美军推进人工智能军事应用的举措、挑战及启示

人工智能技术的发展加速了军事智能化的脚步。本文分析了美军在推进人工智能军事应用方面采取的一系列举措,如注重国家战略层面的顶层设计,出台一系列智能化发展战略规划;部署各类军事智能化研究项目,开展大数据、智能算法研究,促进人工智能技术向情报处理、无人作战平台、指挥控制、武器装备系统、作战方式变革的渗透转化;重视智能化技术的基础理论研究和人才培养,聚焦核心和关键技术的突破,夯实军事智能化发展的基础。阐述了美军在推进人工智能军事应用进程中面临的来自技术、信任、伦理等多方面的挑战,并从成熟算法民转军用、寻求认知智能算法突破、培养军事智能化复合型人才等角度提出几点启示。     

近期美国海军南海地区活动态势分析

随着南海地区力量结构和美对华战略的转变,南海地区成为中美战略博弈的焦点。为围堵遏制中国的崛起,美国针对中国在南海实施了一系列海上挑衅行为。美国海军作为美国军事干预的主要力量,从兵力部署、演习演训、“航行自由”行动等着手,积极拉拢域内外盟友,展开并强化了在南海地区的军事活动。这些军事活动表现出极强的针对性和实战性,致使中美海上摩擦和竞争加剧。未来,美国为维护主导的全球秩序,将进一步提升美国海军在南海地区的威慑力。美国海军会借助并增加域内盟友的军事力量,继续维持高强度的装备平台活动及“航行自由”行动,推动海上力量合作。     

新形势下军队军事计量培训建设

随着我军信息化建设的不断发展,军事计量在装备全系统、全寿命、全过程监管中发挥着越来越重要的作用。武器装备信息化程度越高,越需要严苛的计量保障体系,而计量人员是军事计量保障工作的主体,所以,加强我军军事计量人员的培训工作,具有非常重要的意义。本文通过对地方计量人员培训体系进行分析,利用军地融合方式,研究我军军事计量培训工作在新时期新阶段的发展思路。     

Economic and environmental impacts of vertical and horizontal competition and integration

We explore the economic and environmental impacts of market structures (competition or integration at vertical and horizontal levels). We consider a bilateral duopoly consisting of two manufacturers and two retailers in which each manufacturer offers a wholesale price contract to the respective retailer. The manufacturers decide on wholesale prices and abatement efforts concerning pollution emissions related to manufacturing processes, whereas the retailers compete in quantities in the consumer market. To understand the comprehensive effects of market structures on economic competitiveness and environmental sustainability, we examine a measure of eco‐friendly social welfare, which is the ratio of social welfare and environmental pollution. Interestingly, we find that the market structures that have been believed to be more efficient are less efficient from a broader perspective: (1) double marginalization can generate higher eco‐friendly social welfare, and (2) horizontal competition between firms can result in lower eco‐friendly social welfare. Although vertical integration and horizontal competition yield greater social welfare by facilitating more production activities, these market structures often fail to induce sufficient abatement efforts to balance the polluting effect of the large volume, resulting in more significant environmental degradation. We also show that, despite the pollution‐curbing effect, higher emission penalties can result in less eco‐friendly social welfare. They can even curtail the abatement efforts of firms under particular circumstances. When products become more substitutable, the eco‐friendly social welfare can decrease depending upon the market structure.     

LiDAR点云纹理特征提取方法

针对图像纹理应用于LiDAR点云分类过程中存在的多义性问题,提出点云纹理特征的概念。该特征属性反映了点与其邻域点的属性值分布情况,提取过程基于KD树数据检索结构和灰度共生矩阵算法。分析搜索邻域、移动步长和灰度等级等参数对点云纹理特征的影响,并利用支持向量机分类方法验证点云纹理特征,可以有效地辅助高程和强度信息以改善LiDAR点云的地物分类结果。实验还证明了相比于栅格格式的图像纹理特征,点云纹理特征约束的地物分类具有更高的分类精度,并且点云纹理特征在微小地物的甄别和水陆的区分方面具有突出的能力。该特征的这些优秀特性可以为海岸带机载LiDAR数据的精细化分类、海岸带高精度DEM构建和海岸线提取等工作发挥重要作用。     

