VICENZA, Italy U.S. Army Southern European Task Force, Africa is betting that a small embedded acquisition team can do what traditional Pentagon procurement often cannot: put emerging counter-drone systems into soldiers’ hands in under six months.
The command announced a partnership this week with the Army’s Global Tactical Edge Acquisition Directorate, or G-TEAD, to test and field urgent drone-defense capabilities through a new framework called an Accelerated Capability Event. The first event is set for spring 2027 in Tan-Tan, Morocco, and will focus on protecting early-entry command posts and operating locations from small unmanned aircraft systems .
The move reflects a growing recognition that the drone threat has outpaced the Army’s normal acquisition cycle. G-TEAD, which operates under the Army Pathway for Innovation and Technology Office, embeds acquisition personnel directly within service component commands. That gives field commanders something they have historically lacked: immediate access to acquisition authority and research-and-development funding .
“ASCs always had priorities, they’ve always had capability gaps, but the two things they’ve never had is acquisition authority and research, development, test and evaluation dollars,” said Army Col. Christopher Hill, director of G-TEAD .
The initiative leverages Africa’s unique testing environment. Open spectrum, uncongested airspace, and terrain that ranges from desert to littoral give soldiers validation conditions that U.S. and European training ranges cannot easily replicate . The framework follows a three-phase model: submission and preparation, soldier-led demonstrations, and follow-on operational evaluation. A demonstration is scheduled for February and March 2027, followed by an operational assessment during African Lion 2027, U.S. Africa Command’s largest annual exercise on the continent .
The effort targets five capability categories: an integrated fly-away kit, plus detection, kinetic defeat, nonkinetic defeat, and passive protection for small drones. Solutions will be evaluated for integration into the Army’s Integrated Battle Command System-Maneuver .
The partnership comes as AFRICOM separately pursues its own rapid counter-drone experiments, including a drone-swarm defense concept known as Curtain Call . But the SETAF-AF and G-TEAD collaboration is distinct in one key respect: it places acquisition decision-makers forward, rather than waiting for requirements to travel back to the Pentagon.
“Soldiers need capability,” Hill said. “We have to come in, and we have to actually perform and produce” .
