Turkey has carried out flight tests pairing one of its fighter-style drones with a crewed M-346 fighter-trainer aircraft, in what amounts to an early demonstration of so-called crewed-uncrewed teaming.
The idea behind this kind of teaming is straightforward: a piloted jet acts as a kind of quarterback, while autonomous drones fly nearby to scout, absorb risk, or extend the reach of a mission. The drone handles tasks a human would otherwise have to fly into danger to perform.
According to the report carried by Yahoo News, the demonstrations place Turkey among a small group of countries currently flight-testing this kind of advanced collaboration between piloted aircraft and autonomous ones. The trials involved a "fighter drone" working in tandem with the M-346, a two-seat jet typically used to train pilots.
The report frames the milestone within a broader contest: air forces around the world are racing to field what are often called collaborative combat aircraft — drones designed to operate as wingmen for human pilots rather than as remotely flown aircraft controlled entirely from the ground.
The source does not detail which specific drone was used, how autonomously it behaved during the tests, or when the demonstrations took place beyond noting they have occurred.
Why it matters: pairing AI-driven drones with crewed jets is widely seen as the next major shift in air combat, and Turkey's trials signal that the technology is no longer confined to a handful of the world's largest military powers.