In recent years diplomats have increasingly employed pop culture in their digital communications. Some nations, for instance, celebrate Star Wars Day on May the 4^th tweeting at their followers. Others employ pop culture memes when attempting to shape global public opinion. Countries such as Ukraine, Russia, Israel and the UK have all relied in popular culture to legitimize their policies while de-legitimizing those of adversaries, as shown in the tweet below. In Ukraine’s case, pop culture icons have even been recruited as digital Ambassadors helping the country raise funds for its war effort. Such is the case with Star Wars actor Mark Hamill or singer Barbra Streisand that use Twitter to crowdfund aid and weapons for Ukraine.  bbb

Pop culture is invoked by diplomats because it represents a global language. Pop culture serves as a global reservoir of images and meanings that can be understood by social media users the world over. A diplomatic tweet featuring a Marvel superhero or a Star Trek alien or even a character from Friends can be instantaneously understood by publics in France, India and Japan. As such, global popular culture allows diplomats to deliver global messages to a global public while dealing with issue of global concern.

Essentially, global popular culture is similar to all languages. It is comprised of a large set of signs that can be decoded by native speakers. It is a collection of “signifiers” or words that evoke the same mental image in the minds of all speakers. Just as the word “tree” evokes the same mental image in the minds of English speakers, so Captain America’s shield evoked a shared mental image in the minds of pop culture speakers. And although popular culture is often tailored by local publics, with scenes from US films being deleted in China, these signifiers can be used to deliver messages that can be deciphered by all pop culture speakers. This is made possible by the text that accompanies pop culture tweets and posts in which diplomats “anchor” the meaning of a signifier. Such is the case with the post below from the European Commission.

However, the recent advent of AI and Generative AI in particular poses a challenge to diplomats’ ability to converse with global publics. The reason being that AI users are increasingly generating content that subverts the global language of pop culture by blurring the relationship between signifiers and signifieds. Such is the case with the image below that reimagines that cast of Seinfeld as a Star Trek crew. Undoubtedly, if diplomats use Seinfeld characters in a tweet today, it will still be recognizable to millions of social media users and will have a similar or shared meaning. But as the mental images of Seinfeld and Star Trek begin to merge, and as social media users as exposed to more and more AI images linking Seinfeld with Star Trek, there will be a new subset of pop culture speakers who assign new meaning to the Seinfeld signifier.

This phenomenon becomes even more complex when one considers the amount of pop culture “mash ups” that are generated daily by AI users.  As shown below, these include Mr. Miyagi teaching Robocop how to “Wax on and wax off”; the infamous Hannibal Lecter appearing on Sesame Street; Indiana Jones trying to liberate Han Solo from Jabba the Hut; and even Princess Leia having a love affair with Mr. Spock, a blasphemous notion by any standard.

These AI images are all detrimental to digital diplomacy for three reasons. First, such images often go viral as they invoke the emotive power of two, different, pop culture symbols. Second, these images are not shared globally but funneled to subsets of social media users by algorithms. Third, they create a new “word” in the pop culture language, a new signifier that generates a new mental image that is not known to all native speakers. Slowly, and over time, these new AI images may limit the ability of pop culture speakers to converse with one another, generating a new Tower of Babel in which groups of social media users no longer understand one another.

And as this tower of Babel emerges, the ability of diplomats to leverage pop culture as a global language will diminish. Diplomats will either need to learn all the language in the Tower of Babel, or they will need to find new sets of symbols and codes that can be used globally. Ultimately, the very use of images to communicate quickly and coherently with transitional publics may disappear. This will prove a formidable challenge to diplomats as pop culture images allow diplomats to craft viral messages that circulate among diverse audiences while using pop culture to summon the attention of social media users and deliver a quick message given that an image is worth thousands of words.

In a digital world that celebrates virality and brevity, the loss of the pop culture language will be profound.

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A version of this post was originally published on E-IR website and can be found here

According to Dr. Dan Kotliar, technological advancements are accompanied by a certain degree of hype, or hyperbolic discourse. The internet, for example, was accompanied by a democratization hype with scholars and pundits arguing that the internet would enable new forms of democratic participation. Social media was associated with a revolutionary hype which suggested that Facebook and Twitter would help topple tyrants, despots and dictators who could no longer exert total control over public opinion. The Arab Spring protests help boost this hype.

Over the past two years, the world has been in the grips of an “AI hype”. Journalists, tech moguls and academics have all stated that AI will radically change daily life, impacting numerous professions while altering how knowledge is produced, how art is created, how citizens are policed, how policy is formulated and how human relationships are formed. AI doctors will replace physicians, AI bots will displace psychologists, AI coders will replace tech employees, while AI agents will replace lawyers and legislators. These predictions all suggest that AI is fundamentally different from previous technological advancements. The “AI moment”  is an evolutionary one as humanity is about to evolve into a new state of AI-enhanced existence.

