'Small, smart, cheap': How US plans to counter China's PLA in Indo-Pacific

The US agrees that China has more missiles, more ships and more men, but it has a plan to counter Beijing's quantitative military edge

The United States (US) Department of Defense (DoD) on Monday announced by name the first weapon, the Switchblade 600 loitering munition, that will be part of its Replicator programme, which is aimed at overcoming China's quantitative advantage over the US in the military domain.   

If successful, the Replicator programme, which will see the US operate "thousands" of autonomous platforms to counter China's military, will significantly change how the US military will fight future conflicts. The Replicator programme's first tranche will also see the US military field counter-uncrewed aerial systems (c-UAS) and uncrewed surface vehicles (USVs) of various sizes and payloads, defence news portal The War Zone (TWZ) reported, citing the Pentagon's announcement on the Switchblade 600.

  

 

The US Replicator programme comes at a time when the Pentagon's 2023 annual report on China’s military power estimates that the size of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) is more than 370 ships, making it the largest navy in the world, while the US Navy has a combat-ready fleet of 291. And this gap is set to widen. A declassified intelligence slide from the US Office of Naval Intelligence estimates that China has 232 times the shipbuilding capability of the US.

Photo taken on May 1, 2024, showing tugboats towing China's third aircraft carrier, the Fujian, away from a dock in east China's Shanghai. The Fujian recently set out for its maiden sea trials. (Photo by Pu Haiyang/Xinhua)

  

What is the Replicator programme?   

Announced in August 2023, the Replicator programme has one officially stated objective: to overcome the People's Republic of China's (PRC's) biggest advantage against the US, which is the sheer mass of Beijing's military -- more missiles, more ships, and more personnel. Put simply, the programme envisages the US building thousands of autonomous weapons, which will operate on land, in the air and at sea, in a very short span of time.   

While revealing this objective at the time of the programme's launch, a senior US DoD official had added that the systems produced under Replicator would have to also overcome China's rapidly growing anti-access and area-denial capabilities.

   

According to the official, through the Replicator programme, the US will "outmatch" its adversaries by "out-thinking, out-strategising, and outmaneuvering them". The official had added that the programme would bank upon the US' "real comparative advantage" -- the "innovation and spirit" of its people.   

While it is unknown how many Switchblade 600, c-UAS and USV systems the US will field under Replicator, or when they will become operational, the official had said at the time of the programme's August 2023 announcement that it would see the US military fielding autonomous and attritable systems "at a scale of multiple thousands, in multiple domains, within the next 18 to 24 months".   

The US DoD official also highlighted that the programme meant that matching an adversary "ship for ship or shot for shot" would not be the US' war strategy. The official said that the US would also not use its people "as cannon fodder like some competitors do", in an apparent reference to Russia's strategies in Ukraine. 

To pay for the Replicator programme's first tranche, the US DoD has secured about $500 million in funding from the Fiscal Year 2024 Budget. The Pentagon has asked for about the same amount of funding in its Fiscal Year 2025 Presidential Budget request.     

What are these autonomous and attritable systems?    

Apart from the Switchblade 600, another example of the type of systems that could be deployed under the Replicator programme would be low-cost "interceptor" drone boats, which can operate in a swarm and locate and follow targets at sea.   

According to statements from US military officials, these systems will be designed to deliver capabilities, at scale and speed, that the US feels it needs to secure a free and open Indo-Pacific.

   

However, one common theme across the "thousands" of attritable and autonomous platforms to be fielded under Replicator is that they will be "small, smart, cheap, and many", according to the Pentagon.    

The uncrewed systems built under the programme will also use artificial intelligence (AI) algorithms.    

The systems have been described as "attritable", which in simple terms means that they will be inexpensive enough that the forces using them will be willing to lose them on high-risk missions. But, these platforms will still be capable enough of executing those missions.    

As far as being "autonomous" goes, the US DoD says that Replicator platforms will see the use of "responsible and ethical" AI and autonomous systems, which will probably still have humans overseeing sensitive tasks and taking crucial decisions like when to employ lethal force.

   

According to US officials, the other advantage of the Replicator platforms will be that they can be changed, updated, or improved rapidly.   

Ultimately, the US plans to counter the People's Liberation Army's (PLA's) quantitative advantage with quantity of its own.      

'Small, smart, cheap, and many'   

While the commercially available and rapidly developed drones that Ukraine has been using could provide some sense of the systems that will be developed under the Replicator programme, TWZ argues that its scope is much wider. 

In fact, according to the US DoD, the programme will also include "self-piloted ships" and "uncrewed aircraft".

    

However, these systems will not replace existing US military platforms overnight. Instead, according to the US DoD, they are an indication of a longer-term shift in future US military strategy, where platforms that are "large, exquisite, expensive, and few" will work in collaboration with those that are "small, smart, cheap, and many" -- like the Collaborative Combat Aircraft drones that will work alongside the US Air Force and Navy's Next Generation Air Dominance aircraft.

A notional sixth-generation stealth crewed combat aircraft design. Photo credit: Collins Aerospace

What is the Switchblade 600?   

The Switchblade 600 is a Kamikaze drone made by American company AeroVironment. According to the Pentagon, this tube-launched loitering munition, which can conduct both reconnaissance or strikes, will spearhead the Replicator programme.   

The Switchblade 600 has already seen action in Ukraine against Russian tanks and armoured vehicles.   

The drone, which carries the same multipurpose warhead used by the American-made Javelin anti-tank guided missiles, can fly for about 40 minutes and stay connected to its operator for a range of about 40 kilometres (km).   

Equipped with an electro-optical/infrared sensor, which allows targeting by a remote operator, the munition has a cruising speed of 112 km per hour.   

According to AeroVironment, a single soldier can set up and launch the Switchblade 600 in less than 10 minutes and the complete system weighs 54 kg.