reshape the future of air combat. The Paris show, the biggest aerospace and defence gathering in the world, featured a record number of drones, reflecting their rising importance after proving highly effective in the Ukraine war and as the U.S. prepares for a potential conflict with China in the Pacific. In April last year, the U.S. Air Force selected Anduril and General Atomics to develop the first fleet of drone wingmen, which are designed to fly alongside manned fighter jets and are officially known as Collaborative Combat Aircraft (CCA). California-based Anduril, which has already supplied small drones to Ukraine and was making its debut at the air show, displayed a model of its 17-foot Fury drone, planned for production in 2027 as part of the U.S. Air Force's CCA programme. "We're moving extremely fast," Jason Levin, Anduril's senior vice president of engineering, told Reuters. "The aircraft is very capable. We can't go into specifics here, but it performs the mission like a fighter." Levin said Anduril had raised $2.5 billion to build a 5-million-square-foot production facility in Ohio, with construction set to begin next year. In March, Anduril signed a 30-million-pound ($38 million) deal with Britain to supply its compact Altius drone to Ukraine. The drone can be launched from the ground or air and is capable of conducting strikes, serving as a decoy or for cyber warfare. Larger drones like Fury are part of the U.S. CCA programme, which aims to field around 1,000 autonomous drones capable of conducting surveillance, electronic warfare and strike operations alongside piloted fighter jets, such as Lockheed Martin's F-35 and the next-generation F-47, which Boeing was tapped to build following its selection by the Air Force in March. General Atomics showed off a model of its YFQ-42A drone at the show, which is its equivalent of the Fury, with both designed for potential use in the Pacific if China invaded democratically-ruled Taiwan. Last week, Boeing demonstrated the potential of drones operating in coordination with human pilots during a groundbreaking test with the Royal Australian Air Force, the U.S. aerospace giant announced at the air show. In the trial, two of Boeing's Ghost Bat drones flew alongside an E-7A Wedgetail surveillance aircraft, with a human operator remotely controlling the uncrewed systems to carry out a mission against an airborne target, the company said. "The Ghost Bat has the potential to turn a single fighter jet into a fighting team, with advanced sensors that are like hundreds of eyes in the sky," Australian Minister for Defence Industry Pat Conroy said in a statement. European defence firms are also advancing wingman drone initiatives, including Sweden's Saab and a trilateral partnership between Dassault Aviation, Airbus, and Indra Sistemas under the Future Combat Air System. The programme aims to integrate autonomous drones with manned fighter jets. Turkey's Baykar displayed two of its drone models at the show for the first time: the high-altitude, heavy lift Akinci and the TB3, which has foldable wings and can take off or land on short-runway aircraft carriers. On Monday, Baykar and Italian defence and aerospace group Leonardo formally launched a joint venture for unmanned systems. Germany's Rheinmetall announced at the show that it would partner with Anduril to build versions of Fury and Barracuda, a cruise missile-style drone, for European markets.
Yahoo
11-06-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Opinion - A trillion dollars annually for the Pentagon: Military spending is out of control
The era of trillion-dollar annual Pentagon budgets is upon us. Members of Congress are likely to increase defense spending by $150 billion through the budget reconciliation process. When added to the Trump administration's fiscal year 2026 Department of Defense base budget proposal, Pentagon spending will total over $1 trillion a year. There are two factors that virtually guarantee that defense spending will never dip below that mark again. The first is political. If a future budget proposal dips below the $1 trillion mark, there will be howls about national security cuts, and few politicians are willing to weather those attacks. The second reason is more practical. The reconciliation boost includes development funding for a slew of new weapons programs — the F-47, Collaborative Combat Aircraft, the B-21 strategic bomber, Sentinel ballistic missiles, underwater drones, hypersonic missiles and more. The services aren't buying these weapons yet, just paying to develop them. As expensive as they are now, they will become vastly more expensive in coming years when they go into production. This is the beginning of a Pentagon spending 'time bomb.' New programs currently entering into development will be vastly more expensive than they initially appear as they transition into the production and sustainment phases in coming years. The American people are now dealing with the explosion of the last Pentagon spending time bomb, the one that started on Sept. 11, 2001. We now pay more on the military than at any time since the end of World War II. Even at the height of the war on terror, with American troops fighting in two separate theaters, the military wasn't spending as much in real terms as it does now. After the Sept. 11 attacks, no one seriously questioned military spending in Washington. Politicians almost universally wanted to appear strong on defense, and so few were willing to do anything to impede military spending proposals. The services took advantage of the moment and launched a series of new acquisition programs, few of which had any relevance to the war on terror. The Future Combat System, the Littoral Combat Ship, the F-35, the Zumwalt-class Destroyer and others were begun in earnest after 9/11. These were all programs that began the last time the national security establishment decided the historical moment justified their profligacy with taxpayer dollars. In 2001, it was the fear of global terrorism. Today, a menacing China serves the same purpose. The national security establishment has seriously lost its way. It continues to spend more and more while delivering a lot of disappointments. All components of the U.S. military are far smaller than they were 50 years ago. The Army is approximately 40 percent the size it was in 1975. The Navy went from 559 ships to 293 today. The Air Force had more than 10,000 aircraft then and a little more than 5,000 today. What the military does receive is delivered years late and