Plan

The United States federal government should substantially reduce the

numerical and per country limits for employment-based immigrants of the
Artificial Intelligence industry
 Solvency
LPR status is key to maximize talent – It’s the strongest pull factor in the
decision to migrate
Papademetriou 8 (Demetrios, President – Migration Policy Institute, Will Somerville, Senior
Policy Analyst – Migration Policy Institute, and Hiroyuki Tanaka, Research Assistant – Migration
Policy Institute, “Talent in the 21st Century Economy”, Talent, Competitiveness, and Migration,
Ed. Migration Policy Institute, p. 242-248)

what do the truly skilled and those with the

Firms want and need highly skilled and talented individuals to be competitive, and governments have an interest in facilitating the match. But

“right” qualifications in
(and typically scarce) STEM) — want and
the fields that are key to economic growth and competitiveness — the sciences, technology, engineering, and mathematics (

need in return? how do these sought-after individuals make decisions on when to move
And , , where to work

and how to respond to recruitment efforts? This section examines immigrant selection through the eyes of highly skilled foreign-born professionals, that is, those who both “envisage” a
global career60 and are most likely to have a choice of destinations — rather than those with run-of-the-mill paper credentials and experience who fill the ranks of applicants for one points selection system or another. The immigr ants who are the true focus of this

the highly skilled — migrate to take advantage of sometimes small opportunity differentials
paper —

that may make a large difference in outcomes for them and their employer . And although wages matter, they do not drive the
decision because the remuneration differentials for the most talented do not typically vary significantly. (US firms may be the exception in this regard.) The highly skilled also weigh a firm’s and the destination area’s human- and physical-capital infrastructure, the
presence of other talented workers, and what we call the “total immigration package” (that only governments can offer), as well as a host of other variables. Our analysis is organized along three pathways and is laid out visually in Figure 5. The top half of the figure
focuses on a series of “first-order” decision-making variables that we consider essential to the calculations most talented and highly skilled immigrants are likely to make in the process of deciding where to move. This cluster of variables has easily permeable
boundaries that allow each variable to reinforce the others; we call them decision “drivers.” Our second group of variables (the “second-order” ones, in the bottom half of the figure) also influence the migration decision and are also able to cross boundaries — both
vertically and horizontally. In most instances, however, they are not likely to determine the outcome. We call them decision “facilitators.” 61 And located between the two is what we call the “total immigration package,” that is, the sum total of immigration rules

Highly
and conditions at destination that has a strong, if not determinative, effect on the decision-making process of prospective highly qualified foreign workers. Decision-Making Drivers The first driver, opportunity, is a primary motive for immigration.

skilled immigrants have made deep and often expensive (to them and their families ) investments in developing
their human capital. As a result, they want to get the best returns on these investments. It stands to reason that, like all “investors,” they will look for places where this can be accomplished best and fastest. We call the second
driver capital infrastructure. By that, we want to convey the importance of facilities that allow highly skilled immigrants t o realize personal and professional goals. These might include research labs for scientists, great universities where the immigrant and his/her
family might continue with their academic and professional development, availability/access to industrial clusters for high-tech entrepreneurs (a prerequisite for the essential transitions from scientific innovation, to product development, to market), and even such
intangibles as a sense of dynamism — that is that this is the crossroads where knowledge, creativity and transformation meet. California’s Silicon Valley probably is the best exemplar of that genre. The third driver is the presence of, a nd access to, substantial
numbers of other talented professionals, both in the same field but also in cognate and, increasingly, in complementary, disciplines. This matters a great deal because critical masses of highly educated and motivated workers from many disciplines — including
workers from different ethnic, cultural, and educational backgrounds — create the synergies and multiplier effects that are thought to facilitate breakthroughs in research and product development.62 The presence of other talent ed individuals also provides
opportunities to become integrated into crucial professional networks and enables the transformative environment that attracts new talented immigrants — in effect, creating, fueling, and replenishing the talent pools that energize the virtuous circles of progress
and innovation. As noted, our three drivers are mutually dependent and intentionally overlappi ng. For example, opportunity is fully integrated with the availability of ample human and physical capital infrastructure and the presence of pools of other talented
professionals. And all three drivers contribute to the constant replenishment of a firm’s and an area’s human capital pool since they influence deeply both internal and international migration patterns by other highly skilled and motivated workers. Decision-Making
Facilitators We discuss three variables that influence the decision about choosing a destination. Their effect will vary with the personal and professional circumstances of the prospective immigrant. The first factor, the receiving society’s social model, will be
important to every potential immigrant but would be of particular interest to persons contemplating a long stay and those with family. For those for whom a fair and generous social model is crucial, places like Canada and most of the European Union — with their
universal health care systems, social partnerships (involving government, employers, and worker organizations), and strong social welfare traditions — might be particularly attractive. Strong norms (and regulations) about workplace conduct by employers (including
rules about hiring and firing), as well as opportunities, even guarantees, of worker participation in key firm decisions, extensive unemployment protections and training and retraining opportunities, etc., also give many EU Member States decided advantages. The
second variable, lifestyle and environmental factors, typically refers to quality-of-life issues. Survey respondents, for instance, point to specific destinations’ environmental or cultural attributes63 as particularly relevant. In fact, the ability to market the lifestyle
advantages, including the climate and natural beauty, of a country is and will continue to be important to a significant pool of applicants. Places like Australia and New Zealand are thought to be particularly appealing to many immigrants for precisely such reasons.
Finally, living in a safe and tolerant society, where the acceptance and even respect for diversity of language, ethnicity, race, and cultural and religious practices — and a welcoming environment toward immigration — are part of the national narrative, can be a very
strong element of attraction, particularly given the growing intolerance of many societies. This suggests that the more traditional countries of immigration (the United States, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand) fare much better on these grounds than almost any
other single country, with Canada probably scoring the highest because of its constitutionally guaranteed and now deeply ingrained multiculturalism model. Once more, those intending long-term or permanent immigration, as well as those with families, will tend to
place much greater emphasis on these factors than younger, single, foreign workers focused almost exclusively on advancing their career and building wealth and without a predetermined interest in permanent settlement in a particular country. The Total
Immigration Package We now turn to the total immigration package a country makes available to the prospective immigrant — that is, the immigration rules that apply to them both upon and after entry and the treatment they can expect while in the host country.
The immigration package affects both a potential immigrant’s professional opportunities and his/her experience living in the host country. As Figure 5 indicates, we have positioned the package midway between the decision-making drivers and facilitators, making it
important enough to exert strong influence in the decision about a destination choice but not necessarily a determinant of it. We consider four elements of that package as most essential. The first two are explicitly tied to the receiving country’s immigration rules

The first element, that of clear, fair, and

while the other two are tied more closely to the immigrant’s economic success and the quality of opportunities afforded his/her family.

transparently applied immigration rules, takes the guessing game out of a foreigner’s
relationship to the host country’s immigration system and what (s)he has to do to maintain
his/her status. The ultimate goal is to have predictable outcomes in all immigration-related
matters, an issue of supreme importance for people who are far away from familiar
environments and must learn to negotiate multiple new norms. With immigration “surprises”
out of the picture, immigrants know how to behave, what they can plan for, what investments
to make, and how to handle unforeseen circumstances Considering the , such as an unexpected layoff or a contract or pay dispute.

power asymmetries between employer and worker, knowing one’s immigration status rights
and being able to exercise them can make all the difference between a life of uncertainty and
fear and one of relative predictability and rules-based outcomes work visas that offer . In these regards,

their holders the security of permanent residence up front are unsurpassed in terms of their
value to foreign workers . And this value is irrespective of the individual immigrant’s ultimate decision about settlement and citizenship. The second, and in many ways related, element of the total immigration package

revolves around paths to permanent residency and citizenship. While it stands to reason that highly skilled immigrants, like all immigrants, value transparent rules for the transition between immigration statuses, as well as a clear path to citizenship, not all are
eligible for such transitions. Some countries offer foreign workers temporary work visas without clear rules about or real prospects for taking the next immigration step — a policy that is most common of arrangements for less-skilled work and shorter-distance
migration. The countries that practice this approach (such as Japan) do this precisely because they prefer to tap the labor market skills of immigrants without incorporating them into society in the long term. While this policy may make sense from the host’s
perspective, it makes the country much less attractive for many prospective highly skilled immigrants and reduces the pool and quality of the accessible talent.
An undersupply of US graduates makes immigration the only way to secure
dominance in AI
Osoba and Welser 17 (Osonde Osoba – PhD, MS, and BS In electrical engineering, engineer at the RAND Corportation,
professor at the Pardee RAND Graduate School specializing in machine learning, artificial intelligence, and defense/technology
policy. William Welser – Senior management scientist at the RAND Corporation, professor at Pardee RAND Graduate School,
publishes research acted upon by policy decisionmakers. <MKIM> “The Risks of Artificial Intelligence to Security and the Future of
Work”. 2017. DOA: 10/10/18. https://www.rand.org/pubs/perspectives/PE237.html)

The United States enjoyed substantial advantages in innovation and economic strength in the second half of the last century. The
reasons for this state of affairs and the prospects of its continuation are secondary considerations.9 The point to focus on is that
many of the innovations in AI occurred in the United States and the attending benefits of these innovations accrued to the United
States first. These innovations are diffusing quickly, especially with the strong academic and commercial push to “democratize AI.”
The rise of AI expertise and innovators in other nations (e.g., China’s Baidu, Alibaba, and Didi) is probably the
more indicative signal pointing to the loss of the United States’ first-mover’s advantage in the AI
space. Further complicating the arena is the fact that the United States has ceded dominance in high-
performance computing as those assets have proliferated and become accessible globally. It is no longer tenable to assume
the absence of foreign actors with comparable AI expertise and resources. Suggested response: Assumptions of enduring superiority
in AIrelated technology and expertise should be discarded to account for the reality that stiff global competition now exists. The
competition may grow stiffer over time as the quality of math and science education in the United States (as measured in cross-
national education surveys like the OECD’s PISA [undated]) continues to rate as “average” or “below average.” Decisionmakers could
adopt a “race-to-the-moon” stance with an appropriately aggressive strategy to invest in AI-related research and infrastructure.
The AI talent pool is and will continue to be a space of tight geopolitical competition. The standard lever
would be to improve STEM educational outcomes the local K–12 pipeline. This is admittedly a complex task that will likely only yield
results at longer time-scales. The AI talent concern serves to make this task more urgent. There is also significant strategic
importance to attracting and securing such talent, and interested nations should acknowledge that the pool is global in
nature and thus requires immigration policies that prioritize these skill sets. For the United States,
immigration policy is a major lever for three reasons: (1) an uncharacteristically high percentage
of U.S.-resident AI experts are foreign-born or first-generation immigrants; (2) post-graduate programs
where AI expertise develops have been relying on student immigration for many years now. The U.S.
K–undergraduate education pipeline has not been supplying enough native graduates interested in
supplying enough 17 native graduates interested in STEM; and (3) the global competition for experts may be
close to a zero-sum game. It is easier to cultivate and retain U.S. tech dominance if experts and
would-be experts immigrate from other competing states.
 The Advantage is Artificial Intelligence
AI marks the beginning of the Second Cold War – China plans to lead by 2030
and there can only be one winner
Aitken 18 (Neil Aitken – Business Telephony innovator and reporting expert on telco trends, innovation and SIM Plans.
<MKIM> “The New AI Cold War Between China and the USA”. 6/28/18. DOA: 10/8/18. https://hub.packtpub.com/ai-cold-war-
between-china-and-the-usa/)

The Cold War between the United States and Russia ended in 1991. However, considering the ‘behind the
scenes’ behavior of the world’s two current Super Powers – China and the USA, another might just be
beginning. This time around, many believe that the real battle doesn’t relate to the trade deficit between the two countries,
despite new stories detailing the escalation of trade tariffs. In the next decade and a half, the real battle will take
place between China and the USA in the technology arena, specifically, in the area of Artificial Intelligence or AI.
China’s not shy about it’s AI ambitions China has made clear its goals when it comes to AI. It has publicly
announced its plan to be the world leader in Artificial Intelligence by 2030. The country has
learned a hard lesson, missing out on previous tech booms, notably, in the race for internet supremacy early
this century. Now, they are taking a far more proactive stance. The AI market is estimated to be worth $150
billion per year by 2030, slightly over a decade from now, and China has made very clear public
statements that the country wants it all. The US, in contrast has a number of private companies striving to
carve out a leadership position in AI but no holistic policy. Quite the contrary, in fact. Trumps government say,
“There is no need for an AI moonshot, and that minimizing government interference is the best
way to make sure the technology flourishes.” What makes China so dangerous as an AI Threat ? China’s background
and current circumstance gives them a set of valuable strategic advantages when it comes to AI. AI solutions are based,
primarily, on two things. First, of critical importance is the amount of data available to ‘train’ an AI algorithm
and the relative ease or difficulty of obtaining access to it. Secondly, the algorithm which sorts
the data, looking for patterns and insights, derived from research, which are used to optimize the AI tools which
interpret it. China leads the world on both fronts. China has more data: China’s population is 4 times
larger than the US’s giving them a massive data advantage. China has a total of 730 million daily internet users
and 704 million smartphone mobile internet users. Each of the connected individuals uses their phone, laptop or tablet online each
day. Those digital interactions leave logs of location, time, action performed and many other variables. In sum then, China’s huge
population is constantly generating valuable data which can be mined for value. Chinese
regulations give public and
private agencies easier access to this data: Few countries have exemplary records when it comes to human rights.
Both Australia, and the US, for example, have been rebuked by the UN for their treatment of immigration in recent years. Questions
have been asked of China too. Some suggest that China’s centralized government, and alleged somewhat shady history when it
comes to human rights means they can provide internet companies with more data, more easily, than their private equivalents in
the US could dream of. Chinese cybersecurity laws require companies doing business in the country to store their data locally. The
government has placed one state representative on the board of each of their major tech companies, giving them direct, unfettered
central government influence in the strategic direction and intent of those companies, especially when it comes to coordinating the
distribution of the data they obtain. In the US, data leakage is one of the most prominent news stories of 2018. Given Facebook’s
presentation to congress around the Facebook/Cambridge Analytica data sharing scandal, it would be hard to claim that US
companies have access to data outside each company competing to evolve AI solutions fastest. It’s more secretive: China protects its
advantage by limiting other countries’ access to its findings / information related to AI. At the same time, China takes advantage of
the open publication of cutting edge ideas generated by scientists in other areas of the world. How China is doubling down on their
natural advantage in AI solution development A number of metrics show China’s growing advantage in the area. China is investing
more money in the area and leading the world in the number of university led research papers on AI that they’re publishing. China
is investing more money in AI than the USA. They overtook the US in AI funds allocation in 2015 and have been
increasing investment in the area since. China now performs more research in to AI than the US – as measured
by the number of published scientific peer reviewed journals. Why ‘Network Effects’ will decide the ultimate winner in the AI Arms
Race You won’t see evidence of a Cold War in the behaviors of World Leaders. The handshakes are firm
and the visits are cordial. Everybody smiles when they meet at the G8. However, a look
behind the curtain clearly
shows a 21st Century arms race underway, being led by investments related to AI in both countries.
Network effects ensure that there is often only one winner in a fight for technological supremacy.
Whoever has the ‘best product’ for a given application, wins the most users. The data obtained from
those users’ interactions with the tool is used to hone its performance. Thus creating a virtuous circle.
The result is evident in almost every sphere of tech: Network effects explain why most people use only
Google, why there’s only one Facebook and how Netflix has overtaken cable TV in the US as the primary
source of video entertainment. Ultimately, there is likely to be only one winner in the war surrounding AI,
too. From a military perspective, the advantage China has in its starting point for AI solution
development could be the deciding factor. As we’ve seen, China has more people, with more devices, generating
more data. That is likely to help the country develop workable AI solutions faster. They ingest the hard won advantages that US data
scientists develop and share – but do not share their own. Finally, they simply outspend and out-research the US, investing more in
AI than any other country. China’s coordinated approach outpaces the US’s market based solution with every step. The
country
with the best AI solutions for each application will gain a ‘Winner Takes All’ advantage and the
winning hand in the $300 billion game of AI market ownership.

