Estonia pledges major investments in military AI

Estonia’s flag disappears into digital vectors. (Getty)

WASHINGTON — The Estonian Ministry of Defence has laid out big ambitions for artificial intelligence in a new defense strategy released today.

This AI pledge comes just days after Estonia’s March 18 announcement that it would increase its overall defense spending from 3.3 percent of gross domestic product — already above many other NATO nations — to 5 percent..

The new plan out of Tallinn calls for building a “digital infrastructure” for the Estonian Defence Forces (EDF), one robust enough to run “AI solutions” for everything from intelligence analysis and wartime targeting to smart logistics and back-office administration. (Pentagon plans for AI emphasize similar areas, rather than building “killer robots.”)

Estonia’s plan also prioritizes improving digital interoperability with NATO allies, closer collaboration with the nation’s thriving high-tech sector, and improving AI education for EDF personnel. It also calls for the EDF to “consider” appointing a “Chief Innovation Officer and/or a Chief Digitalisation Officer” as part of a proposed headquarters reorganization.

These castles aren’t being built on air: Funding is forthcoming, the strategy says, with a third or more of the country’s (admittedly modest) research and development budget committed to AI over the next 10 years.

“Resources to fulfill the Strategy’s objectives and to conduct the activities required to achieve them will be provided in the next National Defence Development Plan (2026-2035),” the document says. Thirty to 50 percent “of the annual R&D budget … will be allocated for developing defence AI.”

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There’s a lot of backstory to these announcements. Tiny Estonia has played an outsized role as a digital pioneer for decades, starting with an all-out push to modernize Soviet-era infrastructure after independence in 1991. But the country’s resulting dependence on digital services created a vulnerability that Moscow sought to exploit, launching a massive series of cyberattacks in 2007.

That painful experience, in turn, was a wake-up call for Estonian cyber defense. Within a year Tallinn had created a multinational Cooperative Cyber Defense Centre of Excellence that was soon officially incorporated into NATO. Tallinn also hosts a “regional hub” for NATO’s DIANA tech accelerator, second in size only to the agency’s London headquarters. Finally, Estonia as a whole is widely considered one of the most technologically advanced nations in Europe, and much of its private sector expertise is signed up for a “cyber militia” that coordinates on cybersecurity with the government.

That said, Estonia is keenly aware of its vulnerability in the physical world as well — downtown Tallinn is just about 130 miles from the Russian border, less than three hours’ drive in moderate traffic — and its need for conventional weapons from landmines to rocket artillery. The defense minister said in September that “the main focus” of the defense budget is ammunition, with its four-year spending plan (for 2025-2028) allocating €1.55 billion ($1.67 billion) for ammo out of a total a total budget of €5.3 billion, or almost 30 percent.

The AI strategy acknowledges the primary of physical defense and sees digital technology as an enhancement to it, not a substitute.

“Estonia’s main priority [is] procuring additional weapon systems with a sufficient amount of ammunition to engage the enemy from a sufficient distance,” it says. “On the other hand, substantive firepower needs to be supported by fast and accurate targeting, alongside timely and adequate decision-making” — and there, it argues, the war in Ukraine has shown there is a game-changing role for digital networks, drones, and artificial intelligence.