The “Intelligentization” of War

Intelligentization of war has arrived. The strategic pundits agree that incorporation of artificial intelligence (AI) will drastically change the character of war. However, they disagree regarding the degree to which Mars will change. One group among them asserts that singularity is near the corner. AI being intelligent will be a sentient thing. AI will soon reach Human Level Machine Intelligence (HLMI) and through recurved learning it will very shortly supersede humans. Then AI will take over the conduct of war and a Terminator-like scenario will be a near reality. From the opposite end of the spectrum, a motley group (which includes scholars, politicians, military officers, etc.) argues that AI will never develop consciousness. They continue that AI is good at computing but without societal support and human judgement, smart technologies are of limited use. Anthony King, the professor of war studies at the University of Exeter, belongs to the second group.

To be fair to King, he is not interested in what AI will achieve in the next 20 to 40 years. Rather, in the volume under review, he takes a more pragmatic view and tries to assess how AI is shaping combat at present and what impact the intelligent machines will have in the next five years. Further, instead of merely looking at the possibilities of what a ‘revolutionary’ technology can offer in the near future, King tries to locate technology within the broader social matrix. At present, the US armed forces possess the most advanced AI technologies. King shows that without the emergence and support of the private digitized industry located at the Silicon Valley, the United States armed forces just could not acquire and sustain their AI integrated military systems. Instead of the Deus Ex Machina (as portrayed in the Matrix movies from 1999 to 2021) taking control over strategy, the ‘tech princes’ of the Silicon Valley, like Elon Musk, are becoming actors in strategy making. Ironically, AI is empowering not machines but a new breed of elite human entrepreneurs.

King asserts that AI will not play any significant role at the grand strategic (national security) plane. But, what about the role of AI at the operational level of war? Can we speak about an AI super-general instead of an Erich Manstein or David Petraeus? At present, as King shows, computers are good only at processing data at a rate much faster than human beings. These fast computers can connect the dots in large quantities of disparate data. However, that’s the limit of the intelligent machines. In order to make sense of these dots, critical human judgement and experience are necessary. For use in the field, not swarms of autonomous warbots but combined human-machine teams are necessary. Close integration of the autonomous intelligent systems with skilled humans for intimate cooperation in the battlefields are necessary. Autonomous machines require a lot of logistical support which only a vast and experienced human manned bureaucracy can provide.

AI is powerful but not infallible. King reminds us that AI’s performance is dependent on the data. If the data are corrupted by the enemy, then AI will make erroneous decisions. Nevertheless, clever machines by processing data from a varied source of sensors could create a complex real time picture of the fast changing battlespace. At a more prosaic level, the semi-automated tools will provide the commander with a list of probable targets and the possible weapon systems which can be used effectively against these fleeting targets. Still, the command chain will require a human because war is after all continuation of politics by violent means. The human commander has to judge the political consequences of certain probable hits, and he has to negotiate with the diplomats and persuade his superiors regarding use of certain weapon systems. In the end, says King, it is the human and not the machine, which will be making the final decision. So, a command system with ‘human not on the loop’ is just not a possibility.

Military pundits are saying that the induction of AI will increase the speed of battle. A fast spaced combat will result in war almost ‘at the speed of light.’ The Russia-Ukraine War (which started in February 2022 and is still continuing) is witnessing large scale use of aerial and sea drones, AI integrated surveillance technologies, and cyberwarfare.

Nevertheless, a ‘Cyber Pearl Harbor’ is yet to occur. Cyberattacks utilizing AI have disrupted both the Russian and Ukrainian war efforts but have not resulted in total destruction of their military power. The presence of multiple AI integrated surveillance technologies has indeed made the battlefield transparent. Hence, movement of even small troop formation occurs only when the hostile surveillance technologies (which can bring down high volume of fire accurately) are destroyed with friendly firepower after a long grim duel. This has resulted in slowing down of the pace of military operations. This was evident during the Battle of Bakhmut in Donbas. Between July 2022 and May 2023, the attrition oriented close quarter combat by infantry and artillery with drones hovering overhead in the city and nearby countryside of Bakhmut is reminiscent of Verdun (February-December 1916) and Stalingrad (July 1942-February 1943). Thus AI, concludes King authoritatively, instead of generating blitzkrieg type maneuver attacks is producing attrition oriented positional war.

King takes a long term historical view about the emergence of new technologies and the changing character of war. He claims that AI, just like gunpowder weapons of the early modern world and internal combustion engines in the early twentieth century, will drastically shape the contours of war. But, war will not be taken out of the hands of the humans. Perhaps it is true for the near future. But, in the ‘long future’ what shape military AI will take remains a terra incognita.

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Our Reviewer: Dr. Kaushik Roy is Guru Nanak Chair Professor, Department of History, Jadavpur University, Kolkata, India. He is the author of numerous works in military history, such as Battle for Malaya: The Indian Army in Defeat, 1941–1942, The Army in British India: From Colonial Warfare to Total War 1857 - 1947, The Indian Army in the Two World Wars, Sepoys against the Rising Sun: The Indian Army in Far East and South-East Asia, 1941–45, and many more. He previously reviewed Civil War Infantry Tactics, The Clausewitz Myth, General George S. Patton and the Art of Leadership, and The Russian-Ukrainian War, 2023

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