The world is changing rapidly. Drones are now a primary weapon for military operations across the globe. On 1 June Ukraine used drones to carry out the “Pearl Harbor” of the war against Russia on one of their primary air bases. On 13 June Israel used drones to target Iran’s missile systems. 
 

We are out of time. Our unwavering USNDA mission remains the same: 

To ​Rapidly Enhance the Nation's Effort to Man, Train, and Equip Service Members and Organizations in National Defense, Security, and Safety with Tactics, Techniques, Procedures, Technologies, and Policies required to Compete and Win in the Clear and Present Drone Era

Please read on for critical updates, big wins in Q2, and strategic alliances formed as a result of the USNDA’s activities, with a renewed look ahead at Q3 and Q4.

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SITUATION ​​

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The last Q1 Update Memo identified some of the numerous policy and program barriers preventing the DoD from accelerating drone integration into warfighting formations. 

We conducted multiple listening sessions with the U.S. Army, U.S. Marine Corps, and U.S. Special Operations Command, as the primary stakeholders. In an effort to accelerate change, we targeted three primary lines of effort to update policies and streamline drone experimentation: 

I.  June 3rd - Defense Innovation Unit Summit

The USNDA convened a summit in Washington D.C. at the DIU headquarters, bringing representatives from SOCOM, the U.S. Marine Corps Attack Drone Team, and the U.S. Army Aviation Center of Excellence to engage in direct and detailed policy discussion with policy owners from OSD A&S, DIU’s Autonomy team, and DIU Director Mr. Doug Beck, and AUVSI President Michael Robbins and his policy team. 

The summit was candid, direct, and transparent about past challenges and the clear and present urgency felt by warfighters to gain rapid access to additional drone capabilities. We also briefed the purpose of the USNDA’s partnership with USSOCOM on the DroneWERX White List initiative, designed as a repository of all emerging drone technologies to provide warfighers with direct visibility on evolving capabilities.

The summit resulted in a strong commitment from all parties to work together with renewed sense of urgency, synchronizing efforts to develop more effective programs and streamlined policies. We will announce details of the collaboration between the USNDA and DIU in Q3. 

II.  Office of the Secretary of Defense Engagements 

We continue to work with senior members of OSD to further identify specific and immediate areas of policy reform and governmental efficiency required across the U.S. Government that will streamline drone operations for warfighters. More to follow very soon. 

III.  June 6th Presidential Executive Order: Unleashing American Drone Dominance

For the past two months the USNDA team engaged directly with members of the National Security Commission (NSC) to contribute language to the draft executive order focused on rebalancing the DoD’s obsession with NDAA compliance, with maintaining competitiveness and lethality. We made 7 major recommendations for inclusion in the draft EO under the Section 9: Delivering Drones to Our Warfighters. 

USNDA Recommendation 1: SOCOM be provided with direct authorities to actively and rapidly solve for drone experimentation and acquisition. 
USNDA Recommendation 2: That ALL NDAA-Compliant Systems be immediately onboarded to the Blue List 
USNDA Recommendation 3: That all Blue UAS List systems be allowed to operate on military installations without requiring any further approvals 
USNDA Recommendation 4: That the Blue UAS List be updated on a frequent and ongoing basis. 
USNDA Recommendation 5: While NDAA compliance is critical, and supporting American Drone companies is important to increase domestic industrial base, the #1 priority must be to ensure that warfighters are equipped with capabilities that exceed those of our adversaries, and the former should not impede the latter. 
USNDA Recommendation 6: The DoD MUST advocate for policy changes owned by Departments outside of the DoD, primarily the FAA and FCC, to streamline approvals. 
USNDA Recommendation 7: Training with non-lethal sUAS by itself is not enough. sUAS must be constantly evaluated against emerging cUAS capabilities, and sUAS must be competed against legacy warfighting programs, systems and tactics, in open and objective field competitions, to evaluate which systems should be divested as unacceptably vulnerable or less capable than sUAS. 

ALL of the USNDA’s recommendations were included in the EO.

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