Three Minutes to Detect Decide Defeat

Three Minutes to Detect Decide Defeat

75th USARIC Tech Assessment Teams Evaluate C-sUAS during OSJ 26

By Sgt. 1st Class Sam Hartley

CAMP SHELBY, Miss. — As drone attacks continue to shape modern conflict from the Middle East to Eastern Europe, the Army Reserve is moving urgently to ensure its formations can detect, assess, and defeat unmanned threats in three minutes or less.

More than 12,000 Army Reserve Soldiers are participating in Operational Sentinel Justice 26, a multi‑domain training exercise, being held June 7-21, 2026, and being led by the 78th Training Division and 200th MP Command. During OSJ 26, the largest exercise in Army Reserve history, the 75th U.S. Army Reserve Innovation Command is leading a major effort to put emerging counter‑drone technologies directly into the hands of Army Reserve Soldiers for their immediate feedback.

The exercise focuses on two main areas: large‑scale combat operations and innovative technology assessments. OSJ 26’s LSCO activities entail logistics, sustainment, detention, medical, defensive and offensive engagements. The 75th USARIC assesses novel capabilities at Camp Shelby and Gulfport, Miss., where its Soldiers evaluated 20 advanced systems. Most of the technologies are designed specifically to counter the rapidly evolving small-unmanned aircraft systems, threats permeating the current battlefields in Ukraine and Iran, with live-fire counter-drone training coordinated by the 84th Training Command at Camp Shelby’s range 13.

“We have a responsibility to the future of the force,” said Col. Christopher Christian, commander, Army Applications Group, 75th USARIC and the technology task force commander for OSJ 26. “Our mandate is to utilize a unique attribute, the specialized talents brought to the 75th USARIC by our Soldiers’ highly technical civilian experience and then focus that attribute on innovative solutions to solve Army Reserve problem sets in real-time.”

Integrating Innovation into Real Missions

The 75th USARIC embeds emerging technologies directly into OSJ 26 rotational training units’ exercise, rather than treating them as standalone experiments.

During OSJ 26, industry and federal laboratories offer new technologies and training for Soldiers during realistic, challenging scenarios that mirrored deployed environments. In addition, 75th USARIC deploys technology assessment teams to evaluate the effectiveness of each technology used in the field.

This model reflects the 75th USARIC’s unique role within the Army Reserve. While Army Reserve Soldiers across the force bring diverse civilian expertise, many Soldiers within the 75th USARIC work in advanced technology sectors in their civilian careers. The command leverages experts - who work as leaders in industry and academia – to create a natural bridge between commercial innovation and military application, allowing them to translate cutting‑edge ideas into practical battlefield solutions.

DETECT: Sensing the Threat; Early

The first step in counter‑drone defense is rapid detection. Drone strikes from hostile forces can often come without warning, causing the situation on the ground to evolve quickly. The more tools Soldiers have at their disposal to detect incoming drones, the more likely those Soldiers can control the events that follow.

AeroVironment’s Titan Sky View detection technology delivers 360‑degree surveillance and precise localization of malicious sUAS, with both fixed‑site and portable configurations that automatically alert Soldiers to incoming threats.

Wingman, a ruggedized wearable detector by MyDefence, uses advanced Radio Frequency sensors to provide early warning of unauthorized drones, enhancing situational awareness during patrols and defensive operations.

DECIDE: Understanding What’s Coming

Once a drone is detected, Soldiers must quickly determine whether it poses a real threat. The AirScout platform helps them do exactly that. Using hardened artificial intelligence and sensor‑fusion algorithms, AirScout integrates data from multiple sources and provides real‑time alerts that support rapid, informed decision‑making.

DEFEAT: Neutralizing a Drone

If a drone is confirmed to be hostile, Soldiers must act immediately. Several systems under evaluation by the 75th USARIC TATs give them the tools to do so. Dronebuster 4, a handheld jamming device with target acquisition, allows Soldiers to disrupt sUAS control links. SMASH, an AI‑enabled optic, dramatically increases small‑arms accuracy against moving aerial targets by combining computer vision with ballistic tracking algorithms.

Supporting technologies such as Pitbull, an RF disruption tool, and the Light Expeditionary Energy Agile Platform, a hybrid‑electric all-terrain vehicle providing silent watch and exportable power, round out the Defeat technology ecosystem.

The 75th USARIC’s own internally developed video Retrieval Augmented Generation (RAG) system transforms raw video into a searchable intelligence database, giving units faster access to actionable insights.

“I’ve already been able to give immediate feedback to the technical teams about the Wingman and Defender,” said Sgt. Connor Bowers, a military police officer field testing the two systems with the 390th MP Battalion, 200th MP CMD. “We’re using the technology in a similar environment to the real world, we’re reacting to threats and deploying countermeasures, and we’re more ready to deal with drones than before because of it.”

A Real‑World Need

The urgency behind these demonstrations is grounded in recent history. Drone attacks by Iranian‑backed groups have killed U.S. service members, including six Army Reserve Soldiers in Kuwait, and the war in Ukraine has shown how inexpensive drones can have outsized effects on the battlefield from early improvisation to more contemporary systematized combat. The technologies being tested during OSJ 26 aim to close that gap by giving Soldiers the tools they need to survive and win in drone‑contested environments.

“I know what it is like to give a folded flag to the family of a Soldier killed by a drone attack,” said Brig. Gen. Jonathan Bennett, deputy commanding general-support, 200th MP CMD.

Bennett, who also serves in his civilian capacity as special assistant to the Director at the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency added, “My hope is that no one else must. This exercise, with this training and equipment make that reality possible in a modernized force.”

A Network of Partners Driving Modernization

The 75th USARIC’s work during OSJ 26 is supported by a broad coalition of innovation stakeholders, including: · DARPA · Defense Forensics and Biometrics Agency · U.S. Army Training and Transformation Command · U.S. Army Engineer Research and Development Center · Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering · U.S. Army V Corps · U.S. Army Test & Evaluation Command

These partnerships expand the Army Reserve’s innovation and transformation enterprise, bringing external technologies and funding into OSJ 26, while giving developers invaluable Soldier anecdotal feedback and touchpoints to help them improve and optimize the technologies assessed during the event.

Transforming the Force from the Ground Up

OSJ 26 demonstrates that modernization doesn’t have to wait for formal testing pipelines. By integrating emerging technologies directly into real training and real missions, the Army Reserve showed it can validate concepts, collect data, and accelerate transformation from the ground up. The result is a more agile, more lethal, and more technologically capable force ready for the demands of future LSCO.

“What we’re doing here is greater than a single exercise,” said Lt. Col. Blair Tighe, officer in charge, OSJ 26 technology task force, AAG, 75th USARIC.

Tighe is also Georgia Tech’s Advanced Technology Development Center’s director of cyber and emerging defense technologies, making him uniquely positioned to organize technology assessments for battlefield use through both the Army Reserve and his civilian responsibilities.

“By bringing these systems into real training with real Soldiers, we’re proving how fast the Army Reserve can help the Army modernize,” Tighe said. “The lessons we’re collecting now will shape how units fight, survive and win against drone threats in the years ahead. At the 75th USARIC, we are already looking toward what comes next.”