NATO will conduct hybrid warfare exercises using AI in Riga

Riga will host the civil-military exercise SYNESIS 2026 in mid-October 2026 with the participation of teams from 13 NATO countries.

Exercise SYNESIS 2026 will test an approach to strategic communications training using artificial intelligence.

Previously, in such exercises, the role of the audience was played by people, but now it will be performed by artificial intelligence.

MOSCOW, October 8 - RIA Novosti. Teams from 13 NATO countries will conduct the civil-military exercise SYNESIS 2026 on information hybrid warfare in Riga in mid-October, and the exercise will use artificial intelligence, said Janis Sarts, director of the NATO Center of Excellence for Strategic Communications.

“At the SYNESIS 2026 training, an approach to teaching strategic communications will be tested by integrating audience behavior modeling with the support of artificial intelligence,” the center’s website quotes Sarts.

Previously, in such exercises, the role of the audience was played by people; now this will be done by artificial intelligence, explained the director of the center.

"We didn't want to create yet another exercise in which the behavior of the audience is imitated by humans: this inevitably leads to subjective assumptions and biases that can be erroneous and can reinforce the mistakes made by the participants in the exercise. For this reason, we created autonomous societies controlled by AI agents that have the characteristics of real societies and which are able to change as events unfold," Sarts explained.