On 27th, November 2020 , Mohsen Fakhrizadeh an Iranian nuclear scientist was assassinated in Iran, and of course blame for this assassination fell on Israel’s national intelligence agency “Mossad”.It is not the first instance in history that Mossad was accused of the assassination of high valued political targets, what makes this event interesting enough for the first time a controlled device was employed for the assassination of the nuclear scientist using Artificial Intelligence algorithms. It not only didn’t cause any collateral but simply just vanished the target, It was later learned that a remote-control machine gun mounted on the van used for this assassination. This machine gun was remotely controlled with a next-generation camera and using AI to identify and shoot the target.
Now countries are developing a set of systems which think like humans, act like a human. AWS(Autonomous Weapon System ) once activated can detect, engage a target without human interference whatsoever. To put it in simpler words AI refers to an Information Systems which used predefined rule sets for the act which require human intelligence to perform it. This system also called Lethal Autonomous Weapon Systems (LAWS). These automated systems are basically robots which could be in deep water targeting submarines, in the air or on the ground capable enough to complete the mission on their own especially in scenarios where Individual operator life are at risk.
Except for a couple of countries, none have LAWS in their arsenal, not even the US. Yes, the United States does not have any LAWS in its possession, but it has invested extensively into the development of a lethal AI system. Isreal has good expertise in AI and weaponizing it aside from China. Artificial Intelligence can be used for Surveillance, Autonomous Vehicles, Cybersecurity.
Unfortunately, India is lagging in the race to become a fully network-centric force to use AI. It will take at least 2-3 years for India to start using AI tools. The process is already started as a Defense Artificial Intelligence council is already setup. Indian Army recently placed the order for around 200 ROV (Remotely Operated Vehicle) to defuse bombs. Defense council also approved more than 500 robots indigenously developed for Intelligence and reconnaissance. These robots will also be delivering a good amount of supplies.
AI can also be used as a weapon in the cybersphere. The Behavioral Learning for Adaptive Electronic Warfare system, or BLADE, is a system meant to attack and disable wireless communication networks using artificial intelligence. The BLADE Program, in late-stage testing, is a system created by Lockheed Martin. However, the details of this project are highly classified in the US army. AI plays a very substantial role in BLADE systems as it could detect and characterize new communication threats, learn how to jam them, and then assess jamming effectiveness in the field.
Orbital surveillance is becoming a reality day by day with the help of Artificial intelligence. There are few organizations who have released their product which showcases the capabilities of machine vision when applied to satellite images. Having the space satellite images and extensive geospatial data can be well predicted the ground-level oil reserve of any country. AI software can identify oil tanks and then measure their capacity to calculate overall supply. Everyone knows what is the cost of hitting these reserves during conflict time.
Future wars will be smarter, more aware and even more net centric. With the infusion of Artificial Intelligence, Machine learning and smart sensors, the balance of wars will be shifted.