Australia Orders MQ-28 “Ghost Bat” Drone After Missile Test

Australia just pulled the curtain on a 1.4 billion of australian dollars ($933 million) contract with Boeing Defence Australia for just six operational Ghost Bat drones, a move that feels like the country finally pressed the fast forward button on its defense plans, as Reuters reported.

The timing was no accident. Australian officials revealed the deal while sitting across the table from U.S. defense and foreign ministers in Washington, where both sides were already discussing bigger strategic toys like hypersonic cruise missiles and more rotations of U.S. bomber aircraft. A casual Tuesday, apparently.

The Ghost Bat, also known as the MQ-28A, or the way I like to call it “The Sexiest Drone Alive, Please Let Me Pilot it, I Promise That I Wont Crash It” is the first military aircraft designed on Australian soil in over fifty years, which gives the entire project a national pride roar. It’s like the flying son of a Kangaroo and a big can of Vegemite: pure Australian product.

It is built to fly as an autonomous teammate alongside crewed surveillance and fighter jets, reaching beyond two thousand three hundred miles of range. Think of it as the silent partner that never complains, never sleeps, and never asks for a raise.

A Missile Test Changes the Mood

Defence Minister Richard Marles confirmed that the Ghost Bat recently fired an AIM-120 air to air missile at an aerial target. That successful shot turned a bunch of skeptical eyebrows into impressed nods and likely made the drone feel three inchs taller.

According to Marles, the test shows the aircraft is inching closer to becoming a frontline capability for the Royal Australian Air Force.

All of this sits inside a much larger spending arc. Australia plans to pour around ten billion dollars into drones over the next decade, and Ghost Bat is only the headline act. It joins a growing autonomous family that will eventually include the Ghost Shark, the undersea counterpart created by the Australian defence force and Anduril Industries.

Australia intends to blend these systems into a single unified shield for its enormous northern coastline and the three million square kilometers of water that stretch beyond it.

The U.S. Connection Grows Taller

After meeting with U.S. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth and Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Marles hinted that northern Australia will soon host more American aircraft, more frequently, with new infrastructure rising to support the visiting fighter jets, bombers, and ISR aircraft.

There was also an agreement to pre position important U.S. equipment in Australia, including Osprey aircraft. If northern Australia were a hotel lobby, the staff would be setting out more chairs and snacks.

The U.S. has been nudging Australia to increase its defense spending for years, so Washington is likely chalking this week up as a win. Canberra, meanwhile, gets deeper cooperation on advanced weapons production, shared industrial capacity, and a bigger defensive umbrella in the Indo Pacific, a region where umbrellas now cost billions and fly at Mach speed. A Ghost, or better, a fleet of them, are needed here.

DroneXL’s Take

The Ghost Bat is shaping up to be the most ambitious drone ever built in Australia, and the recent missile test shows it is not just a sleek airframe with a poetic name. It is the start of a full autonomous ecosystem that Australia wants to deploy across sky and sea, a network that watches an enormous border without blinking.

The U.S. partnership gives the program the industrial muscle it needs, but the real story is that Australia is building machines that fly far, strike hard, and plug directly into the future of airpower.

Photo credit: Boeing website