typically twice the quoted price. Many weapons systems also don't work too well. The F-35 works less than one-third of the time. The Navy is retiring Littoral Combat Ships decades ahead of schedule because they can't perform the missions the Navy needs. Army leaders cancelled the Future Combat System without producing a single operational vehicle. Today, policymakers are doubling down on the same structure used to create the current mess. While the American people continue to pay for the sins of the previous generation of policymakers, today's military leaders are setting up at least the next two generations for even more disastrous Pentagon spending. Defense spending has increased nearly 50 percent since 2000. The post-9/11 spending time bomb accounts for a significant portion of that increase. In 20 years, the American people could easily be spending $2 to $3 trillion a year to cover the obligations made today. The Trump administration still has a good opportunity to establish a better path forward. The first step is to reevaluate the strategy that underpins military policies. The world has changed over the last decade. China is facing mounting political, economic and demographic challenges. The U.S. no longer has massive forces fighting overseas. Before proposing gigantic new military spending, the administration should first formulate an updated strategy that can guide policy decisions. By doing things backwards, the entire national security establishment gives the appearance of making the defense budget itself the strategy. Dan Grazier is a senior fellow and program director at the Stimson Center. He is a former Marine Corps captain who served tours of duty in Iraq and Afghanistan. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
The Hill
11-06-2025
- Business
- The Hill
A trillion dollars annually for the Pentagon: Military spending is out of control
The era of trillion-dollar annual Pentagon budgets is upon us. Members of Congress are likely to increase defense spending by $150 billion through the budget reconciliation process. When added to the Trump administration's fiscal year 2026 Department of Defense base budget proposal, Pentagon spending will total over $1 trillion a year. There are two factors that virtually guarantee that defense spending will never dip below that mark again. The first is political. If a future budget proposal dips below the $1 trillion mark, there will be howls about national security cuts, and few politicians are willing to weather those attacks. The second reason is more practical. The reconciliation boost includes development funding for a slew of new weapons programs — the F-47, Collaborative Combat Aircraft, the B-21 strategic bomber, Sentinel ballistic missiles, underwater drones, hypersonic missiles and more. The services aren't buying these weapons yet, just paying to develop them. As expensive as they are now, they will become vastly more expensive in coming years when they go into production. This is the beginning of a Pentagon spending 'time bomb.' New programs currently entering into development will be vastly more expensive than they initially appear as they transition into the production and sustainment phases in coming years. The American people are now dealing with the explosion of the last Pentagon spending time bomb, the one that started on Sept. 11, 2001. We now pay more on the military than at any time since the end of World War II. Even at the height of the war on terror, with American troops fighting in two separate theaters, the military wasn't spending as much in real terms as it does now. After the Sept. 11 attacks, no one seriously questioned military spending in Washington. Politicians almost universally wanted to appear strong on defense, and so few were willing to do anything to impede military spending proposals. The services took advantage of the moment and launched a series of new acquisition programs, few of which had any relevance to the war on terror. The Future Combat System, the Littoral Combat Ship, the F-35, the Zumwalt-class Destroyer and others were begun in earnest after 9/11. These were all programs that began the last time the national security establishment decided the historical moment justified their profligacy with taxpayer dollars. In 2001, it was the fear of global terrorism. Today, a menacing China serves the same purpose. The national security establishment has seriously lost its way. It continues to spend more and more while delivering a lot of disappointments. All components of the U.S. military are far smaller than they were 50 years ago. The Army is approximately 40 percent the size it was in 1975. The Navy went from 559 ships to 293 today. The Air Force had more than 10,000 aircraft then and a little more than 5,000 today. What the military does receive is delivered years late and typically twice the quoted price. Many weapons systems also don't work too well. The F-35 works less than one-third of the time. The Navy is retiring Littoral Combat Ships decades ahead of schedule because they can't perform the missions the Navy needs. Army leaders cancelled the Future Combat System without producing a single operational vehicle. Today, policymakers are doubling down on the same structure used to create the current mess. While the American people continue to pay for the sins of the previous generation of policymakers, today's military leaders are setting up at least the next two generations for even more disastrous Pentagon spending. Defense spending has increased nearly 50 percent since 2000. The post-9/11 spending time bomb accounts for a significant portion of that increase. In 20 years, the American people could easily be spending $2 to $3 trillion a year to cover the obligations made today. The Trump administration still has a good opportunity to establish a better path forward. The first step is to reevaluate the strategy that underpins military policies. The world has changed over the last decade. China is facing mounting political, economic and demographic challenges. The U.S. no longer has massive forces fighting overseas. Before proposing gigantic new military spending, the administration should first formulate an updated strategy that can guide policy decisions. By doing things backwards, the entire national security establishment gives the appearance of making the defense budget itself the strategy. Dan Grazier is a senior fellow and program director at the Stimson Center. He is a former Marine Corps captain who served tours of duty in Iraq and Afghanistan.
