“Artificial intelligence is not just algorithms or data. It is power, control, and sovereignty. The 21st century is being decided in servers, in submarine cables, and in digital laws that will determine who rules the new global order.”
Artificial intelligence is the new gunpowder of the 21st century. It doesn’t smell of sulfur and leaves no smoke on battlefields, but its blast has already changed how we think, produce, and govern. What once seemed like science fiction has become the silent weapon contested by states, corporations, and armies.
The leap was brutal. In 2022, ChatGPT burst onto the scene and, within months, seized the global conversation. Google answered with Gemini, Anthropic launched Claude, Meta released Llama, and the digital board exploded. Algorithms stopped being tools hidden in labs to become public actors—opining, writing, creating images, designing code, even guiding financial or military decisions. The economic impact was measured in the billions. In 2023 alone, AI investments surpassed $50 billion in the United States, while China allocated another $25 billion not to fall behind.
Humanity faces a dilemma that allows no evasions. Do we control artificial intelligence—or does artificial intelligence control us? Are algorithms a mirror of our civilization, or the new cage where we will be trapped? The sovereignty of the future is at stake in that tension, because it is no longer enough to have armies or oil reserves. Today the frontier between freedom and dependence is measured in servers, chips, and code.
The Birth of AI
Artificial intelligence did not appear from nowhere. Its seed was planted in the 1940s when Norbert Wiener founded cybernetics and warned that machines could learn to correct themselves. In the postwar moment, his words sounded like heresy and impossible science, but the germ was already set in universities and U.S. military laboratories.
In 1956 a group of young researchers led by John McCarthy organized a seminar at Dartmouth that became legend. There, the term “artificial intelligence” was born and the idea took shape that a machine could imitate human thought processes. The Cold War supplied the fuel. The Pentagon financed computer vision and language projects because it intuited that the next weapon would not be the hydrogen bomb but algorithmic calculation.
Decades later, in 1997, the world witnessed a symbolic blow: Deep Blue, IBM’s supercomputer, defeated world chess champion Garry Kasparov. It was no trick and no simulation; it announced that computing power could beat human creativity on its own turf. That day began the era of technological fear.
But the real takeoff arrived in the 21st century with the explosion of data and processor power. Algorithms stopped being theories to become search engines, recommendation systems, digital maps, medical diagnostics, and guided weapons. The global AI market, which in 2015 barely moved $10 billion, surpassed $250 billion in 2023 and continues to grow at rates above 35% annually.
The arrival of ChatGPT in 2022 was the digital equivalent of the invention of the printing press. In a few weeks, millions of users tested it, integrated it into their work, and turned it into a real economic actor. Companies, governments, and militaries understood this wasn’t an academic toy but a structural change. AI was no longer an experiment; it was a monster that had learned to speak, write, and simulate reasoning with unsettling fluency.
The first uses marked the line between utopia and threat.
• In medicine, AI began to detect early-stage tumors with accuracy surpassing radiologists.
• In finance, algorithms were used to predict stock movements in milliseconds.
• In the military sphere, drones and surveillance systems powered by AI changed the logic of war. Each application opened a door to progress—but also a window to control and dependence.
From Wiener to ChatGPT, AI’s trajectory shows that what began as an academic promise became a battlefield for power. It wasn’t an accident; it was historical design. Algorithms were not born neutral; they were born under the shadow of the Pentagon, technological competition, and market logic. The monster was always destined to grow—and today it threatens to overwhelm its own creators.
Silicon Valley and the Algorithmic Monopoly
The heart of AI beats in Silicon Valley. There, a handful of corporations concentrate the world’s algorithmic power with a force comparable to oil in the 1970s or gold in the Early Modern era. Google, Microsoft, Meta, OpenAI, and Amazon are not just tech giants; they are empires capable of influencing governments and redrawing the global economy with a single strategic decision.
• Google bet billions on Gemini, its language model intended to avoid losing ground to OpenAI.
• Microsoft invested more than $13 billion in that same company and today controls much of its development.
• Meta released Llama as an open-weight model that draws millions of developers and repositions the battle for influence.
• Amazon, through AWS, concentrates nearly 40% of cloud infrastructure and becomes an indispensable provider for any AI project. The stock market rewarded these bets: in 2024 the five largest U.S. techs together surpassed $10.5 trillion in market cap, a figure larger than the combined GDP of Germany and Japan.
