82nd Airborne soldiers train on drone-countering maneuvers used in Ukraine

Politics 82nd Airborne soldiers train on drone-countering maneuvers used in Ukraine By Eleanor Watson Eleanor Watson CBS News Reporter Eleanor Watson is a CBS News multi-platform reporter and producer covering the Pentagon. Read Full Bio Eleanor Watson Updated on: April 28, 2026 / 8:27 AM EDT / CBS News Add CBS News on Google Fayetteville, North Carolina — Three small drones whizzed overhead, piloted by soldiers on laptops. Two of the Bumblebee drones were being steered to collide with the third, as part of the soldiers' initial training for the kind of drone-on-drone combat that's been taking place for months on the battlefield in Ukraine. The training was held at Fort Bragg last week for a small group of soldiers from the 82nd Airborne Division in tandem with the Pentagon's efforts to produce cheap counter-drone systems that can quickly and easily be put to use by service members. The soldiers trained on both the Bumblebee V1, a small, first-person-view drone that has seen thousands of combat flights in Ukraine, and the newer Bumblebee V2, which has automatic target recognition specifically meant to counter other drones and which has not been deployed yet. Most of the training was on the Bumblebee V1, which is already being used by other soldiers in the 82nd Airborne Division and in the 10th Mountain Division, according to Sgt. Maj. Kellen Rowley, who is the senior enlisted adviser for the Pentagon's Joint Interagency Task Force-401, or JIATF-401, to counter drones. L: Two of the Bumblebee V1s moments after one collided into another to take it down. R: Soldiers of the 82nd Airborne Division piloting Bumblebee V1s from laptops. Eleanor Watson / CBS News Rowley said training for the V1 is taking place at several domestic bases, as well as at a training center for U.S. Central Command in the Middle East. As more service members flow into the Middle East, they will also be able to start doing the same kind of initial training on these systems. "They pick up the skills necessary to do drone-on-drone combat," Rowley said of the training. "The feedback that we've heard thus far is 'I'm not gonna learn it in five minutes, but if I have 40 hours dedicated to learn how to figure this out,' they're gonna be an effective operator." The Defense Department set up the task force to coordinate with other government agencies on countering drones. The war in Ukraine, drone incursions near military bases in the U.S. and now the conflict with Iran have all demonstrated the urgency of developing the technology faster. The Bumblebee is one of the smaller systems the military is looking to use, instead of the more expensive interceptors that were developed primarily to take down incoming missiles. The U.S. military in the war with Iran has raised concerns about U.S. stockpiles of those types of munitions. Bumblebee V1 drone at Fort Bragg, in North Carolina. Defense Department "There's a cost curve challenge, the offensive drones being used versus what we're using to shoot them down," said Lt. Col. Alex Morse, who manages acquisitions for the task force. "Usually our defensive capability is in the hundreds of thousands or maybe in the millions. This is far below that," Morse said, as he held a prototype of the Bumblebee V2. "And we're going to continue to drive the cost down into the single digits of thousands." Both versions are small enough for a soldier to hold. They have four legs with propellers, a camera in the middle, and a battery. The difference in…

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