[Joint House and Senate Hearing, 116 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
AI, UAVs, HYPERSONICS, AND AUTONOMOUS
SYSTEMS: EMERGING TECHNOLOGIES AND
EURO-ATLANTIC SECURITY
=======================================================================
HEARING
before the
COMMISSION ON SECURITY AND COOPERATION IN EUROPE
ONE HUNDRED SIXTEENTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
__________
JANUARY 22, 2020
__________
Printed for the use of the
Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe
[CSCE 116-2-1]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Available via www.csce.gov
______
U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
39-690 PDF WASHINGTON : 2021
COMMISSION ON SECURITY AND COOPERATION IN EUROPE
LEGISLATIVE BRANCH COMMISSIONERS
HOUSE
SENATE
ALCEE L. HASTINGS, Florida ROGER F. WICKER, Mississippi,
Chairman Co-Chairman
JOE WILSON, North Carolina BENJAMIN L. CARDIN, Maryland
ROBERT B. ADERHOLT, Alabama JOHN BOOZMAN, Arkansas
EMANUEL CLEAVER II, Missouri CORY GARDNER, Colorado
STEVE COHEN, Tennessee MARCO RUBIO, Florida
BRIAN FITZPATRICK, Pennsylvania JEANNE SHAHEEN, New Hampshire
RICHARD HUDSON, North Carolina THOM TILLIS, North Carolina
GWEN MOORE, Wisconsin TOM UDALL, New Mexico
MARC VEASEY, Texas SHELDON WHITEHOUSE, Rhode Island
EXECUTIVE BRANCH COMMISSIONERS
Department of State, to be appointed
Department of Commerce, to be appointed
Department of Defense, to be appointed
[ii]
AI, UAVs, HYPERSONICS, AND AUTONOMOUS
SYSTEMS: EMERGING TECHNOLOGIES AND
EURO-ATLANTIC SECURITY
----------
January 22, 2020
COMMISSIONER
Page
Hon. Marc Veasey, Commissioner, Commission on Security and
Cooperation in Europe.......................................... 1
MEMBERS OF CONGRESS
Hon. Colin Allred, Representative from the 32d District of Texas. 3
Hon. Ron Wright, Representative from the 6th District of Texas... 4
WITNESSES
Kelley M. Sayler, Analyst in Advanced Technology and
Global Security, U.S. Congressional Research Service........... 6
Dr. William Inboden, Executive Director at the Clements Center
for National Security and Associate Professor at the LBJ
School, University of Texas-Austin............................. 8
Chris Jenks, Director of the Criminal Clinic and Associate
Professor of Law, Southern Methodist University................ 11
APPENDIX
Prepared statement of Hon. Marc Veasey........................... 26
Prepared statement of Kelley M. Sayler........................... 29
Prepared statement of Dr. William Inboden........................ 42
Prepared statement of Chris Jenks................................ 49
AI, UAVs, HYPERSONICS, AND AUTONOMOUS
SYSTEMS: EMERGING TECHNOLOGIES AND
EURO-ATLANTIC SECURITY
----------
January 22, 2020
Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe
Washington, DC
The field hearing was held at 9:15 a.m. in Nedderman Hall,
University of Texas at Arlington, Arlington, Texas, Hon. Marc
Veasey, Commissioner, Commission on Security and Cooperation in
Europe, presiding.
Commissioner present: Hon. Marc Veasey, Commissioner,
Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe.
Members of Congress present: Hon. Colin Allred,
Representative from the 32nd District of Texas; and Hon. Ron
Wright, Representative from the 6th District of Texas.
Witnesses present: Kelley M. Sayler, Analyst in Advanced
Technology and Global Security, U.S. Congressional Research
Service; Dr. William Inboden, Executive Director at the
Clements Center for National Security and Associate Professor
at the LBJ School, University of Texas-Austin; and Chris Jenks,
Director of the Criminal Clinic and Associate Professor of Law,
Southern Methodist University.
HON. MARC VEASEY, COMMISSIONER, COMMISSION ON SECURITY AND
COOPERATION IN EUROPE
Mr. Veasey. Good morning. It's my distinct pleasure to
welcome everyone to this field hearing on the Commission on
Security and Cooperation in Europe, which is informally
referred to as the U.S. Helsinki Commission. I have the honor
of serving as a commissioner. And the chairman of the committee
is Alcee Hastings of Florida. And I want to thank Congressman
Hastings for asking me to convene this hearing today at UTA.
Some of you may be less familiar with the Helsinki Commission
than our usual audience in Washington, DC, and I'd like to
start off by telling you a little bit about the commission.
Forty-four years ago President Gerald Ford joined 35 other
heads of state--including long-standing American adversaries--
to sign one of the most significant international agreements of
the 20th century, the final act of the Conference on Security
and Cooperation in Europe, better known as the Helsinki
Accords. The accords committed the United States, Europe, and
the Soviet Union to respect human rights, to manage the spread
of dangerous weapons, to foster economic opportunity, and to
ending the territorial disputes in Europe that had already
twice plunged the world into war.
Our commission was created to uphold exactly these
commitments, and since its inception it has provided a crucial
voice for defending freedom, opportunity, and human rights
throughout the United States and the Organization for Security
and Cooperation in Europe, also known as the OSCE, where these
commitments are negotiated to this day. Composed of Members of
Congress from both parties and chosen from the House and
Senate, the Helsinki Commission represents our democracy's
commitment to preserving and advancing the peace, freedom, and
prosperity across the world that previous generations of
Americans sacrificed so much to be able to achieve. That is why
I'm honored to have been appointed to serve on the Helsinki
Commission, because the world has changed dramatically since it
was established, but the need to defend the principles of peace
and security and freedom and opportunity and human rights is
greater than ever.
Ladies and gentlemen, let me now offer a few thoughts on
the purpose of the event and why we're actually having the
event here in Texas. The subject matter for today's hearing
relates to the impact of emerging technologies on Euro-Atlantic
security. And I'm looking forward to learning a great deal from
our witnesses today on this subject. New threats that we are
concerned with range from hypersonic weapons, to drones, to
autonomous weapon platforms, artificial intelligence, directed
energy, and others. These technologies have the potential to
unlock some very important capabilities to ensure the defense
of our homeland and support our allies and friends abroad.
However, these same technologies are under development by some
of our strategic competitors--Russia chief among them--and so
I'll look forward to hearing from our experts and their views
on how potential adversaries are looking to use some of these
same technologies to threaten us and our allies around the
world.
Finally, I will also look forward to our witnesses' views
on how we should approach our international engagement on these
technologies, including through diplomatic efforts and
understanding what national and legal regimes apply or are
under consideration. In particular, today's discussion should
help us better consider whether the OSCE and its affiliated
security institutions can offer a space to establish norms for
emerging technologies. So that's what we want to get out of
today's hearing.
But why are we having it here at UTA rather than D.C.,
where the Helsinki Commission and other committees normally
meet? The answer to that question could not be more clear to
those of us that are here in this room. But for the benefit of
those who may be watching this on livestream or reading the
transcript, I asked Chairman Hastings for the privilege of
convening this hearing here precisely because of the unique
confluence of technical know-how and academic expertise, and
defense industrial presence we have right here in north Texas.
The spirit of innovation and expertise alongside cutting-
edge industry and an innovative private sector is why the Army
decided to establish the headquarters of its Futures Command in
Austin in 2018. In fact, after this hearing we're going to be
spending some time over in Fort Worth at Lockheed Martin
Aeronautics to be briefed on the capabilities and technological
advances provided by the F-35 Lightning II aircraft, and how
well it provides increased opportunities for interservice and
international cooperation. I'll also be visiting the production
line where the F-35 is assembled and getting a firsthand look
at our fifth gen fighters.
And so we are here because of all the expertise available
to us. But we're also here away from Washington because of how
essential it is that Americans throughout our Nation have an
opportunity to engage in policy discussions paramount to our
shared values in the transatlantic space. This hearing offers a
connection outside the Beltway to America's international
commitments as a participating State of the OSCE. We should all
have a stake in meeting commitments to our local and
international communities.
And with that--with all of that being said, I now want to
turn to my fellow Texans. To my right here we have Colin
Allred, who represents the 32d Congressional District in Dallas
County. And to my left we have Congressman Ron Wright of the
6th Congressional District. We're actually in his district, so
thank you for hosting us. And he represents the 6th
Congressional District, that represents Ellis counties and
Tarrant counties. And I now want to yield to them so they can
make some opening remarks.
Colin.
HON. COLIN ALLRED, REPRESENTATIVE FROM THE 32d DISTRICT OF
TEXAS
Mr. Allred. Well, thank you, Mark and Ron, for being here.
And to our panel, thank you for taking your time out. I'd like
to also thank the Helsinki Commission for holding this hearing
here in north Texas.
The emerging technologies discussed in this forum can both
enhance our security and further endanger our future. Although
there are positive aspects to some of these technologies that
could reduce the number of lives lost in armed conflict, there
are, of course, ethical and legal dilemmas that they also
present. And as we look to develop these technologies, I think
the United States must balance both security readiness and
maintaining our values as a Nation. That's why I'm looking
forward to hearing from our witnesses today on these important
topics.
I'm a member of the Foreign Affairs Committee and can say
that obviously we are in a moment in which there is conflict
popping up around the world, and in which we have a complicated
threat stream that we're trying to look to. But as we turn to
the great power competition that we've seen emerging now as the
focus of our own foreign policy and of our strategic opponents,
I think it's important that we look at these emerging
technologies and how this is going to impact it.
