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March 31, 2025 - Epoch Times
34:38
Pentagon's 'Replicator Program' to Pump out MILLIONS of Flying Killer Drones
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The war between Russia and Ukraine has undeniably taught all of us something important in regards to modern warfare.
It specifically taught us that the advent of drones and drone technologies in general has really changed the way that two forces do battle on the ground.
I mean, over the last two plus years, if you're anything like me, I'm sure you've come across too many first-person perspective videos of Ukrainian drones Killing Russian soldiers.
There are hundreds, maybe even thousands of these videos floating around online, and there's even a subreddit devoted almost entirely to them.
And these videos, they depict several different types of drones.
Some drones fly up very high in the air, and then they drop grenades on the soldiers who are at ground level.
Other drones, they're more like kamikazes.
They find the enemy combatants, they track them, They fly directly at them, they self-destruct, explode, and then kill or maim anyone within a 5 to 10 foot radius.
And these drones are vicious.
They have completely changed the ground game.
People used to compare the Ukraine-Russia war to the trench warfare of World War I and or World War II.
But really these drones have made it completely different.
The drones are cheap, they're easy to produce, they're hard to hit, they can be controlled from miles away, they're ultra-precise, And as soon as one of them is exploded or used up or destroyed, it's just automatically replaced by another drone that gets fielded within a matter of minutes.
It's truly an asymmetric, game-changing technology.
Now, as a response, the Russians have begun to drill their soldiers on anti-drone tactics, as well as they've developed jamming software to make the drones unusable.
But it's Literally an arms race.
So for every piece of jamming technology on the Russian side, the Ukrainians are figuring out a workaround.
Including, I should mention, just through sheer volume.
In fact, Zelensky to that end recently came out and he said that after two years of war, Ukraine can now produce upwards of 4 million drones per year.
And you can be absolutely certain How do you see warfare transforming in the future?
I mean, the biggest effect, I think, by far is AI and drones.
So, the next, well in fact, the current war in Ukraine is very much a drone war already.
It's sort of a contest between Russia and China to see who can deploy the most number of drones.
Now, if there's a major power war, it's very much going to be a drone war.
It's going to be drones and AI.
And just for a visual of the type of dystopian future Elon is describing there, take a look at this viral video here that came out of China recently.
It shows a drone and a robot dog launching fireworks at each other in simulation of real bullets.
That video, it's basically a demonstration of what the future of warfare could possibly look like if What Elon says is correct, where you have robots and unmanned aerial vehicles, both of which aren't even controlled by humans anymore, but instead by AI technology, acting as a frontline fighting force.
Now, the risk is obvious.
Turning the world into some sort of Skynet, Terminator universe style dystopia, where robots powered by AIs chase down humans on a large scale.
But the benefits of the technology is also obvious, as limiting the number of real-life human troops who are being placed in harm's way could benefit a country militarily.
Also, realistically, since the genie is already out of the bottle, the only real question becomes who can produce the most and the best drones?
Here's Elon again during that Q&A session over at West Point discussing exactly that.
The United States is strong in terms of technology of the items, but the production rate is low.
So it's a small number of units, relatively speaking.
But basically, I think there's a production rate issue.
Like, how fast can you make drones?
If you say there's a drone conflict, the outcome of that drone conflict will be how many drones does each side have in that particular skirmish times the kill ratio.
So if you've got Do you think our industrial base can scale to make the volume of drones that you're talking about?
I think that's going to be the biggest challenge.
It can spale, but it is not currently spaling.
And exactly for the reason that Elon mentioned in that interview, an arms race has been waging for years now between the U.S. and China to develop the best next-generation drones.
In China, this manifested in a certain way, and we'll get to that later, but here in the U.S., this drone development war, it coalesced into something that the Pentagon called the Replicator Program.
Let me briefly break down for you the history of how this US government program came to be.
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Now, Rewinding the clock back five years to January of 2021, specifically on January 18th of 2021, just two days before Joe Biden was sworn into office, President Trump issued an executive order.
It was one of the last executive orders issued during his first term in office.
And that executive order was titled, Protecting the United States from Certain Unmanned Aircraft Systems.
It was a fairly sweeping executive order that did several things.
It, for one, acknowledged the role that drones play in national security.
Secondly, it warned about the possibility that data collected from these drones can be sensitive in nature, and if that data were to fall into the hands of an adversarial government, it could be damaging to the U.S. national security.
And thirdly, therefore, it ordered the removal of Chinese-made drones from the U.S. military arsenal.
Here's specifically what it said in part.
