China is beating USA in AI race, says ex-Pentagon software chief
Some US government departments' cyber defences are at 'kindergarten level' compared to China's advancement, Nicolas Chaillan thinks
The United States has already lost the AI race to China, and has "no competing fighting chance" in the next 15 to 20 years, the Pentagon's former software chief has warned.
Nicolas Chaillan, the Pentagon's first chief software officer, who resigned last week, said that a failure to respond to China was putting the USA at risk.
"We have no competing fighting chance against China in 15 to 20 years," Chaillan told the Financial Times.
He described the current situation as "a done deal," noting that the AI race was "already over."
Chaillan predicted that China is heading towards global dominance because of its advances in emerging cyber capabilities, machine learning and AI.
"Whether it takes a war or not is kind of anecdotal," he said, adding that the Asian economic giant was set to dominate everything from geopolitics to media narratives in the coming years.
The country has been extending its soft power massively in recent years, from funding Hollywood films to the Belt and Road Initiative across the developing world.
Chaillan thinks cyber defences in some US government departments are at a "kindergarten level" compared to China's advancement.
He told the FT that his resignation was a protest at the slow pace of technological transformation in the US military, and that he could not bear to see the US overtaken by China in its technological development.
"I am just tired of continuously chasing support and money to do my job. My office still has no billet [physical location] and no funding, this year and the next," he wrote in the LinkedIn post announcing his departure.
Chaillan blamed sluggish innovation, the unwillingness of US firms like Google to collaborate with the US Department of Defense on AI, andextensive ethical debatesover the technology.
Chinese firms, on the other hand, are obliged to work with their government, and have been making huge investment into AI technology without regard to ethics, he added.
According to Chaillan, US military officials were repeatedly put in charge of cyber initiatives for which they lacked experience.
A spokesperson for the Department of the Air Force told the FT that Frank Kendall, secretary of the US Air Force, had discussed his recommendations for the department's future software development with Chaillan. Kendall also thanked Chaillan for his contributions.
Chaillan's comments come months after the National Security Commission on Artificial Intelligence (NSCAI) warned that the USA was unprepared for the coming threat of AI, and China could soon replace it as the world's prominent AI superpower.
The panel described China as the 'most significant challenge' to US technological dominance, threatening its military and economic power.
It noted that China had exploited America's lack of comprehensive policies to protect the development of AI and other emerging technologies. The report added that the China was engaged in organised efforts to steal US intellectual property to become a 'science and technology superpower' by 2050.
'Americans have not yet grappled with just how profoundly the artificial intelligence revolution will impact our economy, national security, and welfare.
'Much remains to be learned about the power and limits of AI technologies. Nevertheless, big decisions need to be made now to accelerate AI innovation to benefit the United States and to defend against the malign uses of AI.'
The NSCAI advised the government to take immediate steps to address weaknesses across the American education system, to win the global talent competition. It also recommended creating visas for entrepreneurs and the developers of emerging technology, and to increase the number of employment-based Green Cards it issues.
The 756-page report also urged the government to reject calls for a global ban on AI-powered autonomous weapons, arguing that Russia and China were unlikely to keep to any treaty they sign.