Increasing progress in the field of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and greater understanding of its many potential applications in warfare have, for some time now, given rise to much heated international debate. While drone technology has already demonstrated that modern weapons of war can be ‘uninhabited’ (no human operator is to be found inside the drone) and remotely controlled, current research on AI has begun investigating the feasibility of producing autonomous weapon systems. Seducing some and scaring others, weapon systems capable of identifying, selecting and engaging military targets without human intervention could in the not too distant future be deployed on the battlefield.