I think as was said in some of the testimony that I read
and that may be presented today, you know, advancing technology
is as old as humankind, especially in warfare. This is
something that we have done from the very beginning, finding
better and more efficient ways to conduct warfare. And it has
always presented ethical dilemmas. Maybe never so much so as
now, though. And I think that's something that we should
consider, and that this is an area where the United States has
to lead in. We're the only country that can lead in this
regard. And we are, of course, I think, going to have to take
the dual approach of pursuing our own technology advances while
also pursuing international agreements to find a way forward.
So thank you all for being here. Appreciate you. And I look
forward to getting into the testimony and having a lively
discussion.
Mr. Veasey. Thank you. Thank you very much, Representative
Allred.
And now I'm going to pass the mic to Representative Wright.
HON. RON WRIGHT, REPRESENTATIVE FROM THE 6th DISTRICT OF TEXAS
Mr. Wright. Thank you. And I want to thank Congressman
Veasey for having this hearing here and inviting me. I want to
thank the panel for coming today.
One of the things that Congressman Veasey did not tell you
is another reason to have it here is this is the land of the
lucid, because it's not in Washington. And anytime you can have
a hearing outside of Washington, it's a good thing.
Many years ago--by the way, I'm old enough that I actually
remember the Helsinki Accords, probably one of the few people
in the room that do--but many years ago, it was in the 1970s,
and I'll never forget this. I was with my grandfather, and we
were watching TV at his house. And there was this news report
about--and it was an environmental report. It was mainly about
smog and how bad automobiles had become in terms of their
contribution to smog in concentrated areas. That was before we
really started cleaning up, you know, how--catalytic converters
and all those things that we added to cars to clean them up.
And he looked at me and he said: You know, we didn't have
that problem with horses. And although he was joking, his point
was well-taken. And that is that technology is always a double-
edged sword. And if you have a cellphone, that cellphone is a
double-edged sword. Nothing has interrupted my life like a
cellphone has. And technology's a wonderful thing, but there's
always that downside to it. And what we're looking at here
today is--you know, we have just a plethora of emerging
technologies, all of which could be used to benefit mankind
tremendously.
I think--you know, I would like to think that within my
lifetime biotechnology will solve the problem of famine. That's
just one--medical science--I mean, I could--there's a long list
of technologies that are emerging that are going to make a
tremendous difference to the quality of life of everybody on
this planet. But there's also that downside. And that is that
bad characters can use that same technology and weaponize it in
ways that would really hurt and possibly even destroy humanity.
This is a very important hearing. Congressman Veasey, thank you
for holding it.
Mr. Veasey. Absolutely. Congressman Wright, thank you very
much.
And before I finish with my remarks, I just want to share a
personal story that you may find humorous. So Friday night Ron
and I, Congressman Wright and I, were both here at UTA for the
MLK banquet that they had on Friday night. And as Members of
Congress, particularly when we're back in our district, we're
very busy. We're always at, like, different events.
And were it not for the wonderful staff and all of our
staffs represented here today that help us, from everything
including keeping our schedules, we really wouldn't know how to
get from one place to the other. I usually literally look at my
schedule the night before to know what I'm doing that next day
to try to keep up with everything. And so it's not unusual that
you forget or don't recall that you've agreed to go to a
certain event.
And so if you could have saw Congressman Wright's face on
Friday night at the banquet when I told him: Ron, thank you for
agreeing to come to Helsinki. And he looked at me like, When
did I agree to go to Finland with you? [Laughter.] And if you
could have just saw his face. It was--it was----
Mr. Wright. My heart stopped.
Mr. Veasey. Yes. It was--it was classic. But again, I want
to thank both of these gentlemen for taking time out of their
busy schedule to be a part of this.
Now let me express my gratitude to the experts who have
taken time out of their busy schedules to also be with us today
to provide their testimony for the record. I'd like to very
briefly introduce them. And I think that you'll see that they
represent a clear demonstration of the incredibly high caliber
of locally sourced national security expertise we have right
here in Texas.
First, we're going to hear from Kelley Sayler, who is an
analyst in advanced technology and global security at the U.S.
Congressional Research Service. Kelley, thank you very much for
being here. For those who may not know, the CRS is a great
resource to all of us that are Members of Congress. We really
depend on them to provide us expertise on almost any subject
matter that comes before us as members. Ms. Sayler has an
extensive experience working on these issues both in and out of
the government, including service in the Office of Security and
Defense. And I'll also note her strong Texas connections. She
received her master's degree from Baylor University and also
took some classes here at UTA. So, Ms. Sayler, thank you very
much for being here.
Our next speaker is going to be Dr. William Inboden, who
serves as the executive director of the William Powers, Jr.
chair at the William P. Clements, Jr. Center for National
Security at the University of Texas at Austin. Among Dr.
Inboden's many other roles, he serves as associate professor at
the LBJ School of Public Affairs, distinguished scholar at the
Robert S. Strauss Center for International Security and Law,
and editor-in-chief of the Texas National Security Review. He
has served as a senior director of strategic planning on the
National Security Council at the White House and in the
Department of State's policy planning staff, as well as serving
as a staff member in both the U.S. Senate and the House of
Representatives. Thank you very much for being here today, sir.
Our third witness will be Professor Chris Jenks, who is the
director of the Criminal Clinic and associate professor of law
at the Dedman School of Law at SMU university in Dallas. And as
you can see, Chris is even wearing his SMU colors. Thank you
for representing your colors here today. As a noted expert on
the Law of Armed Conflict and lethal autonomous weapons,
Professor Jenks has served more than 20 years in the U.S. Army,
first as an infantry officer in Germany, Kuwait, and as a NATO
peacekeeper in Bosnia, and later as judge advocate. He also
served details at the Department of State and at the Department
of Justice and was recently called to serve as special
assistant to the Department of Defense general counsel.
And as a last note before I turn the floor over to the
witnesses, I'd like to offer thanks to the University of Texas
at Arlington. Thank you very much, Dean, for helping us
coordinate this, and being a part of this day. We really,
really do appreciate that. And just really Nedderman Hall,
because this being the engineering department, and so much of
the technology that happens here on a daily basis. I couldn't
think of a more fitting place for us to have this program
today.
And let me inform witnesses that their full statements will
be entered in the record. And I've asked them to summarize
their testimony for the purpose of our discussion today. You
now have the floor. And we'll start with Ms. Sayler.
KELLEY M. SAYLER, ANALYST IN ADVANCED TECHNOLOGY AND GLOBAL
SECURITY, U.S. CONGRESSIONAL RESEARCH SERVICE
Ms. Sayler. Thank you to Representative Veasey,
Representative Allred, Representative Wright, and the Helsinki
Commission for the opportunity to provide an overview of
emerging military technologies and their potential implications
for international security. I will focus my remarks today on
three specific emerging military technologies: Artificial
intelligence, lethal autonomous weapons, and hypersonic
weapons.
Although the U.S. Government has no official definition of
artificial intelligence, AI generally refers to a computer
system capable of human-level cognition. AI is currently being
incorporated into a number of military applications by both the
United States and U.S. competitors, including but not limited
to intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance; logistics;
cyber operations; command and control; and semi-autonomous and
autonomous vehicles.
These technologies are intended to either augment or
replace human operators, freeing the operators for more complex
and cognitively demanding work. In addition, AI-enabled systems
could both react significantly faster than systems that rely
upon operator input and cope with an exponential increase in
the amount of data available for analysis. AI could also enable
new concepts of operations, such as swarming, in which unmanned
vehicles autonomously coordinate to achieve a task. Swarming
could confer a warfighting advantage by overwhelming adversary
defensive systems.
The Department of Defense reportedly maintains over 600
active AI projects and is particularly focused on developing AI
applications for predictive maintenance, humanitarian aid and
disaster relief, cyberspace, and robotic automation. China is
the United States' most ambitious competitor in the
international AI market. China has pursued language and facial
recognition technologies and is developing various types of
unmanned vehicles. It is also actively pursuing swarm
technologies. In addition, reports indicate that the Chinese
are developing a suite of AI tools for cyber operations.
Russian AI development lags behind that of the United
States and China. Nonetheless, the Russian military has been
researching a number of AI applications, with a heavy emphasis
on semiautonomous and autonomous military vehicles. Russia is
also developing swarming capabilities and is exploring
innovative uses of AI for remoting sensing and electronic
warfare. In the event of a conflict, these capabilities could
reduce our ability to effectively communicate and navigate on
the battlefield.
A related technology is lethal autonomous weapons, also
known as LAWS. Although there is no internationally agreed upon
definition of LAWS, the Defense Department has identified LAWS
as a class of weapon systems that is capable of independently
selecting and engaging targets without manual human control of
the system. This capability would enable the system to operate
in communications-degraded or -denied environments where
traditional systems may not be able to operate.
Some analysts have noted that LAWS could additionally allow
weapons to strike military objectives more accurately and with
less risk of collateral damage or civilian casualties. Others,
including approximately 25 countries and 100 nongovernmental
organizations, have called for a preemptive ban on LAWS due to
ethical concerns such as a perceived lack of accountability for
use and a perceived inability to comply with the
proportionality and distinction requirements of the laws of
war. The United States is not known to be currently developing
LAWS, and neither China nor Russia has publicly stated that it
is developing LAWS.
