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The Global Nobel Laureates Assembly on Artificial Intelligence and Nuclear War has just met at the Vatican and issued a declaration aimed at reducing the risks arising from the integration of AI in nuclear weapons systems and calling for nuclear disarmament before it is too late.
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The declaration, which was co-signed by the Executive Director of the 2017 Nobel Peace Laureate, the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN), Melissa Parke, recognises the urgent need to prevent the further integration of artificial intelligence into nuclear weapons command, control and communications systems, and recommends principles for AI governance that are predicated on the shared understanding of the increasingly urgent risk posed by the very existence of nuclear weapons. It references the UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons which the Holy See was the first of 100 states to sign. Agreeing that humans must retain control is not really disputed. No government or strategist is currently advocating that AI take charge of nuclear launch decisions. There is strong international agreement on this. So the declaration, and the recommended principles, also addresses the deeper need to stop delaying the necessary elimination of nuclear arsenals. AI is already being woven into nuclear-related systems. AI is used in the military domain to identify missile launches, analyse sensor data, and model escalation scenarios. It is changing how governments approach national security. It is reshaping intelligence analysis, early-warning systems, and military decision-making. Risk reduction measures are a valuable contribution, but will not remove the risk as long as these weapons remain in arsenals. ICAN’s Executive Director Melissa Parke, who participated in the Assembly said: “AI doesn't make nuclear deterrence safer, it gives an already dangerous system more opportunities to cause catastrophe. These technological integrations expose something that has always been true, nuclear deterrence has never been stable or responsible. The idea of responsible management of a genocidal capability has always been an illusion. Nuclear deterrence relies on fear, perception, and moral contradiction, all human traits that are not part of AI design.” Ms Parke added: “The only guaranteed way to eliminate the grave risk we face from AI and nuclear weapons is to agree on the elimination of nuclear weapons. Nuclear weapons can be verifiably dismantled as South Africa showed when it did so in the 1990s. So, I welcome the declaration’s call on the nuclear-armed states to start negotiations on the elimination of their nuclear arsenals. This is a matter of urgency given the exponential speed AI is developing at.” AI does more than raise the risk of nuclear use. It reveals clearly the fundamental flaw at the heart of nuclear deterrence doctrine. Deterrence operates in the adversary's mind and even its most convinced advocates have to acknowledge that its logic collapses the moment that mind becomes a machine. So the goal should not be to make deterrence "AI-proof", it should be to confront the fact that deterrence has always been technically unmanageable, strategically overestimated, and morally indefensible. Its risks cannot be automated away, because they are built into the system itself. In a new article, ICAN, shows how AI subverts deterrence theory: “AI does not offer a new path to stability. Even committed defenders of deterrence would concede that much. What it offers instead is a stark reminder: the stability deterrence promised was illusory from the start. The only reliable way to prevent nuclear catastrophe, AI-driven or human-driven, is to eliminate these weapons, in line with international law and humanitarian principles. This is why the humanitarian argument at the heart of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) matters more, not less, in the age of AI. The catastrophic humanitarian consequences of nuclear detonation do not change because a machine helped trigger it. No AI system can contain radiation, feed a starving population after a nuclear famine, or undo the collapse of a climate. The case for prohibition was never about how a weapon might be launched. It was, and remains, about what happens after.” |
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For further information or to request an interview, contact: Alistair Burnett, ICAN Head of Communications [email protected] +41 78 238 7179 |