Defense & Combat
Military drone news from UASFeed — UAS programs, battlefield lessons from Ukraine and beyond, loitering munitions, and how uncrewed systems are changing combat.
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Defense & Combat
Army Awards Elroy Air $46M to Advance Chaparral Heavy-Lift Cargo Drone
The Army awarded Elroy Air a $46 million Phase III SBIR contract to add GPS-denied navigation, encrypted comms and expeditionary planning tools to its runway-independent Chaparral cargo drone.
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Defense & Combat
Rheinmetall Fires Its FV-014 Loitering Munition From a Moving Truck-Mounted Container for the First Time
Rheinmetall launched its FV-014 loitering munition from a containerized launcher mounted on a moving HX truck for the first time, at a DLR test site in Germany last month.
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Defense & Combat
Navy's Next-Gen Carrier Drone Concepts Deadline Closes as Air Wing of the Future Takes Shape
The Navy's sources-sought window for a next-gen family of carrier-based UAS closed August 13, 2026, seeking strike-to-refueling drones with 1,000nm range and autonomous carrier operations to join MQ-25A and CCA in the future air wing.
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Defense & Combat
Neros Triples to $2.5B Valuation on FPV Attack-Drone Demand
Neros raised $250M at a $2.5B valuation as it races to scale Archer FPV attack-drone production toward 1 million units a year, backed by a $500M Army IDIQ.
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Defense & Combat
Ukraine's Deepest Drone Strike Yet Hits Tatarstan's TANECO Refinery
A long-range Ukrainian drone strike on the TANECO refinery in Tatarstan — nearly 800km from Moscow — killed at least 13 people and extended Kyiv's campaign against Russian fuel production into the country's deep interior.
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Defense & Combat
Cutting Out the Ground Station: P-8 Crews Task MQ-4C Triton Drones Directly in First Automated Navy MUM-T Demo
In a Boeing/Northrop Grumman demo, a P-8A Poseidon crew tasked an MQ-4C Triton via machine-readable UCI messages — the drone planned its own transit, worked its sensors, processed data with AI and reported back over satellite relay, no ground control station required.
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Defense & Combat
Jane's: Ukraine's Frontline Troops Are Downing FPV Kamikaze Drones With 12-Gauge Shotgun Rounds
A Jane's special report details how ammunition makers like Fiocchi are engineering tungsten-shot and fuzed 12-gauge cartridges as a last-ditch, close-range defense against FPV kamikaze drones that give soldiers as little as one second to react.
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Defense & Combat
Shotguns Go to War Against FPV Drones as Ammo Makers Race to Arm Dismounted Troops
A new Janes special report details how ammunition makers are fielding tungsten-shot 12-gauge rounds and other counter-UAV cartridges as militaries scramble to give infantry a fighting chance against kamikaze FPV drones.
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Defense & Combat
China's Ground Force Quietly Fields Its First Armed Reconnaissance Drone, the KVD002
Janes reports China's PLA Ground Force has operationalized the CASC-built KVD002 unmanned combat aircraft, with state media footage showing 13 airframes and a live-fire strike on a naval target.
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Defense & Combat
F-Drones' Ukrainian F10 Quadcopter Enters US Service Under Pentagon's Drone Dominance Program
Ukrainian manufacturer F-Drones delivered the first 2,000 F10 FPV strike quadcopters to US forces on July 31, becoming the first Ukrainian drone cleared for export to the US under the Pentagon's $1 billion Drone Dominance Program.
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Defense & Combat
Russia Pairs Jet-Powered Shaheds With Parodiya Radar Decoys in 80-Drone Barrage on Ukraine
Russia's overnight July 28-29 raid mixed jet-powered Shaheds with warhead-free Parodiya decoys to saturate Ukrainian radar and drain interceptor drones, even as defenders still downed 81% of the 80-UAV package.
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Defense & Combat
New Zealand Moves on Two Fronts: Loitering Munitions and Long-Range Maritime Surveillance Drones
In the same week, New Zealand's defence ministry announced plans to buy loitering munitions and opened market research for a 1,400nm, six-hour endurance uncrewed maritime patrol aircraft covering the South West Pacific.
