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Cyber Warfare and Nuclear Stability

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Evaluating the vulnerabilities and resilience of nuclear command, control, and communication systems to cyberattacks and their potential to escalate to nuclear conflict.

  • North, Matthew, "Can Machines Have Ethics?" AFGC thesis, 2025, 44 pgs. 
    • North warns that utilizing autonomous AI/ML in offensive cyberwarfare could be "savage". A human operator can limit the scope of a cyberattack to abide by the rules of war, but an AI instructed simply to "destroy the enemy" will calculate the fastest, most permanent method available. He points out that an unrestricted AI might choose to melt down a nuclear power plant, shut down hospital grids, or crash airliners, causing devastating and indiscriminate collateral damage that no human commander would authorize.