The German military is evaluating 30 artificial intelligence tools to speed up battlefield decision-making, aiming to deploy such a system from 2027, a senior military official told business daily Handelsblatt.
– “The exploration is ongoing, and I’m optimistic that we will have a prototype in the second quarter of 2027,” the chief of the military’s cyber command, Vice Admiral Thomas Daum, told the paper, with full implementation expected in 2028.
– The war in Ukraine has highlighted how drones and satellites generate vast streams of data, making the battlefield transparent as never before while creating a need for AI to process information at a speed impossible for humans to match.
– Most of the AI tools under review are made by German companies, with French firm ChapsVision among the few foreign businesses in the race, the paper said.
– In April, Daum for now ruled out purchasing the Maven Smart System, the best-known AI tool of its kind, made by U.S. data analytics and defence software company Palantir.
– The U.S., NATO commands and several allies are deploying Palantir’s Maven to analyse battlefield data, including images and video, to improve situational awareness and speed up decision-making.
– Concerns over dependence on the U.S. and data sovereignty have fuelled resistance against Palantir in parts of Europe at a time when the U.S. is seen as a potentially unreliable ally after President Donald Trump repeatedly threatened to quit NATO.