Status quo green card restrictions are the sole factor pushing talent to China –
They’d rather be in the US, but we give them no choice
Sheng, 18 --- writer, editor and content strategist specializing in business, finance and wealth
(Ellen, “Silicon Valley is fighting a brain-drain war with Trump that it may lose,”
https://www.cnbc.com/2018/04/09/trumps-war-on-immigration-causing-silicon-valley-brain-
drain.html, accessed on 5/29/18, JMP)
After six years at LinkedIn, Vikram Rangnekar wanted to go back to his entrepreneurial roots. There was just one big obstacle.
Rangnekar, a cloud computing developer and former Techcrunch50 winner, was working in Silicon Valley on an H-1B visa. Since H-1B
visas are tied to jobs, his options were limited: Get a job at another company or try to get a visa on his own and start a company.
Both came with one huge drawback: Any change to his job would reset the clock on his green card application. Green
cards are
allotted by country; the backlog for citizens from populous countries such as India or China is now more than
10 years. "We decided the indefinite wait was not for us, and we started thinking about our next
play," he said. That next play turned out to be Toronto. "The permanent-resident process (Canada's green
card equivalent) is easy, and if you have all the points, it takes less than six months. The government is working
hard to help and improve the start-up scene," he said. Now happily settled in Toronto with his family, he started a site,
movnorth.com, to help others like him. "People who have been in the U.S. for 10 to 15 years and still restricted by a work visa are
thinking, where can we invest time and have something more permanent?'" Alternatives to U.S. citizenship Rangnekar is one of a
growing number of highly educated foreign entrepreneurs in the United States who have started
looking at alternatives to the obstacle-strewn path to U.S. citizenship. Hardships for foreign
entrepreneurs in the United States have increased as of late, thanks to the heightened vetting of H-1B visas, Trump's
Muslim ban and an increasingly hostile stance toward immigration. Trump, through a number of executive orders and memos from
various U.S. agencies has started narrowing visa requirements. In February the U.S Citizenship and Immigration Services
agency put out a new policy memo requiring "detailed documentation" about H-1B workers employed at third-party work sites to
demonstrate that employees are actually filling specialty roles for which they were hired. The move is designed to cut down on
"benching" — a practice in which employers hire entry-level software engineers from overseas, pay them the minimum required
wage or less and shuffle them to subsidiaries. Although it is important to close some of the loopholes in the H-1B visa program,
these actions could also have unintended consequences. Often lost in the political rhetoric is the fact that immigration
is a
critical issue for the U.S. economy and our nation's competitive position. The National Foundation for American
Policy found that immigrants have started more than half of the country's billion-dollar start-up
companies. Some of the more prominent examples include SpaceX and Tesla founder Elon Musk, from South Africa, and Google
co-founder Sergey Brin, an immigrant from the former Soviet Union. The H-1B visa is the primary avenue for skilled
immigrants to enter the United States. While it's well known that companies in Silicon Valley rely on H-1B
visas, it is also used heavily by companies in New York, Texas and Washington, D.C. A recent Pew
Research Center report revealed that between 2010 and 2016, almost a third of visas went to businesses in the New York City area.
Increased restrictions and rejections of H-1B visas have companies worried. Recent reports suggest that restrictions on
foreign-born workers could have outsized impact on the tech industry. A recent report from the Silicon
Valley Competitiveness and Innovation Project found that the country's largest tech companies rely more on
foreign-born workers than domestic ones. In Silicon Valley at least 57 percent of workers in science,
tech, engineering and mathematics with a bachelor's degree or higher were born outside the United States,
the report said. According to data from the U.S. Department of Labor, IBM applied for 12,381 H-1B visas last year, Microsoft 5,029
visas and Google 4,897. Brain drain begins For
decades the United States has attracted some of the best and
brightest. Now some are starting to see the reverse happen. Vivek Wadhwa, a distinguished fellow and
adjunct professor at Carnegie Mellon University's College of Engineering and author of The Immigrant Exodus: Why America Is
Losing the Global Race to Capture Entrepreneurial Talent, said that in his current class at Carnegie Mellon, not one of the foreign
students is looking to stay. Foreign students from India, China and elsewhere who used to stay are now returning
to their home countries to start businesses. This is alarming because it will adversely impact U.S.
innovation, Wadhwa said. "In the next five to 10 years, we're going to be competing with China and India and
Singapore and many other countries all over the world for talent like never before," he said. The U.S. has seen its
share of tech "unicorns" drop dramatically in recent years, according to data from CB Insights. Of the 214 unicorn start-
ups globally, 41 percent are based in the United States compared to 75 percent in 2013. Meanwhile, the proliferation of
tech unicorns from outside has been increasing, especially from China. China is now home to 36 percent of
tech unicorns compared to 12 percent in 2014. If we keep going on the path we are on, China will have more tech
unicorns than the United States. China is catching up to the United States in advanced technology on
everything from artificial intelligence and gene editing to quantum computing, Wadhwa said, adding
that once that happens, "China will be neck-to-neck with Silicon Valley, and then they're going
to eat our lunch." Toughened immigration policies To be sure, U.S. immigration has been difficult for quite
some time, but now Trump's executive orders and antiimmigration rhetoric has further accelerated the
trend. Tahmina Watson, Seattle-based immigration attorney and author of The Startup Visa: Key to Job Growth & Economic
Prosperity in America, said she's started to see extreme scrutiny of H-1B visa applications. Routine applications that were once
commonly accepted are now sent back requiring more documentation. H-1B visa extensions are facing more scrutiny. Watson is also
seeing a sudden spike in H-1B visa denials. While some of the scrutiny is an attempt to close loopholes in the H-1B program, the
result is that talented, legitimate applicants are being turned away. Antiimmigration policies will likely hurt American workers,
Watson said, noting that for every H-1B worker, five jobs are created. Another visa that would have been a boost to
Silicon Valley's start-up scene has also been quashed. The international entrepreneur rule, or start-up visa, would have allowed
qualified foreign entrepreneurs to stay in the United States to build businesses. It was set to go into effect last year but has been
delayed and looks to be on the chopping block. "The shortsightedness will be felt in upcoming months and years. To make America
great again, scrutinizing business visas is not the way to go," she said. Filling the void As
the United States closes its
borders, other countries are courting the world's best and brightest to come and start businesses. France
introduced a new tech visa program last year, and French president Emmanuel Macron has said he aims to make France a
"Startup Nation." Canada launched a program to fast-track visas and short-term work permits for highly skilled foreign
workers. When the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services department said in June they would stop premium
processing of H-1B visas for up to six months, Canada stepped up and said it would fast-track applications.
India's commerce ministry and various government arms have created innovation labs and incubators in efforts to develop the
country's start-up scene, while China has vowed to invest vigorously in artificial intelligence to create a $150
billion industry by 2030. "In the wake of our administration's policies, it's becoming easier for others to fill the
void," said David Brown, a serial entrepreneur and founder of Techstars, which helps start-ups through accelerator programs and
investment. Brown said that Techstar's Toronto program is reaping the benefit of entrepreneurs who are leaving the United States
for Canada. Whether the current tide of people leaving becomes a wave has yet to be determined. But meanwhile, "the rhetoric
has got people really stressed. They just want to do work and spend time with their families, not
deal with political pressure," said Rangnekar. "The U.S. is still a great place to be. It's not too late. Silicon Valley is still
the most amazing place in the world; people still want to be here if they have a choice. The
problem is, we give them no choice," Wadhwa said.

Job-postings reflect a domestic AI shortage that will remain unfulfilled by US

Universities
Papatsaras 18 (Antonis Papatsaras, Ph.D – Developer for SpringCM cloud computing with 15 years of experience in cloud
infrastructure, scalable architectures, and artificial intelligence. Former Director of Software Engineering at Interwoven, and Vice
President of Software Engineering at Discovery Mining. <MKIM> “In the Middle of an AI Talent Drought, Companies Are Getting
Creative with Their Staffing Needs”. 6/7/18. DOA: 10/8/18. https://recruitingdailyadvisor.blr.com/2018/06/middle-ai-talent-
drought-companies-getting-creative-staffing-needs/)

In the pursuit of innovation and technological advancement, businesses are eagerly hopping
aboard the artificial intelligence (AI) bandwagon. More than half (68%) of businesses have already implemented AI within
their organizations in 2017, and that number is expected to grow as companies reap the benefits of automating repetitive tasks,
streamlining internal workflows, and improving employee productivity. But
as AI jobs become increasingly popular,
we’re also seeing a significant staffing problem for employers looking to fill those roles. Demand
is quickly outstripping the AI talent supply, and businesses are discovering how difficult it is to
hire the very best of the qualified candidates available. A Widespread AI Shortage Is Fueling a Small but
Expensive Candidate Pool Businesses recognize AI’s massive potential, but its newfound popularity has
made qualified candidates a rare commodity. Demand for workers with AI skills has grown
significantly over the past 3 years, with the number of AI-related job postings up about 119%,
according to job-posting site Indeed. Interest is at an all-time high, but employee searches for AI-related positions have plateaued
within the last year, suggesting a disinterest on the jobseeker side. In other words, employers increasingly
need to fill
roles like data scientists and software architects, but there aren’t enough candidates applying
for those positions. Contributing to the skills gap is the indifference toward AI-related fields at
the university level. Business degrees remain the most popular college major, while computer science degrees don’t even
crack the top five. Despite the lure of a six-figure salary, more than 500,000 computing jobs remain unfulfilled
in the United States, and funding for science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) programs remains
in jeopardy under the Trump administration. The few candidates who are versed in AI hold tremendous negotiating
power over the companies clamoring for their attention. Experienced analysts and data engineers can selectively choose where they
take their talents, often driving salaries into the high six figures. Although corporations like Apple and Google can afford to shell out
big bucks for the best of the best, this can force out organizations with less capital looking to break into the AI marketplace.

Domestic talent isn’t sufficient – Trump’s policies on Chinese STEM deter

immigrants and fuel poaching campaigns that are only reversible by expanding
immigration
Mehta 18 (Aaron Mehta - Deputy Editor and Senior Pentagon Correspondent for Defense News, former investigator for the
Center for Public Integrity. <MKIM> “Trump visa limits could hurt American tech”. 6/1/18. DOA: 10/8/18.
https://www.c4isrnet.com/it-networks/2018/06/01/trump-visa-limits-could-hurt-american-tech/)
The Trump administration is preparing to announce new restrictions on Chinese science and
technology students, in a move experts warn may end up backfiring and harming America’s ability to develop key new
technologies. The new limitations, first reported by the AP May 29 and later confirmed by various media outlets, are planned
to go into effect June 11. They would create one-year limits on visas for Chinese students coming to
America to study high-tech sectors such as robotics and aviation. It’s clearly a decision the administration has been
weighing for some time, one previewed by the National Security Strategy released in December. “The United States will review visa
procedures to reduce economic theft by non-traditional intelligence collectors,” the document reads. “We will consider restrictions
on foreign STEM students from designated countries to ensure that intellectual property is not transferred to our competitors, while
acknowledging the importance of recruiting the most advanced technical workforce to the United States.” But analysts
aren’t
confident the visa limits will help keep U.S.-born technology safe — and worry that doing so
could actually harm American innovation, particularly in the realm of artificial intelligence. In December, a
RAND study suggested that rather than limiting the number of foreign born experts, the U.S. should be
expanding immigration policy in order to lure skilled technologists to America. As part of that report,
the researchers found that a high percentage of U.S.-resident AI experts are foreign born or first-
generation immigrants, that the American educational pipeline is not supplying enough AI
expertise, and that it would benefit the U.S. to monopolize the global AI talent by encouraging
immigration rather than blocking it. Those argument appear to be shared by one of the most influential
voices in the tech community: Eric Schmidt, who until recently led Alphabet, the parent company of Google. In
November, Schmidt warned against limiting the ability of foreign experts to come into the U.S., even as
he noted China is gaining significant ground in the artificial intelligence race. “Would you rather
have them building AI somewhere else, or would you rather have them building here?” Schmidt
said then, echoing long-standing complaints from the tech community over immigration issues — complaints that have only gotten
louder under the Trump administration. “Iran produces some of the smartest and top computer scientists in the world,” Schmidt
added. “I want them here! I want them working for Alphabet and Google. I’m very clear on this. It’s crazy not to let these people in.”
Amir Husain, the founder and CEO of Austin-based SparkCognition and author of the AI-focused book “The Sentient Machine,” also
warned against blocking expertise from coming into America during a March event launching a new AI task force at the Center for a
New American Security. “Our universities can be responsible. They don’t have to provide classified
information in undergraduate classes,” Husain said. “But, in general, the influence that America has had
in the world even when these students have gone back to their countries has been tremendous.”
But Paul Scharre of the Center for a New American Security notes that China has been “aggressively and
strategically investing in U.S. tech companies, recruiting talent, and engaging in intellectual
property theft to try to gain an unfair edge on competitors,” to the point that the U.S. needs to be thinking
about ways to level the playing field. Whether this is the best way to go about doing that, however, isn’t clear for Scharre, the head
of the CNAS AI task force. “We should be siphoning off the top talent in the world and recruiting them
to stay in the United States, not pushing them away,” he said. “Having said that, China is arguably a special
case. To the extent that this decision regarding Chinese visas is a bargaining chip to give the U.S. greater leverage to compel China
to compete more fairly on high-technology issues, then I see the merit.” And industry is certainly looking for ways to secure its
intellectual property, which has been victimized by Chinese theft over the last decade. “This is a part of the fair trade aspect of this,
the technology transfer,” said Eric Fanning, CEO of the Aerospace Industries Association, when asked about the potential visa
change. AIA members are “concerned about the loss of IP and technology transfer that frankly is a national security issue in addition
to an economics security issue. That’s part of the difficulty in trying to balance this,” he said.

