U.S. Army unveils MALET, a kit that lets drones drop standard 60mm and 81mm mortar rounds

The U.S. Army’s Combat Capabilities Development Command (DEVCOM) Armaments Center has unveiled a clip-on kit that lets a drone drop ordinary 60mm and 81mm mortar rounds, rather than relying on purpose-built drone munitions. The device is called the Munitions Air-dropped Lethal Effects Tool, or MALET, and was described in a release published on 4 November by Picatinny Arsenal in New Jersey.

The kit converts a standard mortar round into a munition that can be released from an unmanned aerial system. According to the Armaments Center, it adds the fuze function and the aerodynamic stability that a round needs when it is dropped instead of fired from a tube.

How the kit works

Work began in 2024, when specialists in the Armaments Center’s Fuze and Mortar Divisions concluded that soldiers would gain more from a way to drop the rounds they already hold in quantity than from a new type of munition. The Energetics and Warheads Directorate also contributed to the project.

The U.S. Army says the kit is applied without field modifications and without soldiers having to remove safety mechanisms by hand. Fitting it is non-destructive: if the round is not used, or the mission changes, the kit can be taken off and the mortar can still be fired conventionally.

Ryan Gorman, the Armaments Center’s senior scientific technical manager for indirect fire munitions, said the same architecture could be applied to munitions beyond 60mm and 81mm mortars. A project team is studying further concepts, which Gorman described as “unique” but which remain mostly close-hold. Mortars were demonstrated first because of their maturity and their fit with the requirements of large unmanned aircraft.

From the lab to exercises

MALET Project Lead Brad Armstrong said test drops at several U.S. Army facilities had matured both the fuze function and the safety features. The most recent test used live 60mm mortars dropped from an unmanned aircraft that was moving. The rounds oriented correctly and detonated within the intended target area, the Armaments Center said.

The project team intends to send the kit to major military exercises in the fall so that soldiers can handle it and give feedback. The Armaments Center says it has already held promising conversations with industry partners and with the user and acquisition communities, and that its aim is to validate the system and then hand it to industry so it can be produced and fielded quickly. Engineers will keep improving the design based on feedback from tests and exercises.

The release does not say when the kit could enter service, how many would be bought or what it would cost, and it gives no performance figures beyond the live-fire test described. It is a development announcement, not a fielding decision.

For related reporting on U.S. drone production, see Pentagon’s Office of Strategic Capital offers Neros a $450 million conditional loan to build Archer drones in the US.