Drones have become a powerful tool in modern warfare—used effectively by our allies against enemy forces, and, more controversially, against unarmed captives. But is the United States ready to defend itself against drone threats? In this episode, we bring you testimony from five recent congressional hearings, featuring high-ranking military and DHS officials, as well as top experts, sounding the alarm on the growing dangers in our skies.
Please Support Congressional Dish – Quick Links
- Contribute monthly or a lump sum via PayPal
- Support Congressional Dish via Patreon (donations per episode)
- Send Zelle payments to: Donation@congressionaldish.com
- Send Venmo payments to: @Jennifer-Briney
- Send Cash App payments to: $CongressionalDish or Donation@congressionaldish.com
- Use your bank’s online bill pay function to mail contributions to: 5753 Hwy 85 North, Number 4576, Crestview, FL 32536.
Please make checks payable to Congressional Dish
Thank you for supporting truly independent media!
Contact Your Members of Congress: (202) 224-3121
Background Sources
Ukraine-Russia Drone Use
“The Weapon That Terrorizes Ukrainians by Night.” C.J. Chivers. June 25, 2025. The New York Times.
“Ukraine drones strike bombers during major attack in Russia.” Paul Adams and Jaroslav Lukiv. June 2, 2025. BBC.
Israeli Quadcopter Drones in Gaza
“Israel intensifies use of quadcopters to terrorise and target civilians in Gaza, with terrifying sounds and home invasions.” June 1, 2025. Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor.
Drones Over U.S. Military Installations and Nuclear Plants
“Who Is Operating the Mystery Drones Plaguing the U.S. Military?” Christopher Mellon and Hunter Mellon. May 21, 2024. Christopher’s Substack.
“Mysterious Drone Incursions Have Occurred Over U.S. THAAD Anti-Ballistic Missile Battery In Guam.” Tyler Rogoway and Joseph Trevithick. November 27, 2020. TWZ.
“The Night A Mysterious Drone Swarm Descended On Palo Verde Nuclear Power Plant.” Tyler Rogoway and Joseph Trevithick. July 30, 2020. TWZ.
National Endowment for Democracy
Laws
H.R.28 – Protection of Women and Girls in Sports Act of 2025
H.R.5009 – Servicemember Quality of Life Improvement and National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2025
Bills
H.R.3207 – DEFENSE Act
S.663 – DEFENSE Act
S.1793 – COUNTER Act
Audio Sources
Defending Against Drones: Setting Safeguards for Counter Unmanned Aircraft Systems Authorities
Senate Judiciary Committee
May 20, 2025
Watch on YouTube
Witnesses:
- Troy E. Wilson, Division Program Coordinator for Unmanned Aerial Vehicles, Texas Rangers
- Jennifer Daskal, Partner, Venable LLP
- Robert Dooley, UAS Program Coordinator, Florida Highway Patrol
- Laura K. Donohue, Professor of Law, Georgetown Law
- Ricky D. Dixon, President, American Correctional Association
Clips
*33:55 Jennifer Daskal:
Drone safety issues rose to prominence during the last two months of 2024, when there were numerous reports of drones flying over New Jersey. At the time, I was the Deputy Homeland Security Advisor. FBI, Department of Homeland Security, Department of Defense, and FAA officials surge resources in an attempt to determine what was happening and support local officials, subject to the limits of current authorities. They did not find any evidence of malicious activity, foreign involvement or criminal action. Instead, it turns out that many of the reported drone sightings were aircraft and helicopters. Others were lawfully present drones. In early January 2025, the Trump administration reached a similar conclusion. As the President conveyed through his press secretary, “The drones that were flying over New Jersey in large numbers were authorized. This was not the enemy.”
35:45 Jennifer Daskal:
Currently, just four federal agencies, the Department of Justice, Department of Homeland Security, Department of Defense and Department of Energy, have authority to engage in advanced detection and mitigation measures to protect Americans from these risks. State, local and tribal and territorial officials do not have authority to do so, to protect their communities from the misuse of drones. They are wholly dependent on limited federal support.
40:25 Robert Dooley:
Interference with public safety operations, unauthorized drones flying near traffic crashes, fire scenes — which is what we saw in California with a drone strike on one of those airplanes — or disaster zones, can impede emergency response, creating hazardous conditions for both responders and civilians. Most recently, we had a horrific car crash where Trauma Hawk, the helicopter service that comes and transports patients, couldn’t take off because there was a rogue drone hovering over the helicopter, and it created a huge hazard.