Hypersonic weapons, which fly at speeds of at least Mach
5--that's five times the speed of sound--and maneuver
throughout their flight, are in development in a number of
countries, including in the United States, Russia, and China.
Currently no defense against hypersonic weapons exists, and
experts disagree on the affordability, technological
feasibility, and utility of hypersonic missile defense options.
The Department of Defense currently has a number of hypersonic
development programs; however, the United States is unlikely to
field an operational hypersonic weapon before 2022.
Russia is pursuing two nuclear-capable hypersonic weapons--
the Avangard and Zircon. Russia claims that Avangard became
operational in December 2019 while the Zircon could become
operational as early as 2023.
China has tested the DF-ZF hypersonic weapon at least nine
times since 2014. Although unconfirmed by U.S. intelligence
agencies, some analysts believe the DF-ZF will be operational
as early as this year. China also successfully tested Starry
Sky-2, a hypersonic vehicle prototype, in August 2018. And some
reports indicate that that system could be operational by 2025.
The implications of these and other emerging technologies
for international security are difficult if not impossible to
predict. They will be a function of many factors, including the
rate of technological advancement in both the United States and
competitor nations, the manner in which emerging technologies
are combined and integrated into existing military forces, the
interactions between various emerging technologies, and the
extent to which national policies and international law enable
or inhibit their development, integration, and use.
Nonetheless, many emerging technologies exhibit
characteristics that could potentially impact the future
character of war. For example, developments in technologies
such as artificial intelligence, big data analytics, and lethal
autonomous weapons could diminish or remove the need for a
human operator. This could, in turn, increase combat efficiency
and accelerate the pace of combat, potentially with
destabilizing consequences. Emerging technologies could also
potentially shift the offense-defense balance. For example,
some analysts have suggested that swarms of coordinated,
unmanned vehicles could overwhelm adversary defensive systems
or U.S. defense systems, providing a greater advantage to the
attacker, while directed-energy weapons that provide a low-cost
means of neutralizing such attacks could favor the defender.
Thank you, again, for inviting me here today. And I very
much look forward to your questions.
DR. WILLIAM INBODEN, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR AT THE CLEMENTS CENTER
FOR NATIONAL SECURITY AND ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR AT THE LBJ
SCHOOL, UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS-AUSTIN
Dr. Inboden. Congressman Veasey, Congressman Allred,
Congressman Wright, Helsinki Commission, and of course our UT
Arlington leadership and student hosts, thank you also for
including me in today's hearing. I want to say, as a
parenthetical, it's especially encouraging to see bipartisan
leadership here committed on these national security issues
during our time of considerable division in our country across
party lines. It's a great reminder of the bipartisan commitment
that some wonderful leaders in Congress have to keeping our
country strong and safe. So thank you. Your very presence here
today shows that.
On April 27th, 2007, Estonian citizens found their country
under attack. External threats were all too familiar to this
tiny Baltic State, which had been invaded and occupied for most
of the 20th century by Nazi Germany and then by the Soviet
Union. But this attack was different. It wasn't tanks and
troops rolling across the border, or airplanes dropping bombs
from the sky, but computer signals traveling at the speed of
light through internet cables. In short order, the cyberattacks
disrupted or shut down entirely Estonia's banking system,
government, major media outlets, and political parties. These
attacks continued in waves for 3 weeks. Though not a bomb was
dropped, or shot was fired, nor did a single enemy soldier set
foot in the country, the effects were crippling and brought the
country to a standstill.
For Estonia, the effect was almost the same of being
invaded, occupied, and controlled by an outside power. That
outside power was Russia. Though 13 years after the onslaught
on Estonia many operational details are still unknown--which
is, of course, itself a hallmark of cyber warfare--what is not
disputed is that the Kremlin was the originating, authorizing,
and orchestrating power behind the attacks. As the historian
Robert Service writes, ``the Kremlin's purpose was not only to
knock out the Estonian network of communications but also to
show the world what it could do--as well as to allow its
disruptive specialists to conduct a real-life test of what
became known as hybrid warfare. Without setting foot outside
the Russian capital they could do enormous harm abroad.''
In that spirit, and for purposes of this hearing, from our
vantage point 13 years later, I think we should look back on
Russia's cyberattack on Estonia and see it for what it was: the
first wave in what would become a cascade of Russian aggression
and hybrid warfare that included weaponizing new technologies--
the very technologies we're looking at today. The Estonia
attacks were followed by Russia's invasion of Georgia in 2008,
by its seizure of Crimea and invasion of Ukraine in 2014, its
military intervention in Syria in 2015, and even, I would
argue, its assault on our democratic processes in the 2016
election cycle--an assault which continues today.
And I begin with these observations because, though Russia
isn't mentioned by name in the title of today's hearing, Russia
is the OSCE member State most implicated in the themes and
questions we're addressing today and developing and
implementing these new weapons systems.
I should also mention, parenthetically, I'm glad that Ms.
Sayler's testimony mentioned China. I was talking with
Congressman Allred beforehand. We could do a whole `nother
hearing on China. And I think China's advances in this area are
even more significant. I was focusing on Russia because they
are an OSCE member State, but also because, unlike China,
Russia is actually employing these on the battlefield right
now. China may have every intention of doing so, and we need to
watch that space carefully. But Russia's actually
operationalizing this.
So anytime we make a strategic assessment of emerging
technologies, I think we should ask ourselves what is new, and
what is not? I want to mention three aspects of these new
weapons technologies which are not new. The first is lethality.
Yes, these can be lethal, but ever since nuclear weapons we've
had, you know, the most totalizing form of lethality that the
world has known--in addition to chemical and biological.
The second which isn't new is range. These emerging
technologies don't necessarily have unprecedented levels of
range and reach. Existing weapons systems could already project
force globally, and for over a half century we've had reach
into outer space.
The third which is not new is speed. Again, these emerging
technologies have varying dimensions of speed, but they don't
necessarily represent a qualitative leap in rapidity. Ballistic
missiles already fly at several times the speed of sound, as
hypersonics do. The internet already offered communications at
the speed of light.
So what is new? I think there's three aspects of these
emerging technologies which are new, at least in a strategic
sense. The first is deniability. Given various factors
involving the distance of human operators, the operational
complexity of cutouts and false surrogates, and the literal
autonomy of some of these systems, oftentimes it's very easy to
deny who actually was the main actor behind it. You know, to
put it more colloquially, a lot of time they're not going to
have a return address. And that makes deterrence and
retaliation more difficult and can be strategically
destabilizing.
The second is controllability. This is the corollary of
deniability. These new weapons systems can be controlled
remotely with greater precision, from greater distance, with
greater anonymity, and in greater safety for the operators than
any previous weapons by an order of magnitude. It means that
kinetic action could be taking place in an OSCE participant
State, but controlled by various actors 10,000 miles away.
And the third is inhumanity. And I don't mean this in the
melodramatic sense, but the very literal sense of removing the
human actor in ways we've never before seen before. The
emerging domain of AI and autonomous weapons brings us a new
paradigm that may completely remove the human actor and quite
literally be inhumane. A great analyst on these is Paul Scharre
of the Center for New American Security. I know Kelley's worked
with him before. And he put it this way in his really excellent
new book, ``An Army of None'': ``Do we control our creations or
do they control us?''
So how then, on the very specifics of our hearing today,
should the OSCE think about these emerging technologies? Here's
my main takeaway. If you remember nothing else from today,
remember this next sentence: The importance of these emerging
technologies cannot be evaluated aside from the nature of the
states that use them. It's not the fact of the new technologies
that matters most, but who will use them and for what purposes.
To put it a little more provocatively, I doubt that many if
any of us here worry too much about the United Kingdom and
France possessing nuclear weapons, even though they both have
for 77 years. Whereas many of us do continue to worry about
Russia's nuclear arsenal. And there's a reason--there's a
reason for that. And this is, I think, the core strategic
insight of the original Helsinki process, the commission that
brings us here today, because it connected respect for human
rights and civil liberties with European and transatlantic
security. And that continues to be the animating spirit of the
OSCE.
So bringing it back to Putin and Russia, his authoritarian
rule squelches and silences any dissent, and empowers him to
act with aggression based only on his whims or designs. Because
he lacks popular legitimacy--and because he fears his own
citizens--he resorts to a perverse and toxic combination of
cultivating grievances, fueling paranoia, and projecting
strength against adversaries, real or perceived. So such a
ruler would naturally seek to acquire--and in his case to use--
the most advanced, sophisticated, and lethal weapons systems
that he can.
So what should be done? I think the best framework to
address these emerging technologies lies in the commitments and
values of the Helsinki Final Act. Again, the accords, the
agreements that the CSCE continues to monitor and implement
today. Open, free, and secure societies are best equipped to
explore, debate, wrestle with and ultimately resolve these hard
questions. In contrast, authoritarian states, by their nature,
brook little dissent, encourage little transparency or debate,
and concentrate power in the hands of dictators that generally
make decisions on the employment of arms based on expediency
and utility, rather than morality or conscience. So in
practical terms, any strategy to address Russia's growing
advantage in this weaponry needs to include pressing Russia to
honor its OSCE commitments on human rights and freedoms.
Finally, how might these technologies be managed and
perhaps limited by international agreements? Well, I'm going to
conclude with a hope, a caution, and a recommendation. The
first is a hope. International agreements are possible. They
have been forged at times in the past on controlling new
weapons technologies, whether sawtooth bayonets, dum-dum
bullets, chemical and biological weapons, blinding lasers, or
even the entire class of nuclear weapons abolished by the 1987
INF Treaty, competing states have been able to come together,
forge agreements, and honor and fulfill them. So that's the
hope.
