JAMES JOHNSON JULY 29, 2022
Will emerging technologies like AI increase the risk of nuclear war? We are in an era of rapid disruptive technological change, especially in AI. Therefore, the nascent journey to reorient military forces to prepare for the future digitized battlefield is no longer merely speculation or science fiction. “AI technology” is already fused into military machines, and global armed forces are well advanced in their planning, research and development, and, in many cases, deployment of AI-enabled capabilities.
AI does not exist in a vacuum. In isolation, AI is unlikely to be a strategic game changer. Instead, it will likely reinforce the destabilizing effects of advanced weaponry, thereby increasing the speed of war and compressing the decision-making timeframe. The inherently destabilizing effects of military AI may exacerbate tension between nuclear-armed powers, especially China and the United States, but not for the reasons you may think.
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How and to what degree does AI augmentation mark a departure from automation in the nuclear enterprise, which goes back several decades? How transformative are these developments? And what are the potential risks posed by fusing AI technology with nuclear weapons? While we can’t answer these questions fully, only by extrapolating present trends in AI-enabling capabilities can we illuminate the potential risks of the current trajectory and thus consider ways to manage them.
The Emerging AI-Nuclear Nexus
https://warontherocks.com/2022/07/ai-autonomy-and-the-risk-of-nuclear-war/
