6 September 2017

MAN, THE MACHINE, AND WAR

ADAM ELKUS

Deputy Secretary of Defense Robert Work recently announced that the core of the United States’ new “offset strategy” to counter emerging operational and technological threats from Russia and China will be a “centaur” approach of teaming humans with machine intelligence of varying levels of autonomy. The offset strategy, often described as a “competitive strategy,” aims to convince a putative group of future opponents that the cost of opposing the United States is too high by teaming humans and machines. The new offset, Work argues, is necessary to continue to militarily support larger U.S. policy goals imperiled by military-technical developments in competing states such as Russia and China. How do the fundamental components of Work’s efforts — competitive strategy and human-machine teaming — go together? What are the obstacles that Work and his colleagues will need to surmount to make the new offset strategically successful?

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