The caution: An arms control agreement is only as strong as
its weakest signatory, and its verification regime. While
Russia would need to be part of any effective arms control
accords on emerging weapons technologies, Russia also
historically has a bad habit of treaty violations. These
include its violations in its previous incarnation as the
Soviet Union or now as Russia of the ABM treaty, the Biological
Weapons Convention, and the INF Treaty, not to mention its
serial violations of its OSCE commitments. So we should temper
our expectations or hopes of just how much can be accomplished
with Russia in this realm in the near term.
And finally, the recommendation. I do think the U.S. and
our like-minded OSCE participant States should take a page from
the cold war playbook and combine strength with diplomacy.
Diplomatic success proceeds from military power and allied
unity. To begin, the U.S. and other OSCE democracies should
move forward in developing our own capabilities on emerging
weapons technologies, specifically those featured today.
Unilateral disarmament is not a luxury that we can indulge.
But as with the NATO dual track decision of 1979 to respond
to the Soviet deployment of intermediate-range nuclear missiles
in Europe by, in turn, on the one hand, deploying American
intermediate-range nuclear missiles, Pershing IIs and ground-
launched cruise missiles, and also pursuing diplomatic
negotiations was a key decision NATO made and the Reagan
Administration implemented thereafter of buildup, but also
negotiate at the same time. We need to build up to negotiate. I
think from a position of strength we can better encourage
Russia and other potentially recalcitrant states, such as
China, of the advantages of setting shared rules for the
control, use, and limitation of these weapons.
Thank you for your time and I look forward to our
discussion.
CHRIS JENKS, DIRECTOR OF THE CRIMINAL CLINIC AND ASSOCIATE
PROFESSOR OF LAW, SOUTHERN METHODIST UNIVERSITY
Mr. Jenks. Congressman Veasey, Congressman Allred,
Congressman Wright, I want to thank the Helsinki Commission and
UTA for hosting this hearing and bringing attention to
artificial intelligence, unmanned aerial vehicles, hypersonic,
and autonomous systems. These topics are a problematic
combination of critically important and commonly misunderstood.
It is vital to transatlantic security that the United States
and our allies reach consensus on how we think about these
topics so we can identify where and how we wish to develop and
operationalize emerging technologies, but also to identify
norms and whether to limit the export of certain technologies
to mitigate the risk of these capabilities ending up in the
hands of bad actors.
Some of today's topics are not being meaningfully discussed
in multilateral fora. And the one topic which is the subject of
such discussions, autonomous weapons, is frankly validating why
entities like the OSCE may want to consider adding emerging
technologies as a focus area. Autonomous weapons have been the
subject of several years of discussions within the United
Nations. The wonderfully named Convention on Certain
Conventional Weapons, or CCW, has intermittently met in Geneva
beginning in 2014. There are 125 states parties to the CCW, so
roughly two-thirds of the countries in the world have signed
on, including the U.S., Russia, China, and all of our European
allies. The purpose of the CCW is to ban or restrict the use of
specific types of weapons that are considered to cause
unnecessary or unjustifiable suffering to combatants, or to
affect civilians indiscriminately.
But referring to autonomy and autonomous weapons is to
refer to a technological descriptor, not a specific type of
weapon. As a result, the international community has spent many
confusing and frustrating hours in Geneva talking past each
other because of the different understandings of autonomy. That
is but one reason why the OSCE should consider also taking up
this issue. Because we're talking about a technological
descriptor, there are just as many, and frankly more, civilian
applications which will leverage autonomy than there will be
military. And these civilian applications will be increasingly
important for economic growth and prosperity which, of course,
also bears on security.
Another reason why the OSCE should take up emerging
technologies is to help inform the public. Within the CCW
autonomous weapons discussions there is a small but exceedingly
vocal coalition of nongovernmental organizations which seek to
regulate or ban autonomous weapons. They have been effective at
inciting what I call moral panic, employing evocative science-
fiction imagery of uncontrollable robotic weapons
indiscriminately roaming the streets and shooting at everything
from a toddler to a teddy bear. I don't want you to think that
I'm being hyperbolic. They literally produced images of a
robotics weapons system and a child carrying a teddy bear.
While that sounds, and frankly is, absurd, one of the
results of their efforts is that autonomy and artificial
intelligence are now four-letter words. What do I mean? Well,
some countries are avoiding acknowledging that they either
already have fielded or are developing autonomous weapons
systems--as if the word ``autonomy'' was now recognized as
either politically incorrect or a profane word we were just
made aware of. When I speak of autonomous weapons, similar to
Ms. Sayler, I use the widely accepted definition of a system
which is capable of selecting and engaging targets without
human intervention. So we are talking about weapons systems
which determine what to shoot at, and then shoot at that
target.
We should be clear that such systems are not far off in
some vague technological timeline future. They are here, they
have been here. The U.S. and many other countries, including
our European allies, have fielded weapon systems with an
autonomous mode. This goes back to the early 1980s. The systems
are largely defensive, and anti-materiel. They shoot down
incoming missiles, or planes, or boats which are attacking at
close range. With technological advances comes the possibility
of weapons systems able to perform new and different functions
than in the past.
I'm not saying this doesn't raise concerns. It does. But it
also raises the prospects, as Congressman Allred alluded to, of
limiting war's harmful effects, of using lethal force with
greater discrimination, limiting civilian casualties but also
better protecting our servicemembers. In my view, there can be
no question that the U.S. and our European allies must continue
to leverage emerging technology and weapons systems. We would
be derelict in our duty if we didn't. But we need to halt the
demonization of technology in the context of weapons.
So I'll end by expressing my hope that you continue and
expand these discussions both here in the U.S. and also in and
with our European allies.
Thank you for your time. I look forward to your questions.
Mr. Veasey. Thank you very much. And I want to thank the
panelists for those opening remarks. I'm going to open up with
questions, and then I'm going to ask the members if they would
like to ask the panelists questions as well. And if we have
time, toward the end of the program we're going to open it up
for questions from the audience. And so please be thinking
about forming your own questions to ask these distinguished
panelists.
The first question that I have is on these new
technologies. And I wanted to ask you particularly about how
these emerging technologies have reinforced our ability to
protect our own security and that of our allies and partners
abroad. And I want to give you a specific example--addressing
the A2/AD challenge by Russia and China.
As you know, Russia--and it was talked about earlier in
opening comments that you made--Russia actively threatens our
NATO allies through its deployment of what are called anti-
access/area denial--A2/AD--capabilities in Kaliningrad and in
Crimea, among other locations. These capabilities are designed
to make it impossible for the U.S. to operate freely in the
Baltic and Black Sea regions in the event of a conflict. China
is similarly deploying capabilities designed to impact our
ability to operate in the South China Sea.
To what extent are these technologies we are discussing
today relevant to addressing this particular challenge? And in
particular, how could the United States' use hypersonic weapons
and/or AI to defeat the capabilities of an adversary trying to
deny us access to a certain geographic area? And we'll ask Ms.
Sayler to open up with comments on that.
Ms. Sayler. So I think the National Defense Strategy
actually states very explicitly--there's a callout for emerging
technologies, a recognition that these will, quote, ``ensure we
will be able to fight and win the wars of the future.'' And so
I think there was a recognition by the Pentagon that these
would be critical in applications such as anti-access/area
denial situations in Russia and China.
When we're talking about emerging technologies, I think
it's very important to keep in mind that the technologies are
not ends in and of themselves. So they are tools in the hands
of a commander. And what I mean by that is that it's not just
that we get the right technologies, it's that we also ensure
that they are integrated into our military forces, that our
military forces are trained on how to use them, and that we
have the appropriate concepts of operation to ensure that
they're actually effective on the battlefield.
And so hypersonic weapons, we don't have--publicly
available anyway, operational concepts. It's difficult to
evaluate how they might be used in the event of a conflict. But
theoretically they offer maneuverability that you could
potentially use if you have the appropriate sensor architecture
to target road mobile missile launchers, that we know that both
Russia and China, strategic competitors, are investing in, as
well as other fleeting targets--for example, in a terrorist-
type situation. With artificial intelligence you're also
increasing the speed with which you can execute decisionmaking.
Again, that depends on how it's integrated into the system. But
in theory that would enable you to be making decisions faster
than your adversary. And that obviously gives you a distinct
advantage.
Mr. Veasey. Mr. Inboden, do you have any comments on that?
Dr. Inboden. Just to add to that, at the strategic level a
real concern I have is the growing cooperation between Russia
and China in this realm. Whether it's technology sharing, joint
military operations, or even shared strategic concepts on anti-
access/area denial. So China started pioneering this in the
South China Sea. Russia saw that and sort of took a page out of
Beijing's playbook in Kaliningrad.
The other thing I'd say is this is not so much about the
United States trying to poke our nose into other people's
business where we don't have an interest. We have treaty allies
who are very directly threatened and implicated by this. You
know, Poland in the Baltics, you know, around Kaliningrad, of
course, the Philippines in the South China Sea, and then our
commitments--not formal treaty--but commitments to Taiwan and
others. So our legally and morally bound allies want us there.
And when adversaries are saying we can't be there because of
these new technologies, that's a real problem.
