Lt. Luis Echeverria, the newly appointed commander of Task Group 59.1, spoke with Breaking Defense about the group's role in integrating maritime drones into real-world operations.
The command said the operations were focused on tracking Iranian military and paramilitary vessels.
The exercise highlighting unmanned tech follows what the Navy sees as the success of the cutting edge Task Force 59 under 5th Fleet in the Middle East.
“We can’t do our best work unless we’re involved a lot earlier,” said Mandy Long, CEO of BigBear.ai.
Unmanned vessels will head to 4th Fleet this summer, with a mission to "deter the flow of drugs" into the US, according to a top Navy official.
The Middle East is proving to be a test-bed for military innovation that could be incredibly helpful for other priority regions such as the Indo-Pacific, write Jasmin Alsaied and Bilal Saab of the Middle East Institute.