Slotkin’s Senate webpage) revealed that the National All-Domain Warfighting Center (NADWC) has been established as a drone testing facility designated by the Department of Defense. Situated in northern Michigan, the NADWC offers a specialized training area featuring 148,000 acres of maneuverable land and 17,000 square miles of allocated military airspace, making it an ideal venue for conducting drone tests in authentic combat environments.
According to the Department of Defense, Secretary Pete Hesgeth commented, “We will provide tens of thousands of small drones to our forces by 2026, and hundreds of thousands by 2027.” In light of this initiative to swiftly deploy numerous uncrewed aerial systems, the well-equipped NADWC emerges as a natural choice for assessing the technology. Nevertheless, the Michigan delegation had its own motivations for advocating for the NADWC as the preferred testing location. In 2025, Senator Elissa Slotkin outlined a defense strategy that aims to position Michigan at the forefront of defense technology and manufacturing, which would also generate new defense-related employment opportunities within the state.
U.S. Army Maj. Gen. Paul D. Rogers stated that the drone testing to be conducted at the NADWC will involve developing, testing, and utilizing uncrewed systems “at operational tempo under realistic, all-weather conditions.” The NADWC is further equipped with a designated sixty-mile-long drone corridor, emerging counter-UAV technologies, and a Beyond-Visual-Line-of-Sight (BVLOS) drone operation system to enhance the training initiative.