A Lethal Miniature Aerial Missile System launches munitions from a MARTAC T-38 Devil Ray unmanned surface vehicle, attached to U.S. Naval Forces Central Command’s Task Force 59, during Exercise Digital Talon in the Arabian Gulf on October 23, 2023.Photograph: Chief Mass Communication Specialist Justin Stumberg/US NAVY
The Navy’s armed USV efforts appear to have culminated in Project 33, a new initiative unveiled as part of Chief of Naval Operations Admiral Lisa Franchetti’s 2024 Navigation Plan in September 2024 that focuses on, among other targets, “scal[ing] robotic and autonomous systems to integrate more platforms at speed” in an ostensible complement to the Pentagon’s larger Replicator effort, designed to outfit American fleets with armed robot boats ahead of a potential future war with China.
“This Navigation Plan drives toward two strategic ends: readiness for the possibility of war with the People’s Republic of China by 2027 and enhancing the Navy’s long-term advantage,” as Franchetti wrote at the time. “We will work towards these ends through two mutually reinforcing ways: implementing Project 33 and expanding the Navy’s contribution to the Joint warfighting ecosystem … By 2027, we will integrate proven robotic and autonomous systems for routine use by the commanders who will employ them.”
The Defense Department seems confident that the Navy’s robotic push will help prepare the US military for the possibility of war with China, but some seasoned military and defense observers have their misgivings. Van Riper points to Marine Corps’ Force Design 2030, a reorganization of the service ahead of a notional island-hopping conflict against China in the Pacific, as evidence that the Pentagon still hasn’t learned the right lessons from Millennium Challenge 2002.
The Marine Corps “was known for being an air-ground combined arms rapid-response deployed around the world,” Van Riper tells WIRED. “Now it has divested itself of every element of combined arms or reduced it, getting rid of its armor, breaching vehicles, mine clearing, and assault bridging capabilities, cutting its infantry and aviation, all to buy missiles and go on the defense in the Pacific. The Marine Corps got rid of existing capabilities in favor of unproven or undelivered capabilities.”
Indeed, the US military’s propensity to fixate on next-generation technology like drone boats as a one-size-fits-all combat solution may obscure those tactical lessons in combined arms evident in the Ukrainian campaign in the Red Sea, Van Riper says.
“You shouldn’t take the use of drones in isolation with what Ukraine is doing,” Van Riper says. “We presented the Navy fleet [in Millennium Challenge 2002] with multiple challenges, which is really what combined arms is. What you’re doing is presenting the enemy with a dilemma: If he tries to protect himself against threat A, he’s vulnerable to threat B, and with threats C, D, and E, he’s unable to handle it. In Ukraine, boats plus missiles and aircraft are more difficult for the Russians to respond to.”
“I’m not sure the US military today is equipped to learn from those things,” he adds. “I’m depressed from the leadership on all levels, particularly the naval services.”