October 23, 2026
Stephen Herzog
The following describes an article in the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.
In March 2016, the Chinese government opened the doors to a nuclear security training center in Beijing with assistance from American experts. Sandia National Laboratories had worked with their counterparts in China to stand up the center and a physical protection system for a mock nuclear material processing facility. “It’s in our national interest that everybody’s nuclear materials are secure,” Sandia civil engineer Nick Winowich explained in a statement about the opening. A decade later, that same concern can provide a window of opportunity for cooperation on artificial intelligence, even as the United States and China compete to master this emerging technology.
Currently, government and nongovernment nuclear analysts are mainly focused on whether AI could help additional states acquire nuclear arms or make nuclear crises harder to control through its use in military command-and-control and decision-support systems. But a nuclear disaster doesn’t necessarily begin with a government’s pursuit of the bomb or decision to use it.
AI could create risks in other ways. For example, just as AI is used in military operations, it could also help terrorists identify weaknesses in nuclear facilities and plan attacks. Bad actors could leverage AI to sift through commercial and public imagery and reporting about nuclear facilities, reducing the effort needed for reconnaissance. They might also use AI-generated voice recordings to impersonate trusted colleagues and deceive facility personnel into disclosing sensitive information.
But that same technology could aid security personnel in uncovering those vulnerabilities and strengthening protection long before an attack occurs. This may help to give Washington and Beijing a rare, shared purpose amid their disagreements over military AI: to use artificial intelligence to prevent theft of nuclear materials and sabotage of nuclear facilities.
Cooperation between the rivals doesn’t need to begin with restrictions on AI systems. Washington and Beijing could pursue a six-month pilot agreement to jointly test AI applications for physical protection of civilian nuclear materials and facilities. This renewed lab-to-lab engagement could expand to include AI firms and nuclear operators. Together, they could evaluate whether AI workflows can improve threat detection by combining different types of security information that are usually examined separately. The experts could use simulated data from a fictional facility to protect sensitive facility data and commercial information.
Through these exercises, both countries could gain stronger defenses against nuclear theft and sabotage while building confidence for thornier discussions about AI-assisted proliferation and integration into nuclear arsenals.
Continue reading at the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.
