This is John Batchler, a conversation with my colleague General Blaine Holt, the United States Air Force, retired, about war games.

War games that are now called tabletops.

And the reading that I've done, I asked Blaine, tells me that they drift towards escalation.

This is a matter of concern because there's fresh information that AI will enter into war game thinking in future right now.

And is AI trustworthy in a war game?

Does it lead to escalation or de-escalation?

So I asked Blaine about the general opinion of war games that they move towards

nukes.

And eventually that's where you're headed.

Is it accurate?

He answers in particular.

Having an AI at the table would not mitigate this.

It might accelerate it is one observation. Here's Blaine.

No, it's very accurate. And that's why we have to be so concerned about the rhetoric we see

in the headlines today of threats of tactical nuclear weapons or dirty bombs. Because all

the models in the war games, even if you see a tactical nuke go off,

they eventually lead on an escalatory path where all of the adversaries are using their weapons.

And that has, you know, that has civilization consequences for it.

So again, that's, that's what we have to do is we have to work on constructs in these

war games and simulations for how do we de-escalate a situation even in the face of dire

geopolitical consequences or circumstances and threats made by an aggressor.