Defense official reveals how AI chatbots could be used for targeting decisions
Defense official reveals how AI chatbots could be used for targeting decisions
Publish Date: 2026-03-12 18:23:00
Source Domain: www.technologyreview.com
The official described this as an example of how things might work but would not confirm or deny whether it represents how AI systems are currently being used.
Other outlets have reported that Anthropic’s Claude has been integrated into existing military AI systems and used in operations in Iran and Venezuela, but the official’s comments add insight into the specific role chatbots may play, particularly in accelerating the search for targets. They also shed light on the way the military is deploying two different AI technologies, each with distinct limitations.
Since at least 2017, the US military has been working on a “big data” initiative called Maven. It uses older types of AI, particularly computer vision, to analyze the oceans of data and imagery collected by the Pentagon. Maven might take thousands of hours of aerial drone footage, for example, and algorithmically identify targets. A 2024 report from Georgetown University showed soldiers using the system to select targets and vet them, which sped up the process to get approval for these targets. Soldiers interacted with Maven through an interface with a battlefield map and dashboard, which might highlight potential targets in one color and friendly forces in another.
The official’s comments suggest that generative AI is now being added as a conversational, chatbot layer—one the military would use to more quickly find and analyze the data as it makes decisions like which targets to prioritize.
Generative AI systems, like those that underpin ChatGPT, Claude, and Grok, are a fundamentally different technology from the AI that has primarily powered Maven. Built on large language models, they are much less battle-tested. And while Maven’s interface forced users to directly inspect and interpret data on the map, the outputs produced by generative AI models are easier to access but harder to verify.
The use of generative AI for such decisions is reducing the time required in the…