Government documents prove China’s quest for global power will only be
successful if they establish technological dominance
Heath, 18 --- Senior International Defense Research Analyst with the nonprofit, nonpartisan
RAND Corporation (1/5/18, Timothy R., “China’s Endgame: The Path Towards Global
Leadership,” https://lawfareblog.com/chinas-endgame-path-towards-global-leadership,
accessed on 6/4/18, JMP)

Dueling high level strategy documents in both the U S and China portend an intensifying nited tates

competition for leadership and influence at the global systemic leve l. The coming years are likely to see a deepening contest in the diplomatic,

economic, cyber, and information domains, even as the risks of major war remain low. Although the U.S. strategy has garnered considerable scrutiny, less attention has been paid to the directives outlined in key official Chinese strategy documents. The National
Security Strategy recently released by the Trump administration surprised many in its stark depiction of China as a “revisionist power” that seeks to “displace the United States in the Indo-Pacific region.” The strategy’s striking tone has drawn widespread

a closer look at authoritative Chinese documents

commentary, but in many ways it reflects a grim, but realistic recognition of the realities of a deepening rivalry. Indeed,

suggests that preparations are well underway in that country to compete at the global with the United States

level In the 19th

. (CCP) Congress report, China’s most authoritative strategy
Chinese Communist Party

document, Beijing articulated for the first time an ambition to contend for global leadership It .

stated that by mid-century, China seeks to have “become a global leader in terms of composite
national strength and international influence.” Given that China already has the second largest
economy and one of the largest militaries in the world, this phrasing strongly suggests that, over
the long term, China is mulling competition with the U S for the status of global leader nited tates . Beyond reasons of

if trends that
prestige, global leadership affords a country the opportunity to reap considerable economic and security benefits by shaping international norms, rules, and institutions, as the United States has done since World War II. And

narrow the gap in national power continue, global competition between the two giants could
become unavoidable in any case the report’s
. To be sure, the future remains undetermined and there are many reasons why China may never succeed in mounting such a challenge, but

contents suggest China’s leaders are positioning the country to seize such an incredible
opportunity should it present itself Clues as to the sort of preparations underway . China’s interest in global leadership

can be seen in the sections of the 19th (CCP) Congress report that outline policy Chinese Communist Party

objectives for 2035 , a new category designed to serve as an intermediary point between the two well-known centenaries of 2021 (centenary of the founding of the CCP) and 2049 (centenary of the founding of the People’s Republic

The objectives reflect a much stronger awareness of the need to compete globally than
of China).

was the case in previous CCP Congress reports The shifting emphasis reflects the reality that .

China has grown into a great power with global interests, and that consequently elements of
domestic and international policy increasingly overlap. Underscoring this point, the 19th CCP Congress report describes China’s ambitions as interlinked with the world. It
observed, “The dream of the Chinese people is closely connected with the dreams of the peoples of other countries.” Not coincidentally, the 19th CCP Congress elevated the role of the Foreign Ministry in policy making. The goals outlined for 2035 hint at the need

as a public document, the report unsurprisingly features diplomatic and elusive terms
for global competition. But

on sensitive topics Some clues about Beijing’s intentions can nevertheless be deduced
, such as foreign policy.

through careful study of the report’s entire contents, however. the report directs officials For example,

to avoid war and maintain peaceful, cooperative relations with the United States and other great powers. It also highlights the need to safeguard core interests of

The report does

sovereignty and territory, as well as protect the resources, markets, and citizens abroad needed for national development. These imperatives are not new, but they will probably remain essential for years to come.

introduces new requirements, however, such as the need to achieve technological leadership,
build a network of strategic partnerships, and expand China’s international influence and
involvement in global governance The 19th CCP Congress report stated that by 2035,. Technological leadership

China seeks to have “become a global leader in innovation.” This ambition is important for three
reasons. First, leadership in technological innovation increases the likelihood that a country will
enjoy higher productivity and wealth than its peers. Second, the transferability of military and
civilian technology means that a technologically advanced country is better positioned to
build a premier military – an idea captured in the report’s directives for “military-civilian
fusion.” Third, technological leadership enhances a country’s international influence , or “soft power,”

because others tend to emulate the world’s technological leader and the lifestyle changes it
affordssome experts regard the contest for technological leadership as
. Indeed,

among the most consequential for deciding global leadership .

 Scenario One is Deterrence
Eroding nuclear deterrence guarantees war with Russia and China – AI
dominance is key to renewed deterrence capabilities
Dale & Herbeck, 18 --- *space operations officer in the United States Air Force, graduate of
the Air Force Weapons School and has operational experience in intercontinental ballistic
missiles, space-based intelligence collection, and operational level planning at the 609th Air and
Space Operations Center, AND **space operations officer in the United States Air Force,
graduate of the Air Force Weapons School and has operational experience in both ground-based
and space-based missile warning, and operational level planning (3/28/18, Aryan & Brendon,
“21st Century Strategic Deterrence: “Beyond Nuclear””
https://othjournal.com/2018/03/26/21st-century-strategic-deterrence-beyond-nuclear/,
accessed on 6/6/18, JMP)

For half of the 20th Century

Introduction nuclear deterrence
, Warsaw Pact and NATO countries alike wrote the book for how deterrence theory should be applied. In particular,

played a significant role in the way the U.S. built its national security strategy . Nuclear deterrence was so pervasive that the very

Strategic
word “deterrence” itself became synonymous with nuclear deterrence. However, according to General John Hyten, Commander, U.S. Strategic Command, strategic deterrence in the 21st century does not equate to 20th century deterrence.

deterrence is a multi-polar, multi-domain problem and it is fundamentally different now than it

was in last century. The myopic focus on nuclear options falls short of the critical in a national deterrence strategy

thinking required to provide U.S. national leaders with the options necessary for effective
decision making. Today’s complex social-political environment requires more than just a nuclear element for strategic deterrence to be effective against a diverse set of adversaries. Deterrence today must leverage all six domains of
warfare. So what is deterrence? According to DoD Joint Publication 1, deterrence “influences potential adversaries not to take threatening actions” for fear of the overwhelming retaliation from U.S. military might. More simply, deterrence could be any action that
convinces an adversary to not act due to perceived unacceptable costs or because “the probability of success [is assessed to be] extremely low.” For an adversary to believe costs will be unacceptable or that there is a low probability of success, it must assess the U.S.

threat as credible and capable, regardless of whether it is nuclear or conventional. Deterrence hinges on the adversary’s assessment of credibility
and capability. During the Cold War the Soviet Union believed that use of nuclear weapons would lead to an overwhelming retaliation from the U.S.; and therefore, striking any NATO allies with nuclear weapons was not worth the cost.

The multi-polar world of

Effects of a Multi-Polar Environment The end of the Cold War brought to a close 50 years of a bi-polar world, and with it the simplicity of employing one strategy to deter a single adversary.

today brings adversaries who are motivated differently. Both rational and irrational actors must
be considered , which also causes national leaders to question the level of success strategic deterrence has on an adversary. Generally, it is believed strategic deterrence is effective only against a rational actor, and not an irrational actor. This

is due to the perception that a rational actor will take into account some form of cost-benefit analysis prior to acting versus the irrational actor who might act without any consideration of the losses. Further complicating the world environment is that

potential adversaries are watching and learning from U.S actions . This is not a new concept as adversaries have been studying each other for

since the fall of the

thousands of years to gain advantage. But General Hyten reminded us in a speech last fall that “in a multi-polar world, everybody watches you [the U.S.] everywhere.” His point was to highlight that

Soviet Union adversaries have been studying the asymmetric advantages of the
, the U.S. has had a spotlight on it where

U.S. and creating specific capabilities and methods to counter those advantages a . Thus, we must now recognize that

deterrent method of the past may not be viable in the future. The U.S. must seek out new
deterrent strategies. Nuclear versus Strategic Deterrence Nuclear deterrence remains the foundation of U.S. deterrence strategy. However, nuclear deterrence cannot be the sole pillar of strategic deterrence since nuclear
deterrence is not a one-size-fits-all solution. The most recent National Security Strategy (NSS) reflects this requirement to expand deterrence. As Brian Willis points out in the recent “Multi-domain ops at the Strategic Level” article, the recent NSS and Nuclear

Creating non-nuclear deterrence options for use against

Posture Review (NPR) make strides to extend deterrence to the space and cyberspace domains.

potential adversaries is critical, especially against those actors who do not possess nuclear
weapons. the nuclear taboo reduces the credibility—and therefore the utility—of
Michael Gerson suggests

nuclear weapons, especially against regimes not possessing nuclear weapons or w m d other eapons of ass estruction.

adversary must know the capability exists and the U.S. is willing to use it.
This thought process feeds back to the concept of credibility. The

The U.S. must consider a more balanced approach to deterrence as two of its near-peer
adversaries have done. China and Russia are starting to demonstrate new ideas and concepts
about strategic deterrence. This new “deterrence” does not solely focus on nuclear weapons or even the military instrument of power. China defines this new way of thinking as “Integrated Strategic Deterrence” while
the Russians have called it “Cross-Domain Coercion.” People’s Republic of China Approach to Deterrence The PRC’s approach is not focused on preventing actions in a given domain but about achieving certain political goals. Around 2001, PRC military literature
started discussing a concept known as “Integrated Strategic Deterrence” which focuses on nonmilitary aspects of national power—diplomatic, economic, and scientific and technological strength—contributing to strategic deterrence alongside space and cyber
capabilities. These actions could include demonstrating new capabilities through tests and exercises where international observers are watching, owning the majority of mineral mines that hold a certain type of element, or working with partner countries to launch a
new satellite that helps map future droughts and plots areas that are farmable. In 2007, the PRC tested an antisatellite (ASAT) technology demonstrator against a non-operational weather satellite. This test was publicized as a future scientific technology
demonstration. This test demonstrated the PRC had a capability to engage satellites in Low Earth Orbit, which has now been turned over to the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) and is considered an operational military capability. It is also now a credible strategic
deterrent in the space domain. Another piece to the PRC’s deterrence is their dam building operations for water control and hydropower. According to open sources, the PRC owns 45% of the world’s dams with its nearest competitors being the United States at 14%
and India at 9%. Dams have the potential to turn water into political weapons to be wielded in war, or instruments during peace to influence actions or behaviors of a neighbor. India is currently concerned with a number of China dam projects and their ability to
reduce river flows into India. The PRC’s “Integrated Strategic Deterrence” does not come without challenges. Unlike the U.S. who has the Department of Defense and Department of State coordinating different types of deterrent actions, the absence of an entity in
the PLA to integrate and coordinate the employment of these capabilities makes it difficult to execute. However, it would come as no surprise to the casual observer to see the PLA start executing military, space, and cyber coercive activities in national level exercises
in order to move “Integrated Strategic Deterrence” from theory and conjecture to fully operational in limited regional conflicts. Russia’s Approach to Deterrence The PRC is not the only competitor thinking about strategic deterrence from a non-nuclear perspective.
About 30 years ago, Soviet literature introduced a concept we now know as Reflexive Control. This notion centers on the idea of driving your opponent to make decisions that are advantageous to you. This is commonly achieved through misinformation, either via
“leaks” or providing a possible explanation to an unrelated event that causes your opponent to divert attention or respond. That concept has now evolved into “Cross-Domain Coercion.” “Cross Domain Coercion” is Russia’s ability to orchestrate non-nuclear and
informational influence to coerce an adversary. It maintains opaqueness that clouds the nature of aggression as well as the aggressor’s identity. This informational influence was apparent during both the United States elections in 2016 and Catalonia’s bid for
independence from Spain in 2017. Multiple United States intelligence agencies have noted Russian misinformation on social media and mass media outlets. This campaign is a prime example of “Cross Domain Coercion” and used a soft instrument of power, in this
case information, as a form of deterrence on a global scale. The purpose of this interference is still clouded but it must have satisfied Russian objectives if it was used in Catalonia months after the United States election. Another form of this type of deterrence is
Russia’s cyber-attacks in both Estonia in 2007, and Georgia in 2008. In both cases, the attacks were not solely focused on military targets but against government institutions, banks, ministries, newspapers, and broadcasters. These attacks were mea nt to confuse the
population and drive the government towards compliance with Russian demands. Whatever the objectives, Russia has telegraphed that future attacks will fall under “Cross Domain Coercion”. The threats against financial and economic institutions as well as those of
energy sources will be activated in conjunction with the military component of coercion, such as special operations forces and strategic strike systems in order to influence the target country. With both the PRC and Russia, strategic deterrence is no longer
monopolized by nuclear weapons. 21st century deterrence is dam building that has regional implications on precious resources and misinformation campaigns such as Deepfakes where machine learning systems can be trained to paste one person’s face onto

Strategic
another person’s body, complete with facial expressions, and could change the outcome of democratic elections. U.S. Multi-Domain Strategic Deterrence Consideration of deterrent effects other than kinetic weapons must be explored.

deterrence “applies to cyber, it applies to missile defense, and it applies to electronic warfare. It
applies to every mission in U.S. Strategic Command.” an adversarial attack can come through Currently,

any domain, and that is why the U.S. must leverage the multiplicative advantages of all domains .
An adversary who is not deterred by a nuclear response may be deterred by fear of a cyber effect which degrades or destroys a country’s economic stability. Or it could be negotiations in the human domain which threaten sanctions against a country’s ability to
trade. Maybe it is the threat of an information operations campaign with the goal of removing a governmental regime from power and destabilizing a nation state. Regardless of deterrence method, the adversary must perceive the U.S. as capable and willing to
commit to the action for it to be an effective deterrent. The first step for the U.S. is talking about capabilities more openly so adversaries know about our capabilities and the conditions under which they would be employed. This does not mean we share the
technical details of a capability, those should remain secret, but a general understanding of the effect created by the capability must be understood. Adversaries are not deterred by a capability if they do not know it exists. Future Technologies and Deterrence

Technologies on the horizon have huge implications for the future of strategic deterrence. Hypersonic
weapons have the capability of delivering multiple payload types to worldwide targets while rendering missile warning detection and missile defense programs obsolete. Quantum computing has the ability to make encryption unbreakable unless you have quantum

Artificial
technology and increase transmission speeds to levels unheard of in today’s environment. This could deter an adversary from ever trying to break your encryption unless they spend the money to harness quantum computing. Finally,

Intelligence and “combat cloud” services allow computers to easily share information and
(AI)

make decisions involving civil and economic processes to military tasks without ever needing
human interaction According to Putin becomes the leader in
. AI comes with colossal opportunities, but also threats that are difficult to predict. , whoever

AI will become the ruler of the world . Leading the Target The one commonality in the previous paragraph is that the U.S. is arguably not the leader in any of the technologies listed above. The
question is why. The U.S. recognizes the threat but does not seem to recognize deterrence in the same lenses as our adversaries. With all of the historic examples above plus the developing technologies, our adversaries are coming up with new deterrence strategies

If the U.S. wants credible 21st century strategic deterrence, we need to look no
that go beyond nuclear weapons.

further than recent PRC and Russian actions. They have shown us that the blueprint to strategic
deterrence lies in economic expansion, information attacks, and future technologies. The U.S.
needs to start exploring new technologies such as Quantum
start rewriting the textbooks on what strategic deterrence means and

Computing and AI and how we can leverage them through all instruments of national power
and all domains. If the U.S. does not act soon, we could be deterred from intervening in future
conflicts that protects our vital interests or closest allies.

