Turkish Combat Drone Demonstrates Wing-Mounted Carriage of Smaller UAVs
Turkish Aerospace Industries has unveiled a new drone warfare concept, showing its Aksungur combat UAV carrying two smaller Super Simsek drones under its wings.
Footage released this week showed the long-endurance Aksungur flying with the two multi-role UAVs mounted in place of more conventional stores. The configuration turns the aircraft into an airborne launch platform, allowing a larger unmanned system to deploy smaller expendable assets closer to contested airspace.
The demonstration points to a broader shift in air combat planning. Militaries are increasingly exploring ways to use larger drones as carrier platforms for unmanned systems built to strike targets, jam sensors, or confuse enemy air defenses. In that model, the mothership provides range and persistence, while the smaller systems deliver the effect at lower cost and with less operational risk.
By pairing Aksungur with Super Simsek, TAI is highlighting how unmanned teaming could expand the mission set of existing UAV fleets without relying solely on missiles or other traditional payloads. If developed further, the approach could give operators a more flexible way to project force, complicate defensive tracking, and extend reach in high-threat environments.