44:10 Laura Donohue:
The law currently raises troubling first, fourth, fifth and tenth Amendment concerns. On the First Amendment, courts have long considered video recording to fall within freedom of speech and the press. The right to obtain footage includes the right to record government employees in public space. That ability undergirds one of the primary First Amendment aims, which is to hold government officials accountable. That right is not absolute, but provisions which impact that right cannot “burden substantially more speech than is necessary to further the government’s legitimate interests.” The statute, on its face, violates this test. There are no limits on the government facilities which are covered. There’s no requirement for distance from the facility, the direction of travel, or whether the drone is over private property. There’s no showing that must be made about specific targets. The provisions could be used to prevent media coverage on matters of great importance to the electorate. It has already occurred. The AG guidelines detailing covered facilities are similarly troubling. To determine whether activities constitute a credible threat, seven possibilities are offered, some of which, such as the reasonable belief that UAS could harm a person or damage property. It’s true of all drones. Six of the seven have no nexus to any facility or asset, and any interference in the execution of government activity counts, potentially including lawful protest. Further, to satisfy the requirement that the facility be connected to an authorized mission, the guidelines include any special national security event, which is defined as a designated event that by virtue of its political, economic, social or religious significance may be the target of terrorism or other criminal activity. All of those are core First Amendment protected activities. The right to petition, moreover, applies to all three branches and promotes continual active political engagement. Courts use an experience and logic test to determine whether there is a qualified right of public access to public facilities. The law, however, allows the government to forbid access to all federal facilities and federally owned land, without regard to its historical use. On the fourth and fifth amendments, one of the most glaring concerns in the statutory language is that it essentially operates as a general warrant, which is forbidden under the Fourth Amendment. A general warrant is a document issued by an official not based on any evidence of wrongdoing. It lacks particularity in the person or place to be searched or the papers or records to be seized. Unsupported by oath, it’s used to find evidence of criminal activity. At the founding, such documents violated the reason of the common law and were thus unreasonable. The current law gives the government the authority to access all communications between the operator and the drone, to seize control of all UAS systems, and to search devices to find evidence of illegal activity. There’s no oath, no third party, no probable cause, they act as a general warrant. RF drone detection systems share similarities here with geofence warrants in criminal law, which compel companies to provide location data from users’ devices. They also lack particularity, but unlike the drone provisions, geofence warrants involve third party magistrates, a demonstration of probable cause and an oath. Even so, circuits are split as to whether they constitute general warrants. For the Fifth Circuit, they do. 124n suffers from the same constitutional defect. Finally, on states rights, control of real property, including the airspace above land outside of federally owned property, falls in the purview of states. It’s reserved to them through the 10th Amendment. There’s nothing in the federal provisions which acknowledges state control over adjacent airspace, much less state rights to operate their own UAS over public property.
47:55 Laura Donohue:
These deficiencies can be addressed to assure the government has the power to protect against UAS while protecting constitutional rights. First, Congress could require a probable cause warrant to target specific drones under the protective measures subject to exigency exceptions as well as the border exception. Second, Congress should institute substantive First Amendment protections. And third, Congress should respect state rights by ensuring that states have the lead for drones under 400 feet and exempting state drones from federal targeting.
1:48:30 Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT):
The overwhelming number of drones used in this country are made abroad, correct?
Jennifer Daskal:
Yes, that is a concern.
Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT):
In China?
Jennifer Daskal:
That is a concern, sir.
Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT):
What is the percentage? You may have already testified to it, I apologize for repeating.
Laura Donohue:
If I may, 80% of the drones are DJI, which is a Chinese owned company.
Small UAS and Counter-Small UAS: Gaps, Requirements, and Projected Capabilities
House Armed Services Committee, Subcommittee on Tactical Air and Land Forces
May 1, 2025
Witnesses:
- Lieutenant General Eric Austin, Deputy Commandant/Commanding General, Marine Corps for Capabilities Development and Integration/Marine Corps Combat Development Command
- Doug Beck, Director, Defense Innovation Unit
- Lieutenant General Robert Collins, Principal Military Deputy to the Assistant Secretary of the Army (Acquisition, Logistics, and Technology and Director, Army Acquisition Corps), Office of the Assistant Secretary of the Army
- Major General David Stewart, Director, Joint Counter-Small Unmanned Aircraft Systems Office
Clips
28:45 Doug Beck:
In Ukraine, this past December, I had the opportunity to see firsthand the eye-watering pace of change in UAS and counter-UAS technologies and the tactics, techniques and procedures employed at the front line in an underground unit spread throughout Kyiv, all evolving constantly in a life and death struggle of innovation and counter-innovation. The resulting demand is supported by an incredibly dynamic ecosystem of hardware and software providers who are rising and competing to meet the challenge. DIU is embedded with the security assistance group Ukraine to help capture these lessons for both offense and defense and then apply them to our own critical needs globally.
39:25 Lieutenant General Robert Collins:
I would say, in one particular instance here in the homeland, for example, at Picatinny, when we had that incident on the 12th of December, we were able to take immediate action, and within about a 48 hour period, we were able to put kit on the ground to be able to put that in place, to take action and protect that critical infrastructure.
43:40 Major General David Stewart:
The small UAS threat is present and constantly evolving conflicts in the Middle East and Ukraine demonstrate how advances in hardware, software and tactics are making drones more autonomous, easily acquired, and deadlier compared to the IEDs that killed and injured 1000s of American service members. UAS are more dangerous because they actively surveil target and deliver lethal effect effects from the air. Importantly, this threat is not just in operational environments abroad. Small UAS are becoming more prevalent here in the homeland.
