Emerging patterns in intelligentized warfare: speed, consumption, and the transformation of military operations

This article analyzes emerging patterns of warfare shaped by artificial intelligence and autonomous systems, with particular attention to the People’s Liberation Army’s concept of “intelligentized warfare” (智能化战争). Drawing on empirical evidence from conflicts in Ukraine, Nagorno-Karabakh, and Gaza, and through comparison of Chinese and Western military doctrines, it advances three tentative propositions: (1) warfare may become a more readily employed policy instrument due to enhanced precision, controllability, and sustainability; (2) strategic advantage may hinge on sustained consumption capacity in emerging domains rather than traditional centers of gravity; and (3) the OODA loop may both descend and accelerate, producing what this article terms the “centralization paradox”—tactical decentralization alongside strategic centralization. These propositions remain hypotheses requiring further validation, and the article explicitly acknowledges significant evidentiary limitations inherent in analyzing rapidly evolving military technologies.