The dominance is not explained by software alone. The real muscle is in hardware and data centers. In 2023, the big techs spent more than $200 billion on digital infrastructure, double the 2019 investment. The power consumption of AI data centers is estimated to be already 2% of global electricity demand and could reach 6% by 2030. Every server is a brick in the new world power—and almost all depend on U.S. technology.
The monopoly has a proper name: chips.
• Nvidia, founded in 1993, became AI’s indispensable engine. Its GPUs represent more than 80% of the global market and its market value surpassed $3.3 trillion in 2024, becoming the most valuable company on the planet.
• Taiwan’s TSMC manufactures most of those processors, turning the island into a strategic enclave of global geopolitics. Intel, though lagging, is trying to regain space with new AI-dedicated chip lines, fully aware that without semiconductors no algorithm runs.
The rest of the world watches—and depends. Europe regulates, China competes, India develops software, but AI’s backbone remains under U.S. control. The most advanced models are hosted on servers in California, Oregon, or Virginia, and any country that wants to compete must rent compute from those corporations. Dependence is absolute. This isn’t just about programs; it’s about digital sovereignty.
China and the Route of Red Algorithms
China understood early that AI would be the motor of the 21st century. In 2015 it launched the Made in China 2025 strategy to dominate ten strategic sectors, including robotics, semiconductors, and AI. Two years later, in 2017, the State Council presented the New Generation Artificial Intelligence Development Plan—AI Plan 2030—which set a brutal horizon: make China the world leader in AI before decade’s end.
The digital giants aligned with that goal.
• Baidu, with its Ernie model, challenges ChatGPT in natural language.
• Tencent and Alibaba integrate algorithms into social networks, e-commerce, and financial services used by over a billion people every day.
• Huawei, banned in the West, poured billions into developing its own chips and 5G networks that now power much of the planet.
These companies aren’t “private” in the Western sense; they are arms of the Chinese state responding to the central strategy of the Communist Party.
The figures are stark. In 2023, China invested over $14 billion in specific AI projects, and annual spending in the sector already exceeds $30 billion, with projected growth of 25% annually through 2030. It possesses more than 230 high-performance supercomputers—several among the world’s most powerful—dedicated to training language models and scientific simulations. In chips, despite U.S. sanctions, China achieved notable advances: in 2023, Huawei presented a 7-nanometer processor made locally—a symbolic blow showing capacity to resist the tech blockade.
The bet is no improvisation. The Chinese government projects AI will contribute more than $1.3 trillion to GDP by 2030—about 10% of total output. It’s an integrated plan uniting public investment, state-steered private corporations, universities, and a nationwide surveillance system. While the West debates ethics, Beijing advances with pragmatism and discipline.
Comparative table: United States vs. China in AI (2023–2024)
Country | Annual AI investment (USD) | Supercomputers (TOP500) | Strategic chips | AI GDP projection 2030 (USD) | Leading firms | Political control
• United States | $50B+ | ~150 | Nvidia (80% GPUs), Intel, AMD | $1.8T | Google, Microsoft, OpenAI, Amazon, Meta | Private corporations with strong lobbying
• China | $30B+ | ~230 | Huawei, SMIC (7nm chips) | $1.3T | Baidu, Tencent, Alibaba, Huawei | Party-state controls data and firms
Europe and the Defense of Digital Sovereignty
Europe decided it could not compete with Silicon Valley’s brute force or Beijing’s centralized discipline, so it chose another path: regulation. In 2023 the European Union approved the AI Act—the world’s first comprehensive AI law—to come into force between 2024 and 2025. This legal framework sets risk categories for applications—from prohibitions like mass facial recognition to low-risk uses such as commercial chatbots. With that move, Brussels sought to set itself apart as the ethical voice of the digital future.
The problem is that rules don’t create chips or language models.
• While Europe drafts regulations,
• Google and Microsoft launch new systems,
• China deploys new supercomputers every year. European AI companies exist, but they lack the financial and technological muscle of their competitors.
• The continent depends on servers hosted in the United States and on processors made in Taiwan or Silicon Valley. The contradiction is brutal: they legislate firmly but execute with foreign hardware and software.
