Our Military Is Built for the Wrong Century
5/28/20261 hr
The future of high-tech warfare has arrived. Just look to the conflicts in Ukraine and Iran to see how much drones and robots have remade the modern battlefield. Is the U.S. positioned to win wars in this new era? What are the ethical constraints of waging autonomous warfare? My guest this week is Christian Brose, the president and chief strategy officer of Anduril, a defense technology company building a slate of autonomous weapons and defense systems for the American military.
- 00:00 - Intro
- 03:18 - Drones on the Russia - Ukraine battlefield
- 8:17 - Iran's stalemate and American military readiness
- 17:11 - Anduril is more than a "Lord of the Rings" reference
- 25:33 - Force fields and a layered defense
- 31:12 - The challenges of "finicky" autonomous systems
- 44:44 - The ethics of automating the kill chain
(A full transcript of this episode is available on the Times website.)
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Transcript preview
First 90 secondsSolana Pyne0:00
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Ross Douthat· Host0:28
What's your understanding of the constraints on what the Pentagon allows a drone or an autonomous weapon to do- Yeah ... without a human deciding, "Kill this person, shoot this person"?
Chris Brose· Guest0:42
The more important thing is what it doesn't say, right? It doesn't say you're not allowed to automate the kill chain.
Ross Douthat· Host0:47
So you're allowed to do that.
Chris Brose· Guest0:49
You are not not allowed to do that.
Ross Douthat· Host0:51
Right. [upbeat music] Chris Bros, welcome to Interesting Times.
Chris Brose· Guest0:59
Thank you. Great to be here.
Ross Douthat· Host1:00
So it seems to me like the future of high-tech warfare has arrived, that we are living through a revolution in war fighting unlike any, at least in my own lifetime, in which drones and robots and autonomous weapons are remaking battlefields. And your professional work puts you at the center of this shift. You are the president and chief strategy officer of Anduril, which is a defense technology company that's trying to be the hub, or a hub at least, for autonomous