What AI Is Revealing About America

Imagine waking up tomorrow to discover your debit card is declined at the neighborhood gas station. Your pharmacy cannot retrieve your prescription. Your local hospital postpones surgeries because patient records are inaccessible. Cell service is intermittent. The grocery store accepts only cash because electronic payments have failed.

On June 22, senior cyber leaders from the Five Eyes intelligence alliance -- including the heads of cybersecurity at the NSA and CISA -- issued a rare joint warning. Their message was direct: frontier artificial intelligence is reshaping the cyber battlefield so fast that long-held assumptions about digital security could become obsolete not in years, but in months.

Most news coverage stopped there.

It shouldn't have.

During more than two decades serving as a Pentagon strategist, I learned that military planners ask a simple question: If I were America's adversary, where would I strike first? Competent strategists don't attack where an opponent is strongest. They search for dependencies -- those systems a nation quietly assumes will always function.

Artificial intelligence did not create America's greatest vulnerability.

It is exposing one that has been quietly growing for decades.

Modern civilization rests upon an invisible digital foundation. Electricity flows because computerized systems balance power across regional grids. Water treatment, hospitals, airports, pipelines, financial institutions, and emergency services all rely upon sophisticated software operating in the background. Most Americans never think about these systems. When they function, they are nearly invisible.

That invisibility has encouraged a dangerous assumption -- that they will always work.

Every powerful technology magnifies human intentions. The same AI that helps defenders find software weaknesses helps hostile governments find them faster -- and exploit them before anyone can respond.

The issue is not merely smarter attacks. It is less time.

For generations, military planners had days or weeks to recognize threats and organize a response. AI is compressing that window. The Five Eyes statement warns that decision-makers who once had time to deliberate may find themselves reacting to crises unfolding at machine speed.

Over the past several years, I have explored different dimensions of this challenge. In "The New AI Cold War," I traced how artificial intelligence has become a central axis of geopolitical competition. China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea all understand that cyberspace is now a permanent arena of conflict -- one where AI compresses decision cycles and strips away the friction that once allowed commanders and statesmen to pause and choose restraint.

In "AI for Mankind's Future," I argued that Christians must never measure technological progress solely by asking what machines can accomplish. We must also ask what those technologies are shaping us to become.

As I finished writing "The Final Algorithm," due out this July, I found myself returning to a persistent question: What happens when artificial intelligence, digital identity, and financial control converge? Then the Five Eyes warning arrived. It reinforced my conviction that what once appeared to be separate technological trends are converging into one strategic reality.

Our dependence on digital infrastructure was not imposed upon us. It was built -- one convenience at a time. Artificial intelligence did not create the crack in the foundation. It revealed how much of modern civilization now rests upon it.

For decades, we embraced innovations that made life faster and more productive. We rarely paused to ask what would happen if those systems suddenly became unavailable. Convenience quietly became dependence. Dependence became vulnerability.

Scripture consistently praises prudence. "The prudent sees danger and hides himself, but the simple go on and suffer for it" (Proverbs 27:12, ESV). Notice what Scripture does not commend. It does not praise denial. It does not encourage panic. It calls God's people to recognize reality before crisis arrives.

That is a harder word for our generation than it sounds.

How many of us can navigate our own hometown without GPS? How many families could function for several days if electronic payments stopped working? How many churches could continue ministering if communications were interrupted?

Those are not merely preparedness questions. They are stewardship questions.

Every civilization eventually reveals what it trusts most. History's idols have taken many forms. Ancient Egypt trusted military might. Babylon trusted its walls. Israel repeatedly trusted political alliances instead of the Lord.

Our generation's temptation is different. We trust systems we did not create, scarcely understand, and cannot guarantee will never fail.

We do not literally bow before servers, satellites, or data centers. Yet we organize our lives around them. We trust them to connect us, protect us, inform us, and guide us. The First Commandment has never been merely about statues. It has always been about trust.

Technology has not changed that question. It has only sharpened it.

When Nehemiah rebuilt Jerusalem's walls, he neither ignored the danger nor surrendered to fear. The people prayed and worked -- "each labored on the work with one hand and held his weapon with the other" (Nehemiah 4:17, ESV). Faith never excuses complacency. Prayer never replaces preparation. Vigilance and trust in God are complementary, not contradictory.

America should strengthen its cyber defenses and build more resilient infrastructure -- and encourage the gifted men and women who can make both happen.

Churches should consider how they would minister if communications were interrupted. Families should cultivate practical resilience, biblical literacy, and relationships that technology can strengthen but never replace.

King David understood the temptation: "Some trust in chariots and some in horses, but we trust in the name of the Lord our God" (Psalm 20:7, ESV). The temptation has not changed. Only the technology has. Our generation's chariots are cloud servers, satellites, AI systems, and the digital infrastructure that quietly sustains modern life. Remarkable gifts -- but they cannot bear the weight of our confidence.

"Unless the Lord builds the house, those who build it labor in vain. Unless the Lord watches over the city, the watchman stays awake in vain" (Psalm 127:1, ESV).

Notice that the builders still build. The watchmen still keep watch.

Artificial intelligence did not create America's deepest vulnerability. It merely exposed where our confidence has quietly drifted.

Christians know where confidence belongs. Walls, armies, and algorithms are gifts to steward -- not foundations on which to build our hope.

That may be the warning we most needed to hear.

Originally published at The Washington Stand