The U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission Report on AI Development
The 2024 Report to Congress of the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission highlights China's focus on and progress in AI development and its implications for U.S. national security.
The reports paint a stark picture of China's pursuit of artificial intelligence (AI) dominance and its potential implications for U.S. national security. They assume that the conflict over developing AI is inevitable.
Here are some key points from the report regarding AI development:
China's Commitment to AI Leadership: China has demonstrated its ambition to become a global leader in AI, evidenced by substantial investments in AI capabilities and the "New Generation Artificial Intelligence Development Plan" issued by the State Council in 2017, aiming for AI leadership by 2030.
Military Applications of AI: The report underscores China's development of AI not only for economic advancement but also for military purposes, such as autonomous systems, data processing, and cognitive warfare.
U.S. Leadership in Compute Power: The U.S. currently holds an advantage in compute power, crucial for training AI models. This lead is attributed to the preferential access U.S. companies have to advanced semiconductors, particularly GPUs from companies like NVIDIA.
China's Pursuit of Compute Power: Recognizing the importance of compute power, China is actively trying to close the gap with the U.S. by increasing its national computing power and improving resource efficiency.
Challenges to China's AI Development:
Semiconductor Gap: China faces challenges in accessing advanced semiconductors, which are crucial for powering AI technologies. The U.S. and its allies currently have an advantage in this area, and export controls further complicate China's efforts.
Censorship and Data Quality: China's strict censorship practices may hinder the quality of data used to train AI models and restrict the development of its chatbots.
Generative AI Model Quality: While China is actively developing generative AI models, most experts believe that U.S. models currently surpass their Chinese counterparts in sophistication.
AI in Disinformation and Cognitive Warfare: The report raises concerns about China potentially leveraging AI, especially large language models (LLMs), for disinformation campaigns and cognitive warfare operations targeting democracies like the U.S. and Taiwan.
They recommend that "Congress establish and fund a Manhattan Project-like program dedicated to racing to and acquiring an Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) capability. AGI is generally defined as systems that are as good as or better than human capabilities across all cognitive domains and surpass the sharpest human minds at every task. Among the specific actions the Commission recommends for Congress:"
It seems like the militarization of the pursuit of AGI is almost complete, and the next set of conflicts will surround the entire AGI supply chain, including labor, hardware, software, manufacturing plants, and power, among others.
We need to start thinking of incremental areas of bilateral and multilateral progress that can be made and we need not give up on a productive and meaningful dialogue with China.