Overview
- Weapons Training Battalion hosted the inaugural Marine Corps Attack Drone Competition at Quantico from Aug. 10–14 to test strike planning, ISR integration, urban and night operations, long-range strikes and moving-target engagements.
- FPV operators from the 4th Marine Division won the event and received awards at the competition’s close.
- An opposing force used ISR to locate and track teams, forcing competitors to manage signatures and survive while synchronizing multiple attack drones against near-simultaneous targets.
- Organizers identified concrete training shortfalls including long-range aerial navigation, time-on-target planning, hide-site and antenna management, emergency protective actions, escape and evasion, and signature management.
- The Corps plans to expand the championship in FY27 by adding a dedicated opposing force, introducing electronic-warfare effects and stretching engagement distances to about 20 km to better simulate contested operations while using a train-the-trainer model to scale skills fleetwide.