It is the policy of the United States, therefore, to prevent the use of taxpayer dollars to procure unmanned aircraft systems that present unacceptable risks and are manufactured by, or contain software or critical electronic components from, foreign adversaries, and to encourage the use of domestically produced unmanned aircraft systems.
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Trump's executive order then went on to, for one, restrict the use of drones over critical infrastructure in the U.S., and then also concluded by stating that the replacement of any compromised drones should be placed as a priority when the government is working on their budget.
Now, two days after this executive order was published, Joe Biden took office.
And despite the fact that Biden revoked dozens of Trump's executive orders, very notably, he did not revoke this one regarding drones.
Likely because both of these two administrations, they understood the importance of keeping up with China in this particular domain.
Furthermore, the Pentagon, under the Biden administration, they launched something in August of 2023 known as the replicator program.
to advance drone manufacturing even further domestically.
Now, the Replicator Program is a Pentagon initiative which is looking to streamline ways to cheaply produce large quantities of drones to be used by the U.S.
military To counter China if there's ever a kinetic war, likely in Taiwan.
Essentially, the Replicator program takes the idea that Elon Musk was espousing, the idea that future wars will just be decided by who has the largest swarm of drones, and it aims to make sure that America not only has the largest swarm of drones, but also that those drones have the best AI.
The Replicator program is basically an initiative to streamline production and just to Pump out as many units as possible to just copy and paste something very, very small, but very effective tens of thousands, or maybe even tens of millions of times.
I mean, realistically, if Ukraine is able to produce 4 million drones a year to fight against Russia, it's not outside the realm of possibility that a war between the US and China could involve tens or maybe even hundreds of millions of drones.
And so the question simply becomes, how does the US produce tens of millions of drones?
Well, In 2023, the then Defense Secretary, Ms. Kathleen Hicks, she first announced the initial iteration of the Replicator program in the following speech.
Replicator is meant to help us overcome the PRC's biggest advantage, which is mass.
More ships, more missiles, more people.
We've set a big goal for Replicator.
To field a treatable autonomous systems at scale of multiple thousands in multiple domains within the next 18 to 24 months.
As she explained it, the initial goal of the replicator program would be to field thousands of drones while at the same time the longer term goal would be to hone a process to do it all over again On different tech in the future.
Essentially, what she is describing is the US seeking to streamline its defense industry similar to what they did in World War II, where they were able to just crank out anything and everything needed for warfighting.
And along that line, in March of 2024, Ms. Kathleen Hicks spoke again, this time at the American Dynamism Summit, where she expounded on the urgent need for the defense industry to modernize ASAP.
Take a listen.
It's about showing ourselves and our adversaries that DoD can move fast to shape the battlespace and equip our warfighters with what they need.
We've put our heads down, worked with Congress, with the commercial sector, and across DoD to deliver.
And today, we are on track to meet Replicators' goals.
To go from start to fielding inside the two-year cycle is not normal.
It's disruptive.
But we plan to make it normal, because more speed is essential.
This is not the Cold War, nor the post-Cold War era.
With the PRC, we are in a persistent generational competition for advantage, and we have to double down, with urgency and confidence.
Now, the same month that she gave that speech, Ms. Kathleen Hicks also spoke at a Pentagon briefing, wherein she finally gave the public a price tag.
She said that the replicator initiative will cause the US taxpayers roughly $1 billion in its first two years.
Now, it's worth mentioning that the Pentagon's overall budget is $800 billion a year, and so this really is a drop in the bucket.
But, since drones are small and cheap, $1 billion will get you a lot of drones.
And in terms of which specific models of drone they're going to be starting out with, about two months after mentioning the $1 billion price tag, Ms. Kathleen Hicks finally released a statement with the names of some of the systems that the Pentagon selected for the first leg of the replicator program.
Here's specifically what she said, quote, In the air domain, the Department will accelerate fielding of the Switchblade 600.
U.S.-supplied Switchblade drones have already demonstrated their utility in Ukraine, and this system will provide additional capability to U.S. forces.
Now, AeroVirement, which is the company manufacturing these switchblade drones, they have a video over on their website which simulates how this technology would work in practice.
Here's a short snippet from that video.
from that video.
Here's a short snippet from that video.
And I will note that in the announcement that came out of the Pentagon, they mentioned that certain capabilities were contracted, but those capabilities must remain classified.
And so apparently that video that we just watched was not all of it.
The Switchblade 600 brand drones can do something else, just something that we're not supposed to know about.
Regardless, though, this announcement from the Pentagon was just the beginning.
As Admiral Christopher Grady reminded us, quote, This is just the beginning.
