France has developed a navigation system for operation in electronic warfare environments.

French company Thales unveiled the TopStar Smart Receiver. It is a new navigation system designed to provide reliable positioning, navigation, and timing (PNT) in intense electronic warfare environments, according to a company press release.

The device is equipped with a combined Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) receiver that combines signals from military satellites, the publicly available regulated Galileo service, and civilian GPS. It integrates anti-jamming technology using an adaptive antenna with a steerable radiation pattern. This reduces signal distortion and allows operation at distances up to 30 times closer to interference sources than standard systems.

The key advantage is an improved clock that maintains synchronization of tactical radios for up to 48 hours after the loss of the GNSS signal (in conventional systems it is about 30 minutes).

Florent Chauvancy, Vice President Avionics and Flight Operations at Thales:

Using advanced technologies, TopStar provides reliable and high-performance timing, positioning and guidance for ground platforms, unmanned aerial vehicles and munitions.

The Thales development is designed to fill a critical gap amid what is said to be "ongoing jamming and spoofing of GPS signals in Eastern Europe and the Middle East."

The TopStar Smart Receiver is manufactured at Thales's Valence plant in France and, according to a company release, is now available for field testing.

Comments

[Normann]

It will be interesting to see how it works against a serious electronic warfare system.

[Sky strike fighter]

There are options for creating something similar or even better. What if we connected drone swarms to AI-powered computers via broadband internet, which would effectively control them? That's also an option.

At the CIPR-2025 conference, HiTech and Aquarius will present for the first time the Lira hardware and software system—a fully domestic platform for artificial intelligence tasks. The solution is designed for use in critical areas—from video analytics and medicine to unmanned systems and information security. The system ensures high performance, resistance to sanctions risks, and complete independence from foreign components. It is built on Aquarius's AQserv server and equipped with a LinQ HPD accelerator based on Russian tensor processors, as well as HiTech software. This allows neural networks and AI applications to be run on Russian hardware and integrated into the existing IT infrastructure.

https://www1.ru/news/2025/06/08/cifrovoi-suverenitet-v-deistvii-xaitek-i-akvarius-predstavili-otecestvennuiu-ii-platformu-lira.html

The advantage is that the UAV will only have an antenna for broadband internet communication, while all the secrets—the AI ​​controlling numerous UAVs in a swarm—will be located somewhere far away in a protected location. Such a system could operate around the clock and control a huge number of attack UAVs. Simply inject software with AI already trained on the battlefield from other UAVs into such computers and go ahead. This will enable mass production.

Ukrainian intelligence believes Russia is deploying drones capable of operating without external communications: they plot their own routes, find their own targets, and launch strikes via an onboard computer. These systems, known as V2U, have evolved from remotely controlled and programmable to fully autonomous weapons. They operate even when the enemy jams the signals of soldiers at the controls. ... The most striking example is "Glaz/Groza." The "Glaz" program extracts target coordinates from a drone's video feed with a single click and instantly sends them to "Groza," a fire control module that can be launched from a laptop or tablet. The time from target detection to projectile arrival is reduced from hours to a couple of minutes. This system is already being studied in Russian military academies and is being used extensively on the front lines.

https://inosmi.ru/20260421/oruzhie-278074029.html

[Denis_999]

Ukrainian intelligence believes that Russia is deploying drones that can operate without external communication: they plot their own routes, find targets themselves, and they strike themselves via the on-board computer.

From the subsequent text it turns out that, in fact, these are reconnaissance drones-spotters, which manage to transmit the coordinates of the target to the artillery before their "jamming".

[Sky strike fighter]

For some reason, you've linked the autonomous V2U AI drone with the completely different Glaz/Groza system for adjusting UAV fire. These are two completely different systems, completely unrelated; I simply cited them to demonstrate that they exist. This means both options can be used via broadband internet and linked to AI-controlled computers. In the first case, it's autonomous, like in a V2U UAV; in the second case, it's for possible approval to destroy a target, similar to the Glaz/Groza system. If operator control over the final decision is so important to someone, rather than the AI ​​making the decision independently, I believe operators should be excluded from the decision-making chain. This will reduce decision-making time and won't slow down the UAV swarm. In short, the AI ​​should operate directly without any operator approval to engage a particular target.

[Denis_999]

Well, they'll probably bring it/send it to the Ukrainians in Donbass for testing.

[Sky strike fighter]

Thanks to AI, broadband internet—or rather, the combination of both—we can do without the intricacies invented by the French. AI can already replace humans in many ways. Here's an example.
Kabardino-Balkarian State University has developed a robot that plays chess at the level of an international grandmaster.

The project was created by a team from the Intelligent Systems and Data Analysis Lab. It is based on a robotic arm, a 3D camera, and artificial intelligence algorithms. The system recognizes pieces on the board, tracks the opponent's moves, and calculates dozens of possible game outcomes. The machine analyzes a position in 0,1 to 2 seconds, and the move itself takes 4 to 10 seconds due to its mechanics. The robot doesn't just calculate variations; it also takes into account positional decisions typical of strong chess players. The development has already been showcased at a university exhibition, where it received a first-class diploma.
The robot isn't just used as a technology demonstration. Students use it for educational purposes: they learn programming, robotics assembly, and integration with computer vision systems. The university plans to develop the project further. By the summer of 2026, they plan to launch an online platform where anyone can play with the robot, participate in tournaments, and track game results.

https://www1.ru/news/2026/04/19/robot-s-ii-sel-za-dosku-v-kbgu-sozdali-svoego-grossmeistera.html

[knn54]

1The CRPA adaptive antenna reduces the impact of interference and allows operation at a distance of up to 30 times closer to the jamming source compared to a conventional GPS receiver.
2. Thanks to the precise clock, if the signal from the satellite is lost, the receiver maintains synchronization for up to 48 hours, while similar receivers do not last more than 30 minutes.

[expert]

But the enemy is seriously preparing for war, and not only the French.

[Cool90]

A jam-resistant antenna for the combat equipment's control, navigation, and communications systems will allow the Russian army to access GLONASS signals even under electronic countermeasures. JSC VNIIR-Progress

[novel66]

navigation system for operation in electronic warfare conditions

This is a map and a compass