Dehumanizing the Wars: Introduction of Artificial Intelligence in the Warfare – Modern Diplomacy

The dynamics of wars are changing rapidly with the development of new technologies and emergence of Artificial Intelligence. Artificial Intelligence is the key driver in revolutionizing the warfare as it contributed significantly to the introduction of efficient, proficient, and command-oriented devices and programs that have the potential to assist Human controlled processes. The dynamic nature of warfare and the quest for innovation and advancement has led to the introduction of the artificial intelligence in the wars where human aspect of war is being replaced by the artificial intelligence-based developments. Traditionally, wars required a large human force to be fought and the challenging aspect about these wars imposed serious damages to both sides. Even the stronger side or the powerful side had to suffer the damages. There were massive causalities on both sides. The Impact of Industrial Revolution can also be traced the same way as the modern equipment required human power to be an impediment for its working and this accounted for even more damaging aspects in a reciprocal manner.

These patterns began to transform in the twentieth century with the modern data thefts commonly known as cyber-crimes that are becoming more and more important where the data and privacy of a state is breached by the use of different methods and increasing acceptance of Artificial Intelligence based devices such as unmanned combat aerial vehicles (UCAVs) or what we commonly refer to as drones. This led to the introduction of drone warfare as an essential component of modern-day wars. The drones are mainly used under the umbrella of dropping munition over the enemy forces or they can be used in their suicide versions. The suicide versions drones reach the target and then they get explode to fulfill the objective under which they were sent. A significant example in this case is of Russia-Ukraine War in which the drone warfare is becoming extremely important where Russia reported its first use of Shahed-136 drone in September 2022 which was aimed at targeting the military targets in the Kharkiv Region in east of country. In addition to this, Russia is also using Orlan-10 drones to counter the Ukraine who is using Bayraktar Tb-2 drones which are modern drones with increased capacity. The NATO alliances are providing Ukraine with these TB-2 missile and in addition to this, they are also providing Ukraine with SYPAQ and kamikaze drones. The drone warfare is quite effective in this warfare as it had replaced Humans combating the wars with the multiplicity of damages. Not only this, but another use of this drone warfare was also seen in Armenia-Azerbaijan war.

We cannot simply restrict the artificial intelligence to the use of drone warfare. This is because many other attempts are being made to change the dynamics of warfare. A significant advancement in this form is the introduction of robots in the wars. Recently, the military robots began shaping the RUSSIA-UKRAINE war. The Uncrewed Ground Vehicles (UGVs) which are military robots operated by remote control are being used by Russia against Ukraine. An important example in this regard is the use of AGS-17 grenade launchers against Ukraine in the Avdiivka. In order to counter the Russian robots, Ukraine has installed the ChaBla robotic turret which is a remote-based machine gun system, to its front line. Ukrainian officials-as reported in the defense news- termed the use of ground robots as game changer in the war

The transition in warfare has been observed in the form of increasing reliance and use of artificial intelligence. In the current times, the role of artificial intelligence is becoming more and more relevant thus replacing the human role in wars as the direct conflicts involving humans fighting against each other, are being replaced by the type of conflicts where use of AI based devices is increasing to combat the humans on the other side. This can be called the dehumanization of wars, as wars are being fought through the remote controlled or software-oriented devices unlike, with human powers which had dominated the wars in the form of large military troops. So, from the use of Dynamic Analysis and Replanning Tool (DART) to schedule the transportation of supplies and personnel and to solve other logistical problems in 1991 to the use of drones and robots in the on-going Russia-Ukraine war and the assumptions of development of advanced weapons, equipments, navigation systems, and surveillance mechanisms operated by AI etc. will be a step towards changing the character of war by minimizing the Human role in wars.

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Dehumanizing the Wars: Introduction of Artificial Intelligence in the Warfare - Modern Diplomacy