Overview
- Vice Adm. Brendan McLane said a medium unmanned surface vessel will sail with the Theodore Roosevelt carrier strike group later this year to evaluate the pairing.
- The Navy plans to trial new combinations with each strike group, including potential use of small USVs such as GARC operating with Independence-class littoral combat ships for reconnaissance and recovery drills.
- The experiments put into practice Adm. Daryl Caudle's newly published U.S. Navy Fighting Instructions, which institutionalize a tailored-force initiative and a hedge strategy centered on unmanned capabilities.
- Caudle has argued that some tasks do not require a carrier strike group, pointing to Caribbean interdiction and merchant-shipping monitoring suited to littoral combat ships, Navy helicopters, and Coast Guard coordination.
- Operational lessons from 2023 destroyer swaps into the Gerald R. Ford group and the proliferation of low-cost drones inform the push to accept calculated risk and speed decision-making.