Global leadership in artificial intelligence ensures unprecedented deterrence

that renders nuclear capabilities obsolete
Payne 18 (Kenneth Payne - Senior lecturer in the School of Security Studies at King's College, London. Senior member of St
Antony's College, Oxford University, having earlier been a visiting fellow in the Department of International Relations there. Author
and researcher specializing in political psychology and strategic studies. <MKIM> “Strategy, Evolution, and War: From Apes to
Artificial Intelligence”. February 2018. DOA: 10/9/18. https://www.iiss.org/publications/survival/2018/survival-global-politics-and-
strategy-octobernovember-2018/605-02-payne)

In contrast to strategic thinking about nuclear weapons, that about AI is immature. Among the key considerations are speed and
command and control. Then there are concerns unique to the technology: the capacity of AI to cope with ambiguous and rapidly
evolving data and to learn from limited data; its ability to intuit complex, associative meaning and develop imaginative responses;
and its capacity to effectively interpret and execute the human intentions that underpin its activities, even where these are
themselves complex and multifaceted. The uncertainty over the precise capabilities that will emerge and their distribution among
states complicates efforts to discern broad strategic principles for AI. Nevertheless, some themes have already emerged. While
the strategic fundamentals of air, sea and land power are well understood, and have withstood many
technological changes, the ability of AI to seamlessly connect disparate domains and to dominate
through the speed and accuracy of its thought, manoeuvre and fire capabilities will challenge some of these
long-standing strategic standards, including those that relate to nuclear weapons. What can be said already
about these changes? Firstly, AI will change power balances. AI systems will undoubtedly enhance the
ability of militaries that possess them to reconnoitre, manoeuvre and employ deception, before
rapidly concentrating force and delivering precision fires. This will change the utility of force by
enhancing lethality and reducing risk to societies possessing AI war-fighting systems. Effective AI will
likely overmatch legacy military capabilities, dramatically redrawing the balance of power.
Moreover, a marginal technological advantage in AI is likely to have a disproportionate effect on the battlefield, given that small
advantages in decision-making ability, notably in terms of speed and accuracy, can translate disproportionately into dominance.
The key question then becomes who gets what sort of AI, and how quickly? There are some key
technical barriers to entry, which suggest a variegated uptake and limited capacity for others to innovate or emulate. This probably
favours existing advanced industrial societies such as the US, Europe and perhaps China. These societies will see their military power
enhanced relative to others, well beyond the enhancements already realised through the information revolution in military affairs.
The distinction most relevant will be between the best algorithm and the rest. That’s because marginal quality might prove totally
decisive: other things being equal, we can expect higher-quality AI to comprehensively defeat inferior
rivals. In contrast, even rough-and-ready nuclear arsenals, like that possessed by North Korea, can deter more sophisticated
adversaries. But while AI quality will count, antebellum uncertainty about whose AI is best will complicate power assessments and
may be destabilising. In this respect at least, AI is comparable to earlier conventional weapons technologies. The route to
dominant AI need not be linear. Local optimisations generating a temporary strategic advantage will not necessarily
preclude the eventual emergence of better alternative approaches. If the local optimisation is sufficiently advanced, however, it
might trump all comers decisively enough to stymie other approaches. Alternatively,
a marginal advantage in AI quality
may accelerate, perhaps even towards ‘superintelligent’ AGI capable of more flexible and self-
directed learning. Under the most dangerous scenario, one power threatens dominance and
induces rivals to court great risk to avoid that outcome. A nuclear deterrent would mitigate this alarming
prospect, but only if the adversary’s emerging AI capability did not wholly preclude a retaliatory
second strike. Another, perhaps more likely, possibility is that uncertainty about the relative capabilities of rival AIs, and thus
of the distribution of military power at any moment, could provide scope for considerable brinkmanship, and therefore
miscalculation. The current multipolar distribution of power further compounds the difficulty of gauging power reliably when it rests
on a fast-changing capability. If
legacy military power is rapidly overtaken by AI, the overall distribution
of power might switch from multipolar to unipolar with unprecedented speed. In assessing the impact
of AI on the balance of power and incidence of conflict, much will depend on the speed with which any given AI is acquired, and the
extent to which there are significant barriers to proliferation. In broad terms, gains will probably be rapid (given current rates of
progress) and unevenly distributed (given technical challenges of emulation and bottlenecks in expertise). A great deal also hinges
on the particular qualities of any given AI. It’s likely that the more generalisable and flexible the intelligence created, the greater its
military advantage. But the
first military AIs will be specialists and operate at the tactical level. Narrow,
domain-specific AIs may outperform more general-reasoning AIs in their area of expertise for a long while to come, given
the considerable challenges of conceptualising and coding AGI. Secondly, AI changes the risks from using force, especially for
casualty-averse states, which are most likely to field it. The net effect is unclear. Changes in the pay-offs associated with fighting may
actually provoke conflict by making it affordable for hitherto risk-averse states. Elsewhere, however, AI could deter
aggression by adventurers seeking easy gains that are no longer below the threshold for intervention. Alliance
relationships could become complicated: alliance members not possessing cutting-edge AI capabilities could be correspondingly
reluctant to engage in operations that were still risky for them. Such allies might be useful legitimisers for action, without
contributing themselves, reducing them to client-state status, effectively demilitarising states content to function under a Pax AI.
The varied distribution of capabilities and significant barriers to entry echo concerns from the nuclear era about blackmail by
possessing states and preventive strikes by states fearing what rivals might do with the technology if they obtain it. Strategically, the
options are also familiar for the laggards – balancing against AI-possessing powers (difficult, given the qualitative edge) or
bandwagoning alongside them. Geography and culture (including ideology) provide rationales for both options. Thirdly, in
contrast to nuclear weapons, which heavily favour defence provided they can survive a first strike, AI should favour
the offence, given its speed, precision, and acquisition and analysis of unbiased (by human heuristics)
knowledge. While such attributes can equally be utilised by militaries on the defensive, there are two
important respects in which AI shifts the balance. Most obviously, the offence by definition has the initiative, and
with mature AI that alone might be sufficient to overwhelm defences. Secondly, Clausewitz’s remarks about the
culminating point of attack and the relative strength of the defence have an underlying psychological quality that he himself
articulated, and that subsequent research has demonstrated: humans
are loss averse, place greater value on possessions in
hand than those sought, and are prone to gamble more when losing than when gaining.24 What we have, we
hold. AI, by contrast, is not susceptible to these human tendencies. Its resolve and appetite for risk
is not shaped by a subjective, psychological anchor favouring the defender. Among other
considerations are nuclear ones. Weak states have been able to effectively deter stronger ones by dint of acquiring a nuclear
weapon for its tremendous defensive strengths. But AI
enhances the possibilities for successful first strike
against adversaries possessing limited nuclear arsenals, and could even shift the balance against
adversaries that are better endowed with nuclear weapons. Fourthly, AI will shape military
activities across a full spectrum of violence, rather than preserving the clear normative distinction
between conventional and non-conventional systems that evolved in the case of nuclear weapons and the
associated taboo. Because its utility ranges from the most minor levels of force to massively destructive
thermonuclear power, AI could allow possessing states to achieve escalation dominance against
conventionally equipped adversaries at any intensity, and for any type, of hostilities. Against other AI-possessing
states, the calculus is unclear. An evident danger would arise in automating escalation, notwithstanding the imperative to act with
speed against peer adversaries inclined to do likewise. Insofar as AI’s advantages lie in speed and decentralised control, this dynamic
is hazardous and demands close attention to the specification of goals by humans. Further complicating the picture, AI methods
apply not just to explosive force, but to any number of military processes – logistics, weapon design and human resources, to name
a few. And AI itself is not a discrete, clearly bounded category, like a nuclear weapon. Accordingly, the distinctions involved are
unlikely to be binary, as they would be between nuclear and non-nuclear states, or nuclear and non-nuclear explosives. This
complicates both strategy and regulation. Some AI technologies may not be applicable across the spectrum of activities, and certain
states may enjoy a comparative advantage in some but not others.

Specifically, AI allows countries to target and destroy “second strike”

capabilities which reverses MAD – Mere perception of AI is sufficient to deter
conflict
Groll 18 (Elias Groll – Staff writer for Foreign Policy specializing in cyberspace and technology, B.S. in Social Studies from
Harvard University. <MKIM> “How AI Could Destabilize Nuclear Deterrence”. 4/24/18. DOAL 11/27/18.
https://foreignpolicy.com/2018/04/24/how-ai-could-destabilize-nuclear-deterrence/)

“When it comes to artificial intelligence and nuclear warfare, it’s the mundane stuff that’s likely to get us,” says report author
Edward Geist, a Rand researcher. “No one is out to build a Skynet,” a reference to the nuclear command-and-control AI system from
the Terminator movies that concludes it must kill humanity in order to ensure its own survival. For example, AI-enabled
intelligence tools — such as autonomous drones or submarine-tracking technology — threaten to upset the delicate
strategic balance among the world’s major nuclear powers. Such technology could be used to
find and target retaliatory nuclear weapons, which are held in reserve to ensure that any nuclear
strike on a country’s territory will be met in kind. This capability could upend “mutually assured
destruction,” the idea that any use of nuclear weapons will result in both sides’ destruction. But if a country is able to
use AI-enabled technology find and target missiles stored in silos, on trucks, and in submarines, that
threat of retaliation could be taken off the table, inviting a first strike. And in the paranoid logic of
nuclear deterrence, AI doesn’t have to actually provide this breakthrough in order for it to be destabilizing — the enemy
only has to think that it provides a putative edge that puts its nuclear force at risk. In the case of
intelligent image processing, it’s not just paranoia. The U.S. Defense Department’s Project Maven aims to take reams of drone video
and pick out objects automatically from full-motion video, enabling the analysis of massive quantities of video surveillance. The Rand
report makes clear that AI doesn’t have to be a destabilizing technology. Improved intelligence collection could
assure major nuclear powers that their opponents are not on the verge of launching a surprise first strike, but that assumes equal
access to the cutting-edge technology. “The social and political institutions that would normally be trying to keep this manageable
are dysfunctional or are breaking down,” Geist says. And that leaves nuclear powers competing with one another to
develop the best AI, with apparently huge stakes. “Artificial intelligence is the future, not only for Russia, but for all
humankind,” Putin famously said last year. “Whoever becomes the leader in this sphere will become the ruler of the world.”
Chinese authorities, meanwhile, have developed a detailed plan to become a world leader in the field.
In February, the South China Morning Post reported that Chinese military officials are planning “to update the rugged
old computer systems on nuclear submarines with artificial intelligence to enhance the potential thinking skills of
commanding officers.” In researching the report, Geist and his co-author, Andrew Lohn, a Rand engineer, convened a series of focus
groups bringing together technologists, policymakers, and nuclear strategists. They observed an aversion to handing computers
control of any aspect of the decision to use nuclear weapons. But that leaves machine intelligence playing a subtler role in a nuclear
weapons system. “If you are making decisions as a human based on data that was collected, aggregated, and analyzed by a machine,
then the machine may be influencing the decision in ways that you may not have been aware,” Lohn says. And as
AI improves
its ability to recognize patterns and play games, it
may be incorporated as an aid to decision-making, telling
human operators how best to fight a war that may escalate to a nuclear exchange. In a hypothetical
scenario in which Russia masses troops at a border position, an AI system could advise policymakers that the proper response would
be to place troops in certain cities and place bombers on alert. The computer could then lay out that Russia would retaliate and how
escalation would play out. That technology doesn’t exist today, Lohn says, but “if AI is winning in simulations or war games, it will be
hard to ignore it.”

AI deterrence capabilities are the only way to avoid Sino-Russian hyper-war and
hybrid cyber-terrorism that guarantees nuclear extinction
Lindley-French et al. 17 (Professor Dr. Julian Lindley-French - Senior Fellow at the Institute of Statecraft; Director at Europe Analytica; Distinguished Visiting Research Fellow
at the National Defense University; and Fellow of the Canadian Defence and Foreign Affairs Institute. General John Allen - Retired U.S. Marine Corps four-star general and former commander of the NATO
International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) and U.S. Forces in Afghanistan; President of the Brookings Institution; Former senior advisor to the secretary of defense on Middle East Security, and special
presidential envoy to the Global Coalition to Counter ISIL. Admiral Giampaolo Di Paola - Former Minister of Defense of Italy and Chairman of the NATO Military Committee; former commander of the aircraft
carrier Garibaldi and Italian Minister of Defence . General Wolf-Dieter Karl Langheld - General a.D. of the German Army; Former Commander of the NATO Allied Joint Force Command in Brunssum. Ambassador
Tomáš Valášek - Director of Carnegie Europe; Former representative of the Slovak Republic to NATO, President of the Central European Policy Institute, Director of Foreign Policy and Defence at the Centre for
European Reform in London, Policy Director and head of the security and defence policy division at the Slovak Ministry of Defence, Founder and director of the Brussels office of the World Security Institute.
Ambassador Alexander Vershbow - Former Deputy Secretary General of NATO and U.S. Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs. <MKIM> “GLOBSEC NATO ADAPTATION INITIATIVE”.
11/27/17. DOA: 10/9/18. https://www.globsec.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/GNAI-COP-web.pdf) *Edited for ableist language

