Next month, US troops will gather at Camp Atterbury, Indiana, for a new kind of “Top Gun” school—this one focused on Ukraine-style, kamikaze first-person-view (FPV) drones, Defense One reports. The event is part of the Pentagon’s Technology Readiness Experimentation (T-REX) program, which tests cutting-edge unmanned systems under simulated urban combat conditions.

The urgency reflects Ukraine’s rapid drone advances. In late 2023, Ukraine’s Ministry of Defense ramped up production and training of FPV drones, which quickly became a cornerstone of its battlefield strategy. By February, the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) estimated these drones accounted for 70% of Russia’s battlefield losses—forcing a recalibration of US strategy.

Alexander Lovett, deputy assistant secretary of defense for prototyping and experimentation, said the US military is now building out FPV drone schools across the services. At T-REX, teams will square off in “red versus blue” drone battles, with counter-drone technologies also on display.

Ukraine’s drone playbook inspires US strategy

Ukraine’s success has shown that cheap, agile FPV drones can deliver outsized impact. While consumer drones have been used in war since Russia’s 2014 invasion, Ukraine’s scale and innovation pushed them from novelty to necessity.

Today, Ukraine is producing around 200,000 drones a month, according to CNA analyst Sam Bendett—a pace the US has yet to match.

Replicator falls short, procurement gets decentralized

The Pentagon’s Replicator program, launched in 2023 to scale low-cost autonomous drones, has so far fallen short of expectations. In response, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth announced a shift: allowing units to procure drones directly, without waiting on traditional acquisition pipelines.

“We need to be world class, and we will,” Hegseth said, calling the move a way to “open the aperture” to more suppliers and systems.

“The beginning of American drone dominance”

Emil Michael, the new undersecretary of defense for research and engineering, described the Pentagon drone showcase this week as “the beginning of American drone dominance.” But he acknowledged the US lags behind Ukraine, Russia, and especially China.

A major factor is training: Ukrainian forces regularly operate in jamming-heavy environments, something the US struggles to replicate due to FAA and FCC restrictions on jamming, which protect civilian networks.

Michael said drone manufacturers must internalize lessons from real-world conflicts like Ukraine’s. “That’s sort of endemic to becoming a drone manufacturer in the [United States],” he said.

Ukrainians to observe and advise at T-REX

To bridge that gap, Ukrainian military personnel will attend T-REX, offering firsthand feedback. One organizer told Defense One the feedback will likely be “blunt.”

“If you are not operating in Ukraine, then your stuff is not serious,” said Brandon Tseng, co-founder of Shield AI, which works with both US and Ukrainian forces. He noted many companies failed to survive Ukraine’s harsh electronic warfare environment.

Lovett echoed that challenge: “We have limited places where we can do that,” he said, referencing jamming exercises. The Pentagon is working with regulators to open more test ranges, but change will be slow.

Creative autonomy as the path forward

According to Bendett, the US will likely never replicate China’s DJI dominance, but can lead through decentralized innovation. “We have to shake loose our own creativity,” he said.

Allowing commanders to choose their own drones—and learning directly from Ukrainian combat experience—may be key.

“We’ve opened the door for rapid acquisition,” said Michael. “If you’re a smart builder… you could build to those specifications.”