48:30 Rep. Rob Wittman (R-VA):
How do we take lessons learned at Langley, especially where, in my mind, there was a complete breakdown in decision making? I felt bad for the base commander there who said, Hey, you know, I want to be able to act. This platform was there for over 45 days, repeatedly. There were, unfortunately, responses we had to make in relation to that, as this base commander asked people above him, they said, Oh, don’t worry about it. You have the authorities. If you think it’s an imminent threat, then you can use them. And he said, That’s not the question I’m asking. I’m asking, if I use that authority, will you back me? Nobody above him would say that. They’d say, Oh, you have the authorities. You can do it. So here you have an 06 at a base that that’s 18 months away from retirement and is trying to make sure he’s doing the right thing, but is not quite confident that the folks above him have his back. And then, when we asked the folks from the Pentagon to come in and give us their assessment of that, we got a nice, long assessment that was word salad. And then when I asked, well, what’s the Pentagon’s response going to be? Pentagon says, Well, we’re going to impanel a work group. My head exploded.
1:12:55 Major General David Stewart:
I assess we’ve had some great success in the Middle East leveraging against Group 3 one-way attacks using Coyote, APKWS (Advanced Precision Kill Weapon System), and then SM- 2, 3 and 6. So that was the most important and dangerous threat the Group 3 one-way attack. Now we’re seeing, both home and abroad, the Groups 1 and 2, smaller for swarm and mass attack.
1:13:20 Rep. John McGuire (R-VA):
And Mr. Beck, you mentioned that you visited Ukraine, and you went to the tunnels where, I guess they’re producing these drones at very low cost. How would you, in this envrionment, compare our capabilities to do the same or better, to scale, compared to Ukraine?
Doug Beck:
Well, I mean, I think that we need to be able to scale at a whole other level of scale. But maybe I’d make two comments. First one is that what I saw there was very impressive, because you’ve got, literally in basements, three printers, developers, together [with] war fighters coming up [with] an incredibly iterative process to move. You know, our system is not built to do that, which is why we, right now, buy 4,000 or 5,000 drones a year in our system. And there are 4,000 a day being produced over there.
1:17:40 Major General David Stewart:
And then I know General Guillot is looking to expand 130i to extend to all installations. I just want to reinforce that the services, all services, are also pursuing those installations that are covered under 130i, but expanding would give us more crisis response ability. And then lastly, DoD is working to consolidate and clarify policy to prevent that policy confusion.
Securing the Skies: Addressing Unauthorized Drone Activity Over U.S. Military Installations
Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, Subcommittee on Military and Foreign Affairs
April 29, 2025
Witnesses:
- Timothy L. Arel, Chief Operating Officer / Air Traffic Organization, Federal Aviation Administration
- M. Roosevelt Ditlevson, Acting Assistant Secretary of Defense / Homeland Defense and Hemispheric Affairs, U.S. Department of Defense
- Rear Admiral Lower Half Paul Spedero, Jr., Vice Director for Operations, J3 / Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS), U.S. Department of Defense
Clips
25:20 Rep. William Timmons (R-SC):
Right now, the Department of Defense, Federal Aviation Administration, Intelligence community, Department of Justice and Department of Homeland Security are all involved in some aspects of the counter-UAS efforts. As a result, there is no agency with primary authority on countering drone incursions, leading to confusion and, more importantly, gaps on how to identify and mitigate this threat.
26:20 Rep. William Timmons (R-SC):
Another notable incident occurred at Langley Air Force Base in December of 2023. Over 17 days, unidentified drones repeatedly breached our sensitive military airspace, one of America’s most critical installations. The F-22 raptor squadrons were moved to alternate bases to lessen exposure, and discussions were initiated on installing physical countermeasures.
26:45 Rep. William Timmons (R-SC):
In February, the commander of NORAD and NORTHCOM testified to Congress that there were over 350 detections of drones at 100 different military installations last year alone.
34:30 Rear Admiral Paul Spedero:
An Irania- supported militant group successfully employed a one-way attack drone on Tower 22 in Jordan, killing three US service members and wounding 40 on January, 27 2024.
34:50 Rear Admiral Paul Spedero:
The mass drone incursions over Joint Base Langley–Eustis in December 2023 reminded us that the homeland is no longer a sanctuary, and should our adversary choose to employ drones for surveillance or even attack, we would not be prepared to adequately defend our homeland and only marginally capable to defend our military installations.
35:10 Rear Admiral Paul Spedero:
The incursions over Joint Base Langley Eustis were not the first, they’ve not been the last, but they were the longest and the largest series of incursions that we have seen to date.
35:45 Rear Admiral Paul Spedero:
We are now better prepared to respond to incursions with the designation of Commander of US Northern Command and Commander of US Indo-Pacific Command as the operational synchronizers in their respective areas of responsibility. Last year, and within weeks of being assigned this role, General Guillot, the Commander of US Northern Command, released a comprehensive Commander’s Assessment that has served as a road map to building the necessary command and control and standard operating procedures to address the drone threat. Over the last year, we have also invested in education and training against this threat. NORTHCOM has been the central driving force for the work being done by several organizations in partnership with industry to deliver the domain awareness and counter UAS systems that we require. And lastly, we are progressing well in our completion of the counter-UAS tasks assigned to us in the FY 25 NDAA.
41:30 Rep. William Timmons (R-SC):
Rear Admiral Spedero, how many drone incursions have taken place over US military installations over the past two years? We got the number last time we had a briefing of 350 but have they grown? What’s the current data you’re willing to share?
Rear Admiral Paul Spedero:
Yeah so the exact number I’d be happy to share in a classified setting, but I can tell you that it has grown.
