After Rheinmetall bid for Oto Melara, Italian government awaits Fincantieri's move

On the same subject

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  January 7, 2019 | International, Aerospace, C4ISR

  Pentagon Seeks a List of Ethical Principles for Using AI in War

  BY PATRICK TUCKER An advisory board is drafting guidelines that may help shape worldwide norms for military artificial intelligence — and woo Silicon Valley to defense work. U.S. defense officials have asked the Defense Innovation Board for a set of ethical principles in the use of artificial intelligence in warfare. The principles are intended to guide a military whose interest in AI is accelerating — witness the new Joint Artificial Intelligence Center — and to reassure potential partners in Silicon Valley about how their AI products will be used. Today, the primary document laying out what the military can and can't do with AI is a 2012 doctrine that says a human being must have veto power over any action an autonomous system might take in combat. It's brief, just four pages, and doesn't touch on any of the uses of AI for decision support, predictive analytics, etc. where players like Google, Microsoft, Amazon, and others are making fast strides in commercial environments. “AI scientists have expressed concern about how DoD intends to use artificial intelligence. While the DoD has a policy on the role of autonomy in weapons, it currently lacks a broader policy on how it will use artificial intelligence across the broad range of military missions,” said Paul Scharre, the author of Army of None: Autonomous Weapons and the Future of War. Josh Marcuse, executive director of the Defense Innovation Board, said crafting these principles will help the department “safely and responsibly” employ new technologies. “I think it's important when dealing with a field that's emergent to think through all the ramifications,” he said. The Board, a group of Silicon Valley corporate and thought leaders chaired by former Google and Alphabet chairman Eric Schmidt, will make the list public at its June meeting. Defense Department leaders will take them under consideration. Marcuse believes that the Pentagon can be a leader not just in employing AI but in establishing guidelines for safe use — just as the military pioneered safety standards for aviation. “The Department of Defense should lead in this area as we have with other technologies in the past. I want to make sure the department is not just leading in developing AI for military purposes but also in developing ethics to use AI in military purposes,” he says. The effort, in part, is a response to what happened with the military's Project Maven, the Pentagon's flagship AI project with Google as its partner. The effort applied artificial intelligence to the vast store of video and and image footage that the Defense Department gathers to guide airstrikes. Defense officials emphasized repeatedly that the AI was intended only to cut down the workload of human analysts. But they also acknowledged that the ultimate goal was to help the military do what it does better, which sometimes means finding and killing humans. An employee revolt ensued at Google. Employees resigned en masse and the company said that they wouldn't renew the contract. Scharre, who leads the Technology and National Security Program at the Center for a New American Security, said, “One of the challenges for things like Project Maven, which uses AItechnology to process drone video feeds, is that some scientists expressed concern about where the technology may be heading. A public set of AI principles will help clarify DoD's intentions regarding artificial intelligence.” Full artcile: https://www.defenseone.com/technology/2019/01/pentagon-seeks-list-ethical-principles-using-ai-war/153940/

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  September 6, 2019 | International, Aerospace, Naval, Land, C4ISR, Security

  The US Army faces struggles working with small businesses

  By: David B. Larter WASHINGTON — The U.S. Army faces problems on multiple fronts when it comes to sending business to small companies, the head of Army Futures Command said Wednesday. Gen. John Murray said small businesses struggle under a procurement system that can take years, and then struggle to scale their businesses to meet the Army's needs. “There is a lack of trust [on the part of small businesses] that the government can sustain [a] small-business model,” Murray told the audience at the third annual Defense News Conference. “The way we do budgeting, [program objectives memorandum] POM cycles and all that — a small business can't survive. We're going to have to prove to small businesses that we can adjust our POM cycles to meet their needs. “And from the small business perspective, there are only a few ways that they can scale to the size we are talking about in terms of production. One of those ways is partnering with a traditional [defense contractor], so that's going to be a challenge going forward.” Murray's comments come as the Army tries to engage with a range of partners — from universities and small businesses to the traditional prime contractors such as Raytheon and General Dynamics — to find ways to integrate new technologies into the force. The outreach to small businesses at Army Futures Command is about finding new ways to get after the challenges the service faces, Murray said, but that in and of itself comes with challenges. “This outreach to small business is not because there is anything wrong with traditional defense primes, it's really an outreach to find new ways to solve our problems,” he said. “I've been in the Army 37 years, and I think about solving our problems a certain way. I guarantee a lot of these small businesses think about how to solve problems a different way. “Part of the challenge I have with small business is comfortably describing our problem to them. I can't talk in acronyms, I can't talk with 37 years of experience, I need to talk very clearly and very plainly.” Murray said his teams have staged events aimed at the private sector, such as a recent one where startups gathered to figure out how to move artillery shells 250 meters using autonomous unmanned systems. Such events have been instructive, he noted. Ultimately, however, the Army will choose the business that best meets the service's requirements, he said. “What it really comes down to is what are our problems and where is the best place — whether that's small business or a university or a traditional prime — where is the best place to solve that problem,” Murray said. https://www.defensenews.com/smr/defense-news-conference/2019/09/04/the-us-army-faces-struggles-working-with-small-businesses/

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  June 2, 2020 | International, Aerospace, Naval

  US Navy upgrades more ships for the F-35 as the future of carriers remains in flux

  By: David B. Larter WASHINGTON — Former acting Navy Secretary Thomas Modly hadn't been out of the job more than a month before the Navy canceled an ongoing study he'd launched into the future of aircraft carriers — a review he optimistically termed “Future Carrier 2030.” Modly and his predecessor, Richard Spencer, had been excited by the prospect of fielding smaller, more risk-worthy carriers that could reduce the chance of China or Russia landing a major punch in a conflict simply by sinking or disabling a single ship, such as a Nimitz- or Ford-class aircraft carrier with thousands of sailors and tens of billions of dollars of hardware aboard. But very soon after Modly's spectacular departure, former acting Secretary James McPherson canceled the study until further notice. Still, as the effort to move to a smaller carrier seems frozen — as it has been for decades every time someone suggested it — the Navy is forging ahead with preparing its big-deck boats — the amphibious assault ships — for operating with the Marine Corp's F-35B. The Corps' F-35 fighter jet is a short-takeoff-and-vertical-landing variant. The Navy recently inked a $200 million contract with BAE Systems to upgrade the amphibious assault ship Boxer to be able to operate with the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, the fifth landing helicopter assault ship to be so amended. “The USS Boxer [dry-dock availability] will complete a combination of maintenance, modernization, and repair of the following systems: Hull structure, propulsion, electrical plant, auxiliary systems, and communications and combat systems, as well as alterations to prepare the ship for operations with the F-35B Joint Strike Fighter (JSF),” according to a statement from Naval Sea Systems command. But the idea of smaller carriers is one the Navy has been flirting with more recently. Last fall, the Navy packed 13 F-35Bs on the amphibious assault ship America. Then-Navy Secretary Spencer later said the ship could hold up to 20. “I will tell you, we are augmenting the aircraft carrier with our ideas, such as this lightning carrier,” Spencer said at the Brookings Institution think tank. “Twenty F-35 Bravos on a large-deck amphib. My cost performance there is tremendous. Does it have the same punch? No, it doesn't, but it does have a very interesting sting to it.” The Boxer, which is an older class of big-deck amphib, could likely pack about 15 F-35Bs if it were dedicated for the purpose, according to Bryan Clark, a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute.