As part of the Pegasus Charge 3 series of exercises, which included demonstrations of various autonomous technologies that could potentially benefit the U.S. military, the U.S. Army tested the integration of unmanned ground vehicles (UGVs) with the M2A4 Bradley infantry fighting vehicle.
The concept could provide a new way to deploy groups of robotic systems on the battlefield.
Read more: Ukraine's Largest UGV Now Carries 1.5 Tons, but How Survivable Is It in Combat?
According to The Drone Front, the systems involved were FireAnt UGVs developed by Swarmbotics AI. The company recently released footage from the exercise showing an M2A4 Bradley carrying five FireAnt robotic platforms at once.
The UGVs were mounted vertically along the Bradley's left side. This immediately raises questions about their survivability in an actual combat environment.
Such an arrangement could leave all five robotic systems highly exposed to FPV drone attacks. A single strike, or a burst of fragmentation from an impact, could potentially damage several or even all of the UGVs mounted on the vehicle.
It is also unclear whether the Bradley is intended simply to transport the UGVs to their deployment area, where soldiers would remove them manually, or whether the concept could eventually allow the vehicle to deploy the robots autonomously at designated locations.
Either way, the demonstration is an interesting example of how militaries are experimenting with combinations of unmanned and crewed platforms.
At the same time, integrating drones and robotic systems with armored vehicles is hardly a new concept.
Back in 2020, Defense Express reported on various attempts to integrate unmanned systems with armored vehicles, effectively giving crews an extended set of "eyes" beyond the vehicle itself.
One particularly interesting solution involved mounting a launcher for Black Hornet 3 nano-UAVs, allowing the crew to deploy a small reconnaissance drone whenever needed.
More recently, Defense Express reported on Finland's experiment with converting a Patria AMV into a UGV, similar to Ukraine's use of BRDM-2 vehicles as remotely operated platforms, with the vehicle being controlled from a distance of approximately 7,800 km.
Read more: Germany Begins Patria 6x6 Localization, with Service Entry Set for 2027