Rep. William Timmons (R-SC):
I’m actually curious. Why did we get the 350 number in an unclassified setting? That was one of the questions I had.
Rear Admiral Paul Spedero:
It’s a great question, sir.
Rep. William Timmons (R-SC):
Okay.
42:40 Rep. William Timmons (R-SC):
What percent of base commanders have any technology to actually track drones, as opposed to just, ooh, I saw a drone, and then you report it?
Rear Admiral Paul Spedero:
Yeah, so the capabilities at each base is varied. Again, the specifics for the individual locations would be better in a classified setting, but it is not comprehensive. I can tell you that it is not sufficient and, again, varies from base to base from very little to somewhat more comprehensive.
43:30 Rear Admiral Paul Spedero:
I think the development, fielding, acquisition, distribution of domain awareness sensors, is the critical first step. It’s not the only thing. Obviously, we need a method to exert command and control so that we can build a common operating picture, because it will take layers of different sensors, because one sensor may be better against certain UAVs and certain flight profiles, and you may have to rely on different sensors to round out the picture. So being able to fuse all that together to get the complete picture will be necessary, and then, as you mentioned, getting to a point where we can actually respond, that’s an entirely next investment that needs to be made.
44:05 Rear Admiral Paul Spedero:
Yes, we do need more sensors. We’re addressing the shortfall right now with the fielding of fly away kits. So these will be kits that will be available for bases that have very limited capability to detect on their own and build domain awareness. And should they have an incursion that they’re unable to resolve, they would solicit the help from Commander of US Northern Command and this fly away kit, as well as expertise and additional resources that would be required would be immediately deployed to that location.
50:20 Rear Admiral Paul Spedero:
Yeah, in general, the technology to field systems has far outpaced the technology to defeat those systems. It’s a much wider, broader, deeper market for drone application, for commercial and recreational purposes. So hence that technology has evolved very quickly from radio controlled drones to now fully autonomous drones that may or may not even rely on reception of a GPS signal, which would make it very challenging to intercept. So on the counter drone activity, you have to come back to agencies that would be interested in that, like the Department of Defense, Department of Homeland Security, FBI, you know, law enforcement agencies. So we have to partner, and we have to create that demand within industry to get technology back on pace to counter this ever increasing emergence of drone technology.
56:25 Rear Admiral Paul Spedero:
We know that cartels have used UAS for unauthorized surveillance to assess our troop size, our movements, to solicit and enable attacks from other vectors.
1:01:45 Rep. Stephen Lynch (D-MA):
This committee, myself included, investigated a 2020 attack by Al Shabaab at Manda Bay in Kenya. That was a drone attack. Several recent base attacks overseas, in fact, have involved the use of drones. So Admiral, how have our counter measures against drones changed since those initial attacks back in 2020, that resulted in US casualties?
Rear Admiral Paul Spedero:
Yeah, so since that time, we’ve fielded a number of new systems across a variety of the spectrum, electromagnetic as well as electro-optical and infrared sensors, to build our domain awareness. We’ve also fielded a number of kinetic systems that shoot interceptors or use some sort of munition, and they’re deployed at our most vulnerable and most likely to be attacked facilities overseas. That is where the bulk of our counter UAS capability is actually located, is overseas and hence, the problem here in the homeland is we have very, very limited and sparse and distributed capability across the multitude of installations we have.
1:14:40 Roosevelt Ditlevson:
We have a legislative proposal working through the Pentagon right now focused on three areas where we could improve Section 130i in the Department’s opinion. We don’t want this provision to sunset. We want to make sure that the authorities continue forward. There is an expiration date on 130i authorities next year. We also want to expand the locations and missions covered under 130i. As we’ve discussed today, the the bases are not all covered. Not all installations qualify as one of the nine mission areas under 130i. So we’d like to expand that to cover all installations, and then we’d also like to facilitate data sharing, because right now, data sharing from the DoD side is limited only in the pursuit of a legal case against a particular individual or group. We’re not able to share data with our interagency partners to improve our tactics, techniques or procedures. And to your point, Congressman, earlier about driving cost efficiencies, being able to share data to produce better technology would help us be more efficient with taxpayer money.
1:17:25 Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-FL)
Under current authorities, what is preventing base commanders from neutralizing these immediately, in my opinion, going out there with a shotgun and shooting these things down?
Rear Admiral Paul Spedero:
Thank you, ma’am for the question. I wish it were as simple as shooting it with a shotgun, but it’s not.
Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-FL)
Depending on elevation. But what’s stopping it? Is it still the bureaucratic red tape and sign offs, because, in my opinion, if you’re flying something like this that can collect, jam communications, maybe carry explosives, collect surveillance on classified systems, I don’t think that you should have to be required to make a phone call. I think that if you see it, you should shoot it down. Yes,
Rear Admiral Paul Spedero:
Yes, under 130i unauthorized surveillance would meet the standard for engagement. If it were interfering with your operations, it would meet the standard for engagement. If you’re not a 130i, then again, back to the rules of engagement and establishing hostile intent or hostile act. But you may get there. So just the presence of that drone over your base may meet hostile intent or hostile act. There is not a set of circumstances, I can tell you in every case and go down a checklist. Okay, you met it. Go ahead and shoot.
Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-FL)
Sir, I mean, I think you might agree if you are flying a drone in any capacity, I don’t care if it’s civilian or not over military installation, I don’t even think you should have to go to a checklist. I think that it should automatically be taken down.
Rear Admiral Paul Spedero:
Yeah, and that’s the preference to invoke 130i is to relieve that burden, because we do agree that unauthorized access to our bases poses a threat, even if there aren’t sensitive activities. It does provide surveillance of our force posture, our weak points, our vulnerabilities, you know, descriptions, geographic details of the base, all the information. Right? They can gather intelligence piece by piece, by any means necessary. So we do want 130i protection, because we’d like to relieve that burden. Now, engagement still needs to meet the standard, the responsible standard. You have to do a collateral damage assessment before you can engage.
Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-FL)
I have a feeling with this administration and the members on this panel, I think that you’ll probably get there. So help is on the way, in that regard.
To receive testimony on the posture of USNORTHCOM and US SOUTHCOM in review of the Defense Authorization Request for FY 2026 and the Future Years Defense Program
Senate Armed Services Committee
February 13, 2025
Witnesses:
- Admiral Alvin Holsey, USN, Commander, United States Southern Command
- General Gregory M. Guillot, USAF, Commander, United States Northern Command and North American Aerospace Defense Command
Clips
44:10 Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR):
We seem to have drones just flying around everywhere, and many times, people don’t know what’s going on, most notably in the public eye late last year in New Jersey. This is also happening around our military bases a lot. You’ve had drone incursions over Joint Base Langley, Wright-Patt Air Force Base, Vandenberg Space Force Base, Picatinny Arsenal, Anderson Air Force Base.
44:30 Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR): 0:00
Could you explain to us briefly what is the threat that these drones pose to U.S. military operations, facilities, and personnel?
Gen. Gregory Guillot: 0:09
Senator, the primary threat I see for them in the way they’ve been operating is detection, and perhaps surveillance of sensitive capabilities on our installations.
Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR): 0:20
And that’s all installation, not just super sensitive ones like nuclear sites. It could be our fighter bases or Army bases or Naval bases, what have you.
Gen. Gregory Guillot: 0:31
Yes, sir, there there were 350 detections reported last year on military installations, and that was 350 over a total of 100 different installations of all types and levels of security.
Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR): 0:43
But it’s the case right now that only at certain sites, which you might call the super sensitive sites, like nuclear bases, do commanders have the authority to protect their airspace from these drone incursions.
Gen. Gregory Guillot: 0:54
That’s correct, Senator. We call those covered installations, and not all, about half are covered.
46:00 Gen. Gregory Guillot:
I would propose and advocate for expansion of 130i to include all military installations, not just covered installations.
Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR):
I’m glad to hear say that, because I have legislation to do just that. The COUNTER Act with Senator Gillibrand, that would give these commanders the legal authority they need, plus the capability required to protect their bases from these kinds of incursions and then hold them accountable for doing so. Is that exactly what you’re advocating for?
Gen. Gregory Guillot:
That is, sir. And if I could add, I’d also like to see the range expanded to slightly beyond the installation so they don’t have to wait for the threat to get over the installation before they can address it. Because many of these systems can use side looking or slant range, and so they could surveil the base from outside the perimeter, and under the current authorities, we can’t address that.
46:50 Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR):
Now last year, you also said there were thousands of drone incursions over the southern border, and just last week, Mexican cartel leaders were reportedly authorized to use drones equipped with explosives against US Border Patrol agents. Now I know that this is primarily a DHS responsibility at the southern border, but do you need authorization for DoD to share information with DHS and the border authorities about these incursions?
Gen. Gregory Guillot:
Yes, yes, Senator, I would like 130i to be expanded to allow seamless exchange of data on drones.
Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR):
Again, sounds like a great idea. I’m glad that Senator Gillibrand and I have legislation to do just that, and I hope that we can pass it into law this year.
Safeguarding the Homeland from Unmanned Aerial Systems
Committee on Homeland Security, Subcommittees on Transportation & Maritime Security and Counterterrorism, Law Enforcement, & Intelligence
December 10, 2024
Witnesses:
- Keith Jones, Deputy Executive Assistant Commissioner, Air and Marine Operations, U.S. Customs and Border Patrol
- Robert W. Wheeler Jr., Assistant Director of the Critical Incident Response Group, Federal Bureau of Investigation
- Brad Wiegmann, Deputy Assistant Attorney General for National Security, U.S. Department of Justice
- Jeffery Baumgartner, Vice President, National Security and Resilience, Berkshire Hathaway Energy
- Dr. Paul Schwennesen, Co-Director, Global Strategy Decisions Group
Clips
56:30 Keith Jones:
UAS activity on the border is increasing rapidly. During a recent six week period, CBP sensors recorded more than 6,900 drone flights within close proximity of our borders. It is these flights, particularly those in areas of high illicit activity, that present the greatest threat to the safety of CBP frontline personnel, pose a serious collision risk to our crude aircraft, and diminish the effectiveness of our border security operations. Although intent cannot be derived from border proximity alone, through our intelligence processes, CBP has associated a large percent of these, percent of these drone flights, with nefarious activities on the ground.
