U.S. Air Force Expands Order Plans For Autonomous Fighter Prototypes

The U.S. Air Force plans to add more orders for the first batch of Collaborative Combat Aircraft (CCA) prototypes to equip a newly established experimental operations unit, acquisition chief Andrew Hunter said on Nov. 13.

The additional orders come after the Air Force selected Anduril and General Atomics Aeronautical Systems Inc. (GA-ASI) for CCA Increment 1 prototypes in April.

“One thing that I recently did was approve some additional CCA purchases to equip the experimental operations unit in order to enable that experimentation to happen using real assets,” Hunter said at the DefenseOne State of Defense Business event.

Hunter declined to disclose quantities or prices for the orders, citing Air Force security rules.

First flight for both prototypes remains scheduled in 2025, Hunter added.

“The additional buy for the Air Force helps ensure that warfighters will have ample opportunity for experimentation to support operational fielding before the end of the decade,” said Diem Salmon, Anduril’s vice president for Air Dominance & Strike.

GA-ASI spokesman Mark Brinkley said he could not comment on the planned orders for the experimental operations unit, but explained the significance of the unit to the future of the CCA program.

“There is so much more to integrating CCAs into the fight than simply building the aircraft,” Brinkley said. “We also have to build trust, build doctrine, build tactics, techniques and procedures.”

“So the Experimental Operations Unit offers a great opportunity for the Air Force to get a head start on all of those pieces of the puzzle,” Brinkley added, “and supplying them with actual CCAs is an important step to that.”

The fiscal 2024 budget funded the stand up of the new experimental unit to focus on how to introduce autonomous aircraft into Air Force operations, including training the autonomy algorithms that are being developed separately from the prototype aircraft.

The Air Force also announced a development milestone for both CCA companies on Nov. 13. The Anduril Fury and the GA-ASI Gambit completed a critical design review in October, said Col. Timothy Helfrich, the senior materiel leader of AFMC’s advanced aircraft division.

Speaking at the Mitchell Institute Airpower Futures Forum, Helfrich said they are prioritizing the original schedule targets by avoiding a temptation to add certain features that could cause delays. Those could still be added to the Increment 2 prototypes, the requirements for which are being finalized. 

“We are danger-close to getting started in earnest” for Increment 2, Helfrich said.