US Army Bets $2.5 Million on AI Drones to Shield Abrams Tanks

The US Army has awarded a $2.5 million contract for AI threat-detection software designed to let drones spot hidden dangers — land mines, cluster munitions, ambush drones — before Abrams tank crews roll into them.

Defense technology company Safe Pro Group announced this week that it will integrate its Ground Truth threat-detection software into Anduril Industries' Ghost-X drone, a small uncrewed aircraft that resembles a helicopter. The software draws on datasets built from the war in Ukraine.

Safe Pro says the software can identify and map more than 150 types of explosive threats from aerial imagery. The threat list includes land mines, anti-personnel mines, cluster munitions, and first-person-view drones waiting to ambush troops, the company said. The goal is straightforward: give tank crews a clearer view of hazards in their path.

Why is the Army rethinking armored warfare?

The contract lands as the Army reworks how its armored formations will fight on battlefields that mix old hazards like dense minefields with drone reconnaissance, ground robots, and artificial intelligence.

Ukraine offers the cautionary tale. There, tanks and other armored vehicles have faced dense minefields, constant drone surveillance, and increasingly capable FPV drones that strike vehicles from above or pursue them through terrain once considered relatively protected.

Armored combat isn't dead, but the rules have changed. The Army is adapting its formations for environments where tanks have to approach cautiously rather than charge forward. The Safe Pro contract targets the front end of that problem — finding threats before a crew encounters them.

How does the system work?

The Ghost-X drones will use artificial intelligence to detect and locate threats and push that data into military networks, specifically ATAK and Anduril's Lattice, Safe Pro said.

"By adding Safe Pro's threat-detection technology onto Ghost-X, we're providing soldiers with faster, more reliable situational awareness at the tactical edge — directly supporting the Army's tank survivability and reconnaissance missions," Daniel Leighton, General Manager of Tactical Effects at Anduril Industries, said in a release.

The pairing matters because it bundles detection, mapping, and network distribution into a single small aircraft. A crew gets a mapped picture of what lies ahead — minefields, munition remnants, loitering FPV drones — before the tank closes the distance.

The $2.5 million award is modest by Pentagon standards, but it signals where the Army sees armored warfare heading: survivability now depends on software-backed reconnaissance as much as armor thickness. Expect more contracts that pair AI detection with cheap uncrewed aircraft as the service rebuilds its doctrine around Ukraine-era threats.