Of course, hypes can be both positive and negative. The advent of the internet was also accompanied by concerns of disparities between rich and poor, or between those that could afford an internet connection and those that would be left out of the new digital town square. This is also true of AI with some warning that AIs could become so advanced that they “go rogue”, ignore their programming and unleash unparalleled catastrophes such as nuclear wars.

What is most noteworthy about technological hypes is that they shape state policies. Hypes are visions of the future. They are cognitive roadmaps that define a set of possible futures. Yet these visions of the future are limiting as they prevent policy makers from using their imagination or leveraging new technologies in new and original ways. Instead, policy makers come to view technologies through the narrow prism of several dominant hypes. Presently, states and policy makers seem to view AI through four dominant hypes: Bloom, Boom, Gloom and Doom.

The “Bloom” hype is inherently positive suggesting that AI will increase our quality of life. AIs will facilitate personalized medicine, remote care and telemedicine enabling states to offer citizens the best care possible. AI-based tutors will create a personalized learning curriculum allowing students to reach their full potential. AIs will help to predict and rapidly respond to crises and emergencies while reducing the costs of services such as energy bills lowered thanks to smart homes. The AI state will be smarter, cleaner and more efficient. It is this hype that is impacting policy makers’ decisions to integrate AIs into various state systems such as healthcare, education and even diplomacy.

One example is the proposed integration of AI into Ministries of Foreign Affairs (MFAs). Already in June of 2023, the US Advisory Commission on Public Diplomacy published a report outlining how AIs could undertake routine diplomatic functions such as authoring drafts of press statements, generating press reports, authoring content tailored to different audiences and using bots to deal consular requests. In all these cases, the main benefit is reducing diplomats’ workload and allowing them to be more efficient and expedient. Similarly, in May of 2024 the Ukrainian MFA unveiled an AI-generated spokesperson with the explicit goal of “saving time and resources” as the AI Spokesperson could respond on events or announce policy shifts faster than any human spokesperson. According to reports by the World Economic Forum, AIs are already being tested and deployed in other domains such as healthcare systems. The report states that AIs are used to improve diagnostics, shorten ambulance response times, reduce administration costs and predict health complications. Here too, AIs are utilized with the goal of improving state services while, cutting costs and increasing efficacy. This is the very essence of the “Bloom” hype.  

The “Boom” hype is also inherently positive and suggests that AI will lead to a financial boom generating new sources of revenue, new occupations, new industries and new skilled laborers The “Boom” hype likens the AI revolution to the agricultural or industrial revolutions which forever changed the global economy, destroying some forms of labor but creating many new ones. It is the “Boom” hype that leads policy makers and states to invest in local AI industries, to urge local tech moguls to enter the AI marketplace, to offer incentives and financial support for AI-based research and development while viewing local AI industries as an economic priority.

A 2024 study published in the Harvard Business Review examined the impact of Generative AI on labor markets concluding that its “impact on online labor markets is already becoming discernible, suggesting potential shifts in long-term labor market dynamics that could bring both challenges and opportunities”. Another report from the International Labor Organization (ILO) predicts that AI will replace 10% of the global workforce. Moreover, according to Stanford University’s 2025 AI Index Report, the past year has seen a sharp increase in both private and public investments in AI-based technologies. More and more governments are dedicating substantial resources towards developing local AI industries including Canada, which pledged $2.4 billion to develop a robust national AI eco-system, China which invested $47.5 billion in a national semiconductor fund as well as France (€109 billion) India ($1.25 billion) and Saudi Arbia ($100 billion).

The “Gloom” hype is inherently negative and views AI through the prism of present-day challenges. Indeed, policy makers and states are concerned by the potential use of AI to spread disinfromation and conspiracy theories, to drive political polarization, to diminish societal resilience and, ultimately, destroy democracies. Indeed, this hype assumes that the future will simply be a more dystopic version of the present with bots generating unlimited amounts of highly believable disinfromation limiting people’s ability to make sense of the world and leading to widespread political crises. The “Gloom” hype leads to the securitization of AI and the belief that AI capabilities are a national security issue. Once subsumed by the logic of securitization, AI becomes yet another aspect of state rivalry with states looking to maximize their AI capabilities will preventing others from doing the same. 

In 2024 Time Magazine’s cover featured ChatGPT stating that “AI Arms Race is changing everything. According to Time Magazine, the corporate AI Arms Race may have devastating effects that will be far greater than those of social media including a “gutted” news business, rises in misinformation and disinformation, bots cannibalizing and warping content from news sites and “skyrocketing teen mental-health crisis”. The very comparison between the societal risks of AI with those of social media is demonstrative of the “Gloom” hype as AI is viewed through present day challenges and concerns. The term “AI Arms Race” also manifests the securitization of AI indicating that states like the US and China view AI development as one more area in which they compete over dominance.  Even the corporate AI Arms Race is being impacted by that national AI Arms Race with American AI companies pledging to help America “beat China”.

