In the defense sector, the threat and promise of artificial intelligence is everywhere.
AI-powered facial recognition can identify a terrorist in a crowded train station. AI-enabled satellite surveillance can find an insurgent hideout in a vast desert. The technology can spot an illegal fishing boat based on its movement or even predict vehicle breakdowns before they occur. Perhaps the most attention-grabbing aspect is the use of AI-controlled weapons to select a target and apply force without a human operator.
In light of this AI explosion, the Africa Center for Strategic Studies created an “AI Toolkit” for Africa’s defense professionals. The 76-page document offers resources to help security leaders determine how best to use AI, how to educate their personnel, prepare for attacks and incorporate AI policy into their decision-making, doctrine and planning documents.
Dr. Nate Allen, the Africa Center’s faculty lead for Cyber Threats and Strategic Technologies, led the project. He told ADF it began in 2023, following the release of ChatGPT and a webinar on the subject that drew significant interest from the Africa Center’s alumni who are mainly security professionals from the continent.
“We noticed a huge spike in interest in AI among our alumni community,” he said. “We decided to do a bit of a deeper dive and …we wanted it to be a collective effort.”
In April 2025, the Africa Center brought together 15 representatives from 13 African countries for a workshop in Washington, D.C. on AI Strategy in the Security Domain. The ideas, experience and knowledge gathered at this event form the framework of the toolkit, which was released on February 27.
Allen hopes it fills a gap and leads to the creation of more AI-policy documents crafted specifically for the African security environment.
“There are an awful lot of treaties, policies, strategies and toolkits on AI and security and defense that are written globally, but none that are exclusively focused on the continent,” Allen said. “So we figured kind of drawing from African experiences and trying to think about how to adapt AI to an African context fills a needed gap.”
The toolkit includes 20 case studies that show how AI is already being used in Africa’s defense sector. For example, Mauritania is one of the only countries to have crafted a National Artificial Intelligence Strategy with a specific focus on defense. Morocco is using AI for preventive maintenance on its drones. Zambia is using AI to combat human trafficking by sifting through reams of data from ports of entry, tollbooths and other sources to look for signs of criminality.
The toolkit offers advice on “lifecycle management” of AI, which begins with how to define the objective for the tool, develop the needed software and algorithm, deploy AI, maintain it and, ultimately, retire it when it is no longer meeting its objectives. It also offers resources for security professionals to learn about the ethical use of AI systems.
Allen said the toolkit is meant to be useful for people up and down the chain of command. It offers a resource list with webinars or low-cost courses where defense professionals can become proficient in AI.
“We wanted to write it for as wide a number of use cases as possible,” Allen said. “We wanted it to be useful for very senior decision maker — presidents, national security advisors, chiefs of defense staff — people who would be involved in writing an overarching AI defense sector strategy. But we also wanted it to be useful for people who are working at the mid or even the operational level.”
The kit offers resources to help security professionals plan to defend their nations against malign use of AI. Terror groups and insurgents are working to use the technology to power drone attacks, cyberattacks and spread false information.
Allen said the most immediate risk is the use of AI for “social engineering” attacks where generative AI can help spread false information. But, he said, the use of AI-enabled autonomous weapons by nonstate actors may not be far off.
“I wouldn’t rule it out,” he said adding that it is not terribly complicated to retrofit commercially available drones so they can use cameras to acquire a target and fly toward it to detonate without human guidance. Insurgents in Burkina Faso and Mali have launched at least 69 drone strikes since 2023, the Armed Conflict Locator and Event Data project reported.
“The diffusion of the technology seems to be really, really quick,” Allen said. “So I’m concerned about that.”
The full toolkit can be accessed at the following link: Artificial Intelligence for Africa’s Defense Forces – Africa Center
