Ellen Lord, undersecretary for acquisition and sustainment at the Department of Defense, said DoD plans to establish an Army-led office focused on counter-unmanned aerial systems, National Defense reported Tuesday.
“The thing that was really top of everybody's mind were counter-UAS,” she told reporters Tuesday. “We see that small UAS are becoming a more popular weapon of choice … [and] we need to be agile and pivot to that challenge.”
Lord, a three-time Wash100 Award winner, said the office will look at counter-UAS programs across the Pentagon and develop three to five platforms. She added that Robert Behler, director of operational test and evaluation at DoD, has a group that performs independent tests of deployed systems.
“Come April we will have that evaluation completed and written up. And that coincides [with] when we want to make some decisions about downselecting … to the three to five systems that would be utilized,” she said.
The proposed counter-drone office will be based in Arlington, Va., and will operate with about 60 personnel.
