Emerging Technology
Emerging military technologies are constantly evolving, driven by advancements in science, engineering, and innovation. Various emerging technologies, from lethal autonomous weapons systems to directed-energy weapons to high-density storage systems, warrant detailed examinations. This section, inherently limited in scope, does not take a deep dive into every new technology. Instead, it selects a few key technologies and illustrates how they connect over time to have disruptive effects.
The battlefield impact of new military technologies hinges on three critical factors. First, the most disruptive technologies are not always the most advanced. Artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) are good examples of this lesson, as relatively simple models have enabled the proliferation of cheap unmanned weapons systems and improvements in military decision making. Second, disruption depends on the alternatives a technology displaces. For all the concerns driven by Russia’s use of hypersonic missiles in Ukraine, hypersonic missiles are not clearly a better alternative to already-existing missile technologies. Third, the aggregation of technologies can be more disruptive than the individual technologies themselves. For instance, quantum computing’s impact will be determined mostly by how it integrates with other technologies to amplify quantum computing’s inherent disruptive qualities. The three-factor framework provides a lens through which to analyze the disruptive effects of a small sample of emerging technologies with battlefield implications.
Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning
The integration of AI technologies significantly impacts military operations by enabling autonomous systems, predictive analytics, and enhanced decision-making capabilities. Autonomous systems are now playing a significant role in modern conflicts. Limitations in robotics technologies, however, will likely limit the technologies’ use in ground-based operations in the near future. Still, robotics technologies are accelerating the proliferation of relatively inexpensive unmanned aerial and naval vehicles that can offset the advantage of larger legacy systems.45 Although the role AI plays in many legacy systems is currently limited, as databases grow and models become better at targeting, the effectiveness of these systems will significantly increase.
The Department of Defense continues to integrate generative AI into systems and processes with varying degrees of success. Because generative AI can sort through large amounts of data to reveal connections and patterns humans would struggle to discern at all, much less as quickly, generative AI has the potential to affect every facet of military decision making, from routine administrative tasks to operational planning to fully autonomous sensors, vehicles, and weapons systems.46 Still, difficulties with ensuring the quality of output suggest applications will remain limited in at least the short term. In a recent test sponsored by the US Army Combat Capabilities Development Command, human subject-matter experts outperformed AI planning systems; but the results also suggested, when paired together, human-AI teams will outperform humans and AI systems operating separately.47
Thus, AI/ML technologies are currently more useful for improving the speed and quality of supporting functions that contribute to developing planning tools like a common operating picture, such as intelligence production, the creation of staff estimates, and the integration of staff estimates and predictions, rather than for creating the common operating picture itself. Moreover, because of the need for specialized models, enormous quantities of military-specific training data, processing-power requirements, and the changing environment inherent to combat operations, AI/ML is not yet able to develop courses of action or write operations orders without significant human interaction and oversight.
Sergeant Elijah Tovar, part of a rotational unit under the 2nd Infantry Division/Combined ROK-US Division, prepares to launch a RQ-11 Raven drone to conduct surveillance in the training area to locate possible targets during Freedom Shield 24 in South Korea (Texas Army National Guard photo by Specialist Victoria Morgan)
Assessing an Upgrade: Hypersonic Weapons
Hypersonic missiles and glide vehicles travel at speeds exceeding Mach 5, making them extremely difficult to intercept and significantly reducing response times. Major military powers’ development of hypersonic weapons has sparked a new arms race and raised concerns about strategic stability and the effectiveness of existing missile defense systems. Russia, for example, has two types of hypersonic missiles and is developing a third that can be nuclear capable.48 Russia has reportedly used hypersonic missiles in Ukraine, where the missiles got past air-defense systems and significantly damaged civilian targets.49 China is also making substantial investments in hypersonic technology and has reportedly successfully tested two missile types.50 According to the Defense Intelligence Agency, China currently leads the world in supporting infrastructure as well as in numbers of hypersonic systems.51
Whether hypersonic missiles become truly disruptive will depend on managing the extreme heat caused by flying at high speeds in the atmosphere. As the technology currently stands, hypersonic missiles are not more survivable than ballistic missiles with maneuverable warheads that travel at high speeds outside the atmosphere, are equally accurate, and may cost a third less to employ.52 Current hypersonic missiles rely on rocket boosters to reach high speeds, so early-warning satellites easily see the missiles. Hypersonic missiles’ heat signatures can also make them easily detectable.53 Although hypersonic missiles’ ability to fly fast at low altitudes may make engaging them at range harder for ground-based radar defenses, existing technologies can intercept hypersonic missiles.