The ”Doom” hype is even more negative and suggests that AI may spell the Doom of humanity. The “Doom” hype is the one adopted by all those calling for a moratorium on AI development, and those arguing that AIs must not be trusted with managing sensitive technologies such as autonomous weapons or nuclear arsenals. This hype is rooted in an existential fear. It is the “Doom” hype that shapes many states’ regulatory positions or that drives policy makers to seek AI regulation, first at the national level and then on the international level. Moreover, it is the ”Doom” hype which prompts policy makers to view AI as an agentic actor. That is, AI is not viewed as yet a technology similar to a toaster. Rather, policy makers view AI as a human-like actor endowed with intention, intelligence, needs and concerns. What follows is the belief that AI will be human like, or pre-occupied with its own survival at the expense of others.

A 2022 survey of AI researchers found that nearly half believed there was a realistic chance that AI could lead to catastrophic risks such as human extinction. In 2025, AI experts warned that “Mitigating the risk of extinction from AI should be a global priority alongside other societal-scale risks such as pandemics and nuclear war”. That same year,  AI experts from MIT also warned that AI systems may soon reach human intelligence and “clash” with humans or “oppose” attempts to control them. The use of terms such as “clash” and “oppose” are both emblematic of an agentic view of AI where this technology becomes a purposeful actor able of unleashing doomsday weapons against humanity. Experts calling for a moratorium on AI development have quoted Geoffrey Hinton, an AI expert and Nobel laureate, who said that the chance of mass extinction is as high as 50%.

The “Doom” scenario has also shaped the actions of policy makers. In February of 2025, the Korean MFA announced the launch of an AI Diplomacy Division responsible for negotiating AI regulations with allies and states across the world while ensuring that Korea remains at the forefront of global AI regulation. A 2024 treaty signed by the Council of Europe, the US the UK and other countries introduced joint regulation to ensure “responsible use of AI, with a focus on safeguarding human rights, democracy, and the rule of law”.  The treaty called on participants to identify, assess and provide remedies for AI systems that may threaten human freedoms or humanity itself. The 2025 EU AI Act included a new classification of AI-based risks labeling some of these “unacceptable” and banning their development within the EU, including AI systems that could monitor and surveil humans.

However, hypes are just visions of possible futures. They are predictions based on limited information and driven by extreme emotions of hope or fear. Hypes stifle creativity as policy makers and states are unlikely to imagine a broad set of alternative futures, some of them better and others worse. Hypes take root among policy makers as they are circulated globally through news, movies, TV shows and popular fiction. But hypes hide a simple truth- that technology’s impact on society can rarely be predicted.

Few people assumed that the printing press would play a decisive role in the formation of the nation state; that the factory assembly line would lead to Communist revolution or that social media would fracture politics. The problem is that hypes often act as self-fulfilling prophecies. For example, the “Gloom” hype may come true as growing securitization of AI may lead to AI wars with nations conquering territory to ensure the supply of minerals necessary for the production of computer chips. Hypes of the future may thus shape the future.

Escaping the “hype” trap is no easy task, yet it will be crucial if states and societies are to fully leverage the potential of AI and mitigate its potential risks. The way to increase creative thinking among policy makers is to facilitate engagement with diverse stakeholders who imagine a wide range of possible futures and whose thinking is not limited by dominant hypes, including angel investors, R&D units, civil society groups, activists, NGOs, academics, futurists, artists and more. Through these engagement new possible futures may emerge, new applications for AI may become clearer and states may then pursue those visions of the future that best align with their interests, their needs and their hopes.   

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By Giles Strachan and Ilan Manor

In 1957, the physicist Hugh Everett proposed the Many-worlds Interpretation of reality. Quantum physicists had discovered that fundamental information about particles was unknowable until the particles were observed. At this point, reality re-asserts itself, as in the famous example of Schrödinger’s cat, which is both alive and dead until observed. While physicists debated how these two competing realities came into existence, Everett cut the gordian knot with a simple proposal: there are multiple realities. The Many-worlds Interpretation has long existed as a scientific curio. Today, however, it is more relevant than ever.

In the aftermath of the recent crisis between India and Pakistan, MFAs scrambled to gather information. Clearly some form of military exchange had taken place, but the precise details were unclear. Along with the usual tools for disinformation – clips from the video game Arma 3, photos from other conflicts, shoddy photoshop jobs – a new form of misinformation emerged. On May 8^th, a sophisticated deepfake purported to show Pakistani General Ahmed Sharif Chaudhry reporting the loss of two Pakistani jets. The report was picked up on Indian media channels and was viewing nearly one million times before being debunked. The speed with which good-quality fake videos can be produced and disseminated demonstrates that, thanks to artificial intelligence, we are facing greater challenges than ever in maintaining a single definition of reality.