Europe’s strategy leans on its economic weight.
• The EU’s digital GDP is around $600 billion a year—about 4% of its total economy—but far from U.S. and Chinese levels.
• In 2023 Europe devoted just over $10 billion to direct AI investment—five times less than Washington and three times less than Beijing. Germany, France, and the Nordics concentrate most of this spend, but still cannot make the leap.
The AI Act aims to curb Big Tech’s power on European soil. It imposes algorithmic transparency, mandates labels for AI-generated content, and sets hefty fines for noncompliance. Brussels also eyes China warily: it wants to block the entry of Chinese surveillance systems, especially cameras and software from Huawei or Hikvision.
The Global South in the Invisible Battle
While the U.S. and China vie for algorithmic supremacy and Europe legislates, the Global South watches the match from the sidelines. Latin America, Africa, and much of Asia are experiencing the AI revolution with enthusiasm—but also with structural dependence that threatens to deepen the digital divide.
• Latin America: projects are incipient. Brazil concentrates nearly 50% of regional AI investment and launched its national AI strategy in 2021. Yet most systems run on Amazon or Microsoft servers. Mexico deploys AI for public administration and industry but depends on imported chips and foreign software. Chile, with its push in data science and mining, talks of AI to optimize copper and lithium production, though real applications remain limited. Combined, Latin America invests under $2 billion per year in AI—about what Google spends in a single quarter.
• Africa: the situation is more critical. The continent holds the largest reserves of strategic minerals for chipmaking—cobalt, coltan, rare earths—but lacks industrial capacity to process them or build supercomputers. Double dependence: it exports raw materials and then imports algorithms. Data centers in South Africa, Nigeria, or Kenya run largely on foreign capital, and major platforms (Google, Meta, Microsoft) control the digital infrastructure. African sovereignty dissolves in Silicon Valley’s cloud.
• India emerges as the Global South’s heavyweight. With 1.4+ billion people and a software industry employing millions of engineers, it became a key provider of digital services and a competitor in AI. Its IndiaAI Mission allocates nearly $5 billion through 2027, and local giants like Infosys and Tata Consultancy are integrating AI in banking, health, and education. India’s strength is not chips but human capital: it produces over 1.5 million computer engineers every year.
Digital inequality cuts across the map. While a worker in California uses ChatGPT to boost productivity, a student in Lima or Lagos depends on the free, limited, English-only version. While a Berlin hospital trains its own algorithms to detect cancer, a hospital in Guatemala can barely pay for U.S. software licenses.
The result is a Global South trapped in technological dependence that recalls the old colonial dependence: export raw materials, import knowledge.
The Dark Face of AI
AI does not only promise progress. It also opens Pandora’s box, threatening to devour democracy, employment, and even the notion of freedom itself. The dark face is already here—operating silently across social networks, militaries, and labor markets.
• Mass surveillance is one of its most disturbing tentacles. Facial recognition systems installed in train stations, airports, and city streets track millions in real time.
• Political manipulation has surged with generative AI: deepfakes and fake news multiply in every election cycle. In 2024, the EU estimated that over 60% of detected campaign disinformation came from automated content generation. Psychological warfare no longer needs armies—just an army of algorithms.
• Militarization is escalating. Autonomous drones capable of identifying and striking targets without human intervention are no longer a draft; they’re reality. Facial recognition integrates with military databases to locate enemies with surgical precision. Algorithmic weapons change war doctrine: whoever dominates AI needs fewer soldiers—and more servers. The AI-military market was valued at $13 billion in 2023 and will exceed $35 billion by 2030, growing over 15% annually. The U.S. and China lead, while Israel and Turkey export smart drones to dozens of countries.
Employment is the other face. Automation already erased millions of manufacturing jobs, but now AI threatens white-collar workers. Translators, journalists, junior lawyers, programmers, and designers face replacement by systems that work 24/7 without salaries or rights. The ILO warned in 2023 that AI could affect up to 300 million jobs worldwide in the next decade. It’s not hypothetical—it’s happening: global consultancies like PwC and EY use AI for accounting and legal tasks, cutting the need for human staff.
