New AI tech lets soldiers pilot 100 spy drones all at once

The Swedish Armed Forces just announced a new Artificial Intelligence (AI) powered drone swarm that makes it easy for a non-drone pilot to operate. It developed this system in secret alongside Saab, the makers of the Saab JAS 39 Gripen fighter jet, and it took them just 12 months to build it. According to Swedish outlet Expressen, the I 13 infantry regiment, based in Falun, Sweden, would be the first unit to receive this tech, and it’s expected that the new technology will be tested during the Arctic Strike military exercise this coming week.

This development is a direct result of the widespread drone use in the ongoing Russian invasion of Ukraine, with technological developments advancing at a quick pace to help Ukrainians defend against the invading force. “The war in Ukraine teaches us that the pace of change is extremely high,” says Sweden Chief of Army Major General Jonny Lindfors. “A conventional stockpile of 100,000 drones would not be expedient, as the technology becomes obsolete too quickly.”

One big advantage this system delivers to the Swedish Armed Forces is that it doesn’t need specially designed military drones to use it. It can be installed on commercially available drones and turn them into a coordinated swarm. They can then be used for autonomous reconnaissance missions and could even go home at will to recharge once they reach the limit of their operational range.

“Sweden must be able to face an opponent that is quantitatively superior,” said Swedish Minister of Defense Pål Ponson. “Then we have to have a qualitative advantage.”

Aside from its current capabilities, Lindfors also said that they could update and change the software to match the Army’s needs. It was even suggested that it could be upgraded to allow drones to carry a bomb. Doing so would automate attack capabilities, meaning an ordinary soldier or even conscript could give an attack command to the AI drone swarm, and it will execute it without requiring a skilled drone pilot on hand.

Despite the seeming effectiveness of this technology, we hope that Saab and the Swedish Army have added safeguards within the programming of this AI swarm, especially before it deploys it with attack capabilities. After all, we’ve already seen reports of a drone AI turning on its human operator in a simulation to achieve its mission in the most efficient manner available.

The project also passed another milestone, as its development just took a year, instead of the typical four to five years. Expressen says that it was able to achieve this because of the personal involvement of the army chief and defense minister, and that experiences learned from it will be presented to the rest of the government to help streamline the adoption of new technologies.