The Pentagon Says AI is Speeding Up Its 'Kill Chain'

An anonymous reader shares a report: Leading AI developers, such as OpenAI and Anthropic, are threading a delicate needle to sell software to the United States military: make the Pentagon more efficient, without letting their AI kill people. Today, their tools are not being used as weapons, but AI is giving the Department of Defense a "significant advantage" in identifying, tracking, and assessing threats, the Pentagon's Chief Digital and AI Officer, Dr. Radha Plumb, told TechCrunch in a phone interview.

"We obviously are increasing the ways in which we can speed up the execution of kill chain so that our commanders can respond in the right time to protect our forces," said Plumb. The "kill chain" refers to the military's process of identifying, tracking, and eliminating threats, involving a complex system of sensors, platforms, and weapons. Generative AI is proving helpful during the planning and strategizing phases of the kill chain, according to Plumb. The relationship between the Pentagon and AI developers is a relatively new one. OpenAI, Anthropic, and Meta walked back their usage policies in 2024 to let U.S. intelligence and defense agencies use their AI systems. However, they still don't allow their AI to harm humans. "We've been really clear on what we will and won't use their technologies for," Plumb said, when asked how the Pentagon works with AI model providers.

just need to replace the men with the brass keys t

[Joe_Dragon]

just need to replace the men with the brass keys to speed things up when the kill order comes down.

Re:

[Errol backfiring]

That is already done in practice. For example, drone pilots get their target from the AI and have about half a second to decide whether that is the right target. In theory, there is a human in the loop, in practice the human can do nothing but accept the proposal made by the AI.

Re:

[Joe_Dragon]

trun your key sir

Re:

[ayesnymous]

Israel's been doing it: https://www.washingtonpost.com... [washingtonpost.com]

Re:

[Brain-Fu]

Everyone knows, and has always known, that this would happen, right? I mean, nobody actually thought that we wouldn't weaponize AI, right?

We weaponize everything that we can. It's in our nature. We achieve peace through mutually-assured destruction. The capacity for violence is the ultimate determinant of authority, so anything that can increase that capacity is an attractive target.

This isn't something that's ever going to change.

Re: just need to replace the men with the brass ke

[flyingfsck]

Hmm, Ms Sanchez would an attractive target and I do not need an AI to tell me.

Re:just need to replace the men with the brass key

[kmoser]

High tech is first used by the military, then by the porn industry, and finally in mainstream consumer applications. Industry insiders refer to that pipeline as "fuck you, fuck me, go fuck yourselves."

What a Shame

[Kunedog]

OpenAI, Anthropic, and Meta walked back their usage policies in 2024 to let U.S. intelligence and defense agencies use their AI systems. However, they still don't allow their AI to harm humans.

Why not? Surely the kill chain is only as strong as its weakest link!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]

CIA is less clear

[evanh]

and will happily abuse the military assets.

Coming to a neighborhood near you..

[BytePusher]

It won't be long before they put a drinking bird on the kill button and it wipes out some of your family and friends. They won't apologize, because no one will specifically be at fault.

Re:

[sound+vision]

You have the providers of the tech saying "Our AI doesn't kill people", and the guys pulling the trigger saying "The AI told us to".

Not only does it seem tailor made for this purpose, it's already been deployed in Palestine. Tellingly, the IDF chose to name its AI terrorist-designation software "the Gospel". Can't argue with Yaweh.

What these systems do is automate the production of "faulty intelligence" that gets used to justify the unjustifiable. In other words, AI proves useful in generating industrial qu

Re:It's probably why Joe Biden just pardoned

[Tony Isaac]

I think there's a lot more evidence that the January 6 rioters were guilty of crimes, including murder (7 people died as a result of the insurrection), that Trump has promised to pardon. THAT is an indication of how corrupt the Trump administration will be.

If you think that Cheney was corrupt for investigating an insurrection to the best of her ability, then I want nothing to do with your brand of "justice". And I say this as a lifelong Republican, which Trump is not.

Re:

[ShanghaiBill]

7 people died as a result of the insurrection

One died as a direct result of the insurrection, and she was one of the rioters.

Several other people died from natural causes within a few days of the riot, but that's expected in any sufficiently large group of people.

January 6 Capitol riot [wikipedia.org]

Re:

[Tony Isaac]

It is likely that the 4 suicides by officers, in the aftermath of the attack, were murder. The number of officers wasn't "sufficiently large" to expect that many suicides in that group. But I'll concede your point that the 1 unquestioned death probably isn't murder.

However, it's not in question that dozens, or hundreds, of officers were injured in the response. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org] Also, there's no question that the Capitol breach was a violent act that broke many laws.

