U.S. Navy Seeks Unmanned Aircraft for Ford and Nimitz Carriers with 1,000-Nautical-Mile Strike Reach.

The U.S. Navy has asked industry to propose a new family of carrier-based unmanned aircraft capable of striking targets at least 1,000 nautical miles away without aerial refueling. The effort could reshape future carrier air wings by extending the reach and survivability of U.S. naval aviation.

Naval Air Systems Command released the Sources Sought notice on July 14, 2026, as part of the Navy's Air Wing of the Future strategy and the Golden Fleet initiative. The Request for Information seeks concepts that can operate from both Nimitz- and Gerald R. Ford-class nuclear-powered aircraft carriers, while emphasizing that the notice is solely for market research and does not represent a procurement commitment. Industry responses are due by 5:00 p.m. EDT on August 13.

Related news: U.S. Navy and Industry Push Carrier-Based Unmanned Combat Aircraft Toward Deployment

A Boeing unmanned MQ-25 aircraft is given operating directions on the flight deck aboard the aircraft carrier USS George H.W. Bush (Picture source: US DoD)

The scope is broader than an unmanned fighter or carrier strike drone. The U.S. Navy identifies eight mission areas: surface warfare, land strike, anti-submarine warfare, air warfare against aircraft and missiles, electronic warfare, intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance and targeting, aerial refueling, and logistics. Industry can propose a specialized aircraft, a multirole design, or a modular family using common components. The objective is not for every drone to perform all eight missions, but to identify a mix of platforms providing what the RFI describes as affordable mass and risk-tolerant capacity. Existing efforts, including the Boeing MQ-25A Stingray and Collaborative Combat Aircraft (CCA), are placed within this family rather than identified as programs to be replaced.

This defines the Air Wing of the Future as more than an aircraft project. A current carrier air wing combines F-35C Lightning II and F/A-18E/F Super Hornet strike fighters with EA-18G Growler electronic warfare aircraft, E-2D Advanced Hawkeye airborne command aircraft, CMV-22B Osprey transports and MH-60R/S helicopters. The planned transition is from a force still centered on fourth-generation aircraft toward a networked combination of fifth- and future sixth-generation crewed platforms, tankers and autonomous aircraft. Unmanned systems could add sensors, weapons, electronic effects, fuel or supplies without assigning every high-risk mission to a human aircrew.

The 1,000-nautical-mile, or 1,852-kilometer, threshold is the central operational requirement, but it must be interpreted carefully. The Navy requires systems conducting attacks to deliver effects at that distance without aerial refueling. Combat radius normally accounts for the outbound and return legs, mission profile, fuel reserves, payload and time on station, making it different from maximum range. The Navy, for example, publishes a range of more than 1,200 nautical miles for the F-35C, together with almost 20,000 pounds of internal fuel, more than 5,000 pounds of internal weapons and a further 13,000 pounds of external stores. That range figure cannot be compared directly with a 1,000-nautical-mile combat radius.

The RFI does not specify a reference payload, flight profile, speed, reserve requirement or time over the target. It refers to delivering effects 1,000 nautical miles from the carrier without stating whether the distance will be measured to the aircraft's weapon-release point or to the target reached by a stand-off weapon. Those details will determine whether industry concepts are genuinely comparable. A smaller aircraft carrying a long-range missile could produce an effect farther away than its own flight path suggests, while a larger design carrying heavy internal weapons could sacrifice endurance to preserve low observability and survivability. The requirement therefore concerns a complete weapon system, not simply an airframe with large fuel tanks.

MQ-25A Stingray conducts first flight (Picture source: Boeing)

Operating from both carrier classes creates constraints that land-based CCA designs do not automatically satisfy. Nimitz-class ships use steam catapults and conventional arresting gear, while Ford-class carriers employ the Electromagnetic Aircraft Launch System and Advanced Arresting Gear. A common aircraft must remain controllable across both launch and recovery environments and withstand repeated catapult shots and arrested landings. These loads affect the landing gear, tailhook, fuselage structure and overall mass before sensors, fuel or weapons are added. Saltwater corrosion, deck contamination and the maintenance of low-observable materials at sea create further demands that are less severe at land bases.

The U.S. Navy separately expresses interest in vertical takeoff and landing concepts able to operate from other aviation-capable vessels, including destroyers and Expeditionary Sea Base ships. This is an additional area of study, not a requirement for every carrier aircraft proposed under the RFI.

Deck integration may prove as important as aerodynamic performance. An unmanned aircraft must taxi safely among running engines, weapons, fuel lines, vehicles and personnel despite having no pilot with direct vision of the flight deck. It must respond predictably to deck-handling instructions, align with the catapult, clear the landing area and manage emergencies without slowing launch and recovery cycles. Folding wings, tie-down points, access panels, towing arrangements and compatibility with carrier elevators determine how many aircraft can be embarked and serviced. This explains the demand for greater combat effectiveness than a fourth-generation platform at a given spot factor, meaning the deck or hangar area occupied by each aircraft.

