Pentagon to Disclose More Drones in Secretive China Program

The Pentagon, seeking to balance deterrence of China’s Pacific ambitions, industrial base concerns, and secrecy, plans to reveal as soon as this week more details about its “Replicator” drone program.

So far, the Defense Department has disclosed one specific system—the AeroVironment SwitchBlade 600 killer drone.

“You can expect the Department to disclose more information on selected capabilities over the next couple of months,” said Aditi Kumar, the deputy director for strategy, policy, and national security partnerships at the Defense Innovation Unit. “We typically only confirm vendors are involved in Replicator after validating and in some cases augmenting their security posture, ...