entire book - Chris Hables Gray

Military Computerdom [ 53 ]
Germany is working closely with the United States on expert systems for
tactical aircraft as well as other projects. China's military AI research is
mainly in the areas of simulation, translation, and training. Japan, with one
of the largest and fastest growing defense budgets, probably has a large
military computing program, but it is veiled in secrecy.
The Strategic Computing Program and
Strategic Defense Initiative
With the SCP, formally started in October 1983, the DoD was trying to
develop the next generation of computing technology within a military
context (Guice, 1994). The SDI battle manager, the computer system that
was supposed to control the SDI sensors and weapons, was the largest and
most complex software project up to that time. It was conceptually (though
not administratively) a part of SCP. Making the scientific breakthroughs in
computing that the SDI needed was a key goal of the SCP.
The original SCP demonstration projects (the autonomous land vehicle,
pilot's associate, and naval battle manager) were augmented by the
AirLand Battle (ALB) manager, radar imagery analysis, and smart weapons,
all examples of concrete military applications. There was also the related
submarine commander's associate program. Flashy as these projects were,
what made SCP particularly important was its attempt to revolutionize
machine intelligence. Without basic breakthroughs in computer architecture,
symbolic processing, and other areas, these military AI projects would
be impossible to produce. As Stephen Squires, then assistant director of
DARPAs Information Processing Techniques Office, put it, "We're really
trying to develop a fundamentally new type of computing technology, not
simply new hardware" (Aviation Week & Space Technology Staff, 1986, p. 49).
The demonstration projects depended on advances in a number of
subfields: mechanical vision, speech recognition, natural language processing,
and expert systems technology. The work in these areas was dependent,
in turn, on innovations and discoveries in the areas of hardware and software
development that were supposed to increase computer performances many
times over, as well as produce vast improvements in automated manufacturing
and technology transfer between the military and civilian sectors of the
computer industry.
Most of these goals were not met. The autonomous land vehicle
prototype, for example, was terminated because of such difficulties as distinguishing
shadows from objects and roadways from ditches. While there were
discoveries and improvements in multiple processing and speech recognition,
in other areas there was minimal progress (Pollack, 1989).
For another example, the original SCP report predicted reasoning with
uncertainty abilities in place for battle management by the end of 1985