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Drones likely to take lead role in future Royal Navy

The Guardian

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January 18, 2025

The Royal Navy of the future will be dominated by robots, drones and uncrewed vessels, leading chiefs to conclude there is no need to try to recruit extra sailors as part of the forthcoming defence review.

- Dan Sabbagh

Adm Sir Ben Key, the first sea lord, believes the navy has to focus on recruitment and retention rather than seeking more personnel numbers because crew sizes are inevitably falling as military technology evolves.

Though a fully automated warship may be a long way off, last month the navy tested an uncrewed inflatable rib in the Solent for a week. The Pacific 24, used for interceptions and rescues, autonomously carried out a set of pre-programmed tasks during rough seas and a period of snowfall.

Naval insiders acknowledge that the UK's future maritime force will be "a hybrid of crewed and uncrewed systems," and that those without sailors or crew would at some stage be "likely to be the default".

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