57:15 Keith Jones:
Of most concern to CBP is the wide use of drones to conduct reconnaissance of CBP law enforcement personnel, their locations and their activities. This technology enables smugglers to guide non-citizens or transport contraband across the border without encountering any law enforcement. Additionally, to a lesser extent, TCOs have used drones to fly contraband over the border. Most drones have limited payload capacity. An average recreational drone can carry only a few pounds, but the potential risk is still significant. A few pounds of narcotics, specifically fentanyl, or a few pounds of explosive could cause serious harm.
58:40 Keith Jones:
CBP mitigated 86 UAS threats at the border in Fiscal Year 2023, and 60 in FY 24. CBP also mitigated 16 UAS as Special Event Assessment Rating, or SEAR, events in FY 2023, and 49 in FY 24. CBP has mitigated three unmanned aircraft systems so far in FY 25.
59:00 Keith Jones:
Finally, TCOs are rapidly obtaining larger, more maneuverable drones with a higher capacity for payloads and the ability to fly longer, higher, and farther. We’re also tracking the threat of drones used for kinetic attacks with payloads of explosives, firearms, or weapons of mass destruction. We’re already seeing drug cartels in Mexico use drones to attack the military police and their rivals.
1:00:00 Robert Wheeler Jr:
I appreciate the opportunity to test on behalf of the FBI. I currently serve as the Assistant Director of our Critical Incident Response Group in Quantico, Virginia. I’ve done that since July, as you’ve mentioned. In that capacity, I lead the FBI efforts regarding both our pre-crisis planning and response to critical incidents and major investigations, which includes responsibility for our counter unmanned aircraft program.
1:00:45 Robert Wheeler Jr:
Just this year alone, we’ve seen concerning increase in the use of UAS in the commission of crimes with the intent to cause injury to US persons on US soil. A Chinese national recently pled guilty to two misdemeanor counts for using a UAS to conduct espionage at a US Naval facility in January. We believe UAS are being flown for similar purposes over sensitive facilities across the United States. Just last month, a subject was arrested and charged in Tennessee for attempting to use a UAS with an explosive device to destroy an energy facility. That is the same case mentioned by the ranking member. That subject was driven by an ideology to disrupt society through the collapse of the national power grid. Those are two examples of the evolving ways that UAS are being used to harm us and our interests.
1:12:15 Keith Jones:
The volume of activity within 500 yards of our contiguous border, the South and even on the North, is staggering. We have deployed detection technology. You mentioned 20,000. The significant threat is counter surveillance. They are surveilling law enforcement activities. They’re doing this 24/7, 365, and you know, historically, they’ve had to have high ground or terrain. Now, everywhere is the high ground.
Rep. August Pfluger (R-TX):
They can see what’s going on.
Keith Jones:
Exactly
Rep. August Pfluger (R-TX):
Do you have the authority to mitigate those physically or by other means?
Keith Jones:
The Secretary has designated certain areas along our border as covered facilities. So yes, the capability exists and the authority exists in those covered areas.
1:13:15 Rep. August Pfluger (R-TX):
How many events are we experiencing per year along the southern border?
Keith Jones:
So for example, last year, if we look at 45,000 detections on the southwest [border]. Of those, 2,500, plus or minus, actually made an incursion. So now we’re talking about a very small subset. A lot of the surveillance is taking place outside of our jurisdiction, in foreign airspace. That makes it particularly challenging for mitigation.
1:14:10 Rep. Seth Magaziner (D-RI):
Do you see any evidence of the cartels using drones to actually move some of that contraband? I’m thinking specifically of fentanyl. Are they using UAS is to actually move fentanyl across the border?
Keith Jones:
We have yet to see fentanyl being moved via UAS. We have seen other narcotics, albeit in small quantities. From a cost model, it’s not as effective for cartels because the payload capacity is so small they have to make multiple trips. We have seen cocaine, we have seen heroin, we have seen methamphetamine, we’ve seen weapons. So there is a threat of moving contraband across our borders.
1:15:15 Keith Jones:
Again, many of these detections occur on in foreign airspace. Thereby we cannot mitigate. Actually, a very small percentage actually incur into the United States. So for example, in the southwest border, only 5% of that large number actually affected incursion. Of that, we have very strict criteria, and they met the criteria. So thus the 60 that we mitigated in FY 24 actually met the criteria for mitigation.
Rep. Seth Magaziner (D-RI):
So I’m gonna ask about both the 5% and the 95%. The 5% that do come into our airspace. Is the criteria too narrow to bring them down? Why so few?
Keith Jones:
Well, again, one of the things that’s notable here is that those are not 2,500 unique identifiers. You have repeat offenders. So when we take down or mitigate one drone of that large number that could be responsible for hundreds of those.
Rep. Seth Magaziner (D-RI):
So these are events, not necessarily individual drones, these statistics.
Keith Jones:
That’s correct.
1:16:30 Rep. Seth Magaziner (D-RI):
Even if you don’t have the authority to bring them down those that are over foreign airspace, do you still have the ability, the technological ability, ability to track where the operators are and to alert in the Mexican or Canadian authorities as to where the operators are? And can you explain what that process is like?
