EDWARDS AIR FORCE BASE, California – EDWARDS AIR FORCE BASE, Calif. (AP) —
With the midday sun beating down, an experimental orange and white F-16 fighter jet launched with a familiar roar that is a hallmark of U.S. air power. But the aerial combat that followed was unlike any other: This F-16 was controlled by artificial intelligence, not a human pilot. And in the front seat was Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall.
AI marks one of the biggest advances in military aviation since the introduction of stealth in the early 1990s, and the Air Force has aggressively leaned in. Although the technology is not fully developed, the service is planning an AI-enabled fleet of more than 1,000 unmanned warplanes, the first of which will operate by 2028.
It was fitting that the aerial combat took place at Edwards Air Force Base, a vast desert installation where Chuck Yeager broke the speed of sound and the military incubated its most secretive aerospace advances. Inside simulators and classified buildings with layers of surveillance protection, a new generation of test pilots is training AI agents to fly in war. Kendall traveled here to see the AI fly in real time and make a public statement of confidence in its future role in aerial combat.
“It’s a security risk not to have it. At this point, we need it,” Kendall said in an interview with the Associated Press after disembarking. The AP, along with NBC, were allowed to witness the secret flight, with the condition that it not be reported until it was completed, due to operational security concerns.
The AI-controlled F-16, named Vista, flew Kendall in ultra-fast maneuvers at more than 550 miles per hour, which put pressure on his body with a force five times that of gravity. It almost came face to face with a second human-piloted F-16 as the two aircraft raced within 300 meters of each other, twisting and turning to try to force their opponent into vulnerable positions.
At the end of the hour-long flight, Kendall emerged from the cabin smiling. He said he had seen enough during the flight to trust this still-learning AI’s ability to decide whether or not to launch weapons.
There is a lot of opposition to this idea. Arms control experts and humanitarian groups are deeply concerned that AI will one day be able to autonomously launch bombs that kill people, without further human input, and are seeking greater restrictions on its use.
“There are widespread and serious concerns about handing over life-and-death decisions to sensors and software,” warned the International Committee of the Red Cross. Autonomous weapons “are an immediate cause for concern and require an urgent international political response.”
The military’s shift to AI-enabled aircraft is driven by safety, cost and strategic capability. If the US and China end up in conflict, for example, the Air Force’s current fleet of expensive manned fighters will be vulnerable due to gains on both sides in electronic warfare, space and air defense systems. China’s air force is on track to surpass that of the US and is also amassing a fleet of unmanned flying weapons.
Future war scenarios envision swarms of American unmanned aircraft providing an advanced attack on enemy defenses to give the US the ability to penetrate airspace without high risk to the lives of pilots. But change is also driven by money. The Air Force is still hampered by production delays and cost overruns on the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, which will cost around $1.7 billion.
Smaller, cheaper AI-controlled unmanned jets are the way forward, Kendall said.
Vista’s military operators say no other country in the world has an AI jet like this, where the software first learns millions of data points in a simulator and then tests its conclusions during real flights. This real-world performance data is then fed back into the simulator, where the AI processes it to learn more.
China has AI, but there is no indication that it has found a way to test it outside of a simulator. And just as a junior officer learns tactics for the first time, some lessons can only be learned in the air, Vista test pilots said.
Until you actually fly, “it’s all guesswork,” said chief test pilot Bill Gray. “And the longer it takes you to figure that out, the longer it takes you to have useful systems.”
Vista carried out its first AI-controlled dogfight in September 2023, and there have been only about two dozen similar flights since then. But the programs are learning so quickly from each engagement that some AI versions tested in Vista are already beating human pilots in air-to-air combat.
Pilots at this base are aware that in some respects they may be training their replacements or shaping a future build where fewer of them will be needed.
But they also say they wouldn’t want to be in the sky against an adversary that has AI-controlled aircraft if the U.S. didn’t also have its own fleet.
“We have to keep running. And we have to run fast,” Kendall said.
This story originally appeared on ABCNews.go.com read the full story
