this post was submitted on 19 Apr 2024
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What if the human is pulling the trigger to "paint the target" and tag it for hunt and destroy then the drone goes and kills it? Because that's how lots of missles already work. So where's the line?
Well, that's all very idealistic, but it's likely not going to happen.
Israel already used AI to pick bombing sites, those bombs and missiles would have been programmed with altitudes and destinations (armed) then dropped. The pilots only job these days is to avoid interception, fly over the bombing locations, tag the target when acquired, and drop them. Most of this is already done in software.
Eventually humans will leave the loop because unlike self-driving cars, these technologies won't risk the lives of the aggressor's citizens.
If the technology is seen as unstoppable enough, there may be calls for warnings to be given, but I suspect that's all the mercy that will be shown...
... especially if it's a case of a country with automated technologies killing one without or with stochastically meaningless defenses (eg. Defenses that modelling and simulations show won't be able to prevent such attacks).
No, in all likelihood the US will tell the country the attack sites, the country either will or will not have the technical level to prevent an amount of damage, will evacuate all necessary personal, and whoever doesn't get the message or get out in time will be automatically killed.
Where defenses are partially successful, that information will go into the training data for the next model, or upgrade, and the war machine will roll on.
If it is a bad kill, is there a person who will go to jail or be executed for it?
Only the losing side is subject to war crimes trials, and no doubt rules of engagement will be developed and followed to prevent people going to jail due to "bad kills".
There are really no "bad kills" in the armed services, there's just limited exposure of public scandals.
Especially for the US who doesn't subject its self to international courts like The Hague. So any atrocities, accidents, or war crimes will still just be internal scandals and temporary.
Same as it is today.
https://www.cnn.com/2019/06/23/politics/eddie-gallagher-navy-seal-trial/index.html
Of course there isn't just like there isn't when a human makes a mistake on the battlefield, you think that every civilian killed by an American soldier in Afghanistan resulted in a trial and punishment? American hasn't executed amy soldiers since 1961 (for rape and attempted murder of a child in austria, not during war)
Honestly at least the military code will obey orders and only focus on the objective rather than rape and murder for fun.