Replicator is helping us jumpstart the delivery of critical capabilities at scale.
We will build on that momentum with industry partners to deliver what the warfighter needs and remove barriers to doing so again and again.
That statement by the way was from Admiral Christopher Grady in his official capacity as the Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
And indeed, Just six months later, Ms. Kathleen Hicks came out once again and she announced that the second tranche of the Replicator program includes additional platforms along with integrated software enablers, that's her words, which will enhance the autonomy and resilience of other Replicator systems.
In other words, the second batch includes a heavy emphasis on AI systems.
And so, With the Replicator program, they are working to scale up production on millions of physical drones alongside an AI component, an AI platform that they can all plug into.
The announcement from Hicks went on to say that the contracts they have already been awarded to more than 30 hardware and software companies, of which, she made a special point to mention, 75% were non-traditional defense contractors, with many of those being Silicon Valley startups.
Here's an example.
Quote, included in Replicator 1 Tranche 2 is the Army's company-level small unmanned aircraft systems effort, which has selected the Anduril Industries Ghost X and the And so, with this announcement, The replicator program as a whole now officially had three models that they were working to scale up.
You had the Switchblade 600, the Anduril Ghost X, as well as the Performance DroneWorks C100.
And actually there was a fourth drone as well, the Marines, they opted to select Anduril's Altia 600 model.
It's similar but has slight differences than the others.
The others were selected by the army.
Also, citing what was happening in Ukraine, the Pentagon, they mentioned This as a part of their statement regarding these procurements quote Ukraine has demonstrated the value of small attritable drones on the battlefield the delivery of commercially available company-level small UAS which is unmanned aerial systems with support from the replicator initiative will allow American soldiers to rapidly experiment learn and innovate with these systems the advancement of battlefield technology requires us to innovate faster than
ever before And indeed, just as this statement sort of alludes to, Anduril's Ghost-X, it actually made its combat debut in Ukraine, where it proved itself to be very effective.
It flies almost completely in silence.
It has a deadly payload worth of explosives on board.
It has a flight time of roughly 75 minutes, a range of over 15 miles.
It can carry payloads up to 20 pounds, and it's easily transportable.
It only weighs around 55 pounds itself.
Furthermore, if a need arises, the drone can actually work autonomously.
It has an onboard computer that can run an algorithm to detect, classify, and track objects of interest while at the same time navigating both terrain as well as airspace intelligently.
Then there is the Performance DroneWorks C100, which is an even smaller drone platform.
It only weighs 21 pounds, making it both faster and more maneuverable than the Ghost X, but it's still very capable.
It can carry upwards of 10 pounds of payload, as well as it has an onboard AI that can identify, track, and engage targets.
And interestingly, the C100 is also marketed as a Public safety asset because instead of dropping bombs, it can also drop first aid kits to someone either in the battlefield or someone lost in the woods or high up in the mountains.
And so basically, it's a dual use drone.
And also, just like with the first announcement, the second announcement that came out of the Pentagon, it also mentioned that additional systems have been procured by the government, but those systems remain classified.
And so there is a lot that we just don't know about.
But What we do know regarding the AI component is that this second announcement states that the Pentagon is currently in the process of acquiring what they call integrated software enablers.
The department's autonomy efforts, including Replicator, are also leveraging resilient decision-making architectures for collaborative autonomy teaming, or integrated enablers, capable of coordinating hundreds or thousands of unmanned assets in a secure, shared environment.
These integrated enablers are enhancing the ability of Replicator systems to operate and collaborate autonomously and to remain resilient in the face of jamming and other countermeasures.
Plain English, it means that they're contracting out AI drone swarming technology that can act as like a hive mind and control thousands of drones in one coordinated effort.
What could go wrong?
Regardless though, in terms of who will be running these drone swarm AIs, well, on November 20th of 2024, the Defense Innovation Unit with the Pentagon, they finally announced several contracts that they've awarded to software developers In support of this replicator initiative, three companies that were mentioned are as follows.
You have Swarm Aero, which is a great name for this type of company, Anduril Industries, as well as L3 Harris Technologies.
these three companies were given contracts to produce this hive mind drone swarm AI.
These are different from the earlier drones that we discussed, which were heavier and they had specific use tasks.
For the drone swarms, it's basically a combination of AI and just sheer volume of extremely lightweight drones.
Basically, like a swarm of drone bees flying over an area.
And alongside the contract announcement, the Pentagon added in their statement that, quote, While Replicator's priority is rapidly delivering capabilities for forces in U.S. Indo-Pacific Command, the solutions it will deliver are intended to scale across the entire joint force in the future.
