DoD weapons designer: Swarming teams of drones will dominate future wars: Future wars will be fought with swarms of expendable, disaggregated, intelligent systems rather than the big, expensive weapon platforms the U.S. has relied on for fifty years, a top Pentagon weapons scientist asserted this week.
William Roper, the lead of the Pentagon’s semi-secret Strategic Capabilities Office (SCO), made his prediction March 28, adding that he believes the Air Force will have a greater challenge adjusting to this new reality than the other services.
“What used to be solo systems are going to have to be teams to be relevant in the near future, maybe even the far future. The technology is available today to make teams of systems higher performing than solo systems can be on their own,” Roper said at an event hosted by the Air Force Association’s Mitchell Institute.
The idea of swarming systems being paired with a major system in a “loyal wingman” configuration isn’t a new one. The Pentagon’s various research groups, including DARPA and the service research labs, have been playing with the technology for years.
