nuclear-news

How giving AI bots control over nuclear weapons could spark World War III

 New York Post By Anthony Blair, The Sun, February 2, 2022

Giving artificial intelligence control over nuclear weapons could trigger an apocalyptic conflict, a leading expert has warned.

As AI takes a greater role in the control of devastating weaponry, so the chances of technology making a mistake and sparking World War III increase.

These include the USA’s B-21 nuclear bomber, China’s AI hypersonic missiles, and Russia’s Poseidon nuclear drone.

Writing for the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, expert Zachary Kellenborn, a Policy Fellow at the Schar School of Policy and Government, warned: “If artificial intelligences controlled nuclear weapons, all of us could be dead.”

He went on: “Militaries are increasingly incorporating autonomous functions into weapons systems,” adding that “there is no guarantee that some military won’t put AI in charge of nuclear launches.”

Kellenborn, who describes himself as a US Army “Mad Scientist”, explained that “error” is the biggest problem with autonomous nuclear weapons.

He said: “In the real world, data may be biased or incomplete in all sorts of ways.”

Kellenborn added: “In a nuclear weapons context, a government may have little data about adversary military platforms; existing data may be structurally biased, by, for example, relying on satellite imagery; or data may not account for obvious, expected variations such as imagery taken during foggy, rainy, or overcast weather.”

Training a nuclear weapons AI program also poses a major challenge, as nukes have, thankfully, only been used twice in history in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, meaning any system would struggle to learn.

Despite these concerns, a number of AI military systems, including nuclear weapons, are already in place around the world.

Dead Hand

In recent years, Russia has also upgraded its so-called “Doomsday device”, known as “Dead Hand”.

This final line of defense in a nuclear war would fire every Russian nuke at once, guaranteeing total destruction of the enemy.

First developed during the Cold War, it is believed to have been given an AI upgrade over the past few years.

In 2018, nuclear disarmament expert Dr. Bruce Blair told the Daily Star Online he believes the system, known as “Perimeter”, is “vulnerable to cyber attack” which could prove catastrophic.

Dead hand systems are meant to provide a backup in case a state’s nuclear command authority is killed or otherwise disrupted.

US military experts Adam Lowther and Curtis McGuffin claimed in a 2019 article that the US should consider “an automated strategic response system based on artificial intelligence”.

Poseidon Nuclear Drone

In May 2018, Vladimir Putin launched Russia’s underwater nuclear drone, which experts warned could trigger 300ft tsunamis.

The Poseidon nuclear drone, due to be finished by 2027, is designed to wipe out enemy naval bases with two megatons of nuclear power.

Described by US Navy documents as an “Intercontinental Nuclear-Powered Nuclear-Armed Autonomous Torpedo”, or an “autonomous undersea vehicle” by the Congressional Research Service, it is intended to be used as a second-strike weapon in the event of a nuclear conflict.

The big unanswered question over Poseidon is; what can it do autonomously…………………..

B21 Bomber

The US has launched a $550 million remotely-piloted bomber that can fire nukes and hide from enemy missiles.

In 2020, the US Air Force’s B-21 stealth plane was unveiled, the first new US bomber in more than 30 years.

Not only can it be piloted remotely, but it can also fly itself using artificial intelligence to pick out targets and avoid detection with no human output.

Although the military insists a human operator will always make the final call on whether or not to hit a target, information about the aircraft has been slow at getting out.

AI fighter pilots & hypersonic missiles

Last year, China bragged its AI fighter pilots were “better than humans” and shot down their non-AI counterparts in simulated dogfights……..

Last year, China claimed its AI-controlled hypersonic missiles can hit targets with 10 times as much accuracy as a human-controlled missile.,,,,,,,

Checkmate AI warplane

In 2021, Russia unveiled a new AI stealth fighter jet – while also making a dig at the Royal Navy.

The 1,500mph aircraft called Checkmate was launched at a Russian airshow by a delighted Vladimir Putin.

One ad for the autonomous plane – which can hide from its enemies – featured a picture of the Royal Navy’s HMS Defender in the jet’s sights with the caption: “See You”.

The world has already come close to devastating nuclear war which was only prevented by human involvement.

On September 27, 1983, Soviet soldier Stanislav Petrov was an on-duty officer at a secret command center south of Moscow when a chilling alarm went off.

It signaled that the United States had launched intercontinental ballistic missiles carrying nuclear warheads.

Faced with an impossible choice – report the alarm and potentially start WWIII or bank on it being a false alarm – Petrov chose the latter.

He later said: “I categorically refused to be guilty of starting World War III.”

“But if Petrov had been a machine, programmed to respond automatically when confidence was sufficiently high, that error would have started a nuclear war.”

He added: “There is no guarantee that some military won’t put AI in charge of nuclear launches; international law doesn’t specify that there should always be a ‘Petrov’ guarding the button. That’s something that should change, soon.” https://nypost.com/2022/02/02/how-giving-ai-bots-control-over-nuclear-weapons-could-spark-world-war-iii/

February 3, 2022 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | 2 WORLD, technology, weapons and war