By Shannon Vaughn
Introduction
(FPRI) — China’s military modernization is advancing at an extraordinary pace, driven by its CMF strategy, which integrates technological advancements from the private sector directly into the PLA. A key component of this transformation is the use of AI (人工智能) for cognitive warfare (认知战), a strategy akin to Chapter 3 of Sun Tzu’s Art of War, which is aimed at shaping battlefield conditions and manipulating the perceptions of adversaries long before kinetic conflict begins. By leveraging AI-driven predictive modeling (人工智能预测建模), behavioral analytics (行为分析), and social control mechanisms (社会控制机制), Beijing seeks to offset the PLA’s fundamental weakness: its lack of modern combat experience.
China’s homegrown cognitive warfare doctrine extends beyond military applications, leveraging AI-enhanced psychological operations to influence domestic and foreign audiences alike. This approach incorporates disinformation campaigns, narrative shaping, and public opinion manipulation at home, which could prove beneficial to future non-kinetic operations abroad. Reports suggest that China has already deployed sophisticated machine learning models to create personalized propaganda aimed at swaying opinions in Taiwan and other key regions. Such tactics serve a dual purpose: dissuading adversaries from engaging in military conflict while reinforcing the CCP’s hold on domestic stability.
The PLA’s AI-Driven Cognitive Warfare Strategy
The PLA defines AI-driven cognitive warfare as the systematic use of artificial intelligence, big data analytics (大数据分析), and psychological operations (心理战) to manipulate enemy perceptions, degrade decision-making capabilities, and control information flows before and during conflict. Unlike traditional warfare, which prioritizes kinetic force, cognitive warfare seeks to influence the adversary’s strategic thinking, sow discord within societies, and create operational advantages by shaping the information domain.
PLA military theorists emphasize that cognitive warfare is an extension of the “Three Warfares” (三战) doctrine, which consists of psychological warfare (心理战), public opinion warfare (舆论战), and legal warfare (法律战). By integrating AI into these domains, the PLA is enhancing its ability to automate disinformation campaigns, conduct large-scale social media manipulation, and employ deepfake technology (深度伪造技术) to distort reality. Reports suggest that the PLA increasingly sees AI-powered psychological warfare as a key enabler for securing strategic objectives.
The PLA’s War Experience Gap and AI as a “Combat Substitute”
The PLA has not fought a major conflict since the Sino-Vietnamese War (中越战争) in 1979. This lack of real-world combat exposure raises concerns about the PLA’s ability to effectively execute modern joint operations, maintain force cohesion under fire, and adapt to the unpredictability of warfare. In response, China has turned to AI as a substitute for direct combat experience, leveraging developed high-fidelity wargaming platforms, predictive modeling, and algorithm-driven war planning to compensate for its operational deficiencies.
Additionally, the PLA’s push from informationized warfare (信息化战争) toward intelligentized warfare (智能化战争) envisions AI-assisted decision support systems playing a central role in future conflicts. These systems are designed to process vast amounts of battlefield data in real time, enabling commanders to make rapid tactical decisions based on predictive analytics. However, this reliance on AI-driven command structures introduces significant risks. Even the PLA’s mouthpiece, the PLA Daily (newspaper), highlightedthat China’s emphasis on autonomous battlefield decision-making may struggle in dynamic combat environments where human intuition and adaptability remain critical.
While China’s AI-driven simulations allow commanders to model potential engagements, they lack the unpredictability and chaos inherent in real-world combat. Military history demonstrates that adaptive leadership, unit cohesion, and battlefield improvisation—qualities that AI struggles to replicate—are decisive in warfare. If the PLA enters combat relying on algorithm-generated tactics, it risks strategic failure if the US and allied forces introduce unexpected, asymmetrical tactics that force real-time adjustments AI cannot accommodate.
Further, the effectiveness of AI-driven command and control systems depends on secure, uninterrupted data streams. Cyber warfare, electronic jamming, and adversarial machine learning attacks could disrupt AI battlefield assessments, forcing PLA commanders to make decisions without reliable AI-generated intelligence. This creates an opportunity for US and allied forces to exploit China’s dependence on AI-driven decision models by introducing highly dynamic and unpredictable battlefield conditions that AI systems cannot adapt to in real time.