Could NATO suffer a twenty-first century Pearl Harbor? The December 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor took place in a vacuum between
US policy, strategy, technology, and capability. The
aim of broad spectrum holistic hybrid cyber-hyper future war
strategies is great effect at minimum time, and at minimum cost to its architects. At present, NATO, its
nations, and most of the armed forces that serve it, are increasingly vulnerable to a crippling [devastating]
future war attack. In 2017, NATO faces a range of future war ‘threats’. Interoperability within the Alliance is also becoming
increasingly difficult, intensifying the vulnerability of open European societies and militaries to a range of crippling attacks.
Adversaries such as Russia are systematically exploring those vulnerabilities and seeking to
exploit them.6 Hyper warfare: The impact of new technologies, and the interactions between them, are
changing fast the nature, character and conduct of war. Hyper war will see an accelerated speed of
conflict allied to vastly shortened decision-action cycles. Hyper war will see an enormous
compression of time and consequent effect, with the command of war becoming steadily and
necessarily more automated; and part of a new escalation ladder that climbs from chaos to capitulation. The increasing
reliance of Western populations on internet-based social media makes diverse societies vulnerable to political manipulation via fake
news. This forms part of a new form of hybrid warfare which transcends the civil-military divide. Cyber warfare:
Cyber-based civilian infrastructures from healthcare to air transportation will also be natural targets,
adding disruption of life to a profound sense of uncertainty. The threat of hyper warfare at the
high-end of the military spectrum would simply ram home a message, by those who have mastered it, that
resistance is futile. One of the many dangers from such a hybrid-cyber-hyper warfare continuum is that it
again renders plausible the once unimaginable idea of ‘warfare’ in and between developed
societies. It could also render traditional nuclear deterrence, as a stand-alone stratagem of last resort,
increasingly obsolete. Indeed, ‘deterrence’, as currently conceived of, will need to be re-thought across a
new spectrum of conflict if it is to remain credible, whilst Allied armed forces will need to become
demonstrably capable across many domains – land, sea, air, space, cyber, intelligence, information, and, above all,
knowledge. Russia and China are already making significant technical progress at the very highest-
levels of future warfare, efforts that could soon be reinforced by new ‘force multipliers’, such as quantum computing and its
integration into the future order of battle. There are concerns in the West that artificial intelligence in weaponry will
produce morally unacceptable military capabilities. Quite possibly but, like the advent of the torpedo-firing
submarine and the moral dilemma it created around commerce raiding on the high seas, the enemy will exploit any such
capability ‘freedoms’. Or, to put in another way, NATO is unlikely to successfully deter or defend against hybrid
warfare unless it can also demonstrably do the same against cyber and hyper warfare. Russia
has placed increased emphasis on nuclear weapons, and other forms of unconventional hybrid and
hyper warfare capabilities and capacities, to counter what Moscow believes to be NATO’s conventional
military superiority. However, such thinking about future war is not confined to Russia. Radical Islamist groups, such as Al
Qaeda and ISIS, are also exploring the use of technologies and strategies to penetrate open,
western societies, erode the protection of the home base, and undermine the social and political cohesion
upon which all security and defence strategies in democracies must be based. Even the United States
‘poses’ a threat to Europe, at least to its complacency, after a decade of European defence cuts. Consequently, as technology
increasingly drives and shapes both policy and strategy, a split is emerging between the US and Allied militaries. Indeed,
technologically-driven US military strategy is advancing so fast compared with the European allies that, sooner rather than later, all-
important NATO military interoperability might well become a thing of the past. Over time a profound mismatch in military
technologies undermines the politico-military cohesion of any alliance. Russia’s strategic approach is technologically far less
ambitions than its American counterparts, but robustly pragmatic. In effect, Russia is endeavouring to weave existing platforms,
systems and strategies with new capabilities and technologies across the civil-military conflict spectrum. Critically, much like the
British and German strategic bombing campaigns of World War Two, the Russians make no attempt to distinguish
between combatants and non-combatants in a war that Moscow understands would be
existential for the regime. need Russian soldiers marching through Berlin and Paris for the world to as we know it to cease
to exist. A militarily victorious Russia, able to dictate to a defeated Europe and NATO from the end of a barrel
as to exactly what will and what will not be acceptable to them, will be enough for life as we know it in Western
Europe to come to a very abrupt end”. See Shirreff, Richard (2016) “2017: War With Russia”, (London: Coronet) p. 13
Russian strategy seeks to exploit and link technologies as a big power, short action strategy. It is a strategy
which includes the threatened use of nuclear weapons to force an adversary to accept what Moscow calls the
‘changing of facts on the ground’; gaining local military superiority via regional deployments and keeping
adversaries politically and socially off-balance through the use of extended deception, thus rendering a
cohesive defence impossible. The strategy is attributed to the long-serving Chief of the Russian General Staff, General
Valery Gerasimov. In a well-known 2013, article General Gerasimov wrote, “I would like to say that no matter what forces the enemy
has, no matter how well-developed his forces and means of armed conflict may be, forms and methods for overcoming them can be
found. He will always have vulnerabilities and that means that adequate means of opposing him exist”.7 Russian strategy is designed
in part to offset advantages in Allied air power, and thus gain strategic and tactical air superiority at a time and place of Moscow’s
choosing. Russia is also investing significant efforts in the development of autonomous weapons systems as part
of a new force architecture. These include autonomous, robotic and remotely-controlled systems, new and advanced forms of
electronic warfare (EW), as well as a rapidly-expanding offensive and defensive cyber capabilities. Russia’s armed forces are also fast
developing advanced command and control systems designed to exert effective and sensitive political control at the strategic apex
of force, whilst at the same time developing a better devolved command authority culture on the battlefield. The Russians are also
steadily increasing their already extensive use of battlefield internet, as well as enhanced ultra-range air defence and missile defence
systems, and burgeoning anti-satellite (ASAT) capabilities that threaten NATO SIGINT and milsatcom architectures. The focus on air
power is also driving Russian advances in the development of ‘5G’ fighters. The aim is to (at least) match Allied aircraft, such as the
F22 Raptor and F35 Lightning II, and threaten them with advanced air defence systems, such as the S-400, and from 2020 the S-500
(Prometheus) system. Russia is enhancing the battlefield mobility of its forces, and seeking to make deployed Russian forces far
more robust than in the past. However, it is the Russian
interest in the development of hyper weapons and
directed energy weapons which should be of great concern to Allied planners. Specifically, Moscow is
developing so-called hyper-sonic weapons, as well as a new and robust generation of nuclear
warheads, as part of a next-generation intercontinental ballistic missile system that would be effectively
impregnable against future Allied missile defences. The new architecture Moscow is seeking to develop could also
be capable at some point of remote command via artificial intelligence systems, and autonomous ‘learning’ systems. US future war
military technologies include autonomous systems, unmanned undersea vehicles, advanced seamines, hyper-sonic strike weapons,
advanced aeronautics, and new weapons systems such as electromagnetic rail-guns, and high-energy lasers. The US Long-Range
Research and Development Planning Program includes military robotics systems, system autonomy, weapons miniaturisation,
scaling big data for applied military use, artificial intelligence and deep-learning, all as part of new military-strategic
concepts. The Pentagon is also seeking to establish innovative relationships with US industry so as
to deploy the technologies and intellect across the US national supply chain (not simply the defence supply chain) in support of the
defence effort. This kind of civ-mil-tech interface goes far beyond such relationships in Europe, and there is clear evidence China and
Russia are following a similar track. 8 The
US is also developing new and advanced nuclear and space-based
capabilities, advanced sensors, extreme range stand-off weapons, and communication systems designed for twenty-
first century warfare. Most European allies are either failing to invest at all in such futures, or investing at levels far below
the US, China and Russia. Moreover, Beijing, Moscow and Washington are all looking to develop more advanced missile defence
systems, as well as extensive offensive and defensive cyber capabilities.

Trump makes hegemony and Chinese threat construction inevitable – The 1AC
is simply a question of how we can best avoid otherwise inevitable conflict
Chellaney 18 (Brain Chellaney – Author, Professor of Strategic Studies at the New Delhi-based Center for Policy Research, and Fellow at the
Robert Bosch Academy in Berlin. <MKIM> “Trump’s grand strategy: reviving America’s global power”. 8/1/18. DOA: 10/9/18.
http://www.atimes.com/trumps-grand-strategy-reviving-americas-global-power/)

US President Donald Trump’s inability to think strategically is undermining long-standing relationships, upending the global order, and accelerating the decline of his country’s
global influence – or so the increasingly popular wisdom goes. But this assessment is not nearly as obvious as its proponents – especially political adversaries and critics in the
mainstream US media – claim. America’s relative decline was a hot topic long before Trump took office. The process began when the United States, emboldened by its
emergence from the Cold War as the world’s sole superpower, started to overextend itself significantly by enlarging its military footprint and ramping up its global economic and
security commitments. America’s ‘imperial overreach’ was first identified during president Ronald Reagan’s administration, which oversaw a frenetic expansion of military
spending. It reached crisis levels with the 2003 US-led invasion and subsequent occupation of Iraq under president George W Bush On Barack Obama’s watch, China rapidly
expanded its global influence, including by forcibly changing the status quo in the South China Sea (without incurring any international costs). By that point, it was unmistakable:
As unpredictable as
The era of US hegemony was over. It is not just that Trump cannot be blamed for America’s relative decline; he may actually be set to arrest it.

Trump can be, several of his key foreign-policy moves suggest that his administration is pursuing a grand
strategy aimed at reviving America’s global power. For starters, the Trump administration seems eager to roll back America’s imperial
overreach, including by avoiding intervention in faraway wars and demanding that allies pay their fair share for defense. The fact is that many members of the North Atlantic
Treaty Organization do not fulfill their spending commitments, in effect leaving American taxpayers to subsidize their security. These are not new ideas. Before Trump even
decided to run for office, pundits were arguing that the US needed to pursue a policy of retrenchment, drastically reducing its international commitments and transferring more
of its defense burden on to its allies. But it was not until Trump, who views running a country much like running a business, that the US had a leader who was willing to pursue
that path, even if it undermined the values that have long underpinned US foreign policy. Trump’s focus on containing China – which Federal Bureau of
Investigation Director Christopher Wray recently labeled a far bigger challenge than Russia, even in the area of espionage – fits nicely into this strategy.

Successive US presidents, from Richard Nixon to Obama, aided China’s economic rise. Trump, however, regards China not as America’s economic partner, but as

“a foe economically” and even, as the official mouthpiece China Daily recently put it, America’s “main strategic rival.” In general,
Trump’s tariffs aim to put the US back in control of its economic relationships by constraining its
ballooning trade deficits, with both friends and foes, and bringing economic activity (and the
accompanying jobs) back home. But it is no secret that, above all, Trump’s tariffs target China – a country that has long defied
international trade rules and engaged in predatory practices. Meanwhile, Trump is also working to ensure that China does not catch

up with the US technologically. In particular, his administration seeks to thwart China’s “Made in China 2025”
program, the blueprint unveiled by the Chinese government in 2015 for securing global dominance over 10 strategic high-tech industries,
from robotics to alternative-energy vehicles. Trump’s diplomatic activities seem intended to advance this larger strategic

vision of reversing America’s relative decline. He has tried to sweet-talk autocratic leaders, from North Korea’s Kim Jong-un to Russia’s Vladimir
Putin, into making concessions – an approach that has garnered its share of criticism. But Trump’s compliments have not translated into kowtowing. For example, despite all the
controversy over Russia’s alleged interference in the 2016 presidential election, the fact is that, since Trump took office, the US has expelled Russian diplomats, closed a Russian
consulate, and imposed three rounds of sanctions on the country. His administration is now threatening to apply extraterritorial sanctions to stop other countries from making
“significant” defense deals with Russia, a leading arms exporter. Trump has not flattered any foreign leader more than Chinese President Xi Jinping, whom he called “terrific” and
when Xi refused to yield to Trump’s demands, the US president did not hesitate to hit
“a great gentleman.” Yet, again,

back “using Chinese tactics,” including suddenly changing negotiating positions and unpredictably
escalating trade tensions. Even Trump’s direct approach with North Korea undermines China’s position by bypassing it. Trump is right that transforming the US-
North Korea relationship matters more than securing complete denuclearization. If he can co-opt North Korea, China’s only formal military ally, northeast Asian geopolitics will
be reshaped and China’s lonely rise will be more apparent than ever. There are plenty of problems with Trump’s methods. His brassy, theatrical, and unpredictable negotiating
style, together with his China-like disregard for international norms, are destabilizing international relations. Domestic troubles like political polarization and legislative gridlock –
there is no denying that Trump’s muscular
both of which Trump has actively exacerbated – also weaken America’s hand internationally. But

“America First” approach – which includes one of the most significant military buildups since World War II – reflects a strategic vision that
is focused squarely on ensuring that the US remains more powerful than any rival in the foreseeable
future. Perhaps more important, the transactional approach to international relations on which Trump’s strategy relies is likely to persist long after he leaves office.
Friends and foes alike must get used to a more self-seeking America doing everything in its power, no
matter the cost, to forestall its precipitous decline.
 Scenario Two is Trump
Trump’s recent trade war escalations are direct responses to the growing threat
of Chinese technological dominance
Martin 18 (Nik Martin – Technological journalist working with Reuters in collaboration with DW. <MKIM> “Trump's China
trade dispute: Is it a war for tech supremacy?”. 6/26/18. DOA: 10/8/18. https://www.dw.com/en/trumps-china-trade-dispute-is-it-a-
war-for-tech-supremacy/a-44391759)

US President Donald Trump

is set to step up his trade war with Beijing by banning Chinese companies
from investing in US technology firms, and by blocking tech exports to China. The Wall Street Journal on
Monday cited unnamed White House officials as saying the plan will be announced later this week, to head off China's ambitious
plans to close the technology gap with the West in 10 key sectors. Despite US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin later saying the
plans were "not specific to China, but to all countries that are trying to steal our technology," the move was widely seen as aimed at
Beijing. TheMade in China 2025 initiative, which was first unveiled in 2015, seeks to turn the country from
the world's factory into a global technology leader, including in biotech, robotics, aerospace and clean-energy
cars. Tensions over China's high-tech advance have been building for the past two years, due to
Beijing's strategy of allowing Chinese companies to invest in US and European technology firms, while restricting access to its own
tech sector. Longstanding concerns about the theft of intellectual property led Trump to impose some $50 billion (€42.7 billion) in
tariffs on Chinese goods, which will begin to take effect next month. Washington could soon add duties on a further $200 billion of
Chinese imports. US
position threatened It becomes clear that Washington is trying to inflict as much
pain as possible to disrupt any attempt by China to usurp America's high-tech dominance.
"Tariffs are just a tool to deal with the fundamental, underlining issue, which is concern about
China's rise as a technology power," Paul Triolo, practice head for geotechnology at the New York-based think-tank
Eurasia Group, told DW. He warned that China will have to give foreign companies better access to its domestic market if it wants to
see Trump's tariffs and other measures renegotiated. Spooked by Washington's aggressive stance, Chinese officials have in recent
weeks downplayed the likely impact of the Made in China 2025 strategy. "In no way did they [Beijing] account for any type of
reaction," said Max J. Zenglein, an economist at the Mercator Institute for China Studies in Berlin. "Now the US are pushing
back against attempts to undermine their competitive advantage, hopefully the Chinese side will take
their concerns into consideration and adapt their model." Save the crown jewels While the measures to protect
America's "crown jewels," may help slow down China's advance, Triolo and Zenglein doubt
whether it can be halted altogether, due to the billions of dollars being spent by the Beijing
government to realize its ambitions. Eurasia Group's Triolo cited China's huge domestic market, a number of great
Chinese tech companies, and its education system — which is pumping out three times more industrial technology graduates than
the US — as reasons for China eventually rivaling the US. He sees joint-venture projects as key to maintaining American dominance,
something he says has happened in the field of Artificial Intelligence (AI), citing the examples of Google and Microsoft, who have
both invested heavily in China. "But
in many ways, the US tech sector is now being treated as an issue of
economic security and national security," said Triolo, which he said would prevent further collaboration — especially
following concerns about Chinese espionage on US communications networks. Zenglein cautioned over how collaboration with the
West had allowed China to gain the upper hand in another industry, which was once purely the domain of Germany, France and
Japan. "The high-speed rail sector is a pretty good example of where China worked with foreign companies and then used them as a
kind of a stepping stone up the technology ladder," he explained. In the end, you have a situation where the Chinese are no longer
reliant on foreign technology, Zenglein told DW.

