Pentagon asks for about $50 billion for mass production of autonomous and robotic systems
Prepared by Sintelligent with the help of SI. Published in SI: . Updated: .
The Pentagon wants to sharply increase the number of autonomous systems, but the money still has to be approved by Congress.
US Secretary of War Pete Hegseth said at the Association of the US Army's Project Agincourt panel that the Pentagon is requesting about $50 billion in reconciliation funding to scale up autonomous and robotic systems: the goal is to move from thousands of units of autonomous weapons to millions. He called it a one-time investment rather than an annual line item. The sum is separate from the fiscal 2027 request, which sets aside $53.6 billion for the Drone Dominance initiative: $16.9 billion to procure unmanned systems, $14.4 billion to counter them, $13.5 billion for contested logistics, $4.5 billion for collaborative autonomy, and $4.3 billion for institutions and personnel. C4ISRNET notes that the budget documents do not show that the funds Hegseth requested are the same money or that all of it would go to drone purchases.
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