China’s Authoritarian Blind Spot: Political Filtering of Military Intelligence
China’s authoritarian governance model (威权治理模式) presents a structural vulnerability in its military intelligence apparatus, particularly in the way information is delivered to senior leadership. A primary driver of this intelligence distortion is the hierarchical reporting structure within the PLA. Within the PLA and broader CCP bureaucracy, intelligence officers are often reluctant to provide unfiltered assessments to leadership, fearing repercussions for contradicting established narratives. As a result, Xi Jinping may not be receiving accurate intelligence about the true state of the PLA’s readiness or the effectiveness of its AI-driven decision-making models or potential battlefield analysis.
Since AI-driven warfare models rely on training data, the CCP’s political filtering of intelligence means that PLA AI systems may be operating on sanitized or incomplete battlefield information. If these AI-driven military planning tools are trained on censored intelligence reports, China may enter a Taiwan contingency with an overinflated sense of its strategic superiority.
Moreover, reliance on filtered intelligence inputs may reinforce systemic weaknesses within China’s military command structure, reducing the PLA’s ability to adapt to the realities of combat. Unlike Western militaries, where a degree of decentralized command allows battlefield commanders to modify strategy based on ground conditions, the PLA’s top-down decision-making model—especially when reliant on AI-generated intelligence—limits real-time adaptability. If Chinese military leadership is presented with overly optimistic AI-driven forecasts that fail to reflect battlefield challenges accurately, it may create a false sense of security that collapses under combat stress. The United States and its allies can exploit this by introducing operational unpredictability, forcing China’s AI-reliant forces into situations where rapid, unscripted decision-making is required—something AI alone cannot yet replicate effectively.
Opportunities for the United States and Its Allies
While China’s AI-driven cognitive warfare presents a significant challenge, it also reveals opportunities for the United States and its allies. The PLA’s reliance on AI-driven intelligence creates potential vulnerabilities that can be exploited through strategic countermeasures.
Disrupting PLA AI Decision Models
The United States and its allies should explore asymmetric warfare strategies to introduce unpredictability into China’s AI-driven military simulations, thereby reducing future Chinese effectiveness in real-world scenarios.
Opportunity
Because AI relies on patterns and predictive modeling, US and allied forces can exploit this weakness by deliberately employing unpredictable operational maneuvers, deceptive tactics, and irregular warfare strategies that AI struggles to anticipate. In doing so, the United States and its allies can degrade the reliability of PLA AI-generated war planning, forcing China to revert to human-led decision-making—an area where it lacks modern combat experience.
Strengthening Counter-Disinformation Efforts
Allied nations should develop better information-sharing policies on advanced AI tools to detect and neutralize Chinese disinformation campaigns, particularly those targeting elections, military policies, and strategic partnerships.
Opportunity
By enhancing AI-powered detection systems and cross-national intelligence sharing, democracies can limit the effectiveness of Chinese influence operations.
Targeting AI Predictive Models with Misinformation and Strategic Deception
AI-driven warfare relies on data accuracy. If China’s AI training models are fed misleading or incomplete information, their combat predictions and cognitive warfare strategies could be compromised.
Opportunity
The United States and its allies can exploit China’s AI reliance by injecting false indicators into open-source intelligence and cyber environments, disrupting PLA machine-learning models that depend on data ingestion from global sources.
Building Multilateral Responses
The United States should deepen collaboration with regional partners, particularly Taiwan, Japan, India, and Australia, to develop joint AI resilience programs aimed at countering Chinese cognitive warfare tactics.
Opportunity
Strengthening multilateral AI cooperation will enhance joint intelligence-sharing, counter-disinformation efforts, and cyber-defense capabilities, making allied nations more resilient against Chinese cognitive warfare tactics.
Conclusion
China’s AI-driven cognitive warfare strategy represents a significant shift in modern conflict, leveraging big data, psychological operations, and automated disinformation to manipulate adversaries before kinetic battles even begin. However, Beijing’s overreliance on AI-driven intelligence to backfill combat experience gaps and authoritarian decision-making structure is a grave vulnerability. The People’s Liberation Army may find itself ill-prepared for real-world battlefield conditions if its AI-generated assessments fail to align with actual operational challenges. By recognizing and exploiting China’s AI-dependent vulnerabilities, the United States and its allies can exploit this asymmetric advantage, enhance its strategic resilience, and maintain a technological edge in modern warfare.
About the author: Shannon Vaughn is a Non-Resident Fellow with the Asia Program at the Foreign Policy Research Institute (FPRI) and the General Manager of Virtru Federal, a data privacy company headquartered in Washington, DC.
Source: This article was published by FPRI