The Department of Defense Posture for Artificial Intelligence: Assessment and Recommendations

“This report describes a study, which commenced in December 2018, conducted at a time of heightened national and worldwide interest in artificial intelligence (AI) as a potentially disruptive technology and against the backdrop of the 2018 National Defense Strategy (NDS), which identified long-term strategic competitions with China and Russia as the principal priorities for the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD). We describe the context for this heightened interest in AI by surveying a selection of recent relevant activities within the federal government, including the mandate for this report. This RAND Corporation National Defense Research Institute (NDRI) study was conducted with the awareness of, but largely independent from, these activities. Although our work was informed by existing plans and studies, our analysis and recommendations are not constrained by them.”