Senior US commanders say the southern border is being used as a practical testing ground for counter-UAS technology as cartel drones increasingly threaten troops and federal law enforcement personnel. Leaders describe a gap in capabilities for tracking patroll
The southern border has become a proving ground where the enemy isn’t a tank column or a missile battery—it’s something smaller, cheaper, and harder to pin down.
Gen. Gregory Guillot. the commander of US Northern Command. said during a panel discussion at the annual SOF Week conference in Tampa. Florida that the US military is using the border as a “literal and figurative sandbox” to test counter-drone systems in real conditions. He framed the problem in simple terms: the military has ways to shoot down drones. but not yet a reliable way to follow a moving soldier through the fog of multiple threats.
“We have a lot of fixed and movable counter-UAS capabilities, but not really anything that would follow a patrolling soldier,” Guillot said. “The cartels are flying over our soldiers and Marines all the time.”
Those remarks come as the Pentagon worries that the same inexpensive drone technologies that have reshaped warfare in Ukraine are now proliferating among criminal organizations closer to home. While US forces possess tools to counter those drones. Guillot said solutions that can reliably combat multiple drones at once—or shield troops on the move—do not yet exist. That gap has become a major source of anxiety inside the military.
The stakes have been put in stark relief by recent drone attacks and a hard look at preparedness. Six US service members were killed in Kuwait in March by an Iranian drone strike. In 2024, three soldiers were killed in Jordan by a drone launched by an Iran-backed militia. An investigation obtained by Business Insider into the attack indicated that the military was poorly prepared to defend against drones.
On the southern border, training and operations are happening at the same time. The US has sent thousands of troops to the border, where forces conduct both mounted and dismounted patrols. Cartel drones are encountered during those patrols. turning the region into an operational challenge—and a live testing environment—for counter-drone tools that could later be needed on a wider battlefield.
Guillot said the intent is to move quickly from field testing to procurement decisions. “If you’re willing to bring it down to the southern border, we’ll put it to use. We’ll tell you if it works,” he said. He added that if a system performs. “we’ll probably buy it.” If it fails. he said the military will spell out what must be fixed.
In the meantime, officials are working through an expanding catalog of technology. Guillot said the military now has “hundreds of systems” operating along the border as it tries to identify which technologies can protect troops from UAV threats.
The broader challenge is not just engineering—it’s accessibility. Adm. Bradley Cooper. who leads US Special Operations Command. said during the same panel that the “democratization of technology” has lowered the barrier for acquiring lethal drone capabilities. Cooper said most defenses were built to confront the most “exquisite threats. ” a term for high-end. costly weapons such as advanced missiles and aircraft. rather than the kind of swarmable. mass-produced threats that drones represent.
Drones, Cooper said, are cheap, commonly available, and harder to contain. He also pointed to how easy it can be to assemble targeting and weaponized capabilities once the basic pieces are obtainable. “The barrier to be able to have a lethal. precise weapon to aim and orient at our maneuvering forces is lower to the point where anyone with an Alibaba or an Amazon account can piece those things together. ” he said. “It requires us to think through that spectrum of weapons we have to defend against from the exquisite to the more pedestrian.”.
The sequence is hard to miss: troops are already moving under the pressure of cartel drones, the military is already testing counter-drone tools in that environment, and commanders are still describing a capability gap when drones multiply or when protection is needed while soldiers are on the move.
US military southern border counter-UAS counter-drone technology Northern Command SOF Week cartel drones UAV threats Bradley Cooper Gregory Guillot Pentagon troops patrols Kuwait March drone strike Jordan 2024 drone strike