Capability Analysis: AI Machine Guns for Drone Short-Range Air Defense

Published on January 6, 2025

Why do AI machine guns matter, and why should the military consider them?

Before becoming a War Quant, I led a combined Marine Corps anti-armor team in Syria in 2017. During that deployment, hostile, neutral, and friendly unmanned aerial systems (UAS) frequently surveilled my platoon. Just identifying which UAS posed a threat – let alone actually engaging the hostile drones – presented an enormous challenge. My platoon tested and employed several different counter-UAS (CUAS) systems with varying levels of success, each of which used non-kinetic kill methods such as jamming to disable drones. I had no dedicated kinetic kill systems.

Read the full article here.

Other news

The US Army needs inferior, cheaper drones to compete

January 6, 2025
IN UKRAINE BOTH sides are deploying millions of low-cost drones, which play a role in combat as both scouts and as weapons. The US Army, long considered a leader in this field, has been following events in Ukraine closely. But the Pentagon is only acquiring small numbers of drones at high cost. Why are American drones so expensive, and can prices be brought down?Read the full article here.

Defense Tech Scaling New Heights With Incoming Administration

January 7, 2025
The recent run up in the stock market—especially for tech stocks—signals a stimulative business climate during the second Trump Administration which should fuel a continued rise for defense tech—the incorporation of new technologies such as AI, cyber, autonomy and space for military applications. The first Trump Administration saw an S&P 500 increase of 50%, a much larger tech stock increase of 13