US hands Philippine Marines two Devil Ray drone boats worth more than $8 million

The United States has handed two Devil Ray T38 unmanned surface vessels worth more than US$8 million to the Philippine military, the US Embassy in Manila said on 10 November. The uncrewed boats go to the Philippine Marine Corps and are meant to stretch the reach of maritime surveillance across the archipelago at a lower cost than crewed ships.

US Ambassador Lee Lipton turned the two vessels over to Brigadier General Bayani Curaming of the Philippine Marine Corps at a ceremony in Subic Bay, Zambales, on 4 November. The handover took place at a newly opened Unmanned Center of Excellence run by the American builder, Maritime Tactical Systems Inc., better known as MARTAC.

According to the manufacturer, the T38 is an 11-metre catamaran that can exceed 60 knots in short bursts and carry payloads of up to 1,814 kilograms. It can be driven by an operator or run autonomously, and MARTAC lists intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, electronic warfare, mine countermeasures and logistics support among the missions its open design can take on.

Colonel Daniel Oh, the senior US defence official at the embassy and chief of the Joint US Military Assistance Group in the Philippines, said the boats would add to the growing autonomous fleet of the Armed Forces of the Philippines. He said they would let the military monitor wider areas of Philippine waters for longer periods, with personnel directing missions from a safe distance.

Lipton linked the transfer to two anniversaries the allies are marking this year: 80 years of diplomatic relations and 75 years of the Mutual Defense Treaty. The embassy described the donation as support for the Philippines in safeguarding its sovereign rights and improving maritime domain awareness. Curaming said the turnover showed the growing role of emerging technologies in meeting maritime security demands.

MARTAC said the delivery builds on five of its platforms that the Philippine military fielded in mid-2024, one Devil Ray T38 and four all-electric MANTAS T12 boats. The company said the new centre in Subic will train Marine Corps personnel, carry out maintenance and hold spare parts, and that it is intended to support a larger Philippine fleet of unmanned surface vessels over the next several years.

The day after the ceremony, Lipton travelled to Batanes, the northernmost Philippine province. There he met Lieutenant General Aristotle Gonzalez, chief of the Northern Luzon Command, at the Mahatao Forward Operating Base in Basco, where the Philippine military monitors maritime traffic along the Bashi Channel and the Luzon Strait, the waters that separate the Philippines from Taiwan. He also toured a US-funded humanitarian supply depot on the island.

The statements released so far do not say where the two new boats will be based or when they will begin operational patrols. Even so, the pairing of extra hulls with a local repair and training hub points to a Philippine plan to rely more heavily on cheaper uncrewed vessels to watch its long coastline and the sea lanes to its north, with the United States supplying both the equipment and the support needed to keep it running.