Section 3.1

Define Department of Defense Principles for Ethical Use of Biotechnology

Chapter 03

Section 3.1

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3.1A

Congress must direct the Department of Defense (DOD) to consult with stakeholders to define principles for ethical use of biotechnology for the U.S. military.

Maintaining a military advantage with cutting-edge technology is imperative to deterring adversaries and protecting U.S. national security. But the DOD must accomplish that task while maintaining a strong commitment to America’s values.

Recommendation

3.1A

Recommendation 3.1A

Congress must direct the Department of Defense (DOD) to consult with stakeholders to define principles for ethical use of biotechnology for the U.S. military.

A mark of the U.S. military’s professionalism is its commitment to American values. The DOD takes corrective action in response to public oversight of its development and use of emerging technology. When emerging AI capabilities began to enter battlefield applications in 2018, for example, the first Trump Administration released a DOD strategy that laid the groundwork for the lawful and ethical application of this emerging technology, culminating in the Defense Innovation Board’s (DIB) publication of five ethical principles for the department.¹⁹⁸ These principles are a source of American strength, promoting trust, providing guidance, and encouraging accountability.

Emerging biotechnology has reached an analogous point in its development. The United States does not and will never maintain an offensive biological weapons capability, in line with commitments to the UN Biological Weapons Convention.¹⁹⁹ But this critical red line no longer sufficiently captures the wide variety of ways in which this technology could be used to cause harm, including by non-state actors and U.S. adversaries.

By more clearly defining its principles for the development and deployment of biotechnology, the DOD would better support critical innovations within these boundaries while allowing the United States to lead by example through strengthened norms surrounding this evolving technology.

Defining principles for ethical use of biotechnology will require the DOD to consult with a wide range of stakeholders, spanning industry, academia, civil society, and local communities.

As part of this effort, the DOD should consider:

biotechnologies for warfighter performance optimization, including policies on informed consent, reversibility, and heritable treatments; and
biotechnologies that could affect the environment.

REFERENCES +

198 Defense Innovation Board, "AI Principles: Recommendations on the Ethical Use of Artificial Intelligence by the Department of Defense" (U.S. Department of Defense, October 31, 2019), https://media.defense.gov/2019/Oct/31/2002204459/-1/-1/0/DIB_AI_PRINCIPLES_SUPPORTING_DOCUMENT.PDF.

199 United Nations Office for Disarmament Affairs, "Biological Weapons," accessed January 27, 2025, https://disarmament.unoda.org/biological-weapons/.; Convention on the Prohibition of the Development, Production and Stockpiling of Bacteriological (Biological) and Toxin Weapons and on Their Destruction, Apr. 10, 1972, 26 U.S.T. 683, 1015 U.N.T.S. 163.; 18 U.S.C. § 10 (2023).; Jonathan B. Tucker and Erin R. Mahan, "President Nixon's Decision to Renounce the U.S. Offensive Biological Weapons Program," Case Study Series (National Defense University Center for the Study of Weapons of Mass Destruction, October 2009), https://ndupress.ndu.edu/Portals/68/Documents/casestudies/CSWMD_CaseStudy-1.pdf.