West lacks adequate defence against drone swarms

Western militaries do not currently have an adequate defence against the autonomous drone swarms that could emerge as unmanned warfare moves beyond systems requiring individual human pilots, General David Petraeus has warned in an address to the House of Lords, the UK Defence Journal understands.

Speaking on 1 September, Petraeus argued that the war in Ukraine is demonstrating a change extending well beyond the adoption of drones themselves. He described a battlefield in which large numbers of relatively expendable unmanned systems are linked with sensors, software, electronic warfare, artificial intelligence and increasingly rapid targeting processes, while military technology and tactics are being modified continuously during combat.

Petraeus said: “Much of the discussion has understandably focused on individual technologies—unmanned systems, artificial intelligence, electronic warfare, cyber capabilities, precision strike, battle management systems, and others. Each matters. But the principal lesson is larger: the very concept of warfare is changing.”

He continued: “We are witnessing the convergence of technological, operational, industrial, and organizational change into an entirely new way of conducting war. Information is collected, analyzed, disseminated, and acted upon at unprecedented speed. Sensors and battle management systems are connected to vast numbers of attritable unmanned systems capable of precision effects across every domain.”

Petraeus said commercial innovation was also moving directly onto the battlefield, with software, hardware and operational methods adapted during fighting and an increasingly close relationship developing between military operations and the industrial base.

The former US commander said remotely controlled systems are already changing the role of conventional formations by taking over tasks previously performed by personnel in some of the most exposed parts of the battlefield.

He said: “And remotely operated unmanned systems on the ground, in the air, and at sea are increasingly displacing humans from many of the most dangerous functions of front-line combat and profoundly changing the role of traditional combined-arms formations.”

Petraeus also made a strong claim about the scale of drone employment in Ukraine, telling peers that remotely piloted systems now account for the overwhelming majority of Russian casualties and that established land systems are operating under persistent threat from surveillance and precision weapons.

He said: “Those changes will encounter fierce resistance from advocates of existing force structures and legacy systems, many of which are becoming extraordinarily vulnerable on the battlefield we see in Ukraine. Remotely piloted systems, employed there in enormous numbers, already inflict the overwhelming majority of Russian casualties. Tanks and artillery increasingly operate only under extraordinary threat from ubiquitous surveillance and precision strike.”

His warning went further with the development of fully autonomous systems. Petraeus argued that removing the requirement for an individual human pilot for each platform would allow unmanned formations to increase dramatically in size, potentially producing swarms considerably larger than those possible with today’s remotely operated systems.

He said: “And the advent of fully autonomous systems in the months and years ahead will represent another profound development. Removing the constraint imposed by the number of human pilots will make possible unmanned operations at vastly greater scale—including swarms for which we presently possess no adequate defense.”

Petraeus argued that military advantage would consequently depend on institutional adaptation as well as technical development, particularly the ability to incorporate battlefield lessons rapidly into doctrine, force design, training and acquisition.

He said: “In this environment, decisive advantage will belong not simply to those who innovate technologically, but to those whose institutions learn faster than their adversaries. Warfare is becoming a continuous competition in institutional learning and adaptation—the ability to identify lessons, incorporate them rapidly into doctrine, force design, procurement, training, and leader development, and repeat the process before the adversary catches up.”