{"id":6570476,"date":"2026-07-21T11:50:42","date_gmt":"2026-07-21T09:50:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/migflug.com\/jetflights\/loyal-wingman-cca-drones-farnborough-2026-explained\/"},"modified":"2026-07-21T12:02:05","modified_gmt":"2026-07-21T10:02:05","slug":"loyal-wingman-cca-drones-farnborough-2026-explained","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/migflug.com\/jetflights\/es\/loyal-wingman-cca-drones-farnborough-2026-explained\/","title":{"rendered":"Every Robot Wingman Unveiled This Week"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><style>.et_pb_title_container h1.entry-title { padding-top: 40px !important; }<\/style><\/p>\r\n<p>Walk the halls at Farnborough this week and you will trip over robot aeroplanes. Anduril unveiled a tiltrotor on Monday morning. BAE and Lockheed unveiled a jammer an hour or two later. Boeing parked an Australian one on the static line. General Atomics brought its own. Turkey and Italy spent the spring flying theirs together.<\/p>\r\n<p>They are all described, by somebody, as a \u201cloyal wingman\u201d. Most of them are not the same thing at all, and the differences matter more than the marketing.<\/p>\r\n<p>Here is what is actually flying, what each one is for, and why every air force on earth suddenly wants one.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<div style=\"background: #f5f5f5; padding: 20px 24px; margin: 24px 0; border-radius: 8px;\">\r\n<p style=\"margin: 0 0 12px; font-weight: bold; font-size: 17px; color: #222;\">Datos r\u00e1pidos<\/p>\r\n<table style=\"width: 100%; border-collapse: collapse; font-size: 15px; line-height: 1.6;\">\r\n<tbody>\r\n<tr>\r\n<td style=\"padding: 5px 12px 5px 0; color: #666; vertical-align: top; white-space: nowrap;\"><strong>\u00bfPor qu\u00e9 ahora?<\/strong><\/td>\r\n<td style=\"padding: 5px 0; color: #222;\">Two decades of rising fighter costs met a war in Ukraine that showed cheap mass can beat expensive quality<\/td>\r\n<\/tr>\r\n<tr>\r\n<td style=\"padding: 5px 12px 5px 0; color: #666; vertical-align: top; white-space: nowrap;\"><strong>The US programme<\/strong><\/td>\r\n<td style=\"padding: 5px 0; color: #222;\">Collaborative Combat Aircraft (CCA) Increment One \u2014 a two-horse race between General Atomics\u2019 YFQ-42A and Anduril\u2019s YFQ-44A Fury<\/td>\r\n<\/tr>\r\n<tr>\r\n<td style=\"padding: 5px 12px 5px 0; color: #666; vertical-align: top; white-space: nowrap;\"><strong>First live shot<\/strong><\/td>\r\n<td style=\"padding: 5px 0; color: #222;\">A YFQ-44A fired an AIM-120 AMRAAM in a test this month \u2014 the first live air-to-air weapon released by a US autonomous wingman<\/td>\r\n<\/tr>\r\n<tr>\r\n<td style=\"padding: 5px 12px 5px 0; color: #666; vertical-align: top; white-space: nowrap;\"><strong>Australia<\/strong><\/td>\r\n<td style=\"padding: 5px 0; color: #222;\">Boeing\u2019s MQ-28 Ghost Bat, flying since 2021 and the most operationally mature of the lot<\/td>\r\n<\/tr>\r\n<tr>\r\n<td style=\"padding: 5px 12px 5px 0; color: #666; vertical-align: top; white-space: nowrap;\"><strong>New this week<\/strong><\/td>\r\n<td style=\"padding: 5px 0; color: #222;\">Anduril\u2019s Thunder tiltrotor and the BAE\u2013Lockheed Blizzard, both revealed at Farnborough on 20 July 2026<\/td>\r\n<\/tr>\r\n<tr>\r\n<td style=\"padding: 5px 12px 5px 0; color: #666; vertical-align: top; white-space: nowrap;\"><strong>Europe<\/strong><\/td>\r\n<td style=\"padding: 5px 0; color: #222;\">GCAP and FCAS both assume uncrewed adjuncts. Britain wants a UK system flying before 2030<\/td>\r\n<\/tr>\r\n<tr>\r\n<td style=\"padding: 5px 12px 5px 0; color: #666; vertical-align: top; white-space: nowrap;\"><strong>The common thread<\/strong><\/td>\r\n<td style=\"padding: 5px 0; color: #222;\">Open architecture, so weapons and sensors can be added in months rather than years<\/td>\r\n<\/tr>\r\n<\/tbody>\r\n<\/table>\r\n<\/div>\r\n\r\n<h2 style=\"padding-top: 22px;\">Three different things wearing one name<\/h2>\r\n<p>The category has become sloppy. It is worth separating into three tiers, because they cost different amounts, do different jobs and answer to different requirements.<\/p>\r\n<p><strong>Collaborative combat aircraft<\/strong> are the big ones: jet-powered, fighter-sized, expected to come home. The YFQ-42A, the YFQ-44A Fury and the MQ-28 Ghost Bat live here. They carry air-to-air missiles internally, fly alongside <a href=\"https:\/\/migflug.com\/jetflights\/es\/aeronave\/f-35-relampago-ii\/\">F-35<\/a> or F-15EXs, and are meant to survive multiple sorties. They are not cheap \u2014 the US Air Force has asked for close to a billion dollars to buy its first batch in 2027 \u2014 but they are a fraction of a crewed fighter.