Keith Jones:
Absolutely, and we do communicate directly with our foreign partners, and our communication is healthy. Our sharing information is healthy. And so what you just described is exactly
Rep. Seth Magaziner (D-RI):
what we do. And is it working? Does it happen? I mean, when you, when you notify Mexican authorities, for example, that, hey, we’ve got a drone, and we know where the operator is. I mean, are they pursuing the operators? Do you have success stories again? Are there gaps that need to be filled in that process? Can you can you elaborate?
Keith Jones:
Well, again, we have to rely on so in the case of Governor Mexico, we have to rely on our Mexican partners to respond. A lot of times. These are in areas that are not highly populated. They’re very difficult to get to. They’re also controlled by cartels. So by the time law enforcement response is very challenging for them. It’s not for lack of effort or lack of communication, it’s just a very difficult environment. Yeah.
1:17:55 Brad Wiegmann:
Each year, the FBI can cover a number of special events, and DHS covers some as well. So we’re talking about big events like the Super Bowl, the World Series, the Indianapolis 500 that sort of thing. But obviously those are not the only events that could be subject to an attack or a drone threat. You have many other football games, baseball games, soccer games, the World Cup, and if you add them all up, just focused on sporting events, even forgetting about New York Times’ New Year celebration. There’s all manner of events, so we can only cover a tiny fraction of those in any given year. And so if Congress gives the authority to state and locals to engage in the same activity, that vastly expands the scope of what counter drone protection. I’ll
Rep. Seth Magaziner (D-RI):
I’ll just note for the record, I understand the need to expand that authority for the state and locals for these special events. I will just highlight though, I think training is going to be very important in this because there are plenty of people who fly drones at high school football games and stuff for legitimate reasons, and we’ll just need to make sure that the state and locals have the training to know how to kind of go after the bad guys without overly penalizing the good guys. But I take your broader point.
Brad Wiegmann:
Absolutely, that’s a big part of it, the training.
1:27:30 Rep. Dan Bishop (R-NC):
Why not just have a rule that anybody who flies a drone near a mass spectator event, the drone is going to be destroyed in the air? Is that something that it’d be hard to do? And then why do you need to intercept data in order to do that? If the object is there, destroy it.
Brad Wiegmann:
So it’s a good question. I think the way it works, as I understand it, and my colleagues can talk about this operationally. If you had, let’s say, a football game, and you would have a perimeter, it would be declared as a temporary flight restricted area. So around that, you’re going to have a buffer zone. You have an area where it’s a no go, and then you have a larger area around that, where you might want to detect what’s flying. And then you have a larger area around that where you might be tracking. But you know, regular commercial drone use is okay. And so as they’re getting closer and closer to the facility, you’re detecting, originally, the signals to see what is that drone? You’re trying to identify the drone.
Rep. Dan Bishop (R-NC):
Is that like a long distance radar or something like that?
Brad Wiegmann:
Exactly, so is that a UPS drone that’s just delivering a package somewhere? Let it go on its way. Is it getting closer right into the zone where you’re going to have to do something against it? So it’s kind of a calibrated thing. And as you get closer and closer, then that’s where you take the opportunity to use the technology to jam it, is [used] most frequently, rather than destroy the drone. You’re interfering with its navigation in a way that confuses it and requires it to land. And that’s what they do in these scenarios to make it land somewhere. It’s not the same as shooting it out of the sky, is my understanding of how it works. You’re instead using electronic things to bring it down. So that’s that’s essentially how it works.
1:29:50 Keith Jones:
One thing, from a law enforcement perspective, we have to remember is that if we can capture a drone, there’s a forensic capability that allows us to glean information. That’s important to us, as well as avoiding or minimizing any collateral damage. We have to be very careful any application of force in public areas. Responsible law enforcement, first, do no harm.
2:16:30 Dr. Paul Schwennesen: The problem. We have a real train wreck coming. I think it goes a little bit unsaid. I think we lack a lot of the technical know-how on how to deal with this, on how to assess and neutralize these threats. But there is somebody who does know, and that’s the Ukrainians, having recently observed firsthand the astonishing evolution in drone operations in Ukrainian-occupied Kursk. I think the message for me, at least, has finally sunk home. Unmanned systems are not just an iteration. They are indeed a revolution in the application of lethal force. The world’s most advanced weapons and tactics are being developed and deployed at scale in the Ukraine-Russian front at remarkably low cost and without central direction, and these facts hold radical implications for the next major shooting war between great powers. We need to learn from the Ukrainians. The United States is rapidly losing its strategic military advantage in this new technical environment. There can be little doubt that China, North Korea, Iran, and other emergent powers are eagerly sending observers and technicians to the front lines in occupied Ukraine to very carefully note the revolution in weapons delivery and to adopt it into doctrines which seek to invert the military strengths of their larger, better equipped, better trained Western geopolitical adversaries. We need to learn from Ukraine. In short, the rules of the arms race have been fundamentally rewritten to favor small, cheap, easily-mastered weapon systems. More important still, these disproportionate advantages are not a one time effect. They amplify in a positive feedback loop through each iteration cycle, new tech gets better exponentially faster and is deployed far more quickly than legacy countermeasures. In Ukraine, the source of this immense innovation reservoir is the highly adaptable, highly diffuse, emerging engineering base of Ukrainian technicians. Uncountable tech workers routinely work full days in their civilian capacity, then leave their jobs to go work in pop-up tech facilities until late at night, the whole country is on deck. They have created an ecosystem of invention, a web only loosely coordinated through the Ministry of Defense. The advances in hardware and software they produce are channeled into a robust system of decentralized training facilities, and in less than three weeks, an FPV drone operator can be mission-ready. Operators with no previous battlefield experience have been credited with as many as 1,500 confirmed kills. The disproportionality is vast. This is perhaps the main takeaway in a total war peer-to-peer scenario. If technology allows one side of a conflict to impose extraordinary damage on the exquisite, expensive, difficult-to-master weapon systems of their adversary, and can do so at a fraction of the cost expended by their enemy. It doesn’t require an economist to see where that leads. It is easy to be a critic, but I am convinced the United States and its NATO allies have a very narrow window of opportunity to address this major shift in comparative advantage.
