Navy official calls for rapid deployment of unmanned vessels

Chief of Naval Operations Gary Roughead said he expects to take unmanned underwater vehicles from experimentation to routine deployments by the end of the decade, boosting the Navy's ability to detect mines, survey coastlines and conduct other sea missions.

Roughead's comments dovetail with findings in the Pentagon's recently released Quadrennial Defense Review of military capabilities and requirements, which urges the Navy to pursue crewless subsurface ships as the military continues to procure and use unmanned aerial vehicles in record numbers.

"I think that unmanned underwater vehicles have potentially greater value than maybe even ... the aerial vehicles; I submit that the underwater is more stressing, it's harder" on people than flight, Roughead said in an interview at the Pentagon this week. "And therefore I think the ability to use underwater vehicles can give you, I think, more of a payback than an aerial vehicle can."

Read more