Hegseth creates powerful new drone office, pulling authority from the military services

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has consolidated nearly all of the Pentagon’s drone and autonomous systems programs under a single new office that reports directly to his deputy and will oversee what Chief Pentagon Spokesman Sean Parnell called “the most consequential battlefield innovation of this generation.” The Direct Reporting Portfolio Manager for Unmanned Systems, or DRPM-UxS, will become “the single joint integrator for all unmanned and autonomous system programs” in the department, according to a June 29 memo the Pentagon made public Wednesday. Its director, yet to be named, will answer to Deputy Secretary of Defense Stephen Feinberg and oversee how the military develops, buys, fields and sustains unmanned systems in the air, on the ground and at sea. The office’s reach is wide, including small drones in unmanned aircraft groups 1 through 3, unmanned boats, ground robots and counter-drone systems. It also covers the artificial intelligence and swarming software that guides them. Unmanned underwater vehicles will be handled jointly with the Pentagon’s submarine portfolio manager. The office’s authority stops short of the Pentagon’s major defense acquisition programs, the big-ticket programs that already follow a separate approval process set in law. That means large airframes like the Air Force’s Collaborative Combat Aircraft and the Navy’s MQ-25 Stingray and MQ-4C Triton stay with the services, as does the Navy’s medium unmanned surface vessel. Two existing organizations are now moving under the new office. Joint Interagency Task Force 401, which has led the fight against small aerial drones, will expand to countering unmanned threats in every domain. The Defense Autonomous Warfare Group, the Pentagon’s effort to mass-produce cheap drones, becomes a subordinate element. Neither will see its staff or positions relocated, the memo notes. The new office inherits one of the largest spending increases in the Pentagon’s budget. The department’s latest budget request set aside $53.6 billion for autonomous drone platforms, part of what Pentagon officials called an unprecedented commitment to drones and counter-drone systems. Separately, the memo names the Defense Innovation Unit, the Pentagon’s link to commercial tech firms, as the single point of contact for the new portfolio. The office holds significant power. It will act as the milestone decision authority for its programs, the official who decides whether a weapon advances through development, and it will take precedence on drone acquisition matters behind only Hegseth and Feinberg. The office can act as the top buying official on its contracts, order the services to shift money between programs through the Pentagon comptroller, and stop any system from reaching the field. The move also centralizes congressional engagement through the DRPM-UxS, requiring every part of the department to clear its drone-related plans with the office before contacting lawmakers. The memo says the office’s progr…