US and China must set rules before autonomous fighters cross paths
In December 2022, a Chinese J-11 fighter came within metres of a US RC-135 surveillance plane over the South China Sea, according to the US military, which criticised it as an unsafe manoeuvre. China, however, held the American crew responsible and claimed the RC-135 had suddenly veered towards the Chinese jet despite repeated warnings. Both sides released video footage, yet neither accepted the other’s account of the incident.
This and other such close encounters involved human pilots. The next one may involve aircraft with no one on board.
On September 30, US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth announced plans for a four-star Autonomous Warfare Command to scale up autonomous and robotic capabilities across the US military. The Pentagon has requested US$54.6 billion for accelerating the development and adoption of autonomous and unmanned systems in the 2027 financial year, up from US$225.9 million the year before.
KioskNews shows a cleaned-up reading view extracted from the publisher’s page — the original always lives on their site, not ours.