On the plus side, I hope that for regaining access
sometimes it might be a matter of just disabling their command
and control and communications without even having to fire a
shot. So sometimes we can leap ahead of them if they've been
able to try to deny access to an area. So I'm being a little
more optimistic there, but it's not all a losing proposition.
Mr. Veasey. I wanted to talk a little bit about the U.S.,
and are we falling behind in hypersonics. You know, Vladimir
Putin claims that Russia is now the world's leader in
developing and deploying operational hypersonics. Some analysts
suggest that China is also potentially ahead of the United
States in this domain. To what extent is this case? And what
impact could it have on international security? And I think you
have to keep in mind Putin--especially with him being a former
KGB guy, he's always trying to spin things. He's always trying
to see if he can win a propaganda war in saying things like
that. But to what extent should we really be concerned about
this?
Ms. Sayler. So I think when we're evaluating whether or not
the United States is falling behind in hypersonic weapons, it
depends on the metric. So by a timeline, Russia has stated that
it has already fielded a hypersonic weapon. China is likely to
field on this year. The United States is not going to field one
for probably two or three more years. But it's not an apples to
apples comparison because we're developing different types of
systems. And the systems that the United States is pursuing are
actually more technologically sophisticated because, for
example, we're not pursuing nuclear armed weapons. And so they
need to be actually more precise than some of our strategic
competitor systems.
With that said, there is a broad range of opinion sort of
on what the effect will be if these systems are deployed by
U.S. competitors. So on one hand some analysts believe that
these could be destabilizing because they're very unpredictable
in how they operate, and you could have uncertainty with regard
to the object that's being targeted, and that could in turn
lead to unintended escalation of a conflict or other sort of
destabilizing actions.
On the other hand, there are analysts that believe that
these technologies will be bound by the same principles of
deterrence as our already existing missiles, and that therefore
they are unlikely to have a profound consequence. And those
analysts also point out that the United States missile defenses
already are vulnerable in particular circumstances. For
example, if an adversary were to deploy a missile salvo, and
therefore their ability to launch a hypersonic weapon doesn't
really change things particularly. So that's sort of the range
of opinion on that issue.
Mr. Veasey. My last question before I turn it over to
colleagues, is the ethical, the human rights considerations.
You know, some of the things under consideration--a lot of it
is very sobering, especially when you start talking about
lasers that blind people, as I think Dr. Inboden mentioned in
his opening comments. You know, gene-editing babies, those are
things that I think should concern all of us. What are the
implications of emerging technologies for ethics and human
rights? And are certain technologies more concerning than
others to you? And what, if anything, governs our development
of our own deployment of these technologies? And I'll open it
up to anyone that's on the panel.
Ms. Sayler. So I think with regard to ethics and human
rights, again, it depends specifically on the country that's
developing. What measures do they have in place? What does
their weapons review process look like? When we talk about
lethal autonomous weapons, again, full range of opinion. The
U.S. Government has stated publicly that it believes that a ban
on such systems would be preemptive and premature at this time,
because potentially they could enable us to adhere even better
to the law of armed conflict, that they would be more precise,
that they would not have collateral damage or civilian
casualties that other weapons systems might have. There's an
alternative view that suggests that these weapons would be
inherently indiscriminate. And so I think it depends on how
countries are evaluating their systems, and essentially
ensuring that they can perform as anticipated when they're
deploying them. And that's a country-by-country sort of issue.
Dr. Inboden. A couple thoughts to add to that. I'm in
agreement with everything Ms. Sayler said. The first is
essentially what she said, there are some upsides to these new
technologies in the realm of ethics and morality. So for
example, UAVs, you know it can be very controversial, drones,
but in addition to the extra protection they provide for
American forces their precision really helps fulfill two of the
cardinal tenets of just war theory, law of armed conflict, of
discrimination and proportionality. The first, discrimination,
being you don't kill civilians, you just kill the bad guys, the
enemy combatants. And with its precision targeting, you know,
the bad guy can be right there, and a civilian right next to
him or her, and we can just take him--take him out.
The second, of course, is proportionality. Don't use any
more force than you actually need. Don't use a 500-pound bomb
if a bullet will do. And again, just putting a, you know, six-
or eight-pound warhead on a--on a missile from a UAV can
sometimes kill just the right number of the bad people without
excessive civilian casualties.
So there are some positive sides of this. Another one,
getting a little more into the realm of sci-fi, is that
sometime it might even be--we might even have the capabilities
to disable an enemy weapon system without having to kill any of
them. But, you know, just make it stop in its proverbial tracks
there.
I come back to the principles of the Helsinki Accords,
Helsinki's commitments to religious freedom, to allowing
religious communities to bring voices of spirituality and
conscience into these debates ensures that free societies,
while doing whatever they need on the weaponry and materiel
fronts, are also bringing in voices of conscience and morality
to shape these debates. And that's my bigger worry with the
Russias and Chinas of the world, is they're making these
decisions based only on military strength and expediency, while
they're squelching the different, you know, clergy and
religious citizens who may be able to bring the voice of
conscience in. So that's why I go back to that core Helsinki
insight of all these things need to be considered together.
Mr. Jenks. In terms of the implications, I think there's
certainly at least the potential for some real positive, but
also some negative, implications. When I think of the potential
positive implications--I mean, it's certainly an ethical or a
human rights win if we're limiting civilian casualties,
limiting collateral damage. I think there is a risk with some
of these emerging technologies that they might lower the
threshold for using force, because you're now able to use force
in a way where your servicemembers are not going to be at risk.
And when you add into that, as Mr. Inboden talked about,
deniability, I think that's a risk.
One of the things I find interesting in the ethics
discussion is increasingly people talking about human dignity
and being killed by a machine. And I struggle to understand the
difference in a human killing a human or a machine, frankly,
killing a human. When I served in Iraq and we had a number of
wounded U.S. servicemembers, I never encountered a wounded U.S.
servicemember who felt better about having been shot by a
person as opposed to an autonomous system. So I think we even
have an ethical obligation to pursue some of these systems if
we're able to use them more discriminately.
In terms of potentially worrisome technologies, I think
kind of below the radar a lot of the focus is on armed forces,
but domestic security services. If you think about crowd
control and privacy concerns--and if I now tell you that both
on the air and on the ground there are robotic systems that are
able to surveil or maybe even use--take riot kind of control
measures, and to do so autonomously, you can see how in the
hands of different country security services that don't have
the constitutional obligations and responsibilities that we do,
you could see that getting very problematic from a human rights
or privacy perspective.
Mr. Veasey. And I think also too one thing that has to be
taken into consideration that I would ask the audience to think
about also is that once you start limiting these things for
military use, what sort of impact is that going to have on
civilian applications, right? I mean, a lot of the things that
we rely on for everyday use today--whether it's GPS, or whether
it's, you know, drones--I know that cities now want to be able
to use drones and what have you to be able to monitor things
like traffic and high-speed pursuits, and what have you. So
there are a lot of things that the military uses for defense
purposes that we also want to be able to benefit from for
everyday civilian use too. And you know, by denying some of
these things what sort of impact will it--will it have on us
being able to have these advances, particularly when other, you
know, other countries are trying to develop them.
So with that, I'm going to turn it over to Congressman
Wright.
Mr. Wright. Thank you very much. I think all of you know
that Alfred Nobel invented dynamite. Now, this is the same
Alfred Nobel for which the Nobel Prizes are named. And the
story goes that when he developed dynamite he thought he had
invented the end of war because it was such a horribly
destructive device. And of course, we saw that that was wrong.
And the experience of the 20th century at least was that if a
technology could be developed then that technology would be
weaponized. And if it could be weaponized, it would be used.
Now for the last--since the 1980s, and the different arms
accords and agreements that we've had, the use of nuclear
weapons, at least by governments, has not been as great a
factor as it was when I was growing up in the 1950s and 1960s.
But that concern still--is still there, that if there is a
technology that can be developed, it would likely, by bad
actors, be weaponized and possibly used.
And so you get into the ethical and moral questions y'all
were just discussing. And I remember the neutron bomb, and the
moral absurdity of having a bomb that would kill people but
leave the buildings intact. That was a moral--and a worldwide
outrage, because it was morally absurd. Why would it matter if
the building survived, if all the people were dead?
So you get into those kind of questions. My first question
to you, though, is all these emerging technologies that can be
weaponized, what frightens you the most? And I want all three
of you to answer that.
Mr. Jenks. I think I would just reiterate, for me--I mean,
and different people have different fears or concerns. The idea
of a kind of constant surveillance state that would be
emboldened by autonomous--by autonomy, and the idea that there
could be drones in the air. And you know what that drone does?
It follows you everywhere. And if you turn this into
microdrones and swarms of them, the idea that--I mean, I think
a lot of people misunderstand that everywhere you are in
Manhattan, you're on a camera. And everywhere you are in parts
of London, you're under a camera. Now, just expand that level
of surveillance, and I think the privacy--the privacy concerns.
So that's--for me, that's the concern that comes to my mind.
Mr. Wright. Makes your computer easier to use.
Dr. Inboden. I would share all the concerns that Chris said
there. I just spent a few weeks in China this summer and just,
you know, the constant surveillance, the knowing that----
Mr. Wright. The facial recognition.
