MBDA Unveils AI-Assisted FastTrack System for Rapid Cruise Missile Mission Planning

MBDA has unveiled FastTrack, an AI-assisted mission-planning system developed to generate cruise-missile flight paths within minutes rather than the hours or days typically required by conventional planning centres. Demonstrated at Eurosatory alongside the Land Cruise Missile and the next-generation NCM-LCM Mk2 family, the system processes target coordinates and characteristics together with terrain, weather, air-defence locations, threat types and weapon allocation data. It then produces several route options and presents operators with estimated survivability and detection-risk values.

FastTrack is designed to support coordinated long-range strikes by automatically calculating routes, attack directions, impact angles and missile arrival intervals of less than 30 seconds. During the demonstration, the software generated three mission profiles within minutes, including a time-sensitive railway target, a hardened command post and a target located approximately 1,000 km away. In the final scenario, an unavoidable air-defence system reduced the estimated mission-success probability to below 50 percent.

The simulation then added around 30 jet-powered One Way Effectors intended primarily to deplete the air-defence system’s interceptor inventory rather than directly destroy it. Following this saturation phase, the estimated probability of mission success increased to more than 80 percent. FastTrack could therefore significantly shorten the sensor-to-shooter cycle by completing mission preparation during the launcher’s approximately 15-minute deployment period, enabling LCM and other long-range weapons to be employed rapidly after target detection.