On December 16, the House Transportation Committee held a hearing with an unremarkable title: "Changes in Maritime Technology: Can the Coast Guard Keep Up?" What emerged was more interesting than the name suggested. The Coast Guard is pouring hundreds of millions into autonomous systems through its Force Design 2028 plan while simultaneously enforcing regulations that prevent anyone else from deploying the same technology commercially.

That's not bureaucratic inefficiency. It's a genuine paradox built into law.

The Coast Guard lacks statutory authority to waive minimum crew requirements for commercial vessels. Period. The Government Accountability Office confirmed this in August: statutes mandate crew minimums by vessel tonnage, and the Coast Guard cannot grant exceptions outside a pilot program for SpaceX rocket recovery. Yet, the service has established a dedicated Program Executive Office for Robotics and Autonomous Systems, committed over $350M to unmanned platforms, and started awarding contracts.

Defense gets the capability. Commercial operators get the wait.

Force Design 2028 went operational in August when the Coast Guard achieved initial operating capability for its RAS PEO. Anthony Antognoli, the service's first program executive officer for robotics and autonomous systems, oversees what the Coast Guard describes as "the most transformational enhancement to capability since the inception of aviation."

The initial spending tells you what that transformation looks like. VideoRay is delivering 16 Defender remotely operated vehicles to replace the Deployable Specialized Forces' aging ROV fleet. Qinetiq is supplying ruggedized ground robots for Coast Guard Strike Teams responding to hazmat incidents. Skydio just contracted 125 short-range drones for infrastructure inspection and post-disaster assessment. None of this is experimental. These are production contracts for operational deployment.

The Coast Guard already operates autonomous systems at sea. ScanEagle drones have been flying drug interdiction missions from National Security Cutters since 2016 under a contractor-operated model with Insitu. Five Saildrone wind-powered autonomous surface vessels patrol the US-Mexico maritime border, providing surveillance coverage. The service recently added V-BAT vertical-takeoff drones that contributed to what the Coast Guard calls historic drug seizures (hundreds of thousands of pounds interdicted in the Eastern Pacific and Caribbean).

Every one of these platforms demonstrates technical feasibility, operational effectiveness, and cost advantages over traditional crewed assets. The technology works. The Coast Guard knows it works because it uses it.

Commercial shipping companies cannot.