Nearly two-thirds of the aircraft flying off U.S.
Navy carriers could be unmanned someday, including the possibility of drone fighter jets, a top aviation leader said this week.
Like the
Air Force, the Navy will take a "family of systems" approach to its next-generation air dominance, or NGAD, program, which will use aircraft, sensors and other equipment that complement one another and work together to stave off threats, Rear Adm. Gregory Harris, the chief of naval operations' air warfare directorate, said during a Navy League event Tuesday.
"We expect that that family of systems will be a combination of manned and unmanned right now, notionally looking at and driving toward an air wing that has a 40-60 unmanned/manned split. And over time ... shift that to a 60-40 unmanned/manned split," Harris said.