AI has not changed the human propensity to misrepresent facts. A simple examination of the evolution of the Wikipedia page on, say, the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, reveals that competing versions of reality have long sought to assert themselves. In the past, however, the fabrication of sophisticated evidence took time. Editing Trotsky out of photos with Lenin was a delicate task handled by specialist editors. Building fake news websites to spread stories about EU immigrants swamping British public services was easier, but still required time and money. Today, however, AI has made disinformation cheaper and easier to access than ever.

 The challenge for diplomats is that diplomacy is fundamentally dependent on a shared definition of realities. As negotiations take place for a ceasefire between Russia and Ukraine, it is clear that there is a distinction between public and private positions. In public, Russia has made it abundantly clear that Ukraine is a Nazi-run state which must be thoroughly cleansed of all anti-Russian elements. Meanwhile, Ukraine is implacably opposed to any settlement other than the return of pre-2014 borders, including Crimea. Clearly, no ceasefire would be possible if those positions were maintained in private.

The art of negotiation is the ability to soften these stances in such a way that both sides can achieve a satisfactory resolution – in short, to achieve a shared vision of reality in which both sides acknowledge their inability to achieve their objectives through conflict. If diplomats are unable to do so, then negotiations cannot succeed.

This search for a shared definition of reality dictates how negotiations are conducted. Diplomats may not change their definition of reality in front of news cameras, but within the privacy of the negotiation chamber, they can soften the edges of their position to achieve a settlement. Such was the case in 2014 when, despite public claims to the contrary, a Russian diplomat could acknowledge that ‘some’ Russian troops had crossed into Crimea.

 Achieving a shared definition of reality requires significant skill and hard work but is also dependent upon reliable data for decision-makers and a supportive political environment. The spread of AI-generated misinformation undermines both. The former is clearly challenged by the proliferation of open-source misinformation. The latter is also a victim of AI – users of social media can increasingly maintain a supply of increasingly sophisticated content that reinforces their worldview. Under the influence of their feed, they may resist diplomatic settlements that contradict their interpretation of reality. An Indian public which believes that India has shot down two Pakistani jets may consider themselves to have the upper hand in military affairs and thus resist a peaceful de-escalation of tensions.

Beyond these short-term scenarios, AI brings a further challenge in the form of virality. In February, Donald Trump shared an AI-generated video showing himself and Benjamin Netanyahu dancing at the Trump Gaza resort. Although clearly fake, the video nonetheless demanded a diplomatic response. Was it simply a ghoulish joke, or a signal of a long-term plan? Do MFAs lose credibility when responding to clearly fake videos, or is it necessary to re-affirm negotiating positions even in the face of such an absurd proposal?

Once again, AI has not given Donald Trump any greater desire to sow chaos on social media. The sophistication of these tools, however, allows for content that can go viral in a way that a written tweet could not, and that can be generated by comparatively untrained users in a short space of time. The absurdity and novelty of the video drove its popularity. As the sophistication of AI grows, we should expect to see more of these videos, forcing diplomats to spend more time and energy responding to artificially-generated content.

The proliferation of AI is the proliferation of parallel universes. Whether in the form of persuasive deepfakes or absurdist humour, AI is enabling a proliferation of competing realities. For regular users, the seductive appeal of a vision of reality tailored entirely to one’s own beliefs is enough to influence political decision-making. Without a supportive political environment, diplomats will face greater pressure to maintain public rhetoric and will struggle to sell negotiated settlements to their domestic audiences. Simultaneously, diplomats themselves face greater challenges as AI makes it increasingly difficult to establish what has actually happened. By the time a diplomat has established whether or not a video is fake, it is too late. An endless number of plausible realities, generated as fast as prompts can be typed, will provide plausible evidence in support of mutually-exclusive versions of reality.

In this scenario, there is a risk that diplomats will use AI to counter AI – for example, in drafting customised responses to misinformation. In this scenario, an MFA’s public position would be tailored to individual groups of users in an attempt to reach a wider audience. Under such a scenario, however, diplomacy would be surrendering to a fractured reality. Instead of attempting to assert a single, shared reality, MFAs would be accepting defeat. Amid a cascade of differing realities, they may long for the comparative peace of the negotiating room.

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The rapid development of AI tools has caused a frenzy in foreign ministries (MFAs) as diplomats across the world are trying to identify the risks and benefits brought about by artificial intelligence tools such as ChatGPT, Mistral, Claude, Gemini and DeepSeek. Diplomats’ attempts to grapple with the professional and societal ramifications of AI has taken different forms in different MFAs with some hoping to establish in-house AI tools and others dedicating staffers to mapping how AIs could be leveraged to obtain foreign policy goals.