2:22:25 Rep. August Pfluger (R-TX):
As we sit here, you listened to the testimony, we currently have UAS flying over New Jersey. We heard from Mr. Smith in New Jersey that they were flying over Coast Guard vessels last night. How is this possible? Why are we not responding? What do we need to do and what what actions need to be taken?
Dr. Paul Schwennesen:
Yeah that’s a very difficult one to answer. Of course, I can’t speak for them, but I have a suspicion that people are frozen with fear of what would happen in an administrative situation in which they took action and they were punished for doing so that they shot down a drone, God forbid, and the debris hit somebody’s house, and all of a sudden they’re front page news. And so people are acting out of a sort of sense of self restraint here.
2:27:35 Dr. Paul Schwennesen:
I claim no, no engineering expertise in drone warfare, but all I can do is say what I’ve seen, which is that in the world’s most intense EW battle space, which is the Ukrainian-Russian front at the moment, it is an electronic warfare chaos, right? And so what people used to think about the ability to jam drones, which is what some of the speakers we had here are talking about, which is two years old, which at this point is effectively a century old, obsolete information. Jamming doesn’t work the way we think it does. And there are so many new developing technologies on countering the counters, right? They’ve already gone multiple layers ahead of us at this point. They’re doing AI Pixel Lock technology that doesn’t have any any RF frequency whatsoever. They’re doing ambush technology where they’re not needing to have any kind of communication between operator and and drone. So, you know, again, I don’t know the specifics beyond what I’ve just seen, the tip of the iceberg, which is that the jamming solution is not a one-size fits all, that’s the silver bullet. It might be a piece of a suite, but that’s only a piece.
Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena: Exposing the Truth
House Committee on Oversight and Accountability, Subcommittees on Cybersecurity, Information Technology, and Government Innovation and National Security, the Border, and Foreign Affairs
November 13, 2024
Clips
32:30 Rep. Glenn Grothman (R-WI)
Deeply alarmed by the reporting of the massive drone swarm that flew over Langley Air Force Base in Virginia last December. Langley is the home of the 1st Fighter Wing, which maintains half of the F-22s in the US Air Force inventory. Reports of this incident indicate these drones were roughly 20 feet long, flying more than 100 miles an hour at an altitude of over 3000 feet. Yet the origin of these drones and their operators remains a mystery.
Global Challenges and U.S. National Security Strategy
Senate Armed Services Committee
January 25, 2018
Witness:
Dr. George Shultz, Former Secretary of State
Clips
Dr. George Shultz: Small platforms will carry a very destructive power. Then you can put these small platforms on drones. And drones can be manufactured easily, and you can have a great many of them inexpensively. So then you can have a swarm armed with lethal equipment. Any fixed target is a real target. So an airfield where our Air Force stores planes is a very vulnerable target. A ship at anchor is a vulnerable target. So you’ve got to think about that in terms of how you deploy. And in terms of the drones, while such a system cannot be jammed, it would only serve to get a drone—talking about getting a drone to the area of where its target is, but that sure could hit a specific target. At that point, the optical systems guided by artificial intelligence could use on-board, multi-spectral imaging to find a target and guide the weapons. It is exactly that autonomy that makes the technologic convergence a threat today. Because such drones will require no external input other than the signature of the designed target, they will not be vulnerable to jamming. Not requiring human intervention, the autonomous platforms will also be able to operate in very large numbers.
Dr. George Shultz: I think there’s a great lesson here for what we do in NATO to contain Russia because you can deploy these things in boxes so you don’t even know what they are and on trucks and train people to unload quickly and fire. So it’s a huge deterrent capability that is available, and it’s inexpensive enough so that we can expect our allies to pitch in and get them for themselves.
Dr. George Shultz: The creative use of swarms of autonomous drones to augment current forces would strongly and relatively cheaply reinforce NATO, as I said, that deterrence. If NATO assists frontline states in fielding large numbers of inexpensive autonomous drones that are pre-packaged in standard 20-foot containers, the weapons can be stored in sites across the countries under the control of reserve forces. If the weapons are pre-packaged and stored, the national forces can quickly deploy the weapons to delay a Russian advance. So what’s happening is you have small, cheap, and highly lethal replacing large, expensive platforms. And this change is coming about with great rapidity, and it is massively important to take it into account in anything that you are thinking about doing.
Music
Tired of Being Lied To by David Ippolito