Meaning that these drone swarms are eventually set to be utilized ubiquitously across the U.S. military in the future, not just in China.
Now, one of the companies that received this government AI contract was called Swarm Arrow.
They are a tech startup based out of California focused on developing technology for creating and controlling large drone swarms.
Basically, it's a tailor-made company for this replicator program.
If you look over on their website, it's surprisingly vague in terms of the services that they offer, other than that they create systems capable of meshing unmanned land, sea, and aerial vehicles into one controllable fighting force.
However, Their news section does link to an open letter that was penned by their founder and CEO, Mr. Danny Goodman, in which he surmises that next-generation intelligence systems are the future of America's defensive capabilities.
Thanks for watching!
the military is looking at acquiring thousands of low-cost, uncrewed vehicles that carry out human-directed tasks coordinated by AI systems.
AI systems could execute human-directed tasks with greater precision and finesse than humans could achieve alone.
Think thousands of small weapons-carrying aircraft swarming the sky and hundreds of submersibles churning the depth of the sea, all of them equipped with sensors that provide a That is a dystopianly beautiful picture.
He continues...
Our existing ships and aircraft carriers in the South China Sea, for instance, are within range of China's long-range missiles.
Sending them closer only makes them more vulnerable.
But swarms of thousands of long-range, unmanned vehicles can introduce the fog of war to the aerial battlefield, overwhelming detection and air defense systems, and allowing our most valuable assets to enter the fray.
To that end, in March of 2024, Swarm Aero selected a manufacturing site in Northwest Arkansas for its advanced high-volume manufacturing of drones.
Another one of the companies that received that phat AI swarming contract was Anduril Industries.
Aside from the two models from Anduril that we already discussed, And the Real Industries also offers a compact drone that's likely the candidate that's being developed for this AI swarming purpose.
It's only 12 pounds and they have a marketing video that demonstrates its lethality.
Take a look.
Take a look.
look.
And just like Swarm Arrow, it appears that Anduril is also ramping up production.
Not too long ago, they announced that they're building a new $1 billion, 5 million square foot facility over in Ohio to manufacture not only these drones en masse, but also they're working on a line of autonomous fighter jets as well as cruise missiles that they claim should begin production within the next few years.
Anduril's CEO, Mr. Palmer Luckey, who by the way, just as an aside, Their CEO happens to also be the founder of Oculus, the VR headset company.
And he recently gave an interview to Bloomberg on some of the timeline pressures that the company is under.
And take a look at what he said.
Like I said earlier, we don't have time for business as usual.
Right now, people are predicting that there's going to be a window of opportunity for Xi in China that opens in 2027.
That means that you necessarily need to be ready for a potential great power conflict with China in 2027, and for at least a few years after that.
So we have to, right?
There's no other option.
The whole point here, the reason we raised that $1.5 billion round, the reason that we've been accelerating this process, the reason that we're investing in building this factory ahead of the customer actually paying us to do it is because we believe in that timeline, because we have to believe in it.
It is critical that we hit it, and I think we will.
Also, in that very same interview, he gave his take on how the U.S. really needs to shift its mindset when it comes to defense manufacturing in order to actually be prepared for a future conflict.
Take a listen.
For us to build a national security apparatus, we need to move quickly.
We need to take targeted risks.
We need to get more companies into defense manufacturing.
That includes companies that are not currently defense companies.
Getting Big tech in, getting little tech in, getting a lot of our industrial providers in.
That is how we won World War II.
It was leveraging the whole of the nation.
I think that that's the only way that we're going to win in the future as well.
And I think the people who are being brought in have exactly that mindset.
We need to spend less, do more, and do it with the right things.
Then, the third company to receive the AI drone swarming contract was L3Harris Technologies.
Over on their website, as you can see, they advertise a new software called Amorphis that they've built which, quote, I guess that would make them something like the Microsoft of AI drone swarm
technology. And so that is where the Replicator program is currently at.
They have allocated at least $1 billion over two years.
They've selected four large drone manufacturers as well as several AI technology vendors to begin building up an infrastructure which will, in the future, allow the U.S. to scale up its drone production as fast as possible, as soon as necessary.
But the concern is that, no matter what, the U.S. is still moving too slowly.
To that end, you had a report that came out last month from the Defense Innovation Board.
For your reference, the Defense Innovation Board, it was an advisory board that was set up back in 2016 to provide independent recommendations to the Pentagon on the future of warfare, specifically the future of warfare in regards to technology.
And the report that they released in January of 2025 was titled, A Pathway to Scaling Unmanned Weapons Systems.
