UK military trial drone swarm technology with European allies

The British military has been trialling drone swarms in Germany. US and Australian troops joined the so-called Army Warfighting Experiment 2026 as part of the AUKUS alliance between the three nations.

On 15 April, the British Army said:

The biggest achievement of AWE26 was building a system that let British, American and Australian drone swarms share information and data with each other instantly.

Intelligence sharing

The army described how a British drone swarm “collects intelligence” which is then shared via a UK computer to “American and Australian servers straight away”:

This kind of instant sharing between allies marks a significant breakthrough which could make a huge difference on a future battlefield.

Artificial intelligence (AI) was central to the project, forming a third of the exercise:

AI needs to be shown thousands of images before it can reliably identify objects on a battlefield and tell the difference between friendly and enemy forces.

Sounds a little haphazard…

The Ukraine war has seen drone warfare advance at a frightening rate. Battlefield developments there also shaped the allied exercise:

The war in Ukraine is proving enemies have become skilled at blocking the signals between drones and their pilots. AI-powered swarms can help get around this problem — the more data that has been fed in, the greater the accuracy and efficiency the swarm will have at identifying objects.

The precise AI system being used by the British Army was not identified in the army’s publication.

Which AI system is in use?

Commenting on the use of uncrewed systems as a force multiplier in May 2025, UK defence secretary John Healey said:

In five years’ time, AI will have had a massive impact in the military and in the battlefield. We can see this already in Ukraine, just like in every other walk of life.

We have to do a great deal more in defence to get on top and then get ahead and at the cutting edge of this. I want to put the UK military on the leading edge of innovation in Nato on AI.

As Action on Armed Violence (AOAV) points out the current UK government has leant into AI on an unheralded scale — including with a massive budget:

To make good on that promise, the Treasury earmarked £4bn in the Spending Review, explicitly for autonomy. Britain’s defence establishment has long spoken of modernisation, but it has been made unequivocally clear that code, not just iron and steel, would lie at the heart of its future military strength.

In 2022, two AI platforms were put forward for tender. AOAV said:

Two platforms of unmanned aerial systems (UAS) were put forward: one developed by Atlas, the other by Elbit, an Israeli defence company with extensive experience of drones honed in the hellscape of Gaza.

Adding:

Elbit’s system stole the limelight.

AI is being used to marshal UK drone swarms. Who’s AI is unclear… But the overall all implications are concerning. Both the brutal battlefields of Ukraine and Israel’s genocide are shaping drone swarm technology and tactics. And sooner or later those methods will start to turn up closer to home.

Featured image via the Royal Navy

By Joe Glenton

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