Cybertechnologies are becoming increasingly essential to today’s war. While in earlier periods of history following the Industrial Revolution, the sheer industrial technological superiority of European countries determined their military success in terms of colonization and subjugation of Asians and Africans, today, while most states as well as non-state actors are engaged in developing updated cybersecurity and automation technologies, adoption of these technologies in warfare make wars not only more complex, but they are also fought more in the space of the information.
By adopting cybersecurity and AI technologies, warring parties in the ongoing wars in Europe and the Middle East have attempted to serve numerous war objectives and sought to shift the existing balance of power in their favor. New cyberwarfare technologies as well as increased AI-driven automation of warfare have significantly increased not only the capabilities of states to assess enemy strength, disclose their secret plans, and sabotage their critical infrastructure, including the health, electricity and energy sectors, but also to The wars in Europe and the Middle East showed how crucial these technologies were in bringing precision to strikes, helping to identify targets enemies and enemies, carry out security operations monitoring enemy sites and patrolling border areas.
Information and technology have made wars less expensive, to the extent that cheap drones have replaced expensive planes and fighters, to the extent that precision in hitting targets matters more than lethality and destruction . The ongoing wars in the Middle East and Europe are testament to how drone swarms can cross enemy borders and hit their targets with greater precision.
Such technologies have been used by Ukraine to find safe routes and infrastructure for displaced people and to monitor supply routes to return them shelter, food and health equipment.
The wars taking place in Europe and the Middle East are “total wars” in which the distinction between combatants and non-combatants is not only blurred, but states have pooled vast resources by mobilizing their societies, including war volunteers, mercenaries, arms industries, technology companies and experts and civilians. The warring parties prioritize war over other state activity, attack a wide variety of targets, and reshape their own and other countries’ economies. Any advancement in the field of AI technology can be considered essential to winning such all-out wars.
The Israeli Defense Forces used the Lavender AI system which helped them by providing a simplified digital model of the battlefield and identifying 37,000 people linked to Hamas. The AI clearly allowed him to quickly identify and locate infantrymen more accurately. The case for using AI has been supported by the exponential power of the technology, not only to improve a warring party’s ability to target more quickly and carry out effective attacks with less collateral damage by compared to previous conflicts, but its use for humanitarian aid during wars also exaggerates its importance. .
Ukraine used facial recognition technology, provided by US company Clearview, to identify Russian soldiers crossing the border. This aside, his army also used an autonomous machine gun enabled by AI technologies to target moving enemies. Additionally, an autonomous dog-like robot designed by British company Alliance was used to monitor combat zones and detect enemy locations, including minefields, using thermal vision. On June 20, 2024, Ukraine’s IT army, consisting of a group of volunteer hackers, reportedly launched a cyber war against the Russian banking system, temporarily paralyzing several Russian banks, causing significant financial disruption symbolizing the success of a decentralized model of warfare. The IT Army’s cyber offensive has targeted Russia’s energy sector to sabotage critical infrastructure that supports Russia’s war effort.
Highlighting the critical nature of technology in warfare, China’s national defense white paper has already expressed its aspiration to make full use of AI technology and tools to modernize its military and take advantage of them in warfare future, which he calls the “intelligentization” of war. Along the same lines, the United States, European powers, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates have indicated their willingness to invest heavily to harness AI in the conduct of war.
The rough edges of AI
Technological breakthroughs and their adoption in warfare are likely to provoke more wars by enhancing the capabilities and expectations of states to deter and dominate their enemies and to win wars against them by engendering a sense that the balance of power has swung in their favor. Germany, buoyed by its industrial success, miscalculated its power and lost to the Soviet Union in World War II. New technologies can also bring relative stability in the anarchy of international politics through an equitable distribution of power, such as the advancement of nuclear weapons technologies which has pushed smaller powers to exploit them to counterbalance their conventional military capabilities and maintain a rough balance of power. with greater powers. However, unlike nuclear energy, the power gained through cybersecurity and AI technologies is very difficult to measure and compare to determine a state’s position relative to others. Thus, these technologies would rather disrupt the existing balance of power through misperceptions and miscalculations.
While it is true to some extent that wartime AI technology can facilitate faster and more widespread collection and analysis of this type of information, it may well enable humans to make better decisions in conflicts, minimizing risks to civilians, the limits of increasing dependence on technology. cannot be passed over in silence.
The synthesis, analysis and interpretation of information relating to the enemy are essential to a state’s military strategies. On the other hand, disinformation, information hacking, virus penetration and generation of hallucination traps become elements of adversaries’ war strategies at the same time. Overreliance on technology could lead a state’s war strategies to backfire.
Even if the dangers that nuclear technology represents in terms of weapons are well known, state actors retain a monopoly on their development and deployment. There are a significant number of international laws, conventions and treaties that regulate and limit their production and proliferation. However, the exploitation and diffusion of AI technology is, by its very nature, a decentralized process in which private actors such as software companies and individuals with technological expertise are willing to play a role. crucial, either to strengthen the state actor or to undermine its monopoly of power. Its decentralized nature makes it difficult for states to regulate it nationally or internationally. State and non-state actors would be in constant competition for power, leading to anarchy at the national and international levels.
Drone technologies used by state actors have been adopted by non-state actors, not just due to collusion between them, as in the case of Iran on the one hand and Hezbollah and Hamas on the other. other. They call on the help of several private actors to access these technologies also independently of States. Hezbollah uses Iranian-made reconnaissance drones to violate Israeli airspace, in addition to its own drone arsenal that includes many refined and remanufactured versions of older drones to fit its war strategies. Similarly, Hamas has used drones against Israel since October 2023, obtaining them from various sources. The diffusion of AI technology could give exponential power to these non-state actors.
As ongoing wars testify to the harsh reality that states are increasingly dependent on sophisticated technologies to blur and undermine the technological boundaries of their enemies, the phenomenon called “automation bias”, referring to the propensity increasing number of human beings to wholeheartedly accept technological findings, recommendations and actions will be a reality in the not too distant future. Israeli defense experts reviewed Lavender’s recommendations before authorizing the attacks, but they immediately began to consider them reliable.
In the event of war, the urgent need for faster, more efficient and accurate responses through AI would undermine human values, temperament and judgment that could play an important role in the context of wars. Greater automation of war technologies would make it more difficult, if not almost impossible, to exploit the various possibilities for diplomatic channels that might open up during the twists and turns of war.
Some experts point to the possibility of an eventual loss of complete human control over AI technology, which could lead to the phenomenon of “hyperwar”, referring to a type of conflict and competition so automated that it would collapse the decision-making action loop including the steps -Observe, Orient. Loop, Decide, Act (OODA) where human input is essential at each stage.
The algorithmic warfare that underpins AI is susceptible to various external stimuli that could mislead humans and, therefore, constant vigilance, verification and judgment on the part of humans will remain crucial for war focused on technology. The day technology decides the course of war and international politics independently of human agencies, the entire human civilization, coming of age and evolving over millennia, will collapse.