CNBC
10-06-2025
- Business
- CNBC
1. Anduril
Founders: Brian Schimpf (CEO), Palmer Luckey, Trae Stephens, Matt Grimm, Joe ChenLaunched: 2017Headquarters: Costa Mesa, CaliforniaFunding: $6.3 billionValuation: $30.5 billionKey Technologies: Artificial intelligence, autonomous vehicles, edge computing, explainable AI, generative AI, machine learning, robotics, software-defined securityIndustry: DefensePrevious appearances on Disruptor 50 list: 3 (No. 2 in 2024) Over the last year, Anduril has struck a series of deals that demonstrate the company's growth from a disruptive defense industry startup to one of the leaders in a critical sector. In April 2024, Anduril was one of two companies selected by the U.S. Air Force to build and test drone prototypes for the service's Collaborative Combat Aircraft program, the first in a new generation of uncrewed fighter aircraft, and a contract in which it beat out traditional defense stalwarts Boeing, Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman. And as defense moves into the AI era, Anduril has also been working more closely with the tech sector to create the military of the future. In December, Anduril partnered with fellow Disruptor 50 company OpenAI on deployment of an advanced AI system for U.S. counter-unmanned aircraft systems to be used in "national security missions." In February, Anduril took over Microsoft's multibillion-dollar Integrated Visual Augmentation System wearables program with the U.S. Army, a contract that was valued at nearly $22 billion. Then in May, Anduril teamed up with Meta to develop the VR and AR headsets for use by the U.S. Army as part of that program. "Anduril has a lot of traction," founder Palmer Luckey said in a CNBC interview in February. That traction has led to a rapid rise in the company's valuation. Last August, Anduril closed a Series F round, valuing the company at $14 billion and securing $1.5 billion in funding to build a more than five-million-square-foot factory, in addition to other investments in production across multiple states and in Australia. An announcement last week of a $2.5 billion Series G more than doubled that valuation to $30.5 billion, making it one of the most highly valued private tech companies in the U.S. It's hard to separate any one accomplishment from the rest for Anduril, but perhaps it's the company's push into the military headsets that signals the next era of disruption for the company but also takes things back full circle for Luckey, who sold his headset startup Oculus VR to Facebook for $2 billion in 2014, and was unceremoniously fired just a few years later. "Anduril builds a lot of different systems across a lot of different domains — so air, land, sea, subsea, space, cyberspace, and eventually subterranean," Luckey said in the February CNBC interview. "[Integrated visual augmentation systems] and systems like it are going to be the portal through which the warfighter commands and controls all of these different autonomous weapons and autonomous sensors." Luckey has spoken at length about his vision of putting such a tool in the hands of soldiers, in a vein that maybe still seems science fiction film and writing, but which he says will create a world that grants "not just the ability to see the thermal, visual and near IR spectrum, but the ability to see into a digital model of the past, present and future, and just seamlessly team with large packs of autonomous weapons." Of Anduril's deal with Meta, Luckey said, "Of all the areas where dual-use technology can make a difference for America, this is the one I am most excited about. My mission has long been to turn warfighters into technomancers, and the products we are building with Meta do just that." With technology, warfare and defense becoming more intertwined, and at a time of increased focus on efficient government budgets that Anduril's product-based model is based on, the company is clearly now one of the major players in a sector it set out to disrupt only a few years ago, and is perhaps even starting to chart a path well beyond the battlefield. "I'm a believer that we're going to mediate our view of the world with technology," Palmer told CNBC.
