Weapons that operate on their own, without a human, aren't science fiction anymore, and they're becoming a top priority for major military powers.

Autonomous weapons are here. We have a window now to create international law to ban the most egregious types, but it's getting to crunch time.

Why one expert says we have a unique opportunity to avoid calamity the world isn't ready for. It's not an arms race, it's a suicide race. It's a suicide race.

I'm Nila Boodoo for Maxios.

This is one big thing.

In August of last year, U.S. Deputy Defense Secretary Catherine Hicks

announced a major new initiative. It's called the Replicator Initiative.

We're going to create a new state of the art just as America has before

leveraging a tradable autonomous systems in all domains which are less expensive

put fewer people in the line of fire, and can be changed, updated, or improved

with substantially shorter lead times.

The program is meant to amass thousands of drones specifically to counter China.

Replicator is meant to help us overcome the PRC's biggest advantage, which is mass.

More ships, more missiles, more people.

Major military powers pushing for more autonomous weapons

has got some other countries worried and some experts too.

So the US is one of the leading powers. countries worried and some experts too.

So the US is one of the leading powers

pursuing autonomous weapons at break next speed.

Anna Hare is the Autonomous Weapons lead

at the Future of Life Institute.

If you make it easier to wage war and faster without humans being able to see what's going on and make decisions,

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