Same but Different: Legal Review of Autonomous Weapon Systems
Editors’ Note: This post is derived from a presentation given at the 2023 Israel Defense Forces Military Advocate General’s 4th International Conference on the Law of Armed Conflict.
In 2024, a decade will have passed since an inaugural UN Meeting of Experts initiated discussions on the implications of the development and deployment of autonomy in weapons systems. While views on the achievements made in this setting and by its formal successor, the Group of Governmental Experts (GGE), may vary, there is one area where some progress is undeniably evident. In 2014, the discussion scarcely mentioned States’ obligation under international law to carry out legal reviews of weapons. As years passed, acknowledgment of the significance of this obligation has progressively and consistently gained prominence in the consensus reports of the GGE (see, for example, 2018, 2019, 2021, 2023.)
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