Quantum Technologies
Military applications of quantum technologies encompass various fields, leveraging the unique properties of quantum mechanics to enhance capabilities in communication, sensing, and computing. Quantum cryptography, for example, uses the principles of quantum mechanics to secure communication channels. Quantum key distribution enables the theoretically unhackable exchange of encryption keys between parties, as any attempt to eavesdrop on the quantum communication would disturb the quantum state, alerting the sender and receiver to the intrusion. Quantum technology offers the potential for highly secure and tamperproof communication networks for military command-and-control systems, intelligence sharing, and diplomatic communications.54
Quantum communication networks use quantum entanglement and superposition to create secure, high-bandwidth communication links resistant to interception and tampering. Quantum communication networks could support real-time information exchange between military units, command centers, and allied forces, enabling secure voice, video, and data transmission over long distances.55 Quantum communication satellites and ground stations could provide secure connectivity for deployed forces, enabling rapid responses to emerging threats and facilitating coordinated operations in contested environments.56
Quantum sensors use quantum phenomena to achieve ultrahigh precision and sensitivity in detecting signals, measuring physical parameters, and imaging objects. Quantum sensors can detect stealth aircraft, submarines, and other concealed threats with greater accuracy and reliability than conventional sensors, enhancing situational awareness and early-warning capabilities. Quantum sensing technologies also have applications in navigation, geolocation, and environmental monitoring, supporting military operations in diverse operational environments.
Quantum computing will also accelerate improvements in AI and ML applications, potentially accelerating the abovementioned applications. By exponentially increasing computing power and solving complex problems that are beyond the capabilities of classical computers, quantum computers can rapidly process vast amounts of data, optimize logistics and supply chains, simulate battlefield scenarios, and develop advanced algorithms for cryptography, pattern recognition, and AI. Quantum computing could significantly enhance military decision making, situational awareness, and operational planning.
Although quantum computing’s disruptive potential is immense, how soon anyone will feel its effects is hard to tell. Because quantum computers can handle simultaneous calculations, they can leverage more efficient algorithms, but quantum computers’ processing speeds are slow. So, even though non-quantum computers take more steps to solve the same problem, non-quantum computers are still faster than quantum computers for almost all applications.57
Conclusion
The trends and issues selected reflect the complex and dynamic nature of modern warfare, in which technological innovation plays a central role in shaping military strategies, capabilities, and doctrines. The aggregation of technological effects might be most acutely felt in the space domain, which is becoming increasingly militarized, with satellites playing critical roles in communication, navigation, reconnaissance, and surveillance. Space-based systems already provide data AI models can use for intelligence analysis and targeting. In the near future, AI and ML applied to space-based systems will enable better collection, making space-based systems even more lucrative targets.
Should quantum computing become available, it will improve sensor accuracy, communication speed, and navigational accuracy by enhancing the computational capabilities AI and ML use. Quantum computing will enable systems that could more easily detect and defeat hypersonic systems. In this way, advances in one technology can amplify or dampen the impact of others. Thus, maximizing the outcomes of technology acquisition for the future battlefield requires understanding how technologies interact in their applications. The convergence of quantum and other technologies suggests a future battlefield characterized by the complex interaction of technologies, which will prioritize the quality, integrity, and security of information as the center of gravity for successful operations.