Dr. Inboden. Yes, the facial recognition, that kind of
stuff. You know, under a Leninist police state. The other one
that does scare me, though, is the possibility I alluded to
earlier in the inhumanity part, is the potential development of
a completely autonomous weapons system where human controls are
totally out of the picture. I mean, the only time in history
we've really seen something remotely close to this was the
doomsday machine that the Soviet Union started building in the
1980s. Their fear was that if the U.S. were to decapitate all
the Soviet leadership in a preemptive nuclear strike, the
machine would then take over and ensure that all the Soviet
missiles were counter-launched, even though there's no one
actually giving the order.
And even the Soviets decided, wait, this is a bridge too
far, because, you know, what if the machine goes haywire and
we're actually here, but we can't--we can't turn it off and
stop it? But that concept in the 21st century is truly
horrifying. And that goes back to the question of, you know, do
we control our creations, or do they control us?
Ms. Sayler. I would hesitate to say that any specific
technology is inherently bad. I think it really comes back to
how it's being used and what regimes are in place to ensure
that there is ethical use, that human rights considerations are
taken into account. And that's really a question of policy.
Many of these technologies do potentially pose operational risk
or significant concerns for human rights and ethics. But I
don't think that's an issue of something that's inherent in the
technology.
Mr. Wright. My next question has to do with how we engage,
entice, and monitor nations that we think are bad actors and
are engaged in the development of these technologies. We know
that New START [Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty] is about to
expire. I serve on Foreign Affairs with Colin. And we had a
hearing not too long ago on that very issue, and the desire for
the president to open that up to China.
Well, China doesn't have a whole lot of interest in any
kind of arms control. But that is a vehicle by which certain
things could be added if we can do it without destroying the
agreement itself. And that was the chief concern that came up
in the hearing, is if we start adding things it would destroy
the agreement itself and we would have no START.
So my question is, how do we entice--because one of the
reasons you even enter into an arms agreement is it gives you
the ability--it gives us the ability--to see inside that
country in ways we wouldn't be able to otherwise. So if it's
not something like New START, how do we entice and get people,
get nations like China and Russia--China especially. Russia is
a menace, but China in the long term is a much greater threat--
how do we entice them to the table and get them to agree before
all of this happens, before all of this gets to a mature state?
Because it's much harder to do then.
Dr. Inboden. Great question. I'm going to answer it by
going back to one of your previous questions, looking at the
nuclear era. And this is where we can take some encouragement
from history. In the late 1960s there were only six nuclear
powers in the world--the five U.N. permanent Security Council
members and Israel. And they were--that is now undeclared.
But--[inaudible]--Israel has nukes, okay? And in 1968 President
Johnson, the namesake of the school that I teach at, led the
way in drafting and ratifying the Nonproliferation Treaty. And
at the time, the widespread fear was over the next 20 years the
number of nuclear powers in the world would go from about 6 to
about 36. Every expectation was there was going to be a cascade
of proliferation over the next 20 years.
And yet, here we are, over 50 years after the NPT, and
there are only three more nuclear powers in the world since
then--India, Pakistan, and North Korea. There's only nine now.
Now, there's concern with those, especially with North
Korea. But how and why did that work? And I think there's three
reasons that maybe can be applied to the other--to control of
the other technologies we're worried about today. The first is
the treaty monitoring and dialog channels itself, right? I
mean, even if--I was earlier skeptical of the Soviet Union/
Russia's record on this. They do break a lot of them. But
having those monitoring channels, having those dialog ones, it
at least limits the--and sometimes prevents the violations.
The second, though, is something that's fallen into
disrepute these days, and I wish we had more respect for,
America's alliance structure. Why did Taiwan and South Korea
and Japan give up their aspirations for nuclear weapons?
Because they had the protection of the American nuclear
umbrella, because they trusted our alliance commitments to
them. And so I think the United States continuing to be
committed to our allies is actually a strong
counterproliferation measure which is often forgotten.
The third goes back to my other point about strategic
strength. Maintaining our defenses, maintaining a cutting-edge
military ourselves strengthens our hand at the negotiating
table. That needs to be compliant with the diplomacy,
especially in these arms control agreements.
Mr. Veasey. That's interesting, two of you mentioned about
being under constant surveillance earlier, because just, you
know, in our everyday lives, with the issue of data privacy--
something that that we deal with on the Energy and Commerce
Committee--I feel like we're already kind of under constant
surveillance anyway.
In addition to Dean Crouch we've also now been joined by
President Karbhari that's here. I want to recognize him. Thank
you, sir. Thank you, President of UTA. We really appreciate you
giving us this space--the generous use of the space. It's been
a great presentation so far. So thank you very much. We
appreciate it sir. Thank you.
Now I'm going to turn it over to Congressman Allred.
Mr. Allred. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for the day. I want to
thank my colleagues for their great questions. I think we've
covered a lot of ground here.
But, Dr. Inboden, I wanted to drill down on the inherent
tension--and I agree with your point on this about pursuing a
dual track approach. And I want to say I agree both because of
the historic comparisons, and also because I think we can't
unilaterally disarm, pursuing these technologies while also
trying to use international agreements to place them in a----
[AUDIO BREAK]
Dr. Inboden. [In progress following audio break]--for
example. Sometimes you just want to say, we're not going to--
we're not going to play in that realm. Similar to President
Reagan's decisions to start reducing the nuclear arsenal as an
example to the Soviets, would be another there.
And on your larger point, the strategic question that, you
know, leaders almost always face when you're looking at an
adversary is: Are we in an escalation spiral or a deterrence
cycle here? If it's an escalation spiral, where every step we
take to get stronger they're going to take--you know, then it--
then it can get into an out-of-control arms race.
So the key is how can we shift that to a deterrence cycle
where us taking a step to get stronger persuades them we don't
want to go into that realm? And the way to do that is, you
know, partly by the building up, but also by diplomacy, by
talking about the importance of human rights and civil
liberties commitments, as these--as these mutual strengths. So
it's never one clear, only go in this direction and not the
other one as well. So they're hard questions and I appreciate
you bringing it up.
Mr. Allred. Well, I think it is going to be--the dynamic is
going to be difficult because of that. But I don't think that
means that we shouldn't pursue it. And I agree that we've been
able to form some of these agreements at times with adversaries
when--that were--in times that were more difficult than we have
now in terms of our interactions with them. We're not in a cold
war setting, but we were and we were able to sign these
agreements. So I'm hopeful that we will continue to lead, and
lead through our alliances, as you said. I think that this all
has to be multilateral. None of this, in my opinion, should be
bilateral. This is not just about the United States and Russia,
the United States and China. This would be a worldwide issue.
And to that point, Professor Jenks, I wanted to talk about
lethal autonomous weapons systems and proliferation, because I
share the idea that the existence of a weapon itself is not
necessarily an evil, but that it does depend on who possesses
it and how it's used. I might have a few more concerns than you
do about the existence of entirely autonomous weapons systems,
because I think that removing that human element does take out
a discretion step that I think is dangerous in terms of
escalation.
But--and this is for you as well, Ms. Sayler--we've seen
that Chinese weapons manufacturers such as Xi'an, I don't know
if I'm pronouncing that correctly, have indicated that they
might export these weapons systems to the UAE, Saudi Arabia,
and Pakistan. I have in my mind, of course, concerns between
Russia sharing this technology with Iran, China with North
Korea. The proliferation of these systems, to me, has a real
slippery slope here. And so as we look at policies such as
considering a preemptive ban--which I recognize has
limitations--what approach should we take, or do you think we
can take, to try to prevent these weapon systems from getting
out? Because the deterrence part of this is that we have equal
skin in the game in terms of if you use it, we also have the
ability to use it. That's not always the case with some of
these rogue states, or even nonstate actors.
Mr. Jenks. No, thank you, Congressman. That's an
important--it's an important question. One of the unfortunate
downsides of the circular discussions that have been ongoing in
Geneva is it's taken up all the time and the space. And so
we're not having other important conversations. Specifically as
to your question on export controls, I would tell you there's
an alarming lack of any meaningful discussion about what and
how export controls would look like for things like artificial
intelligence, autonomy, and cyber issues. Because we're talking
now about lines of code, and how are we going to regulate and
control that? And no doubt very challenging, but we're not even
having those conversations.
So I think we need to move past this what's autonomy,
what's artificial intelligence. And that's why I wonder if
discussions at a smaller level, maybe within the OSCE, than
these broad forum discussions, like 125 countries that range
the full spectrum including the Vatican and Costa Rica, which
does not have an armed forces. So the discussions that that
group is going to have are hard to kind of channel toward a
productive outcome. But I think starting the discussion about
export control regimes on artificial intelligence and autonomy
is critically important. And it is not occurring at all.
Ms. Sayler. I think one of the challenges with lethal
autonomous weapons, when we think about traditional arms
control regime we often say trust but verify. And as Mr. Jenks
alluded to, this is a real challenge when it comes to a weapons
system in which what is making it a lethal autonomous weapon is
in the software.
And so you could have the same system--the same hardware of
the system, that could be--that could, for example, have a
semi-autonomous mode, an autonomous mode, a fully autonomous
lethal mode. And it's really a question of software. And so in
order to verify that, you would have to have countries
exchanging software code, which then gets into proprietary
information, state secrets, classified information. So that's
the challenge that you're facing. Not to say it's not feasible,
but----
Mr. Veasey. Now I want to open it up for questions from the
audience. I want to let everyone know that we do have a hard
stop at 10:30, so we won't be able to get that many questions
in. I'll ask the panelists to try to keep their answers as
brief as possible. But I did want everyone out there to have a
chance to ask a question. Anyone in the audience have a
question?
