US Army Eyes Drone Boats for Pacific Supply Routes

The US Army wants to buy drone boats to move supplies and equipment across the Pacific, a response to a fleet that is too small for the distances involved.

The service has a limited number of crewed watercraft. Autonomous vessels could supplement those ships, handling routine transport runs while crewed boats focus on missions that need human judgment. The Pacific theater, with its long supply lines and scattered island bases, makes the math worse for a small fleet.

An Army official said the service is exploring unmanned surface vessels as a way to stretch its logistics capacity without building more crewed ships, which take years to design and crew. Drone boats can run on existing navigation and communications gear, and they do not need berthing for a crew, which cuts operating costs.

The Army has tested smaller autonomous craft in recent exercises. The new push is for larger vessels that can carry the same loads as the service's current supply boats – fuel, ammunition, vehicles – but without a crew on board. That changes the risk calculation for resupply runs near contested areas.

A crewed supply ship that takes fire loses sailors. A drone boat that takes fire loses hardware. The Army is betting that tradeoff makes sense for the Pacific, where China's anti-access weapons put any surface vessel at risk.

The service has not released a timeline or a budget for the program. The first step is a request for information to industry, due later this year, to see what is available off the shelf and what would need development.