News·Sep 20, 2026
Army's Latest Combat Exercise Leaned Heavily on Disposable Drones
Roughly half of the nearly 2,000 drones used in a recent training exercise were built to be used up like ammunition.
The US Army used close to 2,000 attack drones during a recent combat exercise, and about half of them were designed to be expendable, according to Business Insider. The approach treats low-cost drones more like ammunition than reusable equipment.
At the Saber Junction exercise in Germany, soldiers used approximately 1,900 autonomous systems, with Brig. Gen. Terry Tillis, head of the 7th Army Training Command, saying roughly 1,000 of the drones used were consumable.
Maj. Gen. Christopher Norrie, acting commander of US Army Europe and Africa, told reporters those numbers are expected to keep climbing in future exercises, Business Insider reports.
The shift reflects lessons drawn from the war in Ukraine, where large volumes of cheap, expendable drones have proven valuable on the battlefield. The Army has been working to get tens of thousands of such systems to soldiers through its Drone Dominance Program.
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