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Australian soldiers standing on rocky, mountainous terrain operate an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle, or drone, as part of the 'Hyper-Teaming' experiment at Project Convergence Capstone 5, at Fort Irwin, California.

Drone Swarms and their Potential within the Australian Defence Force

The onset of the war in Ukraine saw one of the most dramatic shifts in combined arms warfare since the introduction of the machine gun. This shift is attributed to the wide scale introduction of drones to the modern battlefield (Kagan et al, 2024). Principally the conflict is demonstrating drones pioneering new capabilities in reconnaissance, close air support and strategic strike with virtually zero risk to the operator.

SAASS Paper: Royal Australian Air Force 2025: A New Organizational Structure to Optimize Combat Effectiveness in an Era of Great Power Competition

The current RAAF organizational structure is top-heavy, unbalanced and too compartmentalized. This results in stove piped training, which inhibits high-end, networked and integrated joint collective training.

By

David Earl Borg, OAM