Navy Expands Unmanned Operations to 4th Fleet
U.S. Southern Command’s naval component will follow 5th Fleet into heavy-duty experimentation with drones.
CAITLIN M. KENNEY | APRIL 4, 2023
NAVY DRONES AMERICAS SHOW NEWS
NATIONAL HARBOR, Maryland—Drones are heading to the southern waters of 4th Fleet, which will follow 5th Fleet’s pioneering experiments with unmanned craft in the Middle East, Navy Secretary Carlos Del Toro announced Tuesday at the Navy League’s 2023 Sea-Air-Space Conference.
“The 4th Fleet area of operations provides us with an environment best suited to operationalize the concepts of Task Force 59, that has worked tirelessly to develop to increase our maritime domain awareness or MDA capabilities,” Del Toro said.
Instead of hiving off its drones into a task force, 4th Fleet will integrate them into its command and staff structure, Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Mike Gilday told reporters.
“Intelligence, operations, plans, manpower—so it'll all be integrated in. So we wanted to take a different approach rather than a task force this time, because as I mentioned, we're integrating additional sensors into the battlespace, and we think this is another way to normalize them,” Gilday said.
https://www.defenseone.com/technology/2023/04/navy-expands-unmanned-operations-4th-fleet/384820/