Further Chinese dominance in artificial intelligence guarantees escalation –

Specifically over Taiwan and the South China Sea
Xiangwei 18 (Wang Xiangwei – Former Editor-in-Chief for the South China Morning Post. Columnist and editor for multiple
news organizations. <MKIM> “TRUMP’S TRADE WAR WITH CHINA IS JUST HIS OPENING GAMBIT”. 4/14/18. DOA: 10/8/18.
https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/2141399/trumps-trade-war-china-just-his-opening-gambit)
Could the US-China trade war be over before it even starts? The oxymoron may have a ring of truth to it if the latest remarks from
the presidents of China and the United States are to be taken seriously. In a speech billed in official media as a major policy
announcement, broadcast live on national television and over the internet, Xi Jinping promised on Tuesday to widen foreign
investors’ access to China’s financial and manufacturing sectors, lower trade tariffs, greatly expand imports, and strengthen the
protection of intellectual property rights. Throughout his speech of nearly 40 minutes, Xi did not mention China’s trade spats with
the US or US President Donald Trump. But Xi appeared to have singled out some pledges to address Trump’s concerns. A nasty
US-China fight is inevitable. But it needn’t be terminal In particular, he said China would relax the foreign ownership limit
on automobile joint ventures (currently set at 50 per cent) as soon as possible and would “significantly lower” tariffs on imported
vehicles. Xi’s pledge came less than a day after Trump complained in a tweet that China imposes a 25 per cent tariff on imported
American cars, 10 times the tariff the US imposes on imported Chinese ones. “Does that sound like free or fair trade,” Trump asked.
“No, it sounds like STUPID TRADE – going on for years!” Following Xi’s speech, Trump reacted favourably. He tweeted he was
thankful of Xi’s promises on tariffs and automobile barriers as well as “his enlightenment on intellectual property and technology
transfers”. “We will make great progress together!” he said. In a briefing, the White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders
said the White House was encouraged by Xi’s words but it wanted to see concrete actions from China. She said it intended to keep
moving forward with its plans to impose tariffs. Stock markets in Hong Kong, Shanghai, and New York rose strongly on Xi’s
comments, but many overseas media reports concluded
that Xi’s speech contained no big concessions to
Trump, thus failing to assuage fears of a trade war. Those overseas media reports may have misread the intention
of Xi’s speech, which is more about portraying China as a responsible world leader that embraces multilateralism and globalisation
against Trump’s unilateralism in terms of his America First policies and threatened trade wars. By Chinese protocol, top leaders
including Xi usually follow the routine of giving broad outlines and visions at a forum like Boao, avoiding specific targets. Moreover,
directly and fully addressing Trump’s concerns in the speech would have been seen as a total capitulation by China, which is out of
the question in the current heated climate. It is worth noting that Xi stressed he would see the measures outlined in his speech were
released and executed as soon as possible. This may be China’s subtle message to US officials to restart their discussions over trade
frictions and ease any suspicions they may have that Xi’s speech was just more shadow boxing by China – great rhetoric but no
action. In 2017, Xi gave a rousing speech in Davos about China leading the world as a champion of globalisation but foreign investors
have complained there has been little meaningful progress since. Both US and Chinese officials have confirmed that their discussions
over trade frictions have stalled amid the continuing war of words in traditional and social media. One year on, it is time China
delivered on Xi’s Davos speech Now with the positive response from Trump and the White House, both sides are expected to
resume talks very soon. But even if both sides reach comprehensive agreements to avoid a trade war in
the next few months, that will not be the end of the downward spiral in their relationship. Now it has
become increasingly clear that America’s real beef with China is about much more than fixing a trade
imbalance – even though that issue may be the trigger. Trump, or at least some of his senior Sinophobic
advisers, appears to have a much more sweeping agenda aimed at curbing China’s technological
advances and thus containing China’s overall economic rise. Peter Navarro, Trump’s trade adviser, said
as much in his op-ed piece in the Financial Times on Monday. The timing was deliberate as it came one day before Xi’s speech.
Referring directly to the country’s Made In China 2025 policy manifesto, he said if China dominates strategic hi-tech
industries including artificial intelligence, robotics and quantum computing, self-driving vehicles, automated machine
tooling, and advanced medical devices, “the US simply will not have an economic future”. Why China’s silence on
Xi’s term limits move portends trouble One less talked but equally important reason is that the trade agenda is also driven by the
ideological hawks in the White House who are disappointed that nearly 20 years after China joined the
WTO, it has not turned out as democratic as the West had hoped. In fact, following the decision to repeal the
term limits on the presidency, allowing Xi to rule indefinitely, many see China as going backwards. All this shows
that the trade war is most likely to be the opening gambit of a series of moves by Washington to
throw China off balance. The next likely move will be on Taiwan, one of the most sensitive issues in China-US
ties. Beijing sees the island as part of China and frowns on any official contact between Taiwan and other
foreign countries, particularly the United States. Soon after Trump was elected, he started to play the
Taiwan card by taking a congratulatory phone call from the Taiwanese president Tsai Ing-wen in his
transition to the White House and made no secret of his wish to use the Taiwan issue to force trade concessions from China. Since
then, his administration has made several moves to warm ties with Taiwan, including approving the
licences for American firms to sell Taiwan technology to build submarines and signing the Taiwan Travel Act to encourage visits
between American and Taiwan officials. Another
notable example is the recent appointment of John Bolton
as the National Security Adviser. Bolton is known for taking a very strong pro-Taiwan stance in the
past and there is growing speculation he may visit Taipei in June when the new American Institute, the de facto US embassy, is
slated to open. If Bolton or some other senior US official makes the trip, China will see that as a
major provocation. In a related move, the US is likely to put more pressure on China over the
South China Sea following reports last week that China had installed communications-jamming
equipment there to assert its authority. In January, Bolton wrote an op-ed piece suggesting that US could accord Taiwan full
diplomatic status if China did not back off in the South China Sea. The US is also more likely to send more warships
to the disputed waters in the name of freedom of navigation. This context helps to explain the unusually
strong rhetoric from Chinese officials and media over Trump’s decision to impose tariffs worth
US$150 billion on Chinese imports. Over the past week, the Chinese state media has launched an
intense campaign to blast Trump and his tariff decision, saying that the Chinese will not be
cowered and will retaliate in kind without hesitation. But some of the nationalistic language has become
worrisome. Lining up officials and economists to condemn Trump’s unilateral approaches and mounting a robust defence of
China’s positions is one thing. But comparing the preparations for a trade war to those for a real war to fan
the nationalistic sentiment is unhelpful. In one of a series of combative commentaries, the Global Times – the hawkish
newspaper owned by People’s Daily – urged China to fight the trade war with the spirit in which it fought
American soldiers in the Korean war. Xinhua went further by dusting off a phrase China used as a final warning to India
and Vietnam right before launching military attacks on them in 1962 and in 1978 respectively. All this war language may
send a strong unified message to the US but it oversimplifies the evolving and complex bilateral ties between the
world’s two largest economies. Following Xi’s speech, official media were at pains to explain Xi’s promises of more economic
liberalisation did not stem from mounting pressure from the US and China was not capitulating. People’s Daily said in a blog that
while those measures would benefit many of China’s trade partners, they were “not applicable to those countries which violate
WTO rules, and readily launch trade wars against other countries”. As China beats its war drum, who should hear its call? Perhaps
such language stems from the historical perspective that China’s opening up was often forced upon it by external forces. But 40
years ago, Deng Xiaoping showed great foresight and wisdom by putting China on the path of reform and opening up. As Xi
acknowledged in his speech, Deng’s policies have brought revolutionary changes to China, helping pave the way for it to become the
world’s second largest economy and the biggest trading nation. The measures unveiled in Xi’s speech are equally significant and
necessary to bring the country’s economy to a new level. It is in China’s own best interests to see them implemented as soon as
possible. All the better if implementation of those measures helps repair ties with the US.

Intervention over Taiwan or the South China Sea makes nuclear war inevitable
– China is willing to escalate and will draw in Russia on their side
Chang 18 (Gordon Chang - Author of The Coming Collapse of China and Nuclear Showdown: North Korea Takes On the World.
His writings have appeared in The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal, among other publications. <MKIM> “China and
Russia Have Set a Nuclear Collision Course With the United States”. 9/4/18. DOA: 10/9/18. https://www.thedailybeast.com/china-
and-russia-have-set-a-nuclear-collision-course-with-the-united-states)

China, the New York Times reported last week, “can now challenge American military supremacy in the places
that matter most to it: the waters around Taiwan and in the disputed South China Sea.” Therefore, Beijing
can, in the words of the paper, “make intervention in the region too costly for Washington to
contemplate.” Too costly to contemplate? Unfortunately, assessments like these, often heard in U.S. policy circles, can
embolden the already arrogant Chinese and make their adventurism—and war—more likely. Moreover, any conflict
between China and the United States in the Pacific could quickly escalate to nuclear war. China,
surpassing the U.S. last year, now boasts the world’s largest navy, and it is adding to its fleet “at a
stunning rate,” according to the Times. Even last year, the count was lopsided with China claiming 317 surface vessels and subs
in active service and the U.S. 283. Of course, it’s not clear how capable the People’s Liberation Army Navy is. The PLAN, as it is
known, has never participated in a large-scale wartime engagement at sea, and its fleet is not, on the whole, as modern as
America’s. Nonetheless, China
has a few critical advantages. Its naval assets are concentrated along its
shores and U.S. forces are spread around the globe; areas of likely conflict are near China and
far from America; and the PLAN has some crucial weapons that are better than those of the United States, especially anti-ship
missiles. Beijing has also gone big into “asymmetric” warfare, for instance militarizing fishing fleets, enlisting the
“little blue men” of what has become a maritime militia. “Beijing has clearly relished challenging the U.S. Navy and Air Force.” The
Chinese also have one other advantage: the will to use force to take what is in the possession of
others. In their peripheral seas, they grabbed control of the Paracel Islands, in the northern portion of
the South China Sea, from South Vietnam in 1974 after a short battle. The Chinese also seized Mischief Reef
from the Philippines in a series of actions from late 1994 to early 1995, and they snatched Scarborough Shoal,
also from Manila, in early 2012. Now, China is, among other things, pressuring other Philippine features in
the South China Sea and using menacing tactics to take over a chain of uninhabited islets
currently under Japanese control in the East China Sea. Moreover, Beijing has clearly relished challenging the
U.S. Navy and Air Force in the global commons, threatening and on occasion harassing American ships, planes,
and drones. The seizure of an American drone in international waters in December 2016, in sight of the
USNS Bowditch and in defiance of radio commands, was brazen and nothing short of an act of war. Moreover,
Beijing’s harassment of the USNS Impeccable in March 2009 in the South China Sea, using its maritime militia, was
so severe that it constituted an attack on the United States. “The key point is that China accepts
the risk of escalation to a greater extent than does the U.S., because China uses confrontation
to alter the status quo in its favor,” Anders Corr, editor of Great Powers, Grand Strategies: The New Game in the South
China Sea, told the National Interest at the beginning of this year. “For regional warfare, especially in Asia, the People’s
Liberation Army is equipped for nuclear operations both offensive and defensive.” — Richard Fisher of
the International Assessment and Strategy Center China is apparently willing to escalate all the way. But the New
York Times, in its reporting last month, did not mention one Chinese threat to American forces in the region: nuclear attack. “For
regional warfare, especially in Asia, the People’s Liberation Army is equipped for nuclear operations both offensive and defensive,”
Richard Fisher of the International Assessment and Strategy Center told The Daily Beast. “If
China can conjure a
‘defensive’ political moral high ground to justify offensive military campaigns to retrieve ‘lost’
territory, we should be prepared for China’s very early use of nuclear weapons to support its
theater campaign. We can, for example, expect China to ‘demonstrate’ nuclear weapons at sea to
deter American or Japanese military support for Taiwan in the event of a Chinese attack, or even outright Chinese
use of nuclear weapons against Japanese bases supporting U.S. forces coming to the defense of Taiwan.” And American
planners have to be concerned that China’s military partner, Russia, would join a conflict on
Beijing’s side. In September 2016 the two militaries, in an eight-day naval drill, practiced “joint island seizing
missions” in the South China Sea. Moscow might even take advantage of turmoil in Asia to try to
further expand its territory in Europe, perhaps using “little green men” as it did in Crimea in 2014 and later in Eastern
Ukraine. Or maybe its nukes. Russian leader Vladimir Putin has long threatened the offensive use of such
weapons. As Stephen Blank, a scholar at the American Foreign Policy Council, told me, “Russia evidently views nuclear
weapons as a legitimate war-fighting weapon as its deployments, 22 procurement programs, exercises, and
doctrine suggest.” He notes that Moscow is constructing a nuclear weapons storage facility in Crimea and deploying nuclear-capable
Kalibr cruise missiles to the Mediterranean. China
has an announced “no-first-use” policy, but for decades hostile
public statements from Chinese generals and diplomats have cast doubt on whether Beijing
would in fact adhere to that promise in a wartime setting. For instance, in August 2011 Xu Guangyu, a
retired Chinese general working at the China Arms Control and Disarmament Association, blurted out to Hong Kong’s
South China Morning Post a comment indicating Beijing had developed plans to launch “a surprise
attack on the U.S.” These shocking comments, at a minimum, indicate that in the post-Cold War world
the concept of nuclear deterrence is breaking down. The erosion of deterrence looks like it is working to the
benefit of the Chinese. Because of China’s formidable military advantages and its willingness to
escalate, there are many voices, notably Lyle Goldstein of the Naval War College and Hugh White of the Australian
National University, urging American acceptance of Chinese domination of East Asia. That is the wrong
conclusion. A pair of European democracies in the 1930s tried avoiding conflict with a militant state, with spectacularly bad results.
Of course, the People’s Republic of China is not the Third Reich of Germany, but German territorial ambitions naturally grew in
reaction to British and French timidity and Chinese ones now are expanding fast as Americans recoil at the prospect of confronting
Beijing. During the Cold War, the United States maintained a far more resolute stance. Then, Washington and its allies deterred a
Soviet attack in Europe when the “correlation of forces” greatly favored the Warsaw Pact, and the West in general prevented
nuclear war by deterring a foe with superior conventional and nuclear arsenals. Washington convinced Moscow—and its NATO
allies—that the United States was willing to go to war to defend itself and friends, thereby keeping the peace in Europe and, for the
most part, elsewhere. Since the Soviet collapse, however, Americans and others think far less about deterrence and have let nuclear
arsenals age. The Chinese and Russians have noticed. China is bulking up nuke stockpiles. North Korea, after making fast progress on
both nuclear warheads and ballistic missiles, has made recent threats to use its most destructive weapons. Iran, a friend of both
Beijing and Pyongyang, is not far from weaponizing the atom with their help. Pakistan, an early beneficiary of Beijing’s proliferation,
already has a sizeable nuclear arsenal. Russia continues to threaten neighbors, particularly the three Baltic states, all of which are
NATO members, and Ukraine, which is not. It looks, in short, like a new nuclear age.

