The British Army is ramping up its investment in modern weaponry such as drones and lasers as part of a broad revamp of the UK’s defence capabilities.
The Strategic Defence Review (SDR) aims to make the Army “10x more lethal” by combining more people and armoured capability with air defence, communications, AI, software, long-range weapons and land drone swarms.
The major funding package includes more than £4bn for autonomous systems and a further investment of nearly £1bn for Directed Energy Weapons (DEW) this parliament. The DEW investment will include the DragonFire laser, which is expected to enter service onboard Royal Navy ships in 2027. The laser can track and potentially destroy targets including drones, missiles and aircraft with exceptionally high accuracy.
Meanwhile, a new Drone Centre will be established to accelerate exploitation of small, uncrewed air systems across all three military services, helping to deliver them to the front line faster.
The SDR also emphasises a major...