Anduril, a defense startup, is bringing the Pentagon’s dream of autonomous drone swarms to life. The company, co-founded by Palmer Luckey, who previously sold his virtual reality startup Oculus to Facebook, is challenging traditional defense contractors. Anduril was recently selected, along with General Atomics, to prototype a new kind of autonomous fighter jet called the Collaborative Combat Aircraft (CCA) for the US Air Force and Navy.
The CCA project is a significant step forward for uncrewed systems and the military. It represents the culmination of years of work inside the Pentagon to develop a vision of more automated aerial warfare. The ultimate goal is for several drones, similar to those in development by Anduril and General Atomic, to accompany a conventional, crewed aircraft on a mission and collaborate in flexible ways. This approach is based on the philosophy that there is safety, and overwhelming power, in numbers on the battlefield.
The project is intended to be the start of a bigger shift toward deploying autonomous aircraft in much larger numbers. As a tactic, swarming could potentially allow smaller cheaper drones to overcome more expensive systems, providing a game-changing asymmetric capability. However, this shift towards autonomous systems has raised concerns about safety and the ethical implications of AI in warfare.
Read more: www.wired.com