Ground and Air Launched Drone Swarms Create a Self-Protecting Perimeter Using Autonomous AI

The overall goal of this Direct to Phase II research and development effort is to adapt and validate mature, readily available autonomous unmanned aerial swarm technologies to provide enhanced situational awareness and force-multiplying capabilities for high-value Mobility Air Forces assets and forward ground installations. To ensure continued overmatch in contested environments, mobility aircraft operations can be significantly augmented through the integration of dedicated, attritable platforms capable of providing persistent intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance, while ground forces can leverage rapidly deployable autonomous networks to bolster perimeter defense. The immediate objective of this Phase II effort is to propose methods for and demonstrate the deployment and autonomous operation of a multi-agent swarm from high-altitude mobility launch platforms, while simultaneously demonstrating the swarm's dual-use capability to establish an autonomous monitoring and defense perimeter. A critical research and development component of this phase focuses on proposing and developing secure, encrypted military communication architectures to meet Department of the Air Force operational standards. By focusing this phase strictly on proving the foundational capabilities of high-altitude deployment, secure networking, and autonomous baseline behavior, the project establishes a robust architecture. This approach deliberately avoids prescribing specific end-state payloads, thereby allowing for the flexible, innovative integration of various electronic or advanced sensing effects in subsequent operational phases based on evolving warfighter requirements.

The full objective, description, Phase I, II and III requirements and evaluation criteria are in the official topic on DSIP.