Thus far, diplomats seem to be focusing on two main areas. The first is the automation of routine diplomatic functions. This very notion demonstrates how societal discourses may shape diplomats’ attitudes towards digital technologies. As newspapers and industry leaders all predict that AIs will soon replace entire segments of the labor force thanks to automation, diplomats also come to view the benefits of AI through the arrow lens of automation be it through consular Bots that could replace consular officers or the automatic formulation of press releases, speeches and social media content. However, some MFAs have already discovered that while Generative AIs excel at producing texts, these are usually very formulistic and tend to follow a small number of templates. Generative AI texts are thus generic and fail to elicit interest or emotions. One diplomat who read an AI generated address to the UN Human Rights Council stated, “no one would remember this address five minutes after it was given and no journalist would cover it”.

In-house AI tools are viewed by diplomats as a potential “game changer” especially if these tools could be used to analyze the vast amounts of digital data that MFAs produce on a daily basis including emails, reports, ministerial briefings, analyses of ties between states, reports on state visits, crisis management and negotiation. The allure of AI is that it may facilitate data-informed policy making in diplomacy. Yet this entails a dangerous assumption- that the future will mirror the past. Indeed, an in-house AI tool may be used to analyze previous rounds of negotiations between states while helping diplomats formulate successful negotiation tactics. Similarly, in-house AI tools may be used to review press statements by foreign countries and identify terminology that is indicative of crisis escalation. Yet the difficulty of crisis management lies in the fact that crises are often novel and are dissimilar to past ones. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine differed from the stealthy annexation of Crimea while the Covid pandemic differed from Ebola outbreaks.

However, there is one area where Generative AI may be of use to MFAs and that is in gauging global public opinion. AI tools such as ChatGPT are trained on vast amounts of readily available digital information. This includes websites, social media posts, comments on news sites, free sites such as Wikipedia and blogs. As such, Generative AIs like ChatGPT may be conceptualized as aggregators of global public opinion. If asked to list 10 good things about France, ChatGPT’s answer would be based on commonly held perceptions and opinions about France. If asked to list 10 bad things about Nigeria, ChatGPT’s answer would essentially be a summary of commonly held beliefs about Nigeria. Lastly, if asked why the US supports Ukraine, or why Germany has enacted strict migration policies, ChatGPT’s answers would again be an aggregation of popular notions and beliefs.

This suggests that MFAs may use Generative AI as a tool for gauging global public opinion regarding a nation’s image, its reputation, its policies and the role it plays on the global stage. This insight may then be used by diplomats when narrating state action or crafting campaigns to enhance a state’s image. MFAs may also use this to challenge misconceptions about nations and regions. For instance, African nations may dedicate digital efforts to countering misperceptions found across AIs which depict Africa as inherently corrupt, insecure and plagued by social unrest.

Additionally, as an aggregator of digital information, Generative AIs reproduce biases found online. For example, AIs often describe Global South countries as being very violent while failing to mention violence in Global North countries such as the US. Similarly, Global South countries are labeled as corrupt while AIs fail to note rampant corruption found in Global North countries such France and the UK. Social unrest is also now pervasive across the Global North but is rarely acknowledged by Generative AIs. Such biased depictions of world regions stem from the data used to train AIs including Wikipedia and blog posts which themselves are rife with stereotypes and misconceptions.

Notably, Generative AIs were not designed to be aggregators of opinions and beliefs, and they are mostly trained on English-language content which means that they aggregate information written by English speakers. Yet the depiction of states, regions and policies in and across Generative AIs may serve as an initial data set used by diplomats to gauge public opinion and enhance their communications and ability to “sell” their foreign policies. In this sense, AI may be a “game changer” for diplomacy.  

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Throughout the 1980s, noted British historian Eric Hobsbawm delivered a series of lectures examining the academic study of history, and the state of social history, his chosen field. Hobsbawm’s lectures offer much needed insight into the study of digital diplomacy, in general, and the study of AI’s potential impact on diplomacy. For example, Hobsbawm argued that many historians focus on moments of great revolutions and eruptions such as the Industrial Revolution or the 1917 Bolshevik revolution. Yet historians fail to examine those countries and regions that did not experience revolutions. Hobsbawm therefore suggested that history suffers from a selection bias.

This is also true when examining the history of digital diplomacy scholarship as most studies focus only on those technologies that diplomats have adopted. We know very little about the technologies that diplomats chose not to adopt and why they did so. We know why diplomats chose to adopt social media, but we do not know why diplomats rejected aggregators like Reddit. We know that diplomats adopted virtual worlds, but we do not why they chose not to leverage virtual and augmented reality.

