The U.S. Defense Department has made battlefield-ready artificial intelligence a priority in its planning, seeking a massive increase in related spending to counter China's rapid advances in the field. The department's Joint Artificial Intelligence Center requested $268 million under the draft federal budget for the fiscal year that began Oct. 1, roughly triple the figure from the previous year. "I am optimistic that 2020 will be a breakout year for the department when it comes to fielding AI-enabled capabilities," Lt. Gen. Jack Shanahan, the center's director, said in a recent press briefing. "For fiscal year '20, our biggest project will be what we are calling'AI for maneuver and fires,' with individual lines of effort or product lines oriented on warfighting operations," he told reporters. The U.S. military's AI development has focused on predictive maintenance for weapons systems, along with areas such as humanitarian missions and cybersecurity.