<\/p>\r\n<p><strong>Air-launched effects<\/strong> are the small ones, and Blizzard is the example unveiled this week. At around 400 pounds it is closer to a cruise missile than an aircraft. It is carried, released and largely spent, and its job is to jam, decoy or suppress air defences so that something more valuable can get through. Nobody expects to recover it.<\/p>\r\n<p><strong>Rotary-wing teaming<\/strong> is the newest tier and the one Anduril opened on Monday. Thunder is a tiltrotor built to work at helicopter altitude with Apaches and the US Army's forthcoming MV-75, in the low and cluttered air where a runway-dependent jet is no use.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\" style=\"margin: 0 0 24px; width: 100%;\"><img data-opt-id=726844472  fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"skip-lazy\" style=\"width: 100%; height: auto; max-width: 100%; display: block; border-radius: 6px;\" src=\"https:\/\/ml5psubhxdln.i.optimole.com\/cb:0e0_.b970\/w:auto\/h:auto\/q:mauto\/ig:avif\/https:\/\/migflug.com\/jetflights\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2026\/07\/general-atomics-yfq-42a-paris-air-show.jpg\" alt=\"General Atomics YFQ-42A collaborative combat aircraft on display at the Paris Air Show\" width=\"1024\" data-no-lazy=\"1\" \/>\r\n<figcaption style=\"font-size: 13px; color: #777; text-align: center; margin-top: 6px; font-style: italic;\">General Atomics\u2019 YFQ-42A, one of the two contenders in the US Air Force\u2019s Collaborative Combat Aircraft Increment One. Photo: Wikimedia Commons \/ CC BY 4.0<\/figcaption>\r\n<\/figure>\r\n\r\n<h2 style=\"padding-top: 22px;\">What Ukraine taught everybody<\/h2>\r\n<p>The intellectual shift behind all of this happened in the last four years, and Anduril's president was explicit about it at Farnborough.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<div style=\"background: #f8f9fa; border-left: 4px solid #5C91FF; padding: 20px 22px; margin: 18px 0 24px; border-radius: 0 8px 8px 0; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.7; display: flex; gap: 20px; align-items: flex-start;\">\r\n<div><em>\u201cMany of the things that we\u2019ve designed and engineered into Thunder are really based on the lessons that the United States and our European allies are learning in Ukraine, and this whole question of how do you bring mass to the battlefield in a tactical environment where you have to be able to engage in the deep fight\u201d<\/em>\r\n<div style=\"margin-top: 10px; font-size: 14px; color: #555;\"><strong>Chris Brose<\/strong> \u2014 President, Anduril Industries<\/div>\r\n<\/div>\r\n<\/div>\r\n\r\n<p>The lesson is not that drones beat aircraft. It is that quantity has a quality of its own, and that Western air forces had spent thirty years optimising for exactly the opposite \u2014 smaller numbers of exquisite, irreplaceable machines flown by pilots who take a decade to train.<\/p>\r\n<p>An air force with 150 fighters cannot afford to lose ten. An air force with 150 fighters and 400 expendable robot escorts can afford to lose quite a lot of the escorts.<\/p>\r\n<h2 style=\"padding-top: 22px;\">The part that is genuinely hard<\/h2>\r\n<p>Building the airframe is not the difficult bit. Small jet-powered aircraft are a solved problem. Two things are not.<\/p>\r\n<p>The first is autonomy that works in a fight. Not autopilot \u2014 the ability to be told an objective and work out the flying. Anduril's Shane Arnott drew the distinction that the whole field now turns on: commanding these systems rather than controlling them. A Reaper needs somebody flying it. A CCA is supposed to need somebody deciding what it should achieve.<\/p>\r\n<p>The second is integration speed, and it is why every company at this show says \u201copen architecture\u201d roughly once a minute.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<div style=\"background: #f8f9fa; border-left: 4px solid #1565c0; padding: 20px 22px; margin: 18px 0 24px; border-radius: 0 8px 8px 0; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.7; display: flex; gap: 20px; align-items: flex-start;\">\r\n<div><em>\u201cNow, seven months I would tell you is a lot faster than what is typically the course. That goes to the open architectures on the Ghost Bat, how we design it a little bit differently\u201d<\/em>\r\n<div style=\"margin-top: 10px; font-size: 14px; color: #555;\"><strong>Steve Parker<\/strong> \u2014 President and Chief Executive Officer, Boeing Defense, Space &amp; Security, on integrating the AIM-120 onto the MQ-28 in seven months<\/div>\r\n<\/div>\r\n<\/div>\r\n\r\n<p>Seven months to put a new missile on an aircraft is remarkable. On a conventional fighter the same job runs to years of test campaigns, software drops and certification. If these aircraft are going to be updated constantly and produced cheaply, that gap is the entire business case.