The Navy will place arming its fleet of Fire Scout drones with a modified Hydra rocket, heralding a new era in unmanned combat for the service.
An armed Fire Scout will dramatically cut the Navy's kill chain, or time it takes to identify, track and eventually sink an enemy target, says Jan Van Tol, a naval analyst at the Center For Strategic and Budgetary Assessments. The unmanned drone can take out fleets of small, fast moving boats favored by drug smugglers and pirates with relative ease, Van Tol pointed out. "I see this primarily as useful for [counterterrorism and] counter-piracy, dealing with "swarms" of small boats," he said. The armed Fire Scouts will also free up the Navy's manned helicopters to do other missions, he added.