Militaries around the world are racing to build deadlier, more cost-effective drones after seeing howunmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs)have transformed the conflict in Ukraine.
However,one land warfare expert believes that, although they play a critical role, they are not "in, and of themselves, the future" and nor are they going to replace soldiers on the battlefield.
Instead, Dr Jack Watling, a Senior Research Fellow for the defence and security think tank Royal United Services Institute (RUSI),is questioning whether the current focus of innovation is in the right place.
Speaking to Forces News, he explained: "People focus on the bit that flies–the bit that flies is very easy to make."
Getting the drone to the right location, extracting gathered data quickly and updating the design and software so that it will work tomorrow, "is a whole different question", he explains.
Dr Watling said: "We need to pay much more attention to what gets drones in the air, what keeps them flying–the pilots, the pilot training.
"How you actually generate them and make sure they end up in the right bit of the battlefield and stay there and that you can exploit what they do."
Drones will no doubt play a critical role in awell-equipped Army of the future and are already vital for being competitivein terms of situational awareness.
Dr Watling said 80% of casualties in Ukraine have been caused by artillery and very often that has been "corrected" by drones, which is what makes them so accurate and responsive.
He said: "The thing that's killing people is the artillery and so it's important that we understand that drones are an enabler.
"They can fulfill some functions that other capabilities can't and they are extremely useful, they improve the situational awareness of your soldiers, but they are not a panacea, they don't fix anything."
There are many factors that influence the scale that you can operate and the number of drones able to get off the ground.
For example, drones are subject to weather conditions, for use at night they require expensive thermal cameras, and are increasingly operating in a congestedelectronic warfare environment.
Dr Watling adds that to properly contextualise drones, "we need to understand how they interact with other capabilities".
"They are not, in, and of themselves, the future.Drones are not going to replace soldiers on the battlefield.
"But if soldiers are not aware of how to use them, if they are not aware of how to respond to an adversary that is using them, then they will be beaten," he added.
Dr Watling has recently launched his new book, The Arms of the Future, which analyses how the emergence of novel weapons systems is shaping the risks and opportunities on the battlefield.