Cybersecurity is another booming front. In 2024, companies and governments spent over $180 billion to defend against AI-enhanced cyberattacks. Massive hacks, identity theft, and digital sabotage grow more sophisticated; defenders must spend astronomical sums to contain an invisible offensive.
The dark face of AI shows the future won’t be neutral. It can be a tool of liberation—or an instrument of domination—but it will never be innocent. Those who control algorithms will control information, security, and work. Humanity’s fate is at stake in that domain.
Who Controls the Future?
AI has no fixed flag. States, corporations, and international organizations compete for control—but none wields it absolutely. What’s at stake is not only ownership of algorithms, but the digital sovereignty that will define the power map of the 21st century.
• States try to keep the helm. The U.S. subsidizes its tech giants and uses the military apparatus as an anchor of dominance. China deploys a model where the Party controls data, corporations, and citizens. Europe bets on legislation—even while relying on foreign hardware. The fragmented Global South runs behind the play. Rivalry between Washington and Beijing sets the agenda; everyone else orbits those poles.
• Corporations are the most influential actors. Google, Microsoft, Meta, Amazon, Nvidia, and OpenAI command budgets bigger than many mid-sized countries. Their decisions on what model to release, what data to use, or what code to open instantly affect millions. They are accountable not to citizens, but to shareholders. That is the greatest danger: the AI architecture left in private hands without democratic control.
• International organizations arrive late and weak. The UN convened debates; UNESCO issued ethical principles in 2021. None is binding. Recommendations become wet paper against multi-billion investments. There is no global body capable of auditing the algorithms that now steer elections, wars, or financial markets.
Tensions between national sovereignty and digital sovereignty grow more visible. A country can have firm borders and strong armies, but if its data flows through foreign servers and its companies depend on imported software, its sovereignty is illusory.
Today AI advances without referees, without universal rules, without real democratic control. Digital sovereignty is up for grabs, and no pact yet guarantees the future will belong to people and not to machines.
Comparative table: Actors contesting control of AI (2024)
Actor | Main strength | Structural weakness | Examples | Impact on digital sovereignty
• States | Funding, regulation, military power | Dependence on corporations and foreign chips | U.S. (Pentagon, Big Tech subsidies), China (state control), EU (AI Act) | Set legal and geopolitical frames, but don’t always control infrastructure
• Corporations | Financial and tech resources, fast innovation | No accountability to citizens—only shareholders | Google, Microsoft, OpenAI, Meta, Amazon, Nvidia | Control data, models, servers; concentrate real algorithmic power
• International organizations | Ethical principles, forums, global legitimacy | Lack binding power and resources | UN, UNESCO, OECD | Propose ethics, but lack enforcement capacity
Backbone of the New Economy
AI is not an innocent invention or an academic toy. It is the backbone of the new economy and the engine of a geopolitics no longer measured in borders or barrels of oil, but in servers, chips, and algorithms. The world has entered an era where power isn’t disputed in trenches but in data centers—where the most lethal weapon is not a missile but a line of code.
The dilemma is brutal. If algorithms remain in private hands, democracy shrinks into a mirage ruled by shareholders. If they fall under authoritarian regimes, humanity becomes a surveilled herd. Without a global pact, the future will splinter into digital empires dictating the rules of the game.
History warns that every technological revolution opens doors to progress—and to destruction. The printing press liberated knowledge but multiplied religious wars. Nuclear energy promised endless electricity but produced Hiroshima and Nagasaki. AI offers to cure disease, optimize industry, and expand human knowledge—but it can also enslave generations under the tyranny of data.
The sovereignty of the 21st century is not measured in cannon or flags. It is measured in each people’s capacity to control the code that will guide their destiny…
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Bibliography and References
• OECD (2023). AI Policy Observatory.
• UNESCO (2021). Recommendation on the Ethics of Artificial Intelligence.
• Stanford University (2023). AI Index Report.
• McKinsey Global Institute (2023). The Economic Potential of Generative AI.
• World Economic Forum (2023). Future of Jobs Report.
• International Labour Organization (2023). Generative AI and Jobs.
• SIPRI (2024). Military Expenditure Database.
• European Union (2023). Artificial Intelligence Act.
• U.S. Department of Defense (2022). Responsible AI Strategy and Implementation Pathway.
• China State Council (2017). New Generation Artificial Intelligence Development Plan.
