Attack of the drones

Defence Secretary announces hi-tech war equipment drive

BRITAIN is in a “very real race” with its enemies for technological advantage on the battlefield, the Defence Secretary has warned.

Ex-soldier Ben Wallace yesterday unveiled a Ministry of Defence drive to help beat future enemies with hi-tech manned and unmanned weaponry.

It included hand-sized spy drones, mothership tanks that control other unmanned vehicles and small, driverless all-terrain buggies.

Announcing the Science and Technology Strategy on Salisbury Plain, Mr

Wallace explained new inventions are needed. It comes amid growing aggression from Russia, China and Iran – with a huge “integrated review” military overhaul expected in November.

Mr Wallace said: “We are in a very real race with our adversaries for technological advantage.

“Proliferation of new technologies demands our science and technologies to be threat-driven and better aligned to our future needs.

“What we do today will l ay the groundwork for the decades to come.”

The drive was about “converting scientific and technological genius into defence capability ”, he said . “Not replacing those humans, but supporting and supplementing them to ensure we retain our winning edge.”

Mr Wallace was speaking after the Army demonstrated a new Android Team Awareness Kit which allows troops to see the position of other soldiers, helping to avoid friendly fire.

The mobile phone-style device, which is positioned on a soldier’s chest, links to Nano BUG drones and unmanned X2 armoured vehicles fitted with cameras acting as “extendable eyes”.

Mr Wallace added: “To succeed, we’re going to have to tap into our brightest

FORCE MUTT unmanned vehicle

brains across defence industry, academia and the whole of society.

“We’re going to have to bridge the valley of death, between science and technology research, production, scaling and commercialisation.

“We’re going to have to make smarter choices about how we invest taxpayers’ money, take greater science and technology risk where we do spend that money, aligned to our needs.”

The technology will be tested on Salisbury Plain this week as part of the Army Warfighting Experiment.

STATE OF THE ART Left to Right: A soldier holding a Bug Nano drone unit alongside X2, Mission Master, Viking and MUTT unmanned ground vehicles and an Athena Armoured Vehicle on Salisbury Plain yesterday TAKE OFF A soldier launches a Nano BUG drone unit yesterday