Yes, sir.
Questioner. Hello. I'm at UT Arlington political science
and journalism major.
I just recently got back from working at the Library of
Congress Kluge Center, where we focused on a lot of different
issues regarding China and export controls. So the U.S.-China
Commission just recently published its 2019 report, alluding to
the fact that several Chinese labs sponsored by the government
might be sending students--posing as students to our graduate
schools and our other schools, starting as, like, a history
major, and then randomly switching to quantum computing.
So, one, how do you foresee a future in which we defend the
academic freedom of our students and the choice that they make
when they come to study, but also our state secrets and our
government-sponsored labs? I know there's a clearance process,
of course, that goes into that, but how do we prevent those
state secrets and lines of code from being whisked away to our
strategic rivals?
Mr. Veasey. You know, I'll give a couple of thoughts on
that. The panelists or the other members may have some
thoughts. The first one is that, you know, for our defense
contractors that we have here in north Texas and across the
country, you have to be a U.S. citizen to actually work at a
defense contracting plant. You can't be--you can't be on a
green card or H1-B. You have to be a U.S. citizen. The second
thing is that everyone in the intelligence community is very
well aware that the Chinese do send students over here to spy
on us, and to get the expertise that they need in order to help
advance the Chinese Government. To the extent that even a lot
of our technology companies understand that. And when they're
trying to get the H1-B visas, and what have you, for people to
come and work at their different companies, that they put
protections in place knowing that they were probably sent to a
large tech firm, for instance, to be able to bring that
technology back to China.
Mr. Allred. I just wanted to very briefly weigh in and say
I was actually having this conversation with some
representatives from UTD yesterday. And Congressman Veasey's
absolutely right. This is a very real thing. This is not
something that's been made up. It's a threat to us. But at the
same time, we have to balance that with the needs of our
research institutions and understand what they are good at and
what they are not good at. The research institutions themselves
are not going to be good at performing the functions of the
FBI, or the CIA, or trying to ferret out, you know, nefarious
actors. That's not what their purpose is, and I think it also
hurts the goal of their research, and also the goal of the
scientific community--which is to gather information, have it
peer reviewed, and have it available for discussion. But there
are steps that we get to which the classification levels
increase, in which the scrutiny has to increase. And that's
where I think we can apply some of that.
Dr. Inboden. If I could just add, in full agreement with
Congressman Allred and Congressman Veasey, this is a very big
issue we're dealing with at UT Austin as well. And it's a UT
systemwide issue. And this is a very difficult balance because,
on the one hand, one reason why the American higher education
system is the envy of the world and draws so much international
talent is because of its excellence, its quality, based on
principles of transparency, and openness, and free inquiry, and
academic freedom. However, unfortunately the Chinese Government
has been exploiting that. And we've seen some, you know,
significant cases of abuse and espionage. And there're more
that hasn't been uncovered yet.
So I think Congressman Allred's exactly right. We need
better partnerships between FBI, CIA, counterintelligence, and
our universities to at least be alert to these things. But we
also need to remember, I can't stress this enough, that
America's rivalry and competition right now is with the Chinese
Government and the Chinese Communist Party, not the people of
China. The people of China can be some of our best friends and
allies in this. They--for the most part, they want more
freedoms and better lives for themselves. They feel friendship
toward America. They like our--they like our culture. They are
not the enemy. But rather, they have a government with more
nefarious designs. So keeping that distinction clear is really
important.
Questioner. Hi. I'm Victoria LaBarre. I go to UTA. I'm an
electrical engineer and I focus in robotics. So the AI part was
actually really interesting for me.
Just because we're on ethical questions, with the part of
the thing that's coming out with AI is, like, the more you make
it autonomous when it goes wrong, like who do you blame? And
just kind of the background with that is part of my research in
machine learning is trying to make decisions when there is no
base truth, because the problem with a system that you're going
against one of the laws of robotics, where instead of, like,
you can't injure a human, now we're telling you specifically
please shoot one. The problem with this is, like, how does that
autonomous system make that decision based off of no input at
all? And does that lead into some biases?
Ms. Sayler. The issue of accountability is hotly debated at
the U.N. CCW, which is where the discussions of autonomous
weapons take place. So the nongovernmental organization
advocacy community essentially believes that there cannot be
accountability. The U.S. Government and other delegations have
essentially stated that the same accountability measures that
apply to other weapons systems will apply to lethal autonomous
weapons. So you have, you know, product liability, liability
for defense contractors. It's incumbent on the commander who
deploys the system to survey the operating environment and make
sure that the weapon's use would comply with the Law of Armed
Conflict.
There are issues of bias and, you know, spoofing, and all
kinds of concerns with regard to deploying these weapons. And
so that's sort of getting back to the weapons review process.
You would need to know that the weapon would perform as
anticipated in a realistic operating environment. And that's
something that's actually written into the U.S. policy on
lethal autonomous weapons. But many countries--in fact, most
countries--do not have policies for these systems. And so the
concern would be that they might not be taking some of those
factors that you raised into account.
Mr. Jenks. And I think part of what you're likely to see is
the development of autonomous systems in inverse relationship
to the potential of if something goes awry that there will be
civilian casualties. So that's why you're going to see the
greatest development initially subsurface. If something goes
wrong 200 meters below the surface of the water, that may go
back for a whale, a friendly sub, a bad sub. High altitudes,
I'd say middle of the ocean, and frankly the last domain where
you're going to see autonomous weapons systems is going to be
the really challenging ground, urban environment. And we may--
you know, we may never get there. But we will--frankly, are
already working toward those other systems--again, subsurface,
surface of the water, and high altitude.
Mr. Veasey. Well, I know we have a couple more questions,
and I want to apologize, because we do have to stop at 10:30.
We promised we would let the panelists and the Members of
Congress be able to leave at 10:30. But if you have a question
and you want to ask some of the panelists on the way out, we
think that they'd probably be happy to answer your questions.
But I want to, again, thank Dr. Karbhari and the staff at UTA
for allowing us to the space, and thank our distinguished
panelists that were here. I thank my colleagues for taking time
out of their schedule to come and be a part of this meeting of
the U.S. Helsinki Commission on our cooperation that we have
with our transatlantic partners. I think that these topics and
many others that are discussed really, now probably more than
ever, need to be something that the American public takes a
closer look at.
So thank you very much. [Applause.]
[Whereupon, at 10:32 a.m., the field hearing ended.]
=======================================================================
A P P E N D I X
=======================================================================
Prepared Statements
----------
Prepared Statement of Hon. Marc Veasey
Good morning to everybody. It is my distinct pleasure to
welcome you all to this field hearing of the Commission on
Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE), which is informally
referred to as the U.S. Helsinki Commission.
I have the honor of serving as a Commissioner, under the
leadership of Congressman Alcee Hastings of Florida, and I
would like to thank Chairman Hastings for asking me to convene
this hearing today.
Because some of you may be less familiar with the Helsinki
Commission than our usual audience in Washington, DC, I'd like
to start by telling you a bit about our Commission.
Forty-four years ago, President Gerald Ford joined 35 other
heads of state, including longstanding American adversaries, to
sign one of the most significant international agreements of
the 20th Century--the Final Act of the Conference on Security
and Cooperation in Europe, better known as the Helsinki
Accords.
The accords committed the United States, Europe, and the
Soviet Union to respect human rights, to manage the spread of
dangerous weapons, to foster economic opportunity, and to
ending the territorial disputes in Europe that had already
twice plunged the world into war.
Our Commission was created to uphold exactly these
commitments, and since its inception, it has provided a crucial
voice for defending freedom, opportunity, and human rights
through the engagement of the United States in the Organization
for Security and Cooperation in Europe--also known as the
OSCE--where these commitments are negotiated to this day.
Composed of Members of Congress from both parties and
chosen from the House and Senate, the Helsinki Commission
represents our democracy's commitment to preserving and
advancing the peace, freedom, and prosperity across the world
that previous generations of Americans sacrificed so much to
achieve.
That is why I am honored to have been appointed to serve on
the Helsinki Commission. The world has changed dramatically
since it was established, but the need to defend the principles
of peace and security, freedom, opportunity and human rights is
greater than ever.
Ladies and gentlemen,
Let me now offer a few thoughts on the purpose of this
event, and why we are having it here in Texas.
The subject matter for today's hearing relates to the
impact of emerging technologies on Euro-Atlantic security, and
I am looking forward to learning a great deal from our
witnesses today on this subject.
New threats that we are concerned with range from
hypersonic weapons, to drones, autonomous weapon platforms,
artificial intelligence, directed energy, and others. These
technologies have the potential to unlock some important
capabilities to ensure the defense of our homeland and support
our Allies and friends abroad.
However, these very same technologies are also under
development by some of our strategic competitors--Russia chief
among them--and so I also look forward to hearing our experts'
views on how our potential adversaries are looking to use some
of these same technologies to threaten us and our Allies.
Finally, I will also look forward to our witnesses' views
on how we should best approach our international engagement on
these technologies, including through diplomatic efforts, and
understanding what national and legal regimes apply or are
under consideration. In particular, today's discussion should
help us better consider whether the OSCE and its affiliated
security institutions can offer a space to establish norms for
emerging technologies.
So that's what we want to get out of today's event.
But why are we here, in Arlington, Texas, rather than in
Washington D.C., where Congressional hearings typically take
place?
