Dozens of countries have endorsed a set of guidelines on the responsible use of artificial intelligence in combat. China was among the countries attending a summit that did not sign.
The document envisages a "human-centric" application of artificial intelligence on the battlefieldImage: Damian Dovarganes/AP Photo/picture alliance
However, some 30 nations that sent a government representative to the South Korean summit, including China, did not back the document.
What are the guidelines about?
The guidelines said all applications of AI in the military sphere would be "ethical and human-centric."
The document examines what risk assessments must be made and the importance of human control.
"Appropriate human involvement needs to be maintained in the development, deployment and use of AI in the military domain, including appropriate measures that relate to human judgment and control over the use of force," it said.
The Dutch government said the focus of the summit was an "action-oriented" set of guidelines, including discussions about real-world developments such as AI-enabled drones being rolled out by Ukraine.
Included in the details added to the latest document was the need to stop AI from being used to proliferate weapons of mass destruction by entities, including terrorist groups.
Ukraine was among the countries that signed the agreement, as well as prominent NATO members France, Germany and the United Kingdom.
Because of its invasion of Ukraine, Russia was not invited to the summit and so was not a signatory.
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The Responsible AI in the Military Domain (REAIM) summit in Seoul is the second of its kind after one was held in the Dutch city of The Hague last year.
That gathering saw about 60 nations, including China, endorse a modest "call to action" without a legal commitment to take any action.
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How realistic is a wider agreement?
"We are making further concrete steps," Netherlands Defense Minister Ruben Brekelmans told the Reuters news agency. "Last year ... was more about creating shared understanding, now we are getting more towards action."
"We also need to be realistic that we will never have the whole world on board," Brekelmans said, in response to the number of states that did not sign.
"How do we deal with the fact that not everyone is complying? ... That is a complicated dilemma that we should also put on the table," he added.
"There are no principles and agreements yet," Brekelmans later posted on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter. "This is necessary to use AI responsibly. And to confront countries that break rules."
Giacomo Persi Paoli, head of Programme Security and Technology at the United Nations Institute for Disarmament Research (UNIDIR), said it might be counterproductive to rush ahead with rules upon which everyone might not agree.
"The blueprint is an incremental step forward," he said. "By going too fast, too soon, there is a very high risk that many countries do not want to engage."
Other initiatives on the same issue, include the US government's declaration on responsible use of AI in the military launched last year.
The Seoul summit was co-hosted by the Netherlands, Singapore, Kenya and the United Kingdom seeking to allow multi-stakeholder discussions are not dominated by a single nation or entity.
Technologies that revolutionized warfare
Artificial intelligence (AI) experts have warned about the dangerous "revolution" that would occur if lethal autonomous weapons were developed. But what are some of the other inventions that revolutionized warfare?
Image: Getty Images/E. Gooch/Hulton Archive
Artificial Intelligence: 'Third revolution in warfare'
More than 100 AI experts have written to the UN asking them to ban lethal autonomous weapons — those that use AI to act independently. No so-called "killer robots" currently exist, but advances in artificial intelligence have made them a real possibility. Experts said these weapons could be "the third revolution in warfare," after gunpowder and nuclear arms.
Image: Bertrand Guay/AFP/Getty Images
Gunpowder
The "first revolution in warfare" was invented by the Chinese, who started using the explosive black substance between the 10th and 12th centuries to propel projectiles in simple guns. It gradually spread to the Middle East and Europe in the following two centuries. Once perfected, firearms using gunpowder proved to be far more lethal than the traditional bow and arrow.
Image: Getty Images/E. Gooch/Hulton Archive
Artillery
The invention of gunpowder also introduced artillery pieces to the battlefield. Armies started using basic cannons in the 16th century to fire heavy metal balls at opposing infantrymen and breach defensive walls around cities and fortresses. Far more destructive field guns were invented in the 19th century and went on to wreak havoc in the battlefields of World War I.
Image: picture-alliance/akg-images
Machine guns
Guns that fire multiple rounds in rapid succession were invented in the late 19th century and immediately transformed the battlefield. Machine guns, as they came to be known, allowed soldiers to mow down the enemy from a protected position. The weapon's grisly effectiveness became all too clear in WWI as both sides used machine guns to wipe out soldiers charging across no man's land.
Image: Imperial War Museums
Warplanes
Military thinkers did not ignore the invention of the first airplane in 1903. Six years later, the US military bought the first unarmed military aircraft, the 1909 Wright Military Flyer. Inventors experimented with more advanced fighter and bomber aircraft in the following years. Both became standard features in many of the national air forces established by the end of WWI.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/dpaweb/U.S. Airforce
Mechanization
Armies had traditionally used soldiers and horses to fight and transport military equipment. But around WWI, they started using more machines such as tanks and armored vehicles. Faster and more destructive armies were the result. Nazi Germany put this new form of "mechanized warfare" to destructive effect in WWII using an attack strategy known as "Blitzkrieg" ("lightning war").
Image: ullstein bild - SV-Bilderdienst
Missiles
Although artillery was effective, it had a relatively limited range. The missile's invention in WWII suddenly allowed an army to strike a target hundreds of kilometers away. The first missile — the German V-2 — was relatively primitive, but it laid the foundation for the development of guided cruise missiles and intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBM) capable of carrying nuclear warheads.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa
Jet engine
Jet aircraft first saw action alongside traditional propeller airplanes at the end of WWII. Jet engines dramatically increased an aircraft's speed, allowing it to reach a target quicker and making it far harder for an adversary to shoot it down. After WWII, military reconnaissance planes were developed that could fly higher than 25 kilometers (15.5 miles) and faster than the speed of sound.
Image: picture-alliance
Nuclear weapons
The "second revolution in warfare" announced its horrific arrival on August 6, 1945, when the US dropped the first nuclear bomb — "Little Boy" — on the city of Hiroshima in Japan, killing between 60,000 and 80,000 people instantly. In the Cold War that followed, the US and Soviet Union developed thousands of even more destructive warheads that raised the specter of a devastating nuclear war.
Image: Getty Images/AFP
Digitization
Recent decades have witnessed the ever more prevalent use of computers to conduct war. The devices made military communication quicker and easier and radically improved the precision and efficiency of many weapons. Armed forces have recently focused on developing cyber warfare capabilities to defend national infrastructure and attack foreign adversaries in cyberspace.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa
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This article was written using material from the Reuters news agency.