Lead image for 'Pick a side': US demands total loyalty in AI race against China.
The US is preparing to tell dozens of countries they must pick sides in the artificial intelligence race with China, warning they will be excluded from a US-led AI coalition if they also sign up for Beijing's competing framework, according to a US official and an internal draft reviewed by Reuters.
Washington last year launched the Pax Silica initiative aimed at securing supply chains for AI models, semiconductors and critical minerals, amid a fierce technology rivalry with Beijing.
About two dozen countries have joined, including Kazakhstan, a key potential source of critical minerals that has also joined China's coalition, as well as close US allies such as Japan, Australia and South Korea.
The draft letter, prepared by the State Department, is addressed to the 35 signatories of a US "AI Opportunity Statement" signed in June, which includes members of the non-binding Pax Silica framework and other countries that have expressed a desire to align cooperation on AI with Washington.
By pressing countries to choose sides the US hopes to starve China of resources in a race to make the most sophisticated AI, which could be used for military or economic dominance.
In July, Chinese President Xi Jinping launched a rival "World Artificial Intelligence Cooperation Organization", promoting his country's open-weight technology as a challenge to US influence over the fast-moving sector.
Kazakhstan is the only country so far known to have joined both initiatives, setting off alarm bells in Washington.
"To be part of everything is to be part of nothing. Signature of the Pax Silica Declaration is not merely a membership subscription, but a commitment," the letter says, urging countries to "choose deliberately" on AI.