Dynamic power transition inflates the risk of miscalculation and makes

escalation uniquely likely
Allison 17 (Graham Allison - Director of the Harvard Kennedy School’s Belfer Center. He previously served as Special Advisor
to the Secretary of Defense under President Reagan and as Assistant Secretary of Defense for Policy and Plans under President
Clinton. <MKIM> “How America and China Could Stumble to War”. 6/1/17. DOA: 10/9/18.
https://www.pacificcouncil.org/newsroom/how-america-and-china-could-stumble-war)

In the years ahead, could acollision between American and Chinese warships in the South China Sea, or a
drive toward national independence in Taiwan, spark a war between China and the United States that neither
wants? It may seem hard to imagine—the consequences would be so obviously disproportionate to any gains either side could hope
to achieve. Even
a non-nuclear war conducted mostly at sea and in the air could kill thousands of
combatants on both sides. Moreover, the economic impact of such a war would be massive. And if a
war did go nuclear, both nations would be utterly destroyed. Chinese and American leaders know they cannot let that happen.
Unwise or undesirable, however, does not mean impossible. Wars occur even when leaders are determined to avoid them. Events or
actions of others narrow their options, forcing them to make choices that risk war rather than acquiesce to unacceptable
alternatives. But events often require leaders to choose between bad and worse risks. And once the military machines
are in motion, misunderstandings, miscalculations, and entanglements can escalate to a
conflict far beyond anyone’s original intent. The most pertinent background conditions are
Thucydides’s Trap and the syndromes of rising and ruling powers that China and the United States display in full.
Thucydides’s Trap is the severe structural stress caused when a rising power threatens to
displace a ruling one. Most contests that fit this pattern have ended badly. Over the past 500
years, a major rising power has threatened to displace a ruling power 16 times. In 12 of those,
the result was war. The rising power syndrome highlights the upstart’s enhanced sense of itself, its interests, and its
entitlement to recognition and respect. The ruling power syndrome is essentially the mirror image: the
established power exhibiting an enlarged sense of fear and insecurity as it faces intimations of
"decline." Understandably, the established power views the rising country’s assertiveness as disrespectful, ungrateful, and even
provocative or dangerous. China’s disruptive rise creates conditions in which accidental, otherwise
inconsequential events could trigger a large-scale conflict. Anti-satellite weapons are one accelerant that military
planners expect to play a big role in any U.S.-China conflict. Long a subject of science fiction, such weapons are today a fact of life.
The United States depends on satellite technology more than any of its competitors, making it a perfect target for Chinese military
planners. Cyberspace provides even more opportunities for disruptive technological transformations that could provide a
decisive advantage, on the one hand, but might
also risk uncontrolled escalation, on the other. America’s
primary cyberspace organizations, as well as their Chinese counterparts, can now use cyber
weapons to silently shut down military networks and critical civilian infrastructure like power
grids. Moreover, they can disguise the origins of a cyber-operation, slowing the victim’s ability to
identify the attacker. Cyber weapons could also create a decisive advantage in battle by disrupting the command-and-
control and targeting information on which modern militaries depend—and without bloodshed. This presents a dangerous
paradox: the very action that attackers believe will tamp down conflict can appear reckless and
provocative to the victims. Similarly, cyberattacks that disrupt communication would intensify the
fog of war, creating confusion that multiplies the chances of miscalculation. While both the United
States and China now have nuclear arsenals that could survive the other’s first strike and still allow for retaliation, neither can be
sure its cyber arsenals could withstand a serious cyber assault. This creates a dangerous use-it-or-lose-it dynamic
in which each side has an incentive to attack key links in the other’s computer networks before their capabilities are disabled.
Potential sparks can be frighteningly mundane. Escalation can occur rapidly. The following are
overviews of two of the five scenarios I detail in my book Destined for War, all of which show just how easily the United States and
China can stumble into a war that each side hopes to avoid. Scenario 1: South China Sea Suppose that during routine
operations an American destroyer passes near one of the newly constructed islands in the South China Sea where China has built
runways for aircraft and installed air and missile defenses. As the ship nears the contested site, Chinese coast guard vessels harass
the destroyer, just as they did during the USS Cowpens incident in 2013. Unlike that encounter, however, the U.S. destroyer is
unable to swerve in time. It collides with a Chinese ship and sinks it, killing all on board. The
Chinese government
decides to block the U.S. destroyer from leaving the area and demanding that its crew surrender and face justice
for the deaths of the coast-guard personnel. Beijing believes it is deescalating the situation by allowing for a
diplomatic solution. From a U.S. perspective, China’s reckless harassment of the destroyer caused the collision in
the first place. Not willing to undermine its credibility by surrendering, the United States could use a
show of force to get the cruiser to back down peacefully. Washington believes these actions will
signal their seriousness without risking any further escalation. But to Beijing, the United States
has already sunk a Chinese vessel and now scores of American aircraft are threatening attacks on the Chinese cruiser,
other naval vessels, or military installations on nearby islands. Events are running beyond Beijing’s control. As
U.S. fighter jets rush to the scene to assist the stranded destroyer, a Chinese antiaircraft battery panics
and fires on the oncoming aircraft. The destroyer begins firing on Chinese antiaircraft sites on
the island. Under attack, the Chinese commander on the island bombards the destroyer with
anti-ship missiles. The missiles hit their intended target, killing hundreds of American sailors and sinking the ship. Those who
escape are now stranded in small lifeboats. Chinese leaders are desperate to avoid a full-scale war with the United States, but
also cannot admit that their chain of command broke down. They claim their actions were a proportionate and
defensive response because the American destroyer was the aggressor. Though wary of going to
war with China, U.S. officials in the Situation Room cannot back down: video of the ship’s wreckage and
stranded U.S. sailors on cable news and social media has made that impossible. Realizing that attacks on China’s
mainland would trigger war, the president authorizes Pacific Command to destroy China’s military bases
on disputed islands in the South China Sea. The president reasons that this is a proportionate response, since these islands
were directly responsible for the sinking of the destroyer. Most important, such an action would target only China’s artificial islands,
leaving its mainland untouched. Chinese officials do not make this distinction. For years they have told the public
that China has undisputed sovereignty over these islands and America has just attacked them. Many in China are demanding that
President Xi Jinping order the PLA to destroy U.S. military bases in Guam, Japan, and elsewhere in the Pacific. Some want China to
attack the United States itself. Still, President Xi clings to the hope that war can be avoided, an impossibility if China begins attacking
U.S. military bases, killing soldiers and civilians, and triggering retaliatory attacks on the Chinese mainland. Seeking
a
proportionate response to the U.S. attack on China’s island bases, Xi instead approves an alternative plan: using
lasers and electronic and kinetic weapons to destroy or disable all U.S. military satellites in orbit
above the crisis area, and using cyberattacks to cripple American command-and-control systems
throughout the Asia-Pacific. The goal is to deescalate. The dynamics of playing chicken with cyber and space weapons over the South
China Sea can transform a tiny spark into a roaring fire. But from
the American perspective, these "blinding"
attacks are indistinguishable from the first stage of a coordinated attack on the U.S. aircraft
carrier and its strike group sailing from Japan. The 90,000-ton carrier, a floating city of 5,500 sailors that the United
States describes as sovereign American territory, is simply too big to lose. On the advice of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the president
reluctantly approves the only plan ready on short notice that has a chance of saving the carrier: a war plan based on Air-Sea Battle.
Using those assets still operational after the Chinese attack, the U.S. military begins destroying China’s various
satellite and surveillance systems that allow Beijing to accurately target American carriers with its anti-ship missiles. It
also launches massive cruise missile and stealth bomber attacks on PLA missile sites and air bases on the Chinese mainland, which
could at any moment be used to sink U.S. vessels anywhere within the first island chain. The attacks provoke exactly what they
intended to avoid. Its mainland now under attack, and the targeting systems needed to operate China’s anti-ship weapons about to
be lost, China must use them or lose them. Xi authorizes attacks on all U.S. warships within range. Enough missiles reach their target
to sink the carrier, killing most of the 5,500 sailors on board—far more than died during Pearl Harbor. The
dynamics of
playing chicken with cyber and space weapons over the South China Sea has transformed a tiny
spark into a roaring fire. Scenario 2: Taiwan Beijing is prepared to do whatever it takes to keep Taiwan from
asserting its sovereignty. Suppose, however, that the Chinese government were to substantially increase repression at home,
including in Hong Kong. Enraged that the Chinese government is backtracking on its promise to allow autonomy in Hong Kong,
residents there take to the streets. Xi orders the military to do what it did in Tiananmen Square in 1989: crush the protests. The
ensuing violence shocks the Taiwanese, particularly the younger generation. Pro-independence sentiment soars. In this atmosphere,
the Taiwanese president is emboldened to ramp up rhetoric emphasizing her people’s hard-won rights and democracy. To signal
disapproval of Chinese regression in Hong Kong, the American president declares that the 1979
Taiwan Relations Act fully commits the United States to defend Taiwan against a Chinese
invasion. This is a major break from the long-standing U.S. policy of "strategic ambiguity" on the issue. The
Taiwanese president announces that Taiwan will apply for full membership to the UN, a move that China has long opposed. To
punish Taiwan’s insubordination, China barrages Taiwanese waters with "tests" of ballistic and
cruise missiles, severely interrupting the commercial shipping that constitutes the island’s
lifeline to the world. As a small island nation, Taiwan imports 70 percent of its food and most of its natural resources,
including energy. A sustained blockade would grind its economy to a halt and cause large-scale food shortages. The United
States feels obliged to prevent its strangulation. U.S. Pacific Command offers to escort
commercial shipping through the affected seas, a gesture of support but not of willingness to
fight. The escort campaign puts U.S. warships at risk of being sunk by the Chinese missile barrage, either deliberately or
accidentally—an event that could instantly kill more than 1,000 Americans and spark calls for retaliation. In this scenario, a
Chinese anti-ship missile—ostensibly fired as part of ongoing test barrages—sinks the USS John
P. Murtha, an amphibious transport dock ship acting as an escort to civilian shipping. All of the nearly 800 sailors and marines
aboard are killed. China insists that the sinking was accidental. But in Washington, the secretary of
defense and the chairman of the joint chiefs urge the president to authorize the Air-Sea Battle
plan to strike PLA anti-ship missile-launch sites on the mainland. Whether Chinese and American leaders can
rise to this challenge is an open question. What is certain is that the fate of the world rests upon the answer. Because China’s
conventional and nuclear missiles are kept in the same locations, and their command-and-
control systems are intertwined, Beijing mistakenly believes the United States is trying to
eliminate its nuclear arsenal in a surprise first strike. In a desperate attempt to "deescalate by
escalating," China fires one of its land-based, nuclear-tipped ballistic missiles into an empty tract of
ocean south of Okinawa. The nuclear threshold has been crossed. And while no lives have been lost in the strike, it
is but a short step from here to all-out nuclear war. War between the United States and China is not inevitable,
but it is certainly possible. Indeed, as these scenarios illustrate, the underlying stress created by China’s disruptive rise creates
conditions in which accidental, otherwise inconsequential events could trigger a large-scale conflict. That outcome is not
preordained: out of the 16 cases of Thucydides’s Trap over the last 500 years, war was averted four times. But avoiding war will
require statecraft as subtle as that of the British in dealing with a rising America a century ago, or the wise men that crafted a Cold
War strategy to meet the Soviet Union’s surge without bombs or bullets. Whether Chinese and American leaders can rise to this
challenge is an open question. What is certain is that the fate of the world rests upon the answer.
 Scenario Three is Transition
Third wave turbo-capitalism makes economic collapse inevitable – A
fundamental transition in the function of our economy is necessary to prevent
market disintegration
Bruno 18 (Alessandro Bruno – BA and MA in International Relations at the University of Toronto, Analyst and international
advisory specializing in the global investment banking sector. <MKIM> “Economic Collapse Is Inevitable Because of This Persistent
Factor”. 4/16/18. DOA: 10/10/18. https://www.lombardiletter.com/economic-collapse-inevitable-persistent-factor/27545/)

If there were a single concept that could explain the causes of the 2008 financial crisis, few are better than
“turbo-capitalism.” While the world has found ways to emerge from the crisis and the related recession, turbo-capitalism has
not been addressed. Few, outside of a limited academic set, even talk about it. Yet they should, because, if allowed to
continue, it will lead to economic collapse. Edward Luttwak, a world-renowned political scientist, was the first to use
the term “turbo-capitalism” to describe the post-Cold War economic system in a popular book. The concept of turbo-capitalism
explains better than globalization (a related phenomenon) what has happened to economics in the West since 1990. (Source: “Two
Cheers,” The Economist, October 23, 2001.) You may be familiar with the term “turbo.” It derives directly from the Latin word for a
spinning top. It can also mean “whirlwind” or “spiral.” The word has become most commonly associated with aero and automotive
engines. In a gas- or diesel-powered piston engine, a turbocharger is a turbine attached to a compressor. The exhaust gases from the
combustion stroke cause the turbo and compressor to spin, forcing the induction of a greater quantity of fuel-air mixture into the
cylinders, increasing power. Thus, turbo-capitalism intends to describe an enhanced or “souped-up”—but not
necessarily better—form of market capitalism. Left to spin without adequate controls, turbo-
capitalism will cause economic collapse. It already demonstrated this dubious quality in 2008.
Nothing has changed since then. It continues unhinged and it could spin out of control again,
leaving economic collapse in its wake. Turbo-capitalism might be the best way to describe the kind of
development in the most advanced global powers. Most of these fall into the geopolitical camp of the West, and
certainly the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). Just as in the automotive context, the chief characteristic of turbo-
capitalism is its power and speed. It’s much greater than anything that Adam Smith could have imagined and what characterized the
development miracle born from the ashes of World War II, what we might describe as “regulated capitalism.” Turbo-capitalism is
what happened to capitalism after it no longer felt threatened by communism. For capitalism to survive the intensifying
shock waves from the 1917 Russian Revolution during the Great Depression (and after World War I in Europe), some
governments protected the system by adopting social shock absorbers to contain dangerous flirtations
with fascism or communism. President Roosevelt launched his New Deal precisely to soften the harshest aspects of
capitalism in order to save it from the dominant ideologies of his time, as well as stimulating growth after the post-1929 economic
collapse. This approach lasted until January 1981. That’s when Ronald Reagan took office and altered the system, introducing an
enhanced “laissez-faire” economy. That event marked the end of what philosopher Mark Lilla has defined as the “Roosevelt
dispensation.” After the end of communism and the dismantling of the Warsaw Pact (1991), even those who identified as liberals
changed focus. They became more involved in issues of identity politics than in those of socio-economic fairness. Without any
checks and balances, an unhinged form of capitalism emerged from the rubble of the Berlin Wall. Turbo-
capitalism might be considered capitalism’s third wave. The first was the Industrial Revolution and the second
was the New Deal or Keynesian (sometimes known as the Welfare State). The third wave, which could become the
last, led us to the 2008 financial crisis and the Great Recession. It should have ended there. But it did not. The crisis left many
people poorer. Yet it also allowed a few to become fabulously wealthier. The number of millionaires and billionaires has
increased even as the proverbial “middle class,” that venerable institution that best represented the American Dream,
continues to disintegrate. Few have understood how significant the effects of this shift have been. The “Great Recession”
had a far greater effect than an economic collapse. It was a total crisis, affecting all aspects of most people’s lives, including political,
economic, social, and moral aspects. Keynes gave way to Ayn Rand on steroids and neoliberalism/neoconservatism (they are similar
with minor differences in foreign policy). The socio-economic compass, which had pointed to “fairness” from 1933 to 1980, now
shifted its magnetic polarity toward mad competition and total individualism. These might sound good on paper. In reality, they
work less well. They produce societies where the rich cannot truly enjoy the fruits of their ingenuity or luck because they must worry
about protecting their lives and property from the less-fortunate majority. Think Paris in the weeks just before the mob assaulted
the Bastille in 1789. Or think Caracas, Venezuela; Tegucigalpa, Honduras; or even St. Louis, Missouri or Detroit, Michigan—two of
America’s most dangerous cities. (Source: “The most dangerous cities in America,” USA Today, October 1, 2016.) The financial
crisis that left tens of millions of people unemployed in Europe and America—while adding
difficulties to those who remained employed with lower salaries, precariousness, and
underemployment—has not ended. The stock market performance and a slight relief in the employment
statistics have made it seem as if the world has entered a new phase of prosperity. Yet, in reality,
the effects of the financial crisis have shown few signs of easing. The main reason is that nobody has come
up with an ideology to defeat, or even just to challenge, turbo-capitalism. Like all ideologies, they are blind highways that only end
with a breakdown. Turbo-capitalism is leading straight toward economic collapse. Its most salient
feature is to have allowed the free market—while focusing on finance rather than the “real economy”—to
regulate itself. That’s like trusting sharks to behave before a clearly exposed prey. It’s not a good idea. Unregulated capitalism
wrecked the balance between actual productive activities (the kind that generates employment, for example) and the more
predatory characteristics of finance. It distorted the global economy. Until the 1990s, financial markets (inefficient and speculative,
though they were) were always subjugated to addressing the needs of the real economy. Investors acquired shares of companies,
which caused capital to grow. Shares represented fractions of corporations. Bonds and other debt instruments also helped. New
techniques, the infusion of highly sophisticated mathematics in the science-envying humanistic discipline of economics, and the
availability of newly underemployed and unemployed Soviet scientists (made redundant in the disaster that was the post-Soviet
Russia of Boris Yeltsin), accelerated the role and scope of finance. Suddenly, the introduction of ever more sophisticated and risky
options and derivatives (such as the subprime mortgage-backed “security”)—coupled with the greed and ruthlessness of Wall Street
operators—rapidly inflated a financial bubble. It erupted in 2008. Those responsible paid nothing, compared to the deluge of
bankruptcies, millions of job losses, and vanishing pension funds they left behind. One of the most striking phenomena that the 2008
crisis caused was the transfer of the burden from the guilty to the innocent. The bankers, who instigated the crisis, asked for and
obtained a government bailout. That produced a spike in the national debt, which required higher taxes in some cases, and cuts in
many social services. They called these changes “austerity” measures. Still, taxpayers, regular employees, and managers had not
been responsible for the crisis. Meanwhile, most explanations focused on the technical aspects and on some failure at the “financial
markets” or Wall-Street level. Most analysts, with few exceptions (such as Joseph Stiglitz, Robert Reich, or Paul Krugman) identified
the solutions by adopting technical solutions at the market level. President Barack Obama introduced more regulations to protect
investors—The Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, for example. Nevertheless, the real problem was more
systemic. It was a philosophical one. And nobody has had the courage to take it on. The sub-prime crisis of 2008 was
merely a symptom of this disease of turbo-capitalism. Turbo-capitalism is about the radicalization into ideology
of the concept of the stock market as the focus of the economic system, without any safeguards in place to manage
its inevitable excesses. This has metastasized, and it requires a systemic overhaul to prevent economic
collapse.

