Drone Strike Simulation 'Kills' 42 Troops
PHOTO CAPTION: Soldiers with the 173rd Mobile Brigade Combat Team (Airborne) and the Polish Territorial Defense Force provide security for a brigade command post during Saber Junction 26 at Hohenfels Training Area, Germany, Aug. 30, 2026. (U.S. Army photo by Staff Sgt. Justin Martin)
A U.S. Army exercise in Germany delivered a brutal lesson about modern drone warfare after 42 paratroopers were counted as “killed” in a single simulated strike when they staged in the open.
No one was actually killed. The casualties were part of Saber Junction 26, a massive training exercise at the Army’s Joint Multinational Readiness Center in Hohenfels, Germany, designed to expose troops to the kind of drone-heavy battlefield seen in Ukraine.
The exercise pitted the 173rd Mobile Brigade Combat Team (Airborne) against the Army’s resident opposing force from 1st Battalion, 4th Infantry Regiment.
That opposing force was using drones to watch the battlefield, locate troops and vehicles and pass target coordinates to units conducting simulated artillery strikes.
On one morning of the exercise, three drone operators working from screens and an Xbox controller had helped call in 29 artillery attacks by 9 a.m.
During one of those attacks, the drone team located three vehicles sitting exposed near a tree line. The resulting simulated artillery strike destroyed all three and counted nine troops as casualties.
An even larger loss came the previous day.
Army officials told Stars and Stripes that 42 soldiers from the 173rd were counted as killed in a single simulated strike after staging in the open, underscoring how dangerous large groups of stationary troops have become on a battlefield covered by drones.
The exercise incorporates roughly 1,900 drones and tactics drawn from lessons learned in Ukraine. Ukrainian drone experts are also participating and observing how the Army’s opposing force performs.
Army officials said one of the central lessons is that troops can no longer assume they have much time once they stop moving or leave cover. Drones can locate exposed forces, pass their position to artillery and help bring fire onto a target within minutes.
The 173rd began adapting as the exercise continued, according to officials, using more cover, moving more frequently and employing its own drones and electronic warfare systems.
Saber Junction 26 includes more than 5,000 U.S. and European troops and is intended to test how Army formations operate against an opposing force designed to mimic a capable modern enemy.
The Army says exercises like Saber Junction are increasingly incorporating unmanned aircraft, electronic warfare and dispersed operations as the service adapts to lessons from current conflicts.
For the paratroopers involved, one of those lessons came in unusually clear terms: on a drone-covered battlefield, gathering 42 troops in the open can turn into a mass-casualty event before they ever see the enemy.
Source: Stars and Stripes; U.S. Army
