Feb 23, 2026
Jack Beyrer is an editor at Anduril. He was formerly Press Secretary for the U.S. Senate Committee on Armed Services.
Xi Jinping and the Chinese Communist Party had a scary Halloween last year.
On October 31, 2025, a gunmetal-colored, bullet-shaped object streaked across the skies of the California high desert under the careful watch of the U.S. Air Force. It took off without a pilot. It flew only by the guidance of software. And its tightly wound landing gear absorbed impact effortlessly, guiding the aircraft to an easy stop.
All of this happened on demand, with takeoff triggered by the press of a single button. On what was otherwise just another West Coast fall morning with a big sun hanging above and a light wind blowing back and forth, a group of America’s best engineers made aviation history. With Anduril’s Fury AI-enabled fighter craft, they had conducted the company’s first semi-autonomous flight.
But the road to get there was not a straight one.
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