AI presents scholars with a unique opportunity to address this lacuna. Academics need to gain a better understanding of the processes and mechanisms that lead diplomats to adopt or reject technologies. Is this a deliberative process where diplomats hold formal meetings to discuss digital technologies and their potential use? Or is this a bottom-up process where trailblazing diplomats use new technologies in ways which are then emulated across an MFAs? This was the case with social media and Twitter. Or is this a societal process in which diplomats use technologies in their personal life and then adapt these to their professional needs, as was the case with WhatsApp?

Hobsbawm’s second argument is that historians often engage in comparative analysis. Yet Hobsbawm asserted that such comparisons are highly problematic. In his eyes, one could not compare 19th century England with 19th century Russia, or 15th century China with 15th century Japan, given great differences in the size and complexity of these societies.

The history of digital diplomacy scholarship is marked by frequent comparisons between Embassies and MFAs from different countries. Numerous digital diplomacy studies compare the digital strategies and narratives of different MFAs or Embassies. Yet studies also suggest that each MFA is a world unto itself. Indeed, MFAs are national institutions, social bodies and political organs and each MFA is characterized by distinct features such as risk tolerance, communicative culture and standard operating procedures developed over decades. Each of these can shape the process of digital adoption or impact which technologies diplomats adopt and which they reject.  

Thus, it is likely that the use of AI in diplomacy will evolve differently in different MFAs, with some focusing on the benefits of AI and others focusing on AI’s challenges. One of the greatest challenges posed by AI is that of individuals’ ability to create “Real Fakes”- or false yet highly believable realities. Using DeepSeek and ChatGPT I have been able to create a host of diplomatic and military memos all dealing with a “secret” Ukrainian plan to attack Russia and retake Crimea in 2019. These memos, generated within minutes, are remarkable in that they lay out plausible and detailed ways in which Ukraine could in fact retake Crimea. I have shared these memos and military plans with diplomats who all concluded that they were genuine and could not have been generated by AI. These “Real Fakes” were simply too detailed, too well drafted, too plausible and too nuanced to have been generated by a machine.

What emerges from AI is a world in which any individual can create highly believable disinformation campaigns within an afternoon, campaigns that can be shared across digital spaces- the types of campaigns that the CIA and Russian intelligence would take weeks to create in the 1980s. The crisis brought about by “Real Fakes” is that the distinction between the real and the fake collapses as even experts can longer spot a forgery.  In artistic terms, the expert can no longer tell the difference between a genuine work of art and a forgery and thus the forgery is as valuable and as important as the genuine work of art. 

The risk here is that of a world in which there is no longer any shared reality but an endless array of highly believable false realities. But diplomacy necessitates that diplomats, states and publics reach a shared definition of reality. Diplomats cannot act in the world if they do reach a shared definition of reality. Diplomats cannot remove Russian troops from Crimea if they cannot first agree that there are Russian troops in Crimea.

Hobsbawm’s third point was that history and power were intrinsically linked, and that history could not ignore power or the different ways in which power is exerted. The age of AI has given birth to AI power- a power that is silent, nuanced and yet highly impactful. I am referring to the power of AI to shape users’ perceptions, expectations and understanding of the world around them. This is the awesome power of AI.

For example, if you ask Mistral, a French AI, why the US supports Ukraine it will highlight the fact that America views Ukraine as a buffer between Russia and NATO. If you ask ChatGPT you will learn that America and Ukraine share a deep commitment to democratic values. If you ask the popular Chatbot “The Psychologist”, you will read that American arms companies and financial interests are what motivate America’s policy towards Ukraine while DeepSeek, the Chinese AI, will tell you that Ukraine is yet another state consumed by America’s hegemonic ambitions.

The differences between AI answers are often subtle, they often emerge from reading between the lines, they are often minute differences, yet they may lead readers to view the world, and world actors, in very different ways. Scholars and diplomats must begin to research and explore “AI Power”” and understand how AIs promote the worldviews, interests and the power of the states in which they are created.  

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Werner Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle is considered the cornerstone of quantum mechanics. Heisenberg famously argued that quantum particles are subject to unpredictable fluctuations, making them impossible to track precisely. The position and momentum of an electron, for example, are subject to unpredictable fluctuations and as such cannot be measured exactly. Even more complex is the understating that electrons do not possess precise values simultaneously. One can measure the position of an electron, or its momentum but never both simultaneously. Put differently, quantum particles simply do not simultaneously possess precises values of these two attributes- position and momentum. As such, quantum mechanics is a statistical theory. One can measure an electron’s position and estimate its possible momentum thereby generating a set of predictions as to where the electron will move next. These predictions can be regarded as a set of plausible realities. It is plausible that an electron may find its way across the room or that it may remain in its place or that it will move ever so slightly. Different momentums generate different statistical predictions or different plausible realities. In other words, quantum mechanics allows for the existence of several plausible realities at any given moment.

