Deep in the Pentagon, a secret AI program to find hidden nuclear missiles
INSIGHT-Deep in the Pentagon, a secret AI program to find
hidden nuclear missiles
* Pentagon ramping up secret project to use AI to spot
enemy mobile missile launchers, anticipate imminent launches
* Pilot project is looking at threat from North Korea
* Project may expand to look at Iran, Russia, China
By Phil Stewart Tuesday, 5 June 2018 13:49 GMT
WASHINGTON, June 5 (Reuters) - The U.S. military is
increasing spending on a secret research effort to use artificial intelligence
to help anticipate the launch of a nuclear-capable missile, as well as track
and target mobile launchers in North Korea and elsewhere.
The effort has gone largely unreported, and the few
publicly available details about it are buried under a layer of near
impenetrable jargon in the latest Pentagon budget. But U.S. officials familiar
with the research told Reuters there are multiple classified programs now under
way to explore how to develop AI-driven systems to better protect the United
States against a potential nuclear missile strike.
If the research is successful, such computer systems
would be able to think for themselves, scouring huge amounts of data, including
satellite imagery, with a speed and accuracy beyond the capability of humans,
to look for signs of preparations for a missile launch, according to more than
half a dozen sources. The sources included U.S. officials, who spoke on
condition of anonymity because the research is classified.
Forewarned, the U.S. government would be able to pursue
diplomatic options or, in the case of an imminent attack, the military would
have more time to try to destroy the missiles before they were launched, or try
to intercept them.
"We should be doing everything in our power to find
that missile before they launch it and make it increasingly harder to get it
off (the ground)," one of the officials said.
The Trump administration has proposed more than tripling
funding in next year's budget to $83 million for just one of the AI-driven
missile programs, according to several U.S. officials and budget documents. The
boost in funding has not been previously reported.
While the amount is still relatively small, it is one
indicator of the growing importance of the research on AI-powered anti-missile
systems at a time when the United States faces a more militarily assertive
Russia and a significant nuclear weapons threat from long-time foe North Korea.
"What AI and machine learning allows you to do is
find the needle in the haystack," said Bob Work, a champion of AI
technology who was deputy defense secretary until last July, without referring
to any individual projects.
One person familiar with the programs said it includes a
pilot project focused on North Korea. Washington is increasingly concerned
about Pyongyang's development of mobile missiles that can be hidden in tunnels,
forests and caves. The existence of a North Korea-focused project has not been
previously reported.
While that project has been kept secret, the military has
been clear about its interest in AI. The Pentagon, for example, has disclosed
it is using AI to identify objects from video gathered in its drone program, as
part of a publicly touted effort launched last year called "Project
Maven."
Still, some U.S. officials say AI spending overall on
military programs remains woefully inadequate.
AI ARMS RACE
The Pentagon is in a race against China and Russia to
infuse more AI into its war machine, to create more sophisticated autonomous
systems that are able to learn by themselves to carry out specific tasks. The
Pentagon research on using AI to identify potential missile threats and track
mobile launchers is in its infancy and is just one part of that overall effort.
There are scant details on the AI missile research, but
one U.S. official told Reuters that an early prototype of a system to track
mobile missile launchers was already being tested within the U.S. military.
This project involves military and private researchers in
the Washington D.C. area. It is pivoting off technological advances developed
by commercial firms financed by In-Q-Tel, the intelligence community's venture
capital fund, officials said.
In order to carry out the research, the project is
tapping into the intelligence community's commercial cloud service, searching
for patterns and anomalies in data, including from sophisticated radar that can
see through storms and penetrate foliage.
Budget documents reviewed by Reuters noted plans to
expand the focus of the mobile missile launcher program to "the remainder
of the (Pentagon) 4+1 problem sets." The Pentagon typically uses the 4+1
terminology to refer to China, Russia, Iran, North Korea and terrorist groups.
TURNING TURTLES INTO RIFLES
Both supporters and critics of using AI to hunt missiles
agree that it carries major risks. It could accelerate decision-making in a
nuclear crisis. It could increase the chances of computer-generated errors. It
might also provoke an AI arms race with Russia and China that could upset the
global nuclear balance.
U.S. Air Force General John Hyten, the top commander of
U.S. nuclear forces, said once AI-driven systems become fully operational, the
Pentagon will need to think about creating safeguards to ensure humans - not
machines - control the pace of nuclear decision-making, the "escalation
ladder" in Pentagon speak.
"(Artificial intelligence) could force you onto that
ladder if you don't put the safeguards in," Hyten, head of the U.S.
Strategic Command, said in an interview. "Once you're on it, then
everything starts moving."
Experts at the Rand Corporation, a public policy research
body, and elsewhere say there is a high probability that countries like China
and Russia could try to trick an AI missile-hunting system, learning to hide
their missiles from identification.
There is some evidence to suggest they could be
successful.
An experiment
http://www.labsix.org/physical-objects-that-fool-neural-nets by M.I.T. students
showed how easy it was to dupe an advanced Google image classifier, in which a
computer identifies objects. In that case, students fooled the system into
concluding a plastic turtle was actually a rifle.
Dr. Steven Walker, director of the Defense Advanced
Research Projects Agency (DARPA), a pioneer in AI that initially funded what
became the Internet, said the Pentagon still needs humans to review AI systems'
conclusions.
"Because these systems can be fooled," Walker
said in an interview.
DARPA is working on a project to make AI-driven systems
capable of better explaining themselves to human analysts, something the agency
believes will be critical for high stakes national security programs.
'WE CAN'T BE WRONG'
Among those working to improve the effectiveness of AI is
William "Buzz" Roberts, director for automation, AI and augmentation
at the National Geospatial Agency. Roberts works on the front lines of the U.S.
government's efforts to develop AI to help analyze satellite imagery, a crucial
source of data for missile hunters.
Last year, NGA said it used AI to scan and analyze 12
million images. So far, Roberts said, NGA researchers have made progress in
getting AI to help identify the presence or absence of a target of interest,
although he declined to discuss individual programs.
In trying to assess potential national security threats,
the NGA researchers work under a different kind of pressure from their
counterparts in the private sector.
"We can't be wrong ... A lot of the commercial
advancements in AI, machine learning, computer vision - If they're half right,
they're good," said Roberts.
Although some officials believe elements of the AI
missile program could become viable in the early 2020s, others in the U.S.
government and the U.S. Congress fear research efforts are too limited.
"The Russians and the Chinese are definitely
pursuing these sorts of things," Representative Mac Thornberry, the House
Armed Services Committee's chairman, told Reuters. "Probably with greater
effort in some ways than we have."
(Reporting by Phil Stewart Editing by Ross Colvin)
Comments
Post a Comment