In a recent example of drones reshaping the modern battlespace, three United States Navy unmanned surface vessels (USVs) struck an Iranian port in the first U.S. use of one-way sea drones, according to U.S. Central Command. USCENTCOM sent the USVs in July 2026 to strike Bandar Abbas Naval Base, which overlooks the Strait of Hormuz. The base is home to the Iranian navy’s headquarters and many of its most capable ships and submarines, according to news website The War Zone (TWZ). The U.S. said its strikes on Iran are meant to degrade the regime’s ability to harm international shipping flowing through the strait.
The U.S. has been using and testing USVs around the world to carry out a range of missions. The Bandar Abbas attacks were conducted by Corsair USVs made by Saronic, an Austin, Texas, company, according to USCENTCOM. The drones are 7.3 meters long, have a range greater than 1,000 nautical miles and a payload capacity of about 455 kilograms, according to Saronic. USCENTCOM released a 25-second video that shows the one-way Corsairs independently approaching the installation before detonating on impact. The footage included overhead drone imagery and onboard video from one of the USVs during its final approach, according to military news website The Aviationist. The Corsair first gained public visibility in June 2026 when crews used the USV to rescue two U.S. Army aviators after their AH-64 Apache crashed off the coast of Oman. Saronic designed Corsair to carry a range of payloads, allowing it to conduct missions ranging from intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) to logistics and most recently, kinetic strikes.
“The U.S. military’s first combat use of one-way attack sea drones is another example of how wartime drives rapid adoption of new capabilities,” Cynthia Cook, an expert on naval drones at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, told the Wall Street Journal newspaper.
Ukraine has used drones across domains in pioneering attacks during its war with Russia. Its capabilities have allowed it to deter Russia’s navy despite lacking a comparable fleet of conventional warships. Ukrainian Magura V7 sea drones armed with air-to-air missiles downed two Russian Sukhoi Su-30 warplanes in May 2025 — the first such recorded shootdown of fighter aircraft, Ukraine’s Defense Intelligence Directorate told TWZ. In a recent mission, Ukraine used a sea drone to deploy an armed robotic drone in contested territory, according to CNN, which cited a Ukrainian government video. “Ukrainian forces have repeatedly demonstrated how relatively inexpensive autonomous boats can threaten much larger naval assets and coastal infrastructure,” The Aviationist said.
In the wake of the July USV operations, Saronic announced it will build a huge “shipyard of the future” in Brownsville, Texas, where it plans to manufacture crewed and uncrewed vessels as large as 260 meters. Its largest vessel currently is 55 meters long, TWZ said. Saronic said it plans to invest more than $3 billion to build the facility. The U.S. government has made ship-building capability and expansion of the defense industrial base a priority. Also in July, Ukrainian manufacturer UFORCE, the Magura maker, announced it is partnering with the U.S. company ReconCraft to produce sea drones, according to news website Business Insider.
Experts point to the influence of Ukraine’s sea-drone warfare on world navies — from how fleets are based to how surface vessels are deployed and how countries develop their own USVs. For example, the United Kingdom announced recently that it plans to build vessels designed to act as mother ships to drones instead of replacing its current destroyers, according to the Wall Street Journal.
“The future of naval power … will be defined by the ability to deploy autonomous systems at speed, connect them across domains, manufacture them at scale, and adapt them as missions change,” wrote maritime industry executive Barry Hinckley in WorkBoat magazine.