By Andrea Bergonzi, Data Scientist of Dataskills
In our previous articles we talked about how a revolutionary technology such as Artificial Intelligence is destined to shape the future of very different sectors, such as art, Food & Beverage, sport and even the protection of wildlife wild.
In consideration of the flexibility inherent in AI and its innate ability to adapt to the needs of the most diverse industries, it is therefore not surprising to discover that the military one will also be affected by it – and that the Defense sector has already long since adopted Artificial Intelligence to multiple processes.
As reported by an interesting dossier published on the topic by the giant Deloitte, “the introduction of AI can bring profound changes to governments, including improving the citizen experience, economic prosperity and public safety. As a result, countries and governments around the world are rapidly embracing this technology.”
This technological revolution will reverberate in essentially all areas of the so-called “defense and security” – armies, police, cross-border security – from multiple points of view: from that of detection (collecting and analyzing large quantities of data and information) up to planning ( to anticipate events with the help of Big Data and Machine Learning), from field operations (to offer real-time insights that increase the potential success of missions and investigations or to more easily identify suspicious activities) up to support functions (optimizing budgets, facilitating staff selection and training processes, automating repetitive operations).
Generally speaking, the spectrum of opportunities for applying AI in the Defense and Security sector is truly very broad: the proliferation of data produced and collected allows, in itself, a decidedly more holistic approach compared to the state of any type of military or police operation, especially when compared to the past. And this is certainly not the only aspect to consider: Machine Learning and neural networks will offer crucial support in the most “muscular” operations, autonomous vehicles that use Artificial Intelligence will be able to take charge of dangerous activities, automation will be able to streamline bureaucratic processes and, above all, human-machine collaboration will make it possible to cancel activities that distract from objectives.
A complex and multifaceted scenario, which we will try to break down and summarize in a more orderly way in the following paragraphs.
Artificial Intelligence and Defense: important allocations with multiple objectives
To understand how Artificial Intelligence will shape the future of the military sector we must first of all remember what Defense Technology is, closely linked to it. This defines the use of technology for military, war, defense and security purposes.
As far as statistics are concerned, a recent article published by NSTXL talks about investments amounting to as much as 874 million dollars in military and defense technologies linked to AI and Machine Learning by the US Department of Defense. To these must be added the $2.3 billion budget allocated by the Pentagon to finance scientific and technological research specifically linked to military AI. The objectives of these investments are multiple: improvement of cyber weapons, development of hypersonic technology and driver-free vehicles, increase in operational responsiveness and much more.
These are important signals, which indicate without a doubt that AI is destined to profoundly change the very idea of war.
Artificial Intelligence shapes the future of defense technologies (and changes the face of war conflicts)
When we say that Artificial Intelligence shapes the future of defense technologies and war scenarios, we are not just referring to the future, but also to the present!
In the military field, AI is already incorporated into various operations that allow the performance of armed forces to be improved, for example by developing human-machine collaboration in order to encourage faster, more precise and correct decision-making processes; using drones for reconnaissance, site analysis and target recognition; optimizing logistics and administrative activities; detecting potential threats early; better structuring the training phases of soldiers and, obviously, maximizing IT security.
AI and military recruitment
In the recruitment phase, AI improves selection processes by allowing the most qualified candidates to be more easily identified for the various army tasks.
An example of a practical application in this sense is the chatbot on the US army website which, for some time now, has also made a female version available. The reason is simple: the analysis of the data collected made it possible to discover that, of the 2.5 million users who visit the US Army website monthly, as many as 35% are women.
AI and training of military personnel
In the field of military training, Artificial Intelligence is a very powerful tool that offers the opportunity to structure personalized training based on reliable models to soldiers and military personnel of various types.
It can also be used to create war simulations which progressively become more engaging and realistic, allowing preparation for real war scenarios incomparable to any training in the past.
AI on the battlefield to neutralize threats and reduce the risk of loss of life
And once we arrive on the real battlefield, obviously an environment characterized by extreme danger, Artificial Intelligence can mitigate some threats and keep people safer.
How? By identifying dangers more quickly than human personnel could, guiding troops in their proper management, and dispatching ground or air vehicles equipped with intelligent sensors to further reduce the risk to human life.
The defense of soldiers in the field must then be associated with cyber threats, characterized by extreme offensive potential when relating to the defense sector. A cyber attack in a war scenario can have catastrophic consequences and, as a consequence, an ever-increasing number of armies are using AI to research the cyber security technologies best suited to the protection of military personnel and their communication networks.
The objective is obviously to avoid unwanted access to data critical to the success of missions, but also to collect information on threats so as to recognize patterns and quickly create counterattack tools.
AI and military logistics
We then want to offer some reflections on the use of Artificial Intelligence in the field of military logistics and, more specifically, combat transport.
As everyone knows, in a war context soldiers move around the territory – often at least partly unexplored – on board land, water or air vehicles. Driverless vehicles guided by AI-based systems allow for less human involvement and, especially in the exploratory phases, a systematic reduction of risk. Secondly, they produce precise data about locations to make patrolling, combat and defense activities more effective.
Autonomous weapons equipped with artificial intelligence can also launch coordinated assaults without the need for real soldiers on the field. In this sense, AI also proves to be extremely suitable for recognizing targets in particularly difficult combat conditions, offering a precise position of the target and tracking the objectives.
The role of Artificial Intelligence in war healthcare
Finally, the role that this technology plays and will play in war healthcare should not be forgotten: as is easy to understand, any war conflict is strongly interconnected to the need for rapid, punctual and efficient medical assistance.
In the case of surgical interventions in the field, AI can be combined with RGPs (Robotic Ground Platforms), machines equipped with software, sensors, software and technologies that allow you to move in space and interact with the environment, to operate on the wounded. All this, analyzing the patient’s medical history and also providing support in the diagnostic and therapeutic phase.
In this sense, it will be the mix between AI and robotics that will make the difference in the field hospitals of the future.
Data: the element at the heart of AI for Defense
At the heart of all the innovations that AI can bring to the Defense sector there is always data, which can today be collected from operational vehicles on the ground as well as from ships and aircraft; and by soldiers engaged in training, war games, virtual war simulations and field operations.
The Big Data thus obtained are further processed and analyzed until they become “ready for use”, both to guarantee greater security today and to reshape all the parameters of military technologies tomorrow, protecting nations from threats of various types.
Does this mean that we will have less lethal wars in the future?
There is still no answer to this question, if only due to the unpredictability inherent in human nature. What we certainly know is that technology promises to totally transform the geopolitics of war and civil defense, and that perhaps it will do so by strengthening above all the aspect of deterrence with massive use of surveillance drones. On the other hand, there is also the risk that decision-makers will gradually – and increasingly – rely on AI in the command and control of weapons depending on their speed of analysis and reactivity to threats.
The US Department of Defense seems to be aware of this and, not surprisingly, has recently updated its directive on military systems involving the use of Artificial Intelligence, stating that human judgment must always be used in their development and deployment.
Ultimately, technology applied to Defense will only be able to contribute in a positive way to global geopolitics – for example by helping decision-makers in defining the priorities of objectives – as long as human personnel are able to weigh the risks and adopt the appropriate restrictions on its application.