The report, it really expressed the urgency of the situation quite succinctly, quote, Failure to act will leave warfighters unprepared and poorly equipped for future conflicts, endangering the lives of Americans and our allies.
In a potential large-scale conflict, the widespread development of unmanned aerial vehicles, whether by joint force or our adversaries, is an inevitability that demands immediate action.
Waiting until we are confronted with footage of American service members falling victim to enemy first-person view drones is not an option.
We must act now, with the urgency.
The report then goes on to highlight the urgency with which the Pentagon should provide U.S. service members with these drone capabilities ASAP.
The report says that if nothing else, the Ukraine war has really shown us that having drone superiority is perhaps the decisive edge in battle and therefore U.S. service members should be given these systems ASAP so that they can familiarize themselves with them now ahead of any war that might break out in the future.
The report also makes a serious point to acknowledge that currently, China absolutely dominates the manufacturing supply chain of drones on a global scale, and that in order to compete, the US needs to cut through miles of bureaucratic red tape.
And indeed, the US does have a really long road to travel if it hopes to be competitive with China in terms of drone swarms.
One reason, as highlighted by this report, is because China is already dominant in the commercial drone market.
Not the military drone market, but the commercial drone market.
For instance, Dajiang Innovations, most commonly known as DJI, is the world's largest drone manufacturing company worldwide, already controlling roughly 70% of the global commercial drone market and about 80% of the US drone market.
Furthermore, besides just the manufacturing component, The Chinese have been developing their internal drone talent as well.
As just one example of that, here is a recent world record that was set in September of 2024.
Thank you.
They look beautiful and innocuous until of course they come swarming at you on the battlefield.
All jokes aside though, it is getting serious.
You see, another reason, besides the talent and the manufacturing base that the US should be concerned about China, is that China is much more open about leaning into the idea of using drones in the future of warfare.
To that end, They recently revealed their latest drone tech at an airshow last November.
November of 2024.
And among the things that were on display was a G-Tank heavily unmanned aerial vehicle that can not only carry missiles and bombs, but also it can carry smaller drones as well.
This capability earned it the nickname Swarm Carrier.
According to the models that were shown at the airshow, that vehicle can house upwards of 6 tons worth of smaller drones.
Imagine several G-tanks in a formation flying across a long distance to a combat area and releasing a drone swarm.
The drone swarm, incorporated with China's latest AI technologies, could achieve highly effective combat outcomes.
And then furthermore, there was an article published in a publication called World Air News that summarized quite well what the US is up against when it comes to China and these drone swarms that they're developing.
For military analysts and defense contractors attending the show, Zhuhai 2024 offers a crystal clear message.
China is not just keeping pace in the realm of drone warfare, it's positioning itself at the forefront of an emerging era in which drones, both in the air and at sea, will be pivotal.
And so that is where we're currently at.
As horrible as it sounds, technology has now gotten to the point where the great superpowers are developing these mass autonomous flying killing robots.
And the reality is that we can't not develop ours because the other side is developing theirs.
If you'd like to read more about either the US replicator program or about the corollary program over in China, I'll throw the links to my research notes.
You can find them down in the description box below this video.
And lastly, on an extremely negative note, I mean, I don't know how else to say it.
I guess the only hope we have is that the U.S. develops our replicator program to such an extent that we can beat the pants off of any other country.
But just having that technology is just so frightening.
I mean, I can't even imagine that type of a thing.
In that interview I played earlier with Elon Musk over at West Point, The one solution he mentioned, it was kind of almost comical, but I guess it would be a real solution, would be if you're in this kind of battlefield scenario, you could set off an EMP device, Electromagnetic Pulse Weapon Device.
It's basically like a nuclear weapon set off in space and it acts to clear away all magnetic fields and all electromagnetic fields so that all electronics basically stop working in a given area.
And then, if that were to happen, then you basically just have to rely on analog weapons.
The good old AK-47, analog airplanes if you have them, things like that.
But then you introduce this other specter, which is thermal nuclear weapons being detonated in space in order to achieve this EMP weapon type of attack, and that's like an even maybe worse scenario, because then you're introducing nuclear weapons into the fold.
I mean, basically, I don't know.
It's not looking great.
Technology has gotten to a point where World War III will not look good if it's ever fought.
I hope it never happens, but at the very least, this is what's being developed on the U.S. side.
You have the Replicator program.
If you'd like to read more about it, it's in the description box below.
The only thing I ask in return is that you smash those like and subscribe buttons so that before all this goes down, we hopefully reach 2 million subscribers.
That's the goal.
Until next time, I'm your host Roman from the Epic Times.
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