Ten years ago the U.S. Navy had a stealthy, carrier-capable combat drone flying off the deck of a supercarrier — and then it walked away from it. This week the service quietly admitted it wants that aircraft back.

On August 31, Naval Air Systems Command (NAVAIR) issued a Request for Information for a Collaborative Combat Aircraft (CCA) Increment 1 prototype. Buried in the paperwork is a wish list so demanding that it reads less like a cheap "loyal wingman" and more like the heavy, long-range, stealthy uncrewed combat aircraft the Navy famously demonstrated with the X-47B, then cancelled.

The requirements point to a carrier drone that can strike deep into defended airspace, carry a fighter-sized weapons load, and fly the whole mission — catapult to arrested landing — on its own. In other words, the capability the Navy tore up in the mid-2010s and replaced with a flying gas station.

A wish list that looks a lot like a UCAV

The most striking line concerns firepower. The Navy says the Increment 1 CCA must be able to carry four externally mounted weapons weighing up to 2,500 pounds each throughout the flight envelope and during carrier certification. That is a potential external load of 10,000 pounds — not a normal loadout, but a benchmark. For comparison, a very heavily armed F/A-18E/F Super Hornet might launch with close to 17,000 pounds of stores, and that is far from routine.

Put that next to the U.S. Air Force CCAs now in production — the General Atomics YFQ-42A and Anduril YFQ-44A Fury — which are air-to-air machines expected to fly with a pair of AIM-120 AMRAAMs. The Navy is asking for something in a different weight class entirely.

The RFI also asks industry to address internal weapons carriage, weighing both capacity and survivability. Internal bays mean a smaller radar signature and cleaner aerodynamics — a strong hint that the Navy wants a low-observable, survivable design able to push into "highly contested" airspace. That is the definition of an uncrewed combat air vehicle, not a budget wingman.

The ghost of the X-47B

This is where the story turns. In the early 2010s Northrop Grumman built two X-47B demonstrators. They flew from 2011 for roughly half a decade, catapulting from and trapping aboard a carrier and even conducting autonomous aerial refuelling — feats no other uncrewed jet had managed at sea. As of 2022, both airframes were earmarked for museums.

The follow-on UCLASS program was meant to turn that breakthrough into a fielded aircraft. Instead it was gutted and rebranded as a tanker effort, which produced the F-35C-supporting MQ-25 Stingray. Many in naval aviation still regard scrapping the combat-drone plan as one of the most short-sighted procurement decisions in the service's modern history.

The new RFI does not name a maximum range, but the payload and Pacific-focused thinking behind it imply a very long reach. A separate July notice tied to the Navy's "Air Wing of the Future" called for carrier drones able to strike targets at least 1,000 nautical miles away without refuelling. Advanced UCAVs typically measure their combat radius in thousands of miles — far beyond a crewed fighter.

Why now

The urgency has a name: China. Beijing is moving fast on stealthy uncrewed combat aircraft, and one of them — the GJ-11 Sharp Sword — is mature and being navalised for carrier decks. Its described traits, independent operation, teaming with crewed jets, size and survivability, map almost point-for-point onto the Navy's new wish list.

The Navy wants a prototype flying within 24 months of a contract award, carrier certification inside a three-year effort, and a price around $30 million per aircraft — double the roughly $15 million "attritable" target it floated in 2024, but still a fraction of a crewed carrier fighter. Anduril, Boeing, General Atomics and Northrop Grumman already hold conceptual CCA contracts; Lockheed Martin is building the control architecture.

An RFI is only the opening move. But after a decade of second-guessing, the message is hard to miss: the Navy is asking whether industry can finally deliver the carrier combat drone it once had in its hands — and let go.

The clip above, from Collins Aerospace, offers a notional look at how carrier- and land-based collaborative drones might one day fight alongside crewed aircraft.

Sources: TWZ (Thomas Newdick & Tyler Rogoway, Sep 1, 2026); NAVAIR Request for Information via SAM.gov; U.S. Navy.