Source · Select Committees · Defence Committee
Recommendation 10
10
Accepted
Ensure GCAP is future-proofed to accommodate UK AI advances and counter adversary capabilities.
Recommendation
Our recent report on Developing AI Expertise and Capacity in UK Defence examined some of the challenges and opportunities presented by the use of artificial intelligence in defence. These are not exclusive to the air domain, 30 but they will need to be carefully managed as GCAP progresses. The Government must ensure that GCAP is future proofed so that it can not only accommodate advances in our own AI capabilities, but also counter those of our adversaries. (Recommendation, Paragraph 67)
Government Response Summary
The government agrees with the recommendation, stating GCAP is being designed with a continuous spiral upgrade approach, defence-wide architecture, and data standards to accommodate and advance AI and autonomous technologies.
Government Response
Accepted
HM Government
Accepted
The Department is grateful to the Committee for its recommendation and agrees that our future combat air capabilities must be able to adopt AI and autonomous technologies as they develop. These technologies will augment the capabilities of both the core GCAP aircraft and the additional uncrewed platforms that we envisage operating alongside it as part of the UK’s wider FCAS. In the core platform, they will enhance the effectiveness of both aircraft and pilot, tasking sensors, triaging data, and analysing high-intensity combat situations. Within wider FCAS, these technologies will be fundamental to allowing future uncrewed platforms to operate both with a high degree of autonomy and as part of an integrated system of capabilities. Adoption of these and other next-generation capabilities will be enabled by a design-approach that supports continuous spiral upgrades. Defence-wide architecture and data standards are needed to achieve the greatest military advantage. Importantly, GCAP is supporting a pathway for advancing AI and autonomous technologies that will be key to the development of uncrewed systems. Monitoring adversaries’ development and employment of these technologies is key to ensuring delivery of a combat air capability that can fight and win in the battle spaces of the future, which is why we are designing a capability with rapid upgradability at its core.