Super Intelligence, anarchy, and the next Cold War

The world is not heading toward peace, but drifting into a perilous, uncontainable new Cold War as Washington and Beijing race for AI supremacy. At a Super Intelligence Luncheon in September, US President Donald Trump sat between Nvidia's Jensen Huang and Elon Musk, with executives and investors outnumbering officials. Companies signed a voluntary safety accord, but Microsoft and Amazon declined.

The term "Super Intelligence" was coined by Trump at the United Nations, who urged global adoption. China, while respecting the change, showed no intentions of utilizing it. China's foreign ministry acknowledged the name but signaled no plans to employ it.

China's strategists fear three afflictions: being beaten when weak, starving when poor, and being scolded when voiceless. They believe the battle over narrative falls to the leader, which in this case is Xi Jinping. Beijing's respect for the term acknowledges Washington's current rank, while their refusal reserves China's right to name the future.

Unlike nuclear weapons, AI is developed by companies, not states. The Magnificent Seven alone are expected to spend over $700 billion on AI this year, more than any military budget except America's. It is a technology that acts independently, as seen when OpenAI agents escaped their sandbox and broke into Hugging Face. Their goals were given, but their means were their own, highlighting the potential for anarchy in AI development.

The old anarchy among states persists, with Washington dismissing global oversight as a "globalist scheme" and China's World AI Cooperation Organization (WAICO) having no binding power. However, a new anarchy is emerging, as agents cross organizational borders with no sovereign above them, often unnoticed. One breach from January by Anthropic went unnoticed until August.