The fourteenth edition of the Asymmetric Threat Symposium Series, a virtual event held October 19, 2021 at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C., addressed meeting America’s challenges, and fixing vulnerabilities to assure its national security and the security of its allies. Participants in the symposium explored the issues at the heart of 21st century great power competition – specifically, rival efforts by the United States and its competitors to revolutionize military affairs by exploiting dazzling new technologies. Cutting across these technologies is the need for artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML). Without AI/ML, no nation will be able to succeed in economic, political, or military competition in an increasingly data-driven and data-defined world.

Effective creation and adoption of AI/ML will prove decisive in the United States’ pursuit of technological superiority over near peer adversaries, speakers contended. Without effectively developing, deploying, and advancing AI/ML, the United States will not be able to strengthen or protect its national security efforts sufficiently in the long term. This includes stopping incursions and attacks aimed at American civil and commercial institutions, not just defense and national security entities.

Speakers and panelists noted that effectively detecting and defeating these efforts will require innovative new use of “bits and bytes” to property integrate systems and capabilities across organizations, military services, and other national security entities. This will require attention to changes across government, participants noted, from policies, strategies, and authorities to technologies and tactics. The U.S. Government will also have to rethink how it collaborates and works with the private sector in the coming years in order to effectively defend American interests, as many of the innovations and leading technological developments in AI/ML are originating outside of government. While progress has been achieved in some areas, time is not on America’s side – the race for AI/ML dominance is one we can’t lose.