BarcelonaUntil a few years ago, it seemed that the most powerful and wealthy states were destined to dominate the battlefield. The great technological military advances of recent decades—"stealth" combat aircraft or satellite-guided cruise missiles—required vast resources and deployment capability. The United States, the main designer and manufacturer of these technologies, was in the lead. In recent years, however, we have seen how the two great technologies that have revolutionized the world of war, drones and artificial intelligence (AI), are within everyone's reach and often benefit the weaker party, whether in the fields of Ukraine or flying over the Strait of Hormuz.Both drones and AI are technologies that "democratize” war: they can be accessed by both rich and poor states, by both governments and non-state actors, from armed guerrilla groups to drug trafficking gangs. They are technologies that favor asymmetric power: a $35,000 Iranian drone can intercept a $4 million American missile in Hormuz; a criminal group can devise a cyberattack with a cheap subscription to an artificial intelligence, without having to hire a team of IT experts.In this context, China has positioned itself as one of the main suppliers of these "democratizing" technologies. The Chinese market produces between 70% and 90% of civilian drones worldwide: many, for example, end up dismantled and rebuilt as military drones in Ukraine, where 90% of the drones on the battlefield contain Chinese components. Furthermore, China is currently the main supplier of military drones, which it exports to countries such as Saudi Arabia, Morocco, or Ethiopia.On the other hand, China has positioned itself as the main market for open artificial intelligence models, with companies such as Deepseek, MiniMax, or Alibaba leading this market. Chinese open-weight models are free-licensed and can be freely modified, which makes them attractive both for an emerging company and for countries with few resources. It may also prove attractive to non-state military or criminal actors who wish to integrate AI into their military or cyberattack operations.Although it has become one of the major suppliers, the proliferation of these technologies is an issue that worries China, especially in the case of AI. Although Washington and Beijing are rivals and are trying to delay each other's technological development, neither has an interest in criminal groups beginning to strengthen thanks to these technologies. In fact, in a context where an agreement between the United States and China on how to govern AI is very difficult, stopping its proliferation in the criminal world could be one of the few points where they could find common interests.
