Responsibly Pursuing Generative Artificial Intelligence (GenAI) for the War Fighter

This special commentary argues that the US Army must adopt a sober and methodical approach to integrating GenAI into military decision-making processes. Drawing parallels to the historical introduction of tanks and airplanes, the authors caution against both underutilizing the technology and being misled by oversold capabilities. Using the GenAI system Donovan as a case study, the commentary highlights critical deficits in current systems, such as a lack of computational and geospatial reasoning and points to procurement challenges that hinder improvement. The authors contend that simply using GenAI to speed up legacy processes will waste its potential. Instead, they advocate for using war gaming and experimentation within professional military education as a stress test to define requirements properly, manage cognitive loads on personnel, and guide the private sector to develop solutions that are truly aligned with the war fighter’s needs, ultimately enhancing military decision making.