Endnotes
- Jack Detsch, “Ukraine’s Cheap Drones Are Decimating Russian Tanks,” Foreign Policy (website), April 9, 2024, https://foreignpolicy.com/2024/04/09/drones-russia-tanks-ukraine-war-fpv-artillery/; and Thomas Mackintosh, “Ukraine War: Kyiv Says Seven Dead as Drone Attack Sinks Russian Ship,” BBC (website), March 5, 2024, https://www.bbc.com/news /world-europe-68477318. Return to text.
- Edward Moore Geist, “It’s Already Too Late to Stop the AI Arms Race—We Must Manage It Instead,” Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists 72, no. 5 (2016): 318, https://thebulletin.org/2016/09/its-already-too-late-to-stop-the-ai-arms-race-we-must-manage-it-instead/. Return to text.
- Nicholas Waytowich et al., “Learning to Guide Multiple Heterogeneous Actors from a Single Human Demonstration via Automatic Curriculum Learning in Starcraft II,” Proceedings 12113 (2022): 5–6. Return to text.
- Donatas Palavenis, “The Use of Emerging Disruptive Technologies by the Russian Armed Forces in the Ukrainian War,” Air Land Sea Space Application Center (website), October 1, 2022, https://www.alsa.mil/News/Article/3170285/the-use-of-emerging-disruptive-technologies-by-the-russian-armed-forces-in-the/. Return to text.
- Haley Ott, “Russia Hammers Ukraine’s 2 Largest Cities with Hypersonic Missiles,” CBS News (website), January 2, 2024, https://www.cbsnews.com/news/russia-ukraine-war-kyiv-kharkiv-hypersonic-missiles/; and Brad Lendon, “Russia Used an Advanced Hypersonic Missile for the First Time in Recent Strike, Ukraine Claims,” CNN (website), February 13, 2024, https://www.cnn.com/2024/02/13/europe/ukraine-russia-zircon-hypersonic-missile-intl-hnk-ml/index.html. Return to text.
- Paul Bernstein and Dain Hancock, “China’s Hypersonic Weapons,” Georgetown Journal of International Affairs (website), January 27, 2021, https://gjia.georgetown.edu/2021/01/27/chinas-hypersonic-weapons/. Return to text.
- Jeff Seldin, “US Defense Officials: China Is Leading in Hypersonic Weapons,” Voice of America (website), March 10, 2023, https://www.voanews.com/a/us-defense-officials-china-is-leading-in-hypersonic-weapons/7000160.html. Return to text.
- “U.S. Hypersonic Weapons and Alternatives,” Congressional Budget Office (website), January 2023, https://www.cbo.gov/publication/58924. Return to text.
- David Wright and Cameron Tracy, “Hypersonic Weapons Are Mediocre. It’s Time to Stop Wasting Money on Them,” Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists (website), March 12, 2024, https://thebulletin.org/2024/03/hypersonic-weapons-are-mediocre-its-time-to-stop-wasting-money-on-them/. Return to text.
- Kelley M. Sayler, Defense Primer: Quantum Technology, CRS Report IF11836 (Washington, DC: CRS, October 25, 2023), https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/IF/IF11836. Return to text.
- “DOE Explains . . . Quantum Networks,” Department of Energy (website), n.d., https://www.energy.gov/science/doe-explainsquantum-networks; and Laurent de Forges de Parny et al., “Satellite-Based Quantum Information Networks: Use Cases, Architecture, and Roadmap,” Nature 6 (2023). Return to text.
- Michal Krelina, “Quantum Technology for Military Applications,” EPJ Quantum Technology 8, (2021), https://epjquantumtechnology.springeropen.com/articles/10.1140/epjqt/s40507-021-00113-y. Return to text.
- Beth Stackpole, “Quantum Computing: What Leaders Need to Know Now,” MIT Sloan School of Management (website), January 11, 2024, https://mitsloan.mit.edu/ideas-made-to-matter/quantum-computing-what-leaders-need-to-know-now. Return to text.
Photo Credit
Victoria Morgan, Freedom Shield 24, Combined Joint Live Fire Exercise [Image 7 of 7], March 13, 2024, DVIDS, link.