The Navy also asks industry to address autonomous carrier patterns and taxiing, together with dynamic tasking, threat evasion, and automated aerial refueling. Proposed aircraft must integrate with the existing Unmanned Carrier Aviation Mission Control System, which is intended to control future carrier-based unmanned aircraft. This favors common stations and interfaces rather than separate control equipment for every model. Autonomy must also manage degraded communications, an unsafe approach, a wave-off or a changing deck situation. Operators may supervise and retask the aircraft, but the air vehicle must execute flight-control and contingency functions without continuous manual input.

The MQ-25A is directly relevant as an operational and architectural precursor, but it is not a ready-made 1,000-nautical-mile strike aircraft. Its primary mission is carrier-based aerial refueling, with a secondary maritime intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance role. It is intended to release Super Hornets from recovery-tanker duties and extend the reach of other carrier aircraft. The first operational U.S. Navy MQ-25A completed a two-hour flight on April 25, 2026, using the MD-5 ground control station. The program received approval to enter low-rate initial production in May. Earlier footage of an MQ-25 aboard USS George H.W. Bush in 2021 showed Boeing's T1 prototype, first flown in 2019 and used for refueling and deck-handling demonstrations.

MQ-25 experience in autonomous taxiing, carrier control systems and naval sustainment can inform later aircraft. Converting the tanker into a combat platform would nevertheless require more than adding a missile. Weapon interfaces, mission computers, targeting sensors and protected communications would have to be integrated, followed by assessments of structural loads, separation safety, power, cooling, center of gravity and radar signature. An internal bay could preserve low observability but would require considerable volume. External stores would be easier to accommodate but would increase drag and signature. The MQ-25A is therefore more credible as an enabler and source of proven subsystems than as a strike solution available without major development.

As of July 15, no company had publicly confirmed a response to the RFI. General Atomics presents Gambit 5 as the carrier-capable member of its modular Gambit family, making it one visible starting point for a Navy CCA or related requirement. Its ability to meet the new radius, payload, and carrier thresholds has not been disclosed. Northrop Grumman's X-47B offers a technological reference: the demonstrator completed autonomous carrier launches and recoveries in 2013 and autonomous aerial refueling in 2015. It was never a production aircraft, so any successor would require new development and qualification. Other land-based CCA designs could contribute engines, autonomy software, or mission systems, but navalization would require structural reinforcement, folding arrangements, corrosion protection, and carrier suitability testing.

Armament will shape these choices even though the RFI names no weapon. Surface warfare could involve a long-range anti-ship weapon in the class of the AGM-158C Long Range Anti-Ship Missile. Land strike or suppression of enemy air defenses could require stand-off weapons or an Advanced Anti-Radiation Guided Missile-Extended Range class payload. Air warfare would need sensors and air-to-air missiles, while anti-submarine variants might carry sonobuoys, processing equipment and a lightweight torpedo such as the Mk 54. Electronic warfare, refueling and logistics versions would impose different requirements for electrical power, volume and external carriage. These are mission-based examples, not weapons selected by the Navy.

The Navy is also testing whether industry can build and sustain these aircraft at scale. Respondents must estimate the time to first flight, land-based and carrier arrested landings, and Initial Operational Capability. They must explain how production could expand during a surge, how unit and sustainment costs would be controlled, and how maintenance hours per flight hour would be reduced. The RFI also requests alignment with Open Mission Systems standards and government-owned interfaces, planned company investment, and proposals for sharing non-recurring engineering costs.

A 1,000-nautical-mile unmanned combat radius could allow a carrier to generate effects from farther outside a defended maritime zone and reduce dependence on vulnerable tanker tracks during the initial phase of a mission. It would not remove the ship from long-range surveillance and strike networks. The Pentagon's 2025 assessment of Chinese military power estimated that People's Liberation Army kinetic strikes could be effective 1,500 to 2,000 nautical miles from the Chinese mainland and gave the anti-ship-capable DF-26 a range of 3,000 to 4,000 kilometers. Operational value will therefore depend not only on nominal radius, but also on payload, signature, resilient communications, deck-cycle efficiency and the number of aircraft that can be produced and sustained. The RFI begins translating the Air Wing of the Future from a broad concept into measurable choices about reach, weapons, autonomy and carrier capacity.

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Written By Erwan Halna du Fretay - Defense Analyst, Army Recognition Group
Erwan Halna du Fretay holds a Master’s degree in International Relations and has experience studying conflicts and global arms transfers. His research interests lie in Security and strategic studies, particularly the dynamics of the defense industry, the evolution of military technologies, and the strategic transformation of armed forces.