If Ukrainian USV operators are training against NATO surface combatants in a red-team role, the Standing NATO Maritime Group commanders now have an internal data set on how their ships perform against drone swarm tactics. That data will feed into the next revision of ATP-1, NATO's maritime tactical publication, which is the mechanism by which the lesson becomes doctrine across all member navies.
The Royal Navy's £90M Atlantic Net investment, reported yesterday, is designed for submarine detection — not surface drone defense — so the gap the Ukrainian red team is exposing may not be covered by current allied procurement plans.
Ukrainian forces bring 30 months of high-intensity warfighting experience that no NATO member can replicate in a training environment, and embedding them as the red team is the fastest way to stress-test NATO blue-force doctrine against tactics that have actually worked against a peer adversary.
The USV component is particularly pointed: Ukrainian maritime drones have demonstrated the ability to attrit a major navy's surface fleet at low cost, and NATO navies have not faced that threat in exercises at scale. If the format becomes a standing fixture, it gives Ukraine a formal role in shaping NATO doctrine before any membership decision is made.
What specific exercise series is this embedded red-team format being run in — BALTOPS, Steadfast Defender, or a dedicated bilateral — and which NATO commands have adopted it versus which have not?
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