The Pentagon and military tech industry are going into overdrive in a massive effort to scale out existing technology in what has been the Replicator initiative. It envisions a future force in which fully autonomous systems are deployed in flying drones, aircraft, water vessels and defense systems — connected through a computerized mainframe to synchronize and command units.
Arms control advocates fear the worst and worry existing guardrails offer insufficient checks, given the existential risks. Critics call self-operating weapons “killer robots” or “slaughterbots” because they are powered by artificial intelligence (AI) and can technically operate independently to take out targets without human help.
These types of systems have rarely been seen in action, and how they will affect combat is largely unknown, though their impact on the landscape of warfare has been compared to tanks in World War I.
But there are no international treaties governing the use of these weapons, and human rights groups are uneasy about Washington’s ethical guidelines on AI-powered systems and whether they will offer any protection against an array of humanitarian concerns.
“It’s really a Pandora’s box that we’re starting to see open, and it will be very hard to go back,” said Anna Hehir, who leads autonomous weapons system research for the advocacy organization Future of Life Institute (FLI).