- The US Army is teaching soldiers to attack with drones, a style of warfare the US isn't used to.
- But it's also teaching them that drones aren't always the right weapon.
- "Ultimately, drones are a tool, but there are other tools available," an instructor said.
The US Army's new drone school is teaching students that mastering drone warfare means knowing they're not always the right weapon to use.
The new Unmanned Advanced Lethality Course is designed to teach soldiers how to operate and be lethal with small drones, in an effort to catch up with potential adversaries' power.
Soldiers learn to pilot and attack with drones during the three-week course at Fort Rucker, Alabama, that emphasizes making small drones lethal and using them to support traditional fire missions with artillery. In simulators and with drones, students learn how to spot artillery fire and to repair drones rapidly with 3D printing.
Maj. Rachel Martin, the course director, told Business Insider that it is important to her that soldiers realize "it is a tool with which to accomplish a mission, but it may not be the tool given a certain mission set."
When to use a drone "should be something that you plan out, and it shouldn't be a reactionary tactic." Instead, using a drone requires planning.
That choice is part of the training exercises, where students are taught that "ultimately, drones are a tool, but there are other tools available to them," like .50 caliber machine guns and AT4 anti-tank weapons, Martin said.
Russia's invasion of Ukraine and other current conflicts pushed the US Army to start the course by demonstrating how powerful small drones can be and how they can change the roles of some soldiers.
"The eyes of the world are on the Russo-Ukrainian war and the tactics and equipment that are being utilized in that type of warfare. And in America, that is not a style of warfare that we're accustomed to," Martin said.
Learning from current warfare
Drones are used more in Ukraine than in any other conflict in history, carrying out over 80% of battlefield hits against Russia. Warhead-carrying drones are often used for precision strikes instead of artillery, and are used in many of Ukraine's long-range attacks instead of missiles.
Drones have also reshaped soldiers' roles, taking over much of the reconnaissance that previously required scouts, and allow more soldiers to fire weapons with a range once limited to artillerymen.
Ultimately, with drones, Ukraine is creating battlefield tech and tactics that allies are keen to learn from.
But allies are unlikely to find themselves in the exact same position as Ukraine. Ukraine had little choice but to rely on drones: It lacked factories to produce enough artillery shells to take on Russia's much larger military, and it repeatedly suffered shortages on weapons from allies and restrictions on those weapons' use.
Drones can be produced quickly and for far less than traditional weaponry like missiles, and Ukraine can make them itself rather than relying on allies.
Martin described the Ukrainians as "in a fight for their lives, and they're using what they have available to them because they don't have those layered assets that we are lucky to have in our country."
She said the war may have been very different if Ukraine had the same strengths as the US: "I'd be very interested to see how that war would've shaken out if they had the same military industrial complex that we have currently at the start of their war."
"I think it would've been very different."
Better-provisioned Western militaries, like the US, would likely not need to rely as much on drones as Ukraine has, and are not investing in them as heavily.
And there are warnings that they should actively avoid doing that. Justin Bronk, an air power expert at the UK's Royal United Services Institute, wrote last year that "it would be a mistake" for Western forces to replace their traditional firepower with cheap drone capabilites, saying the West would have far greater potential in deterring Russia by investing in its traditional strengths and filling in gaps there, like high-end air power that can give NATO forces control of the air, something Ukraine has been unable to achieve.
The West is also already far behind this kind of warfare compared to Russia, he said, so "relying too heavily on drones plays into Russia's strengths."
But the West still needs to know how to fight in this kind of war, where surveillance enhances defense of troop positions but jeopardizes forward movement.
Martin, who previously commanded a Gray Eagle drone company, said that while the Army has elite systems, like Apache helicopters and the Abrams tank, those may not always be the right tools to use when drones are involved.
"Those are relevant in certain parts of the battlefield and against certain adversaries, but not necessarily in every part of the battlefield and against all adversaries."
Martin said the outsize power that small drones have shown in Ukraine, like cheap drones destroying weaponry worth millions of dollars, is a reason the US needs to learn this style of warfare.
She said that ultimately, Ukraine has shown "that a small country with a small military and a small amount of money could fight a major superpower like Russia and still survive."
The course was motivated by seeing how, in Ukraine, using drones can be so much cheaper than missiles, and because by using them, "you're not putting human lives in danger."
She said she teaches students about Operation Spiderweb, an attack where Ukraine sneaked more than 100 drones into Russian territory and close to air bases to destroy Russian aircraft, including strategic bombers.
She called it an "eye-opening experience for the world" that showed "a small amount of money could be spent to destroy something at the strategic level that costs upwards of $7 million for Russia, which is already hurting financially for being in a prolonged war."
The Army is investing in drone warfare, with efforts including plans to buy one million drones within the next two to three years.
The course brings in students from across the Army, 28 in its inaugural session, including infantry soldiers, cavalry scouts, and some who already work on flying and repairing drones.
The training is growing. The course, which had its inaugural session in August, plans to introduce more advanced tactics and complex scenarios as it continues, with the aim being that graduates bring back expertise to their units and become trainers themselves.
