China’s Military Bets Big on AI: Falling Behind US in Arms Race

NEW TAIPEI CITY, Taiwan — The Chinese naval forces are upgrading their guided-missile frigate, the Qinzhou, by integrating an advanced artificial intelligence (AI) algorithm aimed at enhancing its air defense capabilities by addressing visibility issues, according to a military-affiliated website.

This development was reported by state media and has been described by experts as a significant advancement in the vessel’s combat capabilities, making it one of the most sophisticated frigates currently operational.

Recent announcements made on March 30 indicate a broader adoption of AI across the military, particularly as China prepares for potential conflicts in regions like the South China Sea and the Taiwan Strait. However, experts suggest that China is strategically choosing where to deploy AI technology, instead of seeking rapid dominance or immediate technological parity with the United States.

According to Sophie Wushuang Yi, a postdoctoral teaching fellow at Schwarzman College, Tsinghua University, China maintains a cautious stance regarding the implementation of AI in military strategy. She noted that the concept of AI-enhanced warfare has been included in official defense documents since 2019, although it is acknowledged in academic circles that China has not yet bridged the gap in military AI capabilities compared to the United States.

Nevertheless, AI continues to play an increasingly significant role within the military sectors.

Earlier in January, a division of the People’s Liberation Army demonstrated the use of AI with drone swarms, managing around 200 autonomous vehicles simultaneously, as shown in a broadcast by Chinese state television.

Additionally, AI is expanding its influence in military operations within space and cyberspace, according to Malcolm Davis, a senior analyst for defense strategy and national security at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute. In space, AI is used to handle complex orbital maneuvers, and in cyberspace, it aids in planning and executing strategies against vital information infrastructures.

Davis highlighted that utilizing AI allows the military to execute decisions at machine speed, thereby improving the efficiency of the “observe-orient-decide-act” cycle over systems that rely solely on human control.

He also noted that similar AI applications are being employed by the U.S. and Israel in their operational planning, particularly in the context of the conflict in Iran, where AI plays a crucial role in target identification and mission planning. There is potential for the PLA to adopt comparable technologies.

The extensive integration of AI in military operations was further confirmed in a March 26 report by the PLA Daily, which discussed its use in enhancing battlefield perception, decision-making support, and autonomous control systems.

The leadership of the PLA places a high value on AI for decision-making, especially because many of their personnel lack actual combat experience, unlike their American counterparts, according to Sam Bresnick, a research fellow at the Center for Security and Emerging Technology at Georgetown University.

Bresnick pointed out that among the priorities for the PLA are enhancing their computer networks with AI, collecting extensive data, and advancing the autonomy of unmanned systems like unmanned underwater vehicles.

Despite the aspirations to surpass the U.S. in military AI applications, Chinese officials are currently cautious about the data that AI systems use or generate, fearing that it could contradict the ideals of Xi Jinping and the Communist Party, Bresnick added. Maintaining control over this information is a significant concern.

According to a recent study by the Modern War Institute at West Point, dated March 17, the U.S. maintains a substantial lead in AI capabilities over China. The study highlighted that the U.S. operates over 4,000 data centers compared to about 400 in China and noted that U.S. export controls on advanced semiconductors to China have restricted Beijing’s access to critical AI hardware.

Yi from Schwarzman College emphasized that China publicly adopts a more cautious and hedged approach than what is often portrayed in Western media. She also mentioned that the PLA lacks the extensive operational data that the U.S. military has accumulated through decades of expeditionary warfare, and highlighted doctrinal tensions between the need for decentralized decision-making in effective AI operations and the PLA’s centralized command tradition.

However, China may have gained an edge over the United States in the specific area of AI for drone swarms, according to Chen Yi-fan, an assistant professor in the Diplomacy and International Relations Department at Tamkang University in Taiwan. He noted that with the operational deployment of drone carriers, the PLA has advanced beyond the U.S. military in this particular domain of AI military applications.

The Qinzhou frigate, which was commissioned last year, recently participated in a combat exercise in the South China Sea, a region where Beijing is involved in territorial disputes with five other nations.