The answer to that question could not be more clear to
those of us here in this room, but for the benefit of those who
may be watching this on livestream or reading our transcript: I
asked Chairman Hastings for the privilege of convening this
hearing here precisely because of the unique confluence of
technical know-how, academic expertise, and defense-industrial
presence right here in Texas.
This spirit of innovation and expertise, alongside cutting
edge industry and an innovative private sector, is why the Army
decided to establish the headquarters of its Futures Command in
Austin, Texas, in 2018.
In fact, after this hearing, I'll be spending some time
this afternoon visiting Lockheed Martin Aeronautics, to be
briefed on the increased capabilities and technological
advances provided by the F-35 Lightning II aircraft, as well as
how it provides increased opportunities for inter-service and
international cooperation. I'll also be visiting the production
line where the F-35 is assembled and getting a first-hand look
at this 5th generation fighter jet.
So we are here because of all the expertise available to
us. But we are also here, away from Washington, because of how
essential it is that Americans throughout our nation have an
opportunity to engage in policy discussions paramount to our
shared values in the transatlantic space. This hearing offers a
connection outside of the Beltway to America's international
commitments as a participating state of the OSCE. We all should
have a stake in meeting commitments to our local and
international communities.
With all that being said, let me express my gratitude to
the experts who have taken time out of their busy schedules to
be with us today to provide their testimony for the record. I'd
like to very briefly introduce them now, and I think you will
quickly see that they represent a clear demonstration of the
incredibly high caliber of locally-sourced national security
expertise we have available to us here in Texas.
LWe will first hear from Kelley Sayler, who is an
Analyst in Advanced Technology and Global Security at the U.S.
Congressional Research Service. For those who may not know, the
CRS is a tremendous resource to all of us in Congress who
depend on their expertise on almost any issue that comes before
us. Ms. Sayler has extensive experience working on these issues
both in and out of government, including service in the Office
of the Secretary of Defense. I also note her strong Texas
connection: she received her Master's degree from Baylor
University. Ms. Sayler, thank you for being here.
LOur next speaker will be Dr. William Inboden, who
serves as the Executive Director and William Powers, Jr. Chair
at the William P. Clements, Jr. Center for National Security at
University of Texas-Austin. Among Dr. Inboden's many other
roles, he also serves as Associate Professor at the LBJ School
of Public Affairs, Distinguished Scholar at the Robert S.
Strauss Center for International Security and Law, and Editor-
in-Chief of the Texas National Security Review. He has served
as Senior Director for Strategic Planning on the National
Security Council at the White House, and in the Department of
State's Policy Planning Staff, as well as serving as a staff
member in both the United States Senate and the House of
Representatives.
LOur third witness today will be Professor Chris
Jenks, Director of the Criminal Clinic and Associate Professor
of Law at the Deadman School of Law at Southern Methodist
University (SMU) in Dallas. A noted expert on the law of armed
conflict and lethal autonomous weapons, Professor Jenks served
more than 20 years in the US Army, first as an Infantry Officer
in Germany, Kuwait and as a NATO peacekeeper in Bosnia and
later as a Judge Advocate. He has also served details at the
Department of State and at the Department of Justice, and was
recently called to serve as Special Assistant to the Department
of Defense General Counsel.
As a last note before giving our witnesses the floor, I'd
like to offer the Commission's thanks to the University of
Texas, Arlington, for allowing us to use this great facility;
what better place to talk about technology and its implications
than right here in Nedderman Hall, home to the University's
engineering departments?
Let me inform the witnesses that their full statements will
be entered into the record; I have asked them to summarize
their testimony for the purposes of our discussion today.
Prepared Statement of Kelley M. Sayler
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.epsPrepared Statement of Chris Jenks
I want to thank the U.S. Commission on Security and
Cooperation in Europe and in particular Congressman Veasey and
his staff for the opportunity to discuss emerging technologies
and euro-Atlantic security.
My statement seeks to highlight the significance of
artificial intelligence (AI) and autonomy to our national and
collective trans-Atlantic security. I served in the U.S.
military in Germany and Korea and on operational deployments to
Bosnia, Kuwait, and Iraq and I've researched and written on
emerging military technologies. I am familiar with the current
security challenges facing the United States and our allies and
I can unequivocally state that developing and operationalizing
AI and autonomous systems is a legal and moral imperative. As I
will later explain, more accurate wording would be to continue
to develop and operationalize as depending on how one parses
the definitions, we have fielded such systems for decades.
I will briefly summarize the definitional and taxonomical
challenges AI and autonomy pose before providing the Commission
my assessment of how the U.S. is doing at present and then
suggest where and how we need to change. To preview my bottom
line, our current approach to AI and autonomy is appropriate
but considerably more thinking on how the U.S. will conduct
military operations in the future is needed. With that thinking
will come changes, changes which may need to be Congressionally
directed.
In terms of how we think of AI and autonomy, there are
widely varied approaches but no consensus on what either term
means or even their relationship to the other. This in turn
leads to two important points. The first is that many tech
discussions are reduced to a veritable tower of Babel. The
second is that under a number of definitions or understandings,
the U.S. has fielded systems which use AI and/or perform
functions autonomously for decades. In terms of AI, President
Reagan's 1983 Strategic Defense Initiative incorporated aspects
of what was then thought to be AI, notably expert systems AI
which was developed in the 70s. The Defense Satellite
Communication System and the Navy's submarine force, to name
just two more contemporary programs, rely in part of AI as well
as machine learning. In terms of autonomous systems, the Army's
Patriot Missile and the Navy's Close in Weapons System or CIWS,
incorporate autonomy into functions, including the selection
and engagement of targets. And we fielded the Patriot starting
in 1981 and the CIWS since 1980.
Shifting to an assessment of how the United States is doing
in terms of AI and autonomy strategy and development, the
current U.S. approach is appropriate. Between the Defense
Advanced Research Projects Agency, the relatively new Joint AI
Center and each of the military services, research, testing and
fielding of systems is ongoing. While enabling personnel to
exercise appropriate levels of human judgment, these
developments may improve the military's efficacy while
strengthen the implementation of the law of armed conduct. This
may include reducing the risk of civilian casualties and the
armed forces, facilitating the investigation or reporting of
incidents involving violations, enhancing the ability to
implement corrective actions and automatically generating and
disseminating information on unexploded ordnance.
While the United States has a moral duty to continue to
develop systems which limit the effects of armed conflict,
there may well be a legal duty. Certainly for our European
allies who are States Parties to Additional Protocol I of the
1949 Geneva Conventions there is an obligation that ``in the
conduct of military operations, constant care shall be taken to
spare the civilian population, civilians and civilian
objects.'' Thus if autonomous vehicles achieved a degree of
sophistication and safety such that they were less likely to
crash into civilians and civilian property than human operated
vehicles, a country employing such vehicles might be required
to use them during military operations as a result of the
constant care obligation.
At the same time the U.S. Department of Defense developed
and released a policy on autonomy in weapons systems and the
Defense Innovation Board and the recently established National
Security Commission on Artificial Intelligence are working with
both government and non-governmental organizations and industry
to develop recommendations.
Also appropriate is the United States participation in the
ongoing United Nations meetings on autonomous weapons. The
working papers and interventions from the U.S. delegation have
significantly advanced those ongoing discussions. At the same
time, it is also appropriate that the United States has
resisted fear mongering NGO attempts at sweeping regulation or
even a ban. At a minimum it is premature to consider sweeping
regulation when there is nothing close to consensus on what is
even meant by AI and autonomy. And as I previously mentioned,
depending on how you define AI and autonomy, any number of
systems fielded by the US and our allies for decades would be
implicated.
In terms of where and how we need to change, minimal if any
attention has been paid to demarcating scientific and arms
control mechanisms and much more thinking on how the U.S. will
conduct military operations in the future is needed. This later
point is not so much a tech problem as it is a process problem.
The U.S. military is the personification of a hierarchical
organization. Is such a structure capable of conducting the
decentralized or distributed operations in general let alone in
an environment in which communications are denied by the
adversary? How will command and control, authorizations and
delegations of authorization work? What about resolving dueling
or competing authorities? While the Defense Department operates
jointly, how effectively is DoD able to conduct joint military
operations involving AI and autonomy without sharing a common
backbone network?
By way of example, consider the hierarchical way in which
an air tasking order or ATO is developed in a military
operation. An ATO is the sole method by which air strikes are
planned, executed and assessed and involves multiple levels of
command and staff and varying timelines and authorities. Now
imagine a future environment in which no level of command is
able to effectively communicate with the other, there are AI
enabled systems able to perform a number of the ATO functions
and ground forces require air support.
Between military service cultures and organizational
inertia, DoD is unlikely to make the significant changes
required to effectively conduct the distributed, netcentric,
military operations many experts believe will be required. The
question then becomes what would force DoD to make those
changes?
Changes to how the U.S. military is structured and operates
do not come quickly or easily. Ultimately, I submit that the
U.S. Congress may need to direct that change.
I suggest the Commission and the Congress consider the
Goldwater-Nichols Act of 1986. The need for the Act arose
during interservice rivalries in the Vietnam War, which later
tragically manifested themselves in the 1980 failed attempt to
rescue U.S. hostages in Iran and in the 1983 U.S. invasion of
Grenada.
I believe emerging technologies may require Goldwater-
Nichols 2.0, though preferably more quickly and without a
precipitating armed conflict involving AI in which the U.S.
fares less well than it could or should have.
Thank you for your attention and I welcome your questions.
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