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\" style=\"margin: 0 0 24px; width: 100%;\"><img data-opt-id=1853640374  fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"skip-lazy\" style=\"width: 100%; height: auto; max-width: 100%; display: block; border-radius: 6px;\" src=\"https:\/\/ml5psubhxdln.i.optimole.com\/cb:0e0_.b970\/w:auto\/h:auto\/q:mauto\/ig:avif\/https:\/\/migflug.com\/jetflights\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2026\/07\/mq-28-ghost-bat-takeoff-valiant-shield-rota-1.jpg\" alt=\"Boeing MQ-28 Ghost Bat taking off during Exercise Valiant Shield 2026 on Rota\" width=\"1024\" data-no-lazy=\"1\" \/>\r\n<figcaption style=\"font-size: 13px; color: #777; text-align: center; margin-top: 6px; font-style: italic;\">The MQ-28 Ghost Bat taking off during Valiant Shield 2026 \u2014 the first collaborative combat aircraft to take part in a joint, multinational exercise. US Air Force photo by SrA Adrien Tran<\/figcaption>\r\n<\/figure>\r\n\r\n<h2 style=\"padding-top: 22px;\">Who is actually ahead<\/h2>\r\n<p>On maturity, Australia. The MQ-28 has been flying since 2021, has fired a live AMRAAM in a teamed engagement with an E-7A and a Super Hornet, has operated from California, and has flown in a multinational exercise alongside American fighters. Nothing else in the category has that record.<\/p>\r\n<p>On money and scale, the United States. The CCA programme has two flying competitors, a live missile shot this month, and a budget line to buy the first operational aircraft in 2027.<\/p>\r\n<p>On breadth of ideas, arguably Europe and Turkey. The Kizilelma has flown teamed with an Italian M-346 under Baykar and Leonardo's K-SWARM programme. GCAP and FCAS both assume uncrewed adjuncts from the outset. Britain has said it wants a domestic system in the air before 2030 and has three separate industry pitches circling that requirement.<\/p>\r\n<p>What nobody has yet is an operational squadron. Every aircraft named here is in test, and every date attached to them is a target rather than a delivery.<\/p>\r\n<p>Which is worth remembering while walking the halls this week. What is on display at Farnborough is not the future of air combat arriving. It is six or seven competing bets about what that future looks like, made by companies who will not all turn out to be right.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<div style=\"max-width: 550px; margin: 0 auto 28px;\"><iframe class=\"skip-lazy\" style=\"width: 100%; height: 400px; border: none; border-radius: 12px; overflow: hidden;\" src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/embed\/Tweet.html?id=2079176043965952275&amp;theme=light\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\" data-no-lazy=\"1\"><\/iframe><\/div>\r\n\r\n<p><em>Sources: DefenseScoop, Aviation Week, The Aviationist, Breaking Defense, FlightGlobal, Janes, Boeing.<\/em><\/p>\r\n\r\n<div style=\"background: #f0f4ff; border-left: 4px solid #5C91FF; padding: 16px 20px; margin: 32px 0 8px; border-radius: 0 8px 8px 0;\">\r\n<p style=\"margin: 0 0 8px; font-weight: 600; color: #333;\">Publicaciones relacionadas<\/p>\r\n<p style=\"margin: 4px 0;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/migflug.com\/jetflights\/anduril-thunder-autonomous-tiltrotor-farnborough-2026\/\">Three Drones, One Apache, Triple the Missiles<\/a><\/p>\r\n<p style=\"margin: 4px 0;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/migflug.com\/jetflights\/bae-falconworks-lockheed-skunk-works-blizzard-uas-farnborough-2026\/\">The Drone Built by Two Secret Labs<\/a><\/p>\r\n<p style=\"margin: 4px 0;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/migflug.com\/jetflights\/boeing-mq-28-ghost-bat-farnborough-debut-2026\/\">The Ghost Bat Finally Came to Farnborough<\/a><\/p>\r\n<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Thunder, Blizzard, Ghost Bat, Fury, Kizilelma. They&#8217;re all called loyal wingmen and most of them are not the same thing at all. A plain-English guide to what&#8217;s actually flying.<\/p>","protected":false},"author":27,"featured_media":6570348,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"editor_notices":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[664,670],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6570476","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-military-aviation","category-news"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v28.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Loyal Wingman Drones at Farnborough Explained<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Thunder, Blizzard, Ghost Bat, Fury, Kizilelma. 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