Danish Naval Drone Shows What European Navies Should Do
A Danish USV manufacturer, Stormborn, has accidently provided an excellent example of how Denmark, and other European Navies, can better monitor increased Russian Naval activity and hybrid warfare operations at sea. One of their firm-operated USVs, the Stormborn X-Wave 01, had a close encounter with the Russian Pr.20380 Steregushchiy class missile corvette Soobrazitelny. The incident occurred 30 km southeast of Bornholm in the Baltic, east of the Danish Straits.
The prototype Stormborn X-Wave 01 involved in the incident, seen here with a Danish frigate in the background.
The Russian frigate, which was sailing without AIS, was visible to the USV’s many sensors, showing the ability of USVs to monitor warships from an acceptible distance. The corvette approached to within 200 meters of the USV (whose presence was being transmitted on AIS) and launched a small quadcopter UAV to investigate.
The Russian warship launched a small quadcopter UAV to inspect the Danish USV.
The Stormborn X-Wave is, as the manufacturer’s name implies, designed to operate in particularly harsh conditions. It is unarmed but it doesn’t take any imagination to see how this could be weaponized.
Denmark, and other European allies, should operate USVs like this to reduce the cost of monitoring Russian warships, and create a greater threat. USVs which can be armed with torpedoes, missiles or ram-charges, could reshape the threat Russia has to negotiate. In peacetime Russia isn’t expecting a NATO navy to suddenly attack (despite Russian rhetoric). But in the same way as crewed warships do it imposes a cost on operations to be constantly monitored. And being uncrewed, they are attritable in peacetime and expendable in war; this shifts the risk calculation in the favour of the uncrewed platform.
The X-Wave 01 prototype outside the shed at the manufacturer
USVs like the X-Wave 01 are road mobile and do not require traditional port facilities, making them a more versatile and survivable option.
Denmark, which is under the greatest external threat it has been since 1944, has a relatively small navy to cover both vast oceans and complex & confined littorals, including some of the harshest maritime environments on the planet. Their ice patrol ships are, although aging, very optimized to Denmark’s traditional problem sets. But the rapid adoption of uncrewed platforms for warfighting roles could be what brings the Kingdom’s defences into the current era, to face unpresidented unprecedented threats.
Another Danish manufacturer, Copenhagen Global, builds the low-profile Copenhagen Orca which could be used in the same way.
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