Asia-Pacific Demand for Military Expenditure: Spatial Panel and SUR Estimates

This article investigates the demand for military expenditure for a sample of key Asia-Pacific countries. Spatial panel demand estimates are presented for three joined spatial units using a fixed-coefficient spatial lag model based on a two-step efficient GMM estimator. Spatial autoregression estimates are next presented for 1991–2015, founded on alternative kinds of country connectivities, such as contiguity, inverse distance, discrete distance, and power-projection considerations. Finally, 11 select countries’ demands for defense equations are estimated using seemingly unrelated regressions. From alternative perspectives, these estimated models indicate how Asia-Pacific countries respond to the defense spending of other countries. In the spatial runs, free riding is prevalent despite the growing military might of China, which apparently is not generally viewed as a threat. For the sample period, the projection of Chinese or American power is a relevant spatial factor. The main threat is reflected in non-U.S. allies’ reaction to U.S. allies’ defense spending during 1991–2015 and to Chinese defense spending after 2002.     

Ideology,ballots, and alliances: Canadian participation in multinational military operations

The decision to employ force abroad is often a contentious political decision, where partisanship plays a crucial role. Prior to military intervention, political parties usually make their ideologically distinctive preferences clear and seek to implement them once in power. What remains unclear, however, is how ideology affects the decision to use military force. This article contends that alliance and electoral calculations constrain the ability of political parties to implement their ideological preferences with regards to the use of force. It examines a “most likely” case for the partisan theory of military intervention, namely Canada’s refusal to take part in the invasion of Iraq and its decision to commit forces to the war against the Islamic State. It finds that only in combination with alliance and electoral calculations does executive ideology offer valuable insights into Canada’s military support to U.S.-led coalition operations, which contributes to our understanding of allied decision-making.     

Hybrid warfare through the lens of strategic theory

Hybrid warfare is the latest of the terms/concepts that have been used within the defence community in the last three decades to label contemporary warfare. It has been officially adopted in the core strategic documents of NATO, EU and national governments and has already inspired many articles, policy papers and books; however, this paper is unique in the sense that it analysis the hybrid warfare concept through the lens of strategic theory. It is argued that hybrid warfare does not merit the adoption as a doctrinal concept. Strategic theory instead, which lies at the nexus of all dimensions of warfare, provides a better viewpoint to approach contemporary warfare. It concludes that efforts should be directed towards exploring warfare under the light of eternal principles instead of proving the emergence of new types of warfare.     

Rethinking military behavior during the Arab Spring

Why did some Arab militaries remain loyal to authoritarian rulers amid mass uprisings during the Arab Spring while others defected to the opposition? One popular explanation shows this variation with reference to the degree of military institutionalization: institutionalized militaries defected, while patrimonial militaries remained loyal. This article argues that the institutionalization hypothesis does not provide a complete account of the mechanisms through which the degree of military institutionalization leads to either defection or continued loyalty. This shortcoming stems from the fact that scholars have treated military institutionalization as a catch-all concept for three distinct variables: ethnic stacking of the military, patronage distribution, and organizational factionalization. Examining the interaction between these variables highlights the mechanisms through which military defection occurs, and therefore that disaggregating institutionalization into its component parts provides a more complete explanation of military behavior during the Arab Spring.     

Revisiting the rise and fall of the Somali Armed Forces, 1960–2012

The history of the Somali Armed Forces, principally the army, forms an important part of studying the Somali civil war. Two key themes are evident from 1960: the pursuit of an irredentist agenda beyond reasonable limits, which led to the downfall of Siad Barre’s regime, and the clan divisions and agendas that Barre used to shore up his rule in the 1980s and that have bedeviled the rebirth of the Somali Army in the twenty-first century. With the twentieth-century context covered, and in some places reinterpreted, this article then focuses on the uncertain rebirth of the Somali Armed Forces since 2008, using a host of primary and United Nations official sources. Assistance efforts have been focused on Mogadishu, but limited success has been made in forming truly national armed forces. Future prospects are uncertain, but there are some signs of hope.