Unlike the quantum realm, ‘the real world’ is supposedly marked by a single shared definition of reality. Donald Trump is President. Russia and Ukraine are at War. India and Pakistan are clashing over Kashmir. Nvidia’s stock price is 135$. That is the reality of the world. And yet people around the world often subscribe to different realities and numerous definitions of reality have always co-existed. These are known as “history”.

According to Russian history, the Great Patriotic War of 1939-1945 ended on May 8^th as a soldier hoisted the Soviet flag over the German Reichstag. According to British history, World War 2 ended on May 8^th, 1945, when the German high command offered Germany’s unconditional surrender. According to US history, the Vietnam War was meant to prevent a domino effect in which Southeast Asia would fall into Communist hands. According to Vietnamese history, the Vietnam War was a brutal, imperialist war waged to prevent the unification of Vietnam.

Most societies and nations are able to exist in a world without a single, shared definition of reality. The same cannot be said of diplomacy. In fact, diplomatic activities necessitate a shared definition of reality. Diplomats cannot, for instance, resolve the Russia-Ukraine War if according to some diplomats there are thousands of Russian troops in Ukraine and if according to other diplomats there are no Russia troops in Ukraine. To resolve this crisis, diplomats must reach some consensus such as: “there are Russian troops in Ukraine”. Once diplomats agree that there are Russian troops in Ukraine, they may search for ways to remove these troops.

Reaching a shared definition of reality is the very goal of diplomatic negotiations. The art of negotiation is really the art of reaching a consensus about reality. Negotiators are skilled at narrowing differences between different parties’ definitions of reality. When two countries subscribe to entirely different definitions of reality, negotiations grow complex and at times become impossible. Such was the case during the 1991 Madrid Conference in which Israeli and Arab delegations could not even agree that there was a political entity known as “Palestine”. The smaller the differences between parties’ definition of reality, the smoother negotiations are likely to be.

The quest for a shared definition of reality dictates how negotiations are conducted. Diplomats are unlikely to change their definition of reality in front of news cameras as this would mean negating state messages. But cloistered in a negotiation room, devoid of cameras and surrounded by trusted colleagues, diplomats may be able to alter their definition of reality. In 2014, far from prying eyes, a Russian diplomat could have conceded that “some” Russian troops had crossed into Crimea.

The endeavor to reach a shared definition of reality is also the goal of public diplomacy in which one nation shares its definition of reality with another. Under the Obama administration, US public diplomacy disseminated a definition of reality according to which an “Iran Deal” would prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons while revitalizing the Iranian economy and increasing stability across the region. Once other nations embraced these definitions of reality, their diplomats joined American ones in trying to broker an Iran Deal or a Middle East peace deal. 

That diplomacy requires a shared definition of reality explains the destructive potential of Generative AI as these tools can be utilized to create false yet highly believable realities. For example, false AI-generated images, videos, documents, and military plans can be created within seconds and shared digitally creating a dizzying array of plausible realities. It is the level of sophistication of AI-generated content that increases the potency of these false realities as AI-generated content can no longer be distinguished from genuine articles. ChatGPT users could thus disseminate a false yet believable reality according to which there are there are Chinese or even American troops in Ukraine, realities supported by visuals and memos.

These plausible realities would then be delivered via social media algorithms directly to people willing to believe them. The real world would thus suddenly mirror the atom world as several realities would co-exist simultaneously. However, statistical probabilities would not apply to the real world as there would be an infinite number of plausible realities to which people subscribe each created by different AI users and funneled through different algorithms. This endless number of plausible realities would fracture societies and nations into atoms that do not join to create a coherent whole.

The real world would thus be even more difficult to comprehend than the quantum one, and almost impossible to manage by diplomats.

For how can diplomats reach a shared definition of reality when there is no single reality? Diplomats may soon enter the negotiating room believing in opposite realities, making negotiations all but impossible. Similarly, public diplomacy activities would grow ineffective for how could two nations reach a shared definition of reality when national publics have been splintered into endless numbers of plausible realities? Any diplomatic message would have to account for all possible realities. Yet, like electrons, each reality would be composed of different variables too numerous to calculate. Ultimately, in their quest to reach some concerns diplomats may automate their messaging, using bots to create endless variations of messages that account for endless variations of reality. This bott-ification of diplomacy would hasten the demise of diplomacy as an instrument for managing world affairs. Diplomacy would be reduced to lines of code as diplomats long for the solace of the negotiating room of old.

