U.S. Air Force and Navy fighter pilots recently tested an artificial intelligence battlefield coordination management system.
This month’s exercise is one of the earliest full-scale U.S. military tests of AI in a battlefield scenario.
RAFT, a defense contractor, put its AI battle management system to the test in what amounted to a learning exercise for both military pilots and the AI system.
RAFT CEO Shubhi Mishra said in a statement made available to Newsmax that the Department of Defense “is saturated with legacy systems” — outdated command structures and communication procedures.
Mishra said, “In today’s environment, defense modernization needs to enhance the ecosystem with agentic AI capabilities and innovative platforms.”
That means restructuring how battlefield data is gathered, processed, and made available to frontline warfighters to put to the best use.
Mishra’s reference to “agentic” points to a new level of AI that essentially thinks and acts on its own. It has the capacity to act independently, make choices, and change battlefield outcomes.
The RAFT programming, she said, ensures security, scalability, and operator-level usability. The new AI military approach “is trained on limited LLMs – or classified data – so it’s specific to what a warfighter needs to defend the country and people,” Mishra said.
Pending more large-scale tests and enhanced integration with human commanders, Mishra believes it will be “a game-changer for defense and national security operations.”
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