Big interview
The ‘Ambitious, safe and responsible’ paper extended these values to any potential future use of AI in weapon systems, noting that while the MoD would not rule out doing so, some concepts and capabilities may prove impossible to deliver in a safe and responsible manner. Indeed, it states that there must be “context-appropriate human involvement in weapons which identify, select and attack targets”, citing the need for real-time human supervision or another form of control. While noting AI offers great potential to augment the performance of personnel and enhance defence capabilities, the paper also states that, given ethical concerns and risks over delegating certain decisions to AI, the best outcomes will come from human-machine teaming – where AI augments human capabilities rather than autonomously carrying out tasks. “We feel that human judgement will always be necessary in nearly all aspects of defence work. That’s why human-machine teaming is our default approach to AI adoption – that’s our firm position,” notes Woodward.
Tying defence together
In the long term, the DAIC aims to respond to developments in the technology and then help teams across the MoD bring those advances into operational use. Across the MoD, frontline commands have started to build their own focal points for AI – in the form of the Army AI Centre and the Navy AI Cell, with the RAF possessing its own hubs of AI expertise – which Woodward welcomes, seeing this growth as the beginnings of a federated model across the MoD, working in synergy.
“For the MoD, if you didn’t have the DAIC, then I think everyone would try and develop AI solutions in isolation – and therefore there would be a risk of duplication,” he notes. “There’d be a risk of not being able to scale [AI systems] because they would be built on different architectures and platforms. […] I see the long-term evolution of the DAIC in being a recognised central hub where people know they can come and talk about the technical implementation of AI and interface with partners, whether from the MoD or from industry.” Recent events, like the DAIC’s robot dog hackathon or large language model hackathon, have been particularly valuable in terms of building DAIC’s profile as a focal point in this area. Similarly, November’s inaugural DAIC Connect event and the sixth iteration of AI Fest in Autumn 2024 – which Woodward describes as “our big blue ribbon flagship engagement event” – will also go far to forward thought leadership, coherence and collaboration around AI and its use in across the MoD. This need for collaboration extends to commercial processes as well, which can often be frustratingly slow and time-consuming in the defence sector. The
DAIC has teamed up with Commercial X, which is an initiative aimed at identifying and breaking down some of the barriers within MoD procurement processes, speeding up the delivery of new defence technologies to the user.
One of the advantages that the DAIC and
Woodward see in improving procurement processes is that it makes defence a more attractive sector to work with, which benefits both the supplier and the MoD itself. “One of the challenges with AI is that is that it’s a very crowded space, and every sector wants access to what is quite a limited talent pool,” he adds. “That remains a bit of a challenge for the defence sector.”
Recognising the importance of industry to the
UK’s defence capabilities is important to Woodward, who notes that “a government or army doesn’t go to war alone – it’s the whole country”. Even in peacetime, the deterrence factor stems not only from an army or the MoD, but from the nation as a whole. For Woodward, this underlines why the DAIC wants to generate a much more dynamic and integrated relationship with industry, beyond simply making it easier to get in contact and running more effective contract competitions. In his eyes, achieving the DAIC’s goal of fostering a thriving AI ecosystem in the UK, across government, academia and industry, will ultimately serve as both a huge deterrent to adversaries and a powerful demonstration of defence capabilities. As long as the centre continues driving AI in an ambitious, safe and responsible manner, Woodward is confident that it’s already well on its way. ●
Defence & Security Systems International /
www.defence-and-security.com 11
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