The military interests in these machines seem to go in the direction of what you could call drones on the ground.
Invading an area on the ground is still necessary to occupy and maintain control. Air-based drones are used more for targeted attacks and assasinations, with documented collateral damage, or killing and terrorizing of civilian populations put less eloquently.
With drones on the ground, the situation changes completely, and you can have much more control over areas without putting any soldiers lives at risk.
This would make occupations much more cost effective, probably mostly in the PR sense, any government getting lots of their youth killed will sooner or later have a problem at home. Not so much with drones.
I find this a very frightening development.