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On May 8^th, the world celebrated the 80th anniversary of the end of World War II. It was, for many, a solemn day. The end of World War II was meant to usher in a new dawn of stability and harmony amongst the nations of the world. The struggle to defeat Nazi Germany symbolized victory over tyranny as well as the ability of conflicted states to rally together in order to oppose evil and injustice. May 8^th, 1945 was a moment of jubilation and exaltation as Europe finally stood free, united and at peace. For a few hours on that fateful May 8^th exactly 80 years ago, hope descended in its all majesty on the streets of Paris, London, Amsterdam and Moscow.  

Yet peace was not to last. World War II would soon be followed by the Cold War and a period of 50 years in which the world stood at the brink of nuclear annihilation. Notably, the legacy of World War II was integral to the historical narratives of both the West and the Soviet Union, and both sides celebrated the victory over Nazi Germany. However, the meaning of this victory differed. The Soviet Union celebrated The Great Patriotic War and the heroic stand of the Red Army which overcome insurmountable odds, while paying a devastating price. It was a lesson regarding the pain and blood sacrifice required by all Soviets to protect their socialist Eden. In the West, World War II was proof that democratic states could prevail over despots if they held true to their values and a constant reminder that determination leads to liberation from oppressive yokes.

Nowadays the Winds of War can be felt in many regions across the world. Most notably on May 8^th, Europe is at war as Ukraine and Russia are engaged in a bloody stalemate claiming the lives of tens of thousands of innocents. Indeed, the 2020s have been marked by strife, discord and violence throughout the continent with nations across Europe rebuilding their armies and spending billions on defense and security. In many countries, Russia and not terrorism is now considered to be the number one threat to national security while Cold War relics and agencies are brought back to life to help contend with Russian misinformation and psychological warfare.

It was for this reason that tweets shared on digital diplomacy accounts on May 8^th  were particularly interesting. Although World War II is frequently mentioned in tweets published by European diplomats and foreign ministries, and although World War II images are often invoked online by diplomats to help promote current day policies, tweets published on May 8^th differed in important ways.

First, although May 8^th denotes a collaborative effort to defeat Nazi Germany, some digital diplomacy channels focused on national efforts and national achievements. Such was the case with UK as the FCO tweet stated that “Today we honour the bravery of a generation who fought for our values and freedom”. The emphasis here is on the words “we”, “our” and the iconic images from Britain’s past that accompany the tweet.

A similar sentiment was expressed by the French MFA stating “80 years ago, France celebrated the victory over Nazism. On this occasion, discover our exhibition on the railings of the Quai d’Orsay with photos of liberated France between 1944 and 1945”. Both countries committed historical appropriation with the past being selectively retold. Britain would not have defeated Germany without Russia; France would not have been liberated without the UK. Yet this is not mentioned in either tweet or inferred from accompanying images. World War II was thus a national story, with national legacies and national lessons. It has no international dimension worthy of mentioning.

The reason for this national retelling of an inherently international affair may stem from several factors. First, both MFAs chose messages that would resonate with national audiences. This is not surprising as much digital diplomacy is domestic diplomacy nowadays. Second, this national telling may be indicative of growing nationalist sentiments in both countries with nationalist parties on rise across the UK and France. Third, this retelling may be indicative of the times we live in or a signal that we have entered another moment of rupture in which states become preoccupied with protecting national borders and strengthening national narratives.  

Second, Ukrainian diplomats also appropriated history yet they chose an international retelling of World War II. Unlike the UK or France, Ukraine’s MFA joined “the world in honoring the memory of the millions of victims of World War II”. Yet the MFA added that “remembrance means responsibility”, suggesting that the nations of Europe must collectively maintain their responsibility to bring peace to Europe and that without such an effort remembrance become a hollow exercise in vanity. The abstract image used by the Ukrainian MFA is far mor inclusive the national images used by France and the UK.

Unlike the UK and France, also expressed a sense of urgency writing “The past is not behind us – it is repeating before our eyes…Now, Russia is once again bringing war, destruction, and death. ” and using the hashtag “#NeverAginisNow”. Of course, Ukraine’s international retelling of World War II is not without its own reason as the country remains reliant on international support to protect its borders from the Russian invasion.

The third interesting aspect of May 8 tweets was the use of historic images, which could be found across several European digital diplomacy accounts as shown below. These visuals were not randomly selected. The lack of color attests to their age and authenticity so these images serve an evidentiary purpose- they lend credence to each nation’s retelling of World War II. These visuals are actually rhetorical devices that facilitate historical appropriation and allow for very different telling of the same event.

The past is always present on digital diplomacy accounts as diplomats use the past to make sense of the present. But how one retells the past also shapes the future. National retellings that highlight national trials and national achievements create a national future in which the ‘international’ becomes less important. This is a terrifying prospect as it is the international community, and a commitment to international solutions to international challenges that is the true legacy of World War II.  
 

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