Drones were the decisive weapon From the Ukrainian war. But when the next conflict breaks out, these weapons will be relatively outdated and will also have to compete with new generation weapons. The deciding factor in the next large-scale military confrontation, which experts expect within three to five years, will be neurotechnological systems, capable of paralyzing an adversary, modifying his behavior on the battlefield, or worse, blocking the activity of neurons to nullify his will to resist. But these innovations are not the only hallucinations that keep scientists and technicians who work day and night in military engineering laboratories awake. There are other cases, much less extravagant, that actually represent a real threat.
Although it’s not over yet After the war that began in 2022 with the Russian invasion of Ukraine, arms manufacturers and dealers have already begun showcasing the armor that the superpowers will deploy in future conflicts. “Ukraine radically changed the nature of war[because]it sparked the greatest conceptual and technological shift since World War II,” author Alan Power says in his book. The beginning of the war (In the beginning was war.)
Which However, rapid development poses a tangible limit For fans of Boromir Lord of the Rings Who dreamed of owning the “ultimate weapon”: In the real world, any such dream conflicts with the enormous financial effort such adventures require.
The insane cost of highly advanced combat systems discourages us For technicians And experts when they get excited about the prospect of creating high-tech weapons. 21st century armor guarantees a high mortality rate, but requires an exhausting research and development process, huge sums for manufacturing and massive operational funding. For this reason, Engineers’ Preferences aims to explore the perspectives opened up by recent innovations for the development of cognitive warfare technologies, and to seek to explain the discoveries of neuroscience with the advances made by artificial intelligence.
Dr. Jack MacDonald is not Chinese, but his forward-looking analysis is inspiring In the principles of Sun Tzu, the general who revolutionized military strategy five centuries before the birth of Christ. He assumed that “the art of war consists in subduing the enemy without fighting.”
in His research as director of the Center for Science and Security Studies From King’s College London, MacDonald realized that instead of causing great human slaughter to weaken the adversary, as has always happened throughout history, the wars of the future would favor means capable of disorienting, disorienting, disorienting the combatant, paralyzing the tools, and disorganizing the minds of the officers and those responsible for tactics on the field of operations. He adds, “Cognitive warfare aspires to manipulate the enemy’s perceptions with the aim of changing his ability to make decisions.”
The military learned years ago how to jam communications Now they are pursuing the more ambitious goal of perturbing neural activity. In collusion with scientists and technicians, they hope to use advances in understanding brain mechanisms to disrupt the enemy’s information processing, thus disrupting their ability to discriminate. “This will be a central issue in the war of the future: it is about fooling the enemy’s brain by physiological means and at a distance,” says a senior French defense ministry official, recalling the “nightmare weapons” the Soviet Union tried in the 1970s. Now the Russian military – as well as Western forces – have scent laboratories and know how to produce synthetic pheromones and other compounds capable of “creating our nightmares.” A weapon of this type can neutralize the entire crew of a submarine or aircraft. Some of this was self-evident when the “Havana Syndrome” scandal broke. Since 2016, more than a hundred American diplomats in Cuba, Russia, China, and other countries have been subjected to cyberattacks that have caused nausea, headaches, dizziness, and brain disturbances. North American intelligence agencies have not obtained any conclusive evidence of foreign interference, but the mystery remains.
Without being discouraged by successes or failures Building on that emblematic incident, those responsible for electromagnetic warfare have simultaneously developed other models – cheap and easy to build – designed to disrupt GPS positioning, interfere with enemy communications, blind radars, and infrared systems for guiding missiles and drones. “Whoever can control the waves will win the war,” says General Aymeric Bonnemeison, the new head of French cyber defence.
It is still on a reduced scale, sorcerer apprentices working in service The great powers made important advances in dealing with meteorology. It now faces the possibility of unleashing storms capable of disrupting the naval fleet or paralyzing maritime traffic, which underwrites 80% of global trade, according to the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development. In 2008, China tried – without getting the expected results – to cool down Beijing during the Olympics. In Silicon Valley and many Indian cities, engineers are working to combat global warming by creating artificial drops in temperatures, blocking sunlight, or generating torrential rains, but they fear that miscalculation could lead to biblical disasters.
The French General Staff, like the Supreme Command of the other great powersmaintains permanent cells of experts consisting of scientists, soldiers, doctors, industrialists, film and television screenwriters, and even science fiction authors, who are dedicated to imagining the future. The result of these works is summarized in the book Threats of 2035. Whoever wants peace prepares for the futureWhich just appeared in France. This is not speculation, but rather a series of scenarios, prepared on scientific grounds, for the risks that may arise in the coming decades.
Those Business ignores imagination Robot war or muscular super fighters armed to the teeth. “There will be no confrontation between the Matrix and Terminator,” one expert said sarcastically.
One of the hypotheses that worries Europe the most It is the “lithium war” of 2030, with a complete competition for supremacy in the global electric car market, resulting from the alliance of the main producers of this metal in the world (China, Argentina and the United States, supported by Australia, Chile and Brazil). This perspective takes into account the oil war of 1975, which led to a global economic crisis.
Another great fear is threat Biological warfare using new viruses and bacteria that could pose a tangible danger to humanity and all forms of life on Earth. China is one of the most advanced countries in this regard. What’s even sadder is that the actors in that cult, to realize their nonsense, don’t even need the help of artificial intelligence.
Economic intelligence specialist and journalist