Artificial Intelligence and the Security Dilemma

Editor's Note: We know artificial intelligence will change the very nature of war--but we don't know how. The United States, China, and other powers recognize this transformative potential and, even as they seek to exploit it, fear that others will gain the upper hand in an artificial intelligence arms race. My Brookings colleague Chris Meserole describes how artificial intelligence might produce a new security dilemma and proposes several ways to mitigate the risk. Recent breakthroughs in machine learning and artificial intelligence (A.I.) have prompted breathless speculation about their national security applications. Yet most of that work has focused narrowly on their implications for autonomous weapons systems, rather than on the broader security environment.