Now, explain how a Congre

Re:

[misexistentialist]

It's quite a stretch to make a suicide into a homicide even someone hands the person the rope, but does it really make sense to you that experienced men offed themselves because of that event? Seems more plausible that they were being investigated as MAGA supporters, subject to decades in prison under the draconian Democrat regime, in which case old Joe (or whatever person or group was actually in charge) was the murderer.

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[Tony Isaac]

Fine. I won't accuse the rioters of murder.

I *will* accuse them of insurrection, and injuring dozens of police officers, and breaching the Capitol, and attempting to subvert the will of the people, as expressed through their votes.

And a President who will pardon such people, is corrupt.

And people who complain about Biden's pardons for people who were following the law to the best of their ability and conscience, are hypocrites.

Re:

[NotEmmanuelGoldstein]

... how corrupt the Trump administration ...

The GOP stopped caring about democracy about 25 years ago: I get it, the Tea-Party falling and being replaced by the rise of Mitch McConnell and a GOP 'mafia' didn't look that different to the existing finger on the 'scales' of US democracy. It's easier to assume the system still works, rather than draw a line in the proverbial sand. Everyone did that, which is why the "slippery slope" is real and lots of baby-steps led to the current corruption.

It's great that you object to the corruption but you stil

Re:

[Tony Isaac]

Oh, no, I no longer identify as Republican. The party moved away from its ideals. Its only ideal now is loyalty to Trump. I *do* identify as conservative. The Republican party no longer does.

But before you get all high and mighty about the "pure" ideals of the Democrat party, they're just as bad. Politicians of every party will tell you whatever you want to hear, or give you money, as long as it makes you vote for them.

Biden and Trump *both* gave away trillions in the wake of COVID, and to pay off school lo

Absorption chambers

[caseih]

Great now to complete the cycle all we need are national battle computers that work out the progress of the war (we've always been at war with Eurasia) and calculate casualties that should report to the absorption chambers. So much cleaner than what we've been doing up till now.

But... the military has been using AI already, so?

[Anonymous Coward]

There are even articles going way back (Popular Mechanics?) where the US gov't has been experimenting with AI -- that topic disappeared quickly, and now here we are with OpenAI. It could be that OpenAI has an advantage.

But it's the narrative that I find irritating -- this narrative that AI is going to kill everyone, which is really a dumb assertion meant to influence public opinion. My hammer here can build a house, or crush your skull -- but the fact that I have the hammer, does that make me a killer?

Why not use AI to help people find jobs?

[gillbates]

Instead of identifying and eliminating targets, why not use the AI to help the target solve the problems in their life which made them a threat in the first place?

While it is true that some people are genuinely evil, for most people, doing evil is a matter of their inability to do good, rather than a genuine preference for making themselves and everyone else miserable. If someone has become disgruntled with their lot in life to the extent that they're willing to threaten others, wouldn't it be far bette

Re:

[timeOday]

Certainly AI is being used to help people find jobs. It's just framed as the opposite - AI being used to pass people over for jobs. Neither is really wrong, it's a glass-half-full thing.

Re:

[oumuamua]

Very soon robots will be doing all the work and you'll get your wish. Because if robots do all the work surely TPB must help people and start up UBI. Never underestimate the power of greed, read 'Manna Two Views of Humanity’s Future' if you have not already, it is not scifi, it is a warning: https://marshallbrain.com/mann... [marshallbrain.com]

Re:

[Gravis Zero]

Instead of identifying and eliminating targets, why not use the AI to help the target solve the problems in their life which made them a threat in the first place?

The honest truth is that we cannot eliminate all the major risk factors involved in our present understanding of what makes someone likely to become a terrorist.

Major risk factors include:
* high intelligence (regardless of education)
* lack of fulfilling love life
* lack of fulfilling employment
* dissatisfaction with own government

The more of these things that are true about them, the more likely they will become a terrorist. So basically, you can fix most of the world's problems and still not prevent people

The real menace

[cowdung]

People are worried by ChatGPT (an awesome autocomplete), and want to add all sorts of laws to stop that.
A huge distraction from the real problem: the militarized robotics that are making killing more and more automated and deadly.

CPE1704TKS

[havana9]

I hope the made the AI play tic-tac-toe against themselves before putting them on production. And also use at least 2FA for missile launch orders.

Police next

[lamer01]

i.e. Robocop screwball robot

You need real wars to test with

[RossCWilliams]

The problem is that you need real wars in order to test and refine these weapons. The same way you ultimately can only test driverless cars on real streets. So you need an Iraq, Afghanistan, Gaza, Sudan,Serbia, Libya, Syria or .. Ukraine and ultimately a Taiwan. The venture capitalists can't do it alone.