
Brian Michelson Colonel, US Army, Retired
Author of true stories that happen in the future....
Author of true stories that happen in the future....
“Artificial intelligence is the future, not only of Russia, but of all mankind. Whoever becomes the leader in this sphere will become ruler of the world.” ~ Vladimir Putin, 2017
Warbot 1.0 offers a compelling picture of future combat as teams of Chinese, American and Filipino soldiers, enabled by AI and robotic systems, fight for their lives in a battlefield full of deadly new technologies.
Set in 2033, China’s neighbors increasingly chafe at its heavy-handed efforts to dominate them as Taiwan teeters on the brink of declaring independence. When the newly elected president of the Republic of the Philippines attempts to eject Chinese military forces from his country, the People’s Republic of China launches a punitive expedition against his country as an object lesson for the other nations bordering the South China Sea.
Despite the changing character of war now dominated by the weaponization of artificial intelligence, robotics, big data, cyber, and all form of media, its nature remains the same: a brutal, deadly, and complicated contest of wills by the humans who have to fight it.
https://thestrategybridge.org/the-bridge/2017/2/28/blitzkrieg-redux-the-coming-warbot-revolution
Using the historical lens of the blitzkrieg and the remarkable way that the Germans integrated the common technologies of the era, two key trends can help inform our concept of future warfare and our ability to wage it. They include: the rise of lethal warbots as primary combatants and adapting current leadership methods to a future era of manned/unmanned, or Centaur, teaming.
Rapid improvements in robotic technologies are presenting both civilian policy makers and military leaders with uncomfortable ethical choices. The pace of change is even quicker than many imagine: California recently issued its 30th corporate permit to test autonomous vehicles on public roads.[1] Emerging artificial intelligence (AI) technologies offers impressive gains in military effectiveness, yet how do we balance their use with accountability for inevitable errors? Considering the history of major technological and conceptual advances, many of these tensions and choices are neither new, unique, nor conceptually unapproachable. The choices fall broadly into three categories: How much autonomy do we provide to autonomous weapons to maximize their military effectiveness? Who makes that decision? And perhaps most critically, who is held accountable when something inevitably goes wrong? Fortunately, current military thought, doctrine, and regulations already provide an effective and adaptable conceptual framework for these challenges.
Colonel Brian M. Michelson, USA, Retired, holds a Bachelor of Science Degree from West Point, a Master of Business Administration from Webster University, a Master of Strategic Studies from the United States Army War College, and has served as a Senior Fellow at the Atlantic Council in Washington, DC.
Prior to becoming a military author, he served in a number of diverse units to include XVIII Airborne Corps, the 101st Airborne Division (Air Assault), the 97th Civil Affairs Battalion (Airborne), United States Special Operations Command (USSOCOM), and Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC).
Brian's military duties have taken him to numerous overseas locations including Laos, the Philippines, Indonesia, Cambodia, Bangladesh, the Maldives, Sri Lanka, the Republic of Korea, Thailand, Cambodia, Panama, Iraq, and Afghanistan.
While he enjoys military history, Brian appreciates the science fiction/fact work of Tom Clancy, August Cole, P.W. Singer, Anton Myer and Robert Heinlein.
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