Justina Ireland's Collateral Damage: A Response from a Military History WriterTechnology and military history often go hand-in-hand. In the past, military thinkers and soldiers have come up with innovative ways to make the world a better place. This is to inspire them to not do the same thing to their enemies. Strategists are able to use the new or improved weapon to help them deploy their troops and/or counteract their effectiveness.AdvertisementThe Greek phalanx was developed to protect soldiers from the cavalry. The deployment of longbows by the English helped stop large numbers of enemy soldiers. New construction methods altered the form of fortifications. Line infantry allowed European formations to take advantage of firearms. Anti-aircraft cannons protected against incoming enemy planes. Today, robotics are a key part of modern warfare. They can be used to automate turrets and drones or remotely controlled Flir PackBots.AdvertisementAdvertisementWhile technology has brought about new and more effective ways to kill your opponents, one constant throughout history is the human beings on the battlefield, who put those technologies to use. These advances can be a competitive advantage for an army if they are properly used. It can take soldiers and strategists a while to understand the implications, tactics and strategies of these tools. This often leads to casualties. The First World War saw unprecedented casualties as commanders relied on old tactics to send their troops into the machine-gun fire.AdvertisementJustina Ireland's short story Collateral Damage depicts one such moment in human nature that leads to inhuman efficiency. A group of soldiers are sent to test TED, a large-sized military robot. It quickly draws the ire of its fellow soldiers. It is equipped with sensors and weapons and can clear hostile streets and buildings. The unit will eventually be deployed to an unnamed conflict zone around the globe. The soldiers are annoyed by TED's response times and its logs of their interactions. Some of them even recognize the benefits of its existence.AdvertisementAdvertisementYou might not realize that robots have been involved in war for longer than you think. P.W. Singer referred to early attempts made during World War I, when prototypes for remote control bombs were developed on land, air and sea. This was helped by the advent of radios on the battlefield. New innovations were introduced in World War II, such as the Germans Goliath-tracked mine, a remote-controlled, caterpillar tracked bomb that soldiers steered towards their targets, or the Fritz X 1400 aerial bomb, which was controlled by German pilots.As the Cold War progressed, more robots were introduced. The U.S. military experimented with drone aircrafts during the war on terror. They began entering combat in greater numbers such as the Predator drone and the Northrop Grumman RQ-4 Global Hawk. These drones can be used to deliver bombs or conduct surveillance from far away. Remote-controlled robots were also used in the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. They could be used for everything, from bomb disposal to scouting for gunshot detection to weapon shot detection. Unlike Ireland's wary characters however, there have been real soldiers who were upset by the loss of their squads device. They even wrote to iRobot (which since has spun off its military division into a separate business) to ask for it to be fixed.AdvertisementAdvertisementThe technology is improving, and so will the robots that step on the battlefield. Boston Dynamics has seen remarkable improvements in the last few years with its robots. While Internet commentators may have made fun of them getting beat with hockey sticks in 2016, recent dance and gymnastics routines demonstrate just how far technology has advanced. We have already seen soldiers train with Boston Dynamics Spot, other drones and robots as well as autonomous armored vehicles. These efforts are intended to refine and improve the tactics and strategies of soldiers as they figure out the best uses cases for them in combat.AdvertisementThese robotic systems will soon appear on battlefields all over the globe, and we begin to notice friction points as they take fire and return it. The idea that militaries are trained to fight the last battle is often true. Therefore, the possibility of facing an enemy with artificial intelligence is of great concern for military strategists.AdvertisementA few years back, I participated in an exercise at U.S. Army War Colleges Center for Strategic Leadership, Carlisle, Pennsylvania. Our group was given the task of devising the parameters for a war game where one team would face an A.I.-assisted opponent. It wasn't like The Terminatort. This was more like thinking of an enemy who had access to vast amounts of data and offered suggestions about the battlefield. Artificial intelligence, which is basically inhuman, can help to solve problems in novel ways, such as in Go, or sorting Amazon warehouses. There was concern that the system could give orders that are not in line with their objectives or just too far-fetched to be followed. Without trust in the system, soldiers might not be able to follow the system's thinking or recognize it.AdvertisementThis is not a hypothetical concern. A survey by the U.S. Air Forces Journal of Indo-Pacific Affairs of 800 Australian officer-cadets and midshipmen found that most would not be willing to deploy alongside fully-autonomous lethal autonomous weapons systems.AdvertisementAdvertisementIn order to adopt new technologies, trust is crucial: trust in your fellow soldiers, the strength of their shields, the accuracy of ones arrows, and that one's radio signals will accurately guide a bomb towards its target. Air Force's study emphasized the importance of trusting in any robotic system's safety and reliability. If an officer doesn’t trust it, so will their subordinates. The study's authors wrote that without that trust, the unit is likely to disregard, minimize or abandon that piece of equipment, regardless of any doctrinal guidance.AdvertisementIreland's soldiers don't trust their new teammate. They don't understand how it functions, what decisions it makes and how it uses data. They are worried about their livelihoods in an uncertain world. TED is able to perform its mission well on the battlefield but ultimately fails.If history is any indication, however, soldiers who fight alongside robots and against them will eventually evolve. They will learn to trust their tools, adapt and survive another day.Future Tense is a collaboration between Slate, New America and Arizona State University. It examines emerging technologies and public policy.
