KARGU-2

Turkey’s man-portable quadcopter loitering munition with embedded machine-learning autonomy — the world’s most-cited alleged lethal autonomous weapon, now in service with multiple NATO and partner armies.

Overview

The KARGU-2 is a battery-powered quadcopter loitering munition developed by Turkish defence engineering firm STM. Designed as a man-portable, squad-level precision strike asset, it carries an anti-personnel or armour-piercing warhead and uses on-board machine-learning image processing to detect, classify and track targets, even when the datalink is severed. The system can be operated with a human in the loop or in a fully autonomous “fire, forget and find” mode that drew the attention of the United Nations and international humanitarian law bodies after the 2020 Libya conflict. KARGU-2 first entered Turkish service in 2018 and has since been exported to Azerbaijan, Peru and at least one European NATO/EU member, with the manufacturer claiming deliveries to 15 countries on four continents by early 2026, according to STM and Army Recognition.

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