This transition is only feasible through the development of US artificial

intelligence – Key to globalized solutions to energy, education, healthcare,
inequality, and more
Perez 18 (Carlos Perez – MA in Computer Science, Software architect and developer, former developer for the National Cancer
Institute, Department of Education, Social Security Administration, Sprint, and IBM. <MKIM> “How Artificial Intelligence Enables the
Economics of Abundance”. 2/18/18. DOA: 10/10/18. https://medium.com/intuitionmachine/artificial-intelligence-and-the-
economics-of-abundance-92bd1626ee94)

Today, the global economy is in a perilous situation. Wage growth is stagnant across all industrial economies.
Jobs for less skilled workers are in constant decline and this decline is accelerating. Economic inequality
continues to increase. Not only is the economy in a perilous situation, the planet itself is in dire condition. Mass
extinction is now happening and countries are going to be inundated and wiped out of existence. Many
coastlines will become uninhabitable with a ton of wealth in beach-front property going up in smoke. Nation states are
dissolving into chaos. The root of the problem is that the old economy has reached the end of the line in terms of its growth. The
old economy is driven primarily on resource scarcity (i.e. fossil fuel) and we have maximized its exploitation such that
Earth’s own ecology is now in jeopardy. There is nothing more to be extracted without real consequences; our civilization’s
capabilities are constrained by the laws of physics and our oceans have reached their carbon absorption
limit. In a fossil fuel-based economy, there are intrinsic limits in how we can produce and transport goods while reducing waste. The
goods many industries create are actually subsidized by nature. We create revenue from borrowing what we believe to be free from
nature like water, air, trees, fish, etc. Unfortunately, our failure to pay for what we take has made our ways
unsustainable. We are producing stuff like crazy and in turn accelerating environmental entropy. We create products nature
itself can’t decompose and therefore cannot reuse. We are destroying ourselves for short-term gains while mortgaging our
children’s futures. Meanwhile, there is another kind of economy being created that many incumbents are
scared to death of. This is an economy based on exponential technologies. Economic revolutions arise when
three kinds of technologies converge. That is, when a new source of energy, a new kind of transport and a new kind of
communication all converge in concert to become the basis of a new economic platform. The last economic revolution was driven by
oil, automobiles, and electrical communication. The
new economy emerging is driven by the convergence of
renewable energy, self-driving transport and digital communication. The nature of this new
economy will be very different. We are transitioning from an economics of scarcity to an
economics of abundance. This new kind of world, driven by the exponential progress of silicon, is creating
massive disruptions in our economies. The biggest media company in the world (i.e. Facebook) has no journalists or
content producers. The biggest hospitality company in the world (i.e. AirBNB) has no rooms. The biggest taxi company in the world
(i.e. Uber) has no cars. The biggest bank in the world (i.e. cryptocurrencies) has no buildings (or physical safes). All these are
software-driven entities. Software is essentially knowledge and processes that are captured by automation. All of
these operate in the virtual world. Artificial Intelligence (AI) is just a more advanced kind of software. The greatest
immediate problem we are about to face is the transition from our current economy into this new economy. Achieving a world of
abundance is an ideal goal, but the process of getting there is going to be very painful. This will not happen overnight and may
perhaps take two generations. We are already seeing the ugly consequences of this transition playing out in real-time. Tribalism and
protectionism are becoming resurgent. This is a consequence of having many members of the population unable to participate
economically in this transition. When resources become scarce, the idea of sharing gets thrown out the window. This resentment is
also driven by the old economy continuing to become obsolete. It is simply human nature to not comprehend why the world has to
change. There are human communities, for example the Amish people, which have the avoidance of technological progress
ingrained in their religion. There is some profound wisdom here. If the goal of technological progress is the improvement of human
well-being, then we should not always blindly accept the latest technology; instead, we should select the technologies that are best
for our human souls. As you will read later, “The Economics of Abundance” is another kind of philosophy which emphasizes
sustainability and fairness. The
fossil fuel economy is estimated to be worth 100 trillion in value. As that economy moves
towards extinction, there will be a massive loss of wealth. A majority of the world’s wealth are accumulated in financial
instruments tied to this old economy. Today’s yields are negative and will continue to be negative with no end in sight. This wealth
has nowhere to go and that desperation is already being telegraphed with the mind boggling explosion of wealth in the
cryptocurrency space. We are going to see big time wealth destruction for many and big time wealth gains for the technically savvy.
This is the Revenge of the Nerds sequel. AI creates an economy of abundance. If we are to truly grasp the
consequences of AI, we need to, at a minimum, understand what the economics of abundance is all about. Jeremy Rifkin
describes the new economy as the “Third Industrial Revolution”. This is an economy where marginal costs of
production (the cost to create an additional product or service) go down to zero. He points out that the millennial generation which
grew up in this type of economy have very different sensibilities than previous generations. No longer do they see cars as an enabler
of mobility. Access has become more important than ownership. Participation and sharing in networks is power, while isolation is
death. Millennials are the ones who will be most severely impacted by this sudden loss of economic wealth. To survive, they are
adapting to a new world where the rules of the game are very different. Older
generations all too easily dismiss
millennials as not being able to comprehend the “rules of the game”, however perhaps it’s just that
many can’t see the rules are actually changing. The psychology of scarcity is very different from the psychology of
abundance. Scarcity encourages hoarding, in contrast, abundance encourages sharing. Hoarding chokes
innovation, sharing facilitates innovation. Most of the world comes from scarcity and the psychology of abundance
manifests itself in wealthier communities. The economics of abundance is also very different from a world defined by scarcity. In
fact, one can make the generalization that economics in a world defined by scarcity does not exist when there is no scarcity. How
does civilization even function in a world without scarcity? Wolfgang Hoeschele has studied extensively the ‘Economics of
Abundance’. His writings gave us a glimpse of how a world with advanced AI will be organized. In “Seven Key Elements of an
Economy of Abundance” he explores how the world will operate differently. His definition of the Economic of Abundance is as
follows: Aneconomy of abundance seeks to dismantle or reform these scarcity-generating
institutions in such a way as to affirm our freedom to live life as art (self-expression to others), social
equity (so that everyone can live life as art), and sustainability (so that all life can thrive into the future). Among other
things, this implies a much greater role for various forms of shared property, individual and community-level self-reliance, and
participatory decision-making.” Hoeschele’s exploration involves the context where there is a means of decentralized production.
Zero marginal costs, zero distribution and decentralized production are sources of abundance. However, abundance also creates
relative scarcity. This scarcity is analogous to the problem of information overload. For example media (i.e. video, music, literature
etc) in a world of abundance would have a scarcity of attention. Similarly, although zero marginal cost creates abundance, it will
consequently lead to relative scarcity created elsewhere. This scarcity typically manifests
itself in our cognitive
limitations of handling a barrage of new information created by abundance. This is the reason
why AI is a critical component in the equation. You can have millions of vehicles, but it creates a scarcity
in the availability of roads (and therefore unbearable traffic). With AI, you can have more efficient use of
vehicles and achieve a higher density of vehicles per road. In addition, you would have fewer vehicles because
the cars will not be sitting in garages all day waiting for a driver. Just to be clear, the “economics of abundance” refers to a mode of
operating production that minimizes waste and encourages decentralization. One way to reduce waste is to become very intelligent
about recycling goods. Sharing goods is a form of recycling. However, to share physical goods, one has to be in close proximity to be
efficient. Decentralized systems are more efficient than centralized systems in the sense that you can get a closer match between
actual needs and resources. However, with more advanced manufacturing and farming (examples: 3D printing and hydroponics) one
can circumvent the energy expenditure to ship fresh goods across vast distances. Why is decentralization extremely important? This
is because people need to feel that they are in control of their own lives. It is what allows people to work on what they love and
what they are good at while remaining self-sufficient. They see their contributions improve the lives of the people around them. Life,
liberty and the pursuit of happiness (not property). In the following paragraphs, I will highlight some of the effects of AI in driving the
economics of abundance. Natural Resource and Land Commons Governments provide exclusive access
for
corporations to exploit environmental resources in exchange for compensation. Today this assessment uses a very
primitive and crude way of valuing said resources. This problem is further exacerbated through corrupt practices where the people
responsible for the stewardship of a resource are paid off. AI can be made available to track resource
consumption and compensation for use. Transactions can also be made available in a public ledger and enforced at
the time of consumption to mitigate against corruption. Cooperative Business There needs to have an equal sharing of profits
between the coordinators and the providers of goods and services. Each party has their own costs and are required to be
appropriately compensated. Today’s corporation are extremely unbalanced. Those who are responsible for coordination are
compensated grossly more than those who provide the actual goods and services. AI can provide superior coordination and planning
capabilities so that value moves toward the edges and at the point of contact with the consumer. Energy for Everyone
Renewable energy such as solar power is democratizing the generation of energy. AI will allow the more
efficient distribution of excess energy where it can be used more effectively. Finance as Servant, not
Master Blockchain in combination with advanced AI will lower the cost of financial instruments that are
necessary for business. The financial industry (finance, insurance and real estate) accounts for 20% of the
US economy. This is a massive percentage which doesn’t produce any goods or services. AI can reduce the cost of
managing financial instruments which should reduce the cost of running businesses across the
board. One major reason for the high inequality in this world is due to the inability of many to
have access to capital. At a certain monetary amount, it isn’t worth the bank’s effort to service impoverished clients.
However, AI allows services to scale with zero marginal cost. This lowers the cost for access and thus
allowing larger participation into the economy. Liveable Cities Smart AI driven mobility will lead to a change in how
cities are designed. Cities will be designed to maximize people’s interactions and would less prioritize the movement of people. The
value of cities has always been in the richness and the diversity of interactions. Cities are the primary driver of innovation in our
current knowledge-based economies. Smarter cities are going to be influenced more by the need to enhance collaboration rather
than the need to transport people. London has 20,000 ghost homes despite the high cost of rent and the growing number of
homeless people. Clearly there is a problem here where homes are used only to store wealth instead of sheltering people. AI driven
by the objective of higher occupancy can put an end to this kind of hoarding behavior. Liberated Learning Access
to learning
will be greatly democratized with the availability of scalable AI teaching systems. One’s perceived
value to a business will be based less on credentials acquired by virtue of attending an exclusive educational
institution, butrather on a real-time assessment of one’s true skills. This more transparent assessment of skill sets may
lower one’s own premium on the market as one can’t leverage asymmetric information. The need to seek credentialed
education in colleges and universities has lead to crushing debt on the millennial generation. These educational
debts guarantee a kind of indebted servitude, which is basically a new kind of slavery. The primary reason to pay for
exorbitant tuition is to access exclusivity and not necessarily for education. Excellent formal education can be found in many sources
online at affordable costs. However, there are many professions that create artificial barriers to entry by demanding expensive
access for any aspiring member. The problem is not the cost of education, but rather we deliberately
make the cost for credential expensive to discourage competition. Formal education is no different today
than the NYC Taxi medallions which were such a great investment prior to Uber and Lyft. Truly Caring for Health AI leads to
greater access to affordable healthcare. AI already provides lower cost and accessible diagnosis.
(This won’t roll out in the U.S. because the medical cartel will do what it can to hang on to its monopoly). Healthcare will be
more holistic and sophisticated. Instead of providing care only in times of emergencies, lifelong
care is provided at a continuous basis to ensure the maintenance of a healthy lifestyle. The emphasis would be in
reducing the likelihood of falling ill over the current paradigm of addressing the problem only when the patient is already ill.
Healthcare driven by AI will be preventive and proactive rather than how it is today — reactive,
irreversible and expensive. With AI, you will have democratization of healthcare diagnosis allowing
health issues to be identified much earlier and therefore remedied at much lower costs. You may be wondering right now: What
does AI do that makes it so valuable? To answer this, you have to understand what makes anything valuable. A service or a good is
always valuable from the perspective of a Job to Be Done (JTBD). What AI is good at (and getting better at) is identifying a person’s
unique context and subsequently deliver the best goods or service that enables a person to get their job done. Context + Resource =
Value. In summary, the notion of monetary compensation will make little sense in a far future AI-driven world. However, it is unlikely
in the near term that we can arrive at this new world without the pain of weaning ourselves out of the previous economy of scarcity.
There will be a period where few people will own the majority of ‘wealth’ in the world. And just as we see it today, a world where 4
billion people earn less that $2 a day, we will see even more people without means to support themselves as we make the
unavoidable transition. AI will break capitalism and this should be obvious to anyone. Capitalism only works where there exists a
reasonable level of equality. That’s because Capitalism requires both capital and labor. When you don’t have labor (as it is replaced
by AI), then there will be nobody to consume the goods produced. Capitalism also requires scarcity, otherwise the price of goods
goes to zero. In a world with all but the few own AI, there is an absence of buying power in the population who have no jobs. Our
civilization needs to make the conscious effort to address the disruptions that are about to occur. The great challenge of our time is
to manage this transition. If we currently cling to this mindset of “business as usual,” (that our economies will continue to function
as they always have) then we are setting ourselves up to be blind-sided for the coming disruption. Ignorance of what is about to
happen will lead to a lot of suffering for those who continue (sometimes without a choice) to cling to the past. We should not, as an
example, insist that our younger generation fall into indebtedness when the rules of the past may not be applicable in the future.
The debt of older generations have accumulated to live a life of comfort should not be passed on to their descendants to pay.
Artificial Intelligence is both the destroyer and the creator of wealth. How
do you survive the transition? That should
be obvious, place your talents and investments in anything that has to do with Artificial Intelligence.