Drone Swarms: Technology and Tactics

In September 2025, one country fired 818 drones and missiles at a single city in one night. That number was not a fluke. It was a drone swarm — hundreds of machines, coordinating in real time, doing what one drone alone never could.

A coordinated civilian drone swarm display of 1,000 drones, Japan, 2024. Photo: 空の青さが目に染みる, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

MCQ Questions

SCITECH0137

1,000 Drones

India’s 2022 swarm display — the world’s 4th nation to do it

Drone swarms: many drones, one coordinated mission.

Inter-Drone Link

Mesh Network

Drones talk to each other, not just command.

Command Link

RF / SATCOM

Not Terahertz — that’s for close-range links only.

Counter-Tactic

GPS Spoofing

Feeds false satellite signals to derail navigation.

India’s Shield

Bhargavastra

Counter-swarm micro-missile system, trials 2026.

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📑 Contents

1What Is a Drone Swarm?
2Countering Swarms: Jamming, Spoofing, and Bhargavastra
3Test Yourself
4India and the World
5Current Affairs

🐝 What Is a Drone Swarm?

1. Many Drones, One Coordinated Mind

Definition A drone swarm is a group of drones that fly together and coordinate in real time. Numbers alone don’t make a swarm; real-time coordination does.
Inspiration The concept borrows from natural swarms, such as birds, bees, or fish, where many simple units act together to do things one unit could never manage alone.
Two Links A swarm uses two kinds of links. Standard RF bands, or satellite links, connect it to its ground command centre. A separate mesh network lets drones talk to each other.
UPSC Trap The Terahertz band is researched for short-range drone-to-drone links, not for the command-centre connection. Don’t mix the two up.

🛡️ Countering Swarms: Jamming, Spoofing, and Bhargavastra

1. Electronic Countermeasures

Jamming Jammers flood a drone’s control frequencies, usually 2.4 or 5.8 GHz, with noise. This drowns out the link between drone and operator.
GPS Spoofing Spoofers broadcast fake satellite signals that mimic GPS, GLONASS, Galileo, or BeiDou. A drone that trusts the fake signal computes a false position, and drifts off course.
Limits Neither jamming nor spoofing works well against fully autonomous drones that don’t depend on GPS or a live radio link.

2. India’s Bhargavastra

System Bhargavastra is India’s indigenous vehicle-mounted counter-swarm system, built by Solar Defence and Aerospace.
Two Layers A first layer of unguided micro-rockets clears dense swarms at close range, about 20 metres. A second layer of guided micro-missiles hits evasive targets up to 2.5 km away.
Capacity A single launcher vehicle carries 64 munitions and offers 360-degree coverage. Final trials are due to finish by late 2026.

Test Yourself

🌏 India and the World

1. India’s Milestone

2022 Display On 29 January 2022, India flew a 1,000-drone indigenous swarm at the Beating Retreat Ceremony. That made India only the fourth nation, after the US, Russia, and China, to fly a display at that scale.
Built By Botlab Dynamics designed and built the display, with support from IIT Delhi and the Department of Science and Technology.
Army Push India’s Army has since placed a ₹200 crore order with domestic start-ups for swarm systems covering surveillance, electronic warfare, and kinetic strikes.

For India’s indigenous loitering-munition drones, a related but distinct strike technology, see SciTech0132 — Loiter Munitions. For India’s wider drone policy and regulatory framework, see SciTech0110 — Drone Ecosystem and Policy in India.

Previous Year Question

Asked as: “Which of the following statements with regard to drone swarms is/are correct? 1. They use Terahertz band of frequency to communicate with the command centre. 2. Individual drones in the swarm can communicate with other drones in the swarm. 3. GPS Spoofing is a commonly used technique to counter drone swarm attack.” (UPSC CSP 2026, GS Paper I). Answer: 2 and 3 only — statement 1 is wrong, since command-centre links use standard RF bands or SATCOM, not the Terahertz band.

✈️ Current Affairs (2025-26)

1. Recent Developments

Record Strike Sep 2025: Russia launched its largest single salvo of the Russia-Ukraine war so far, 818 drones and missiles, against Kyiv and surrounding areas. It shows swarm tactics used at real combat scale.
Frequency Rising 2025: Attack sizes grew through 2025, with Russian salvoes averaging nearly 370 munitions roughly every eight days by mid-year.
India’s Shield 27 Jul 2026: The Indian Army, Air Force, and Navy reviewed Bhargavastra’s capabilities as it neared final trials, positioning it as India’s answer to the same swarm threat.