Some have claimed that the future development of powerful AI systems would enable the United States to shift the international balance of power dramatically in its favor. Such a feat may not be technically possible; even so, if American AI development is perceived as a sufficiently severe threat by its nation-state adversaries, then the risk that they take extreme preventive action against the United States may rise. To bolster its security against preventive action, the United States could aim to pursue a strategy of restraint by demonstrating that it would not use powerful AI to threaten the survival of other nations. Drawing from the international relations literature that explores how states can make credible commitments, we sketch a set of options that the United States could employ to implement this strategy. In the most challenging setting, where it is certain that the US will unilaterally obtain powerful new capabilities, it is difficult to credibly commit to restraint, though an approach that layers significant policy effort with technical breakthroughs may make credibility achievable. If an adversary has realistic levels of uncertainty about the capabilities and intentions of the United States, a strategy of restraint becomes more feasible. Though restraint faces difficulties, it deserves to be weighed against alternative strategies that have been proposed for avoiding conflict during the transition to a world with advanced AI.

翻译：有人声称，强大人工智能系统的未来发展将使美国能够显著改变国际力量平衡，使其向有利于自身的方向倾斜。这一目标在技术上或许无法实现；即便如此，如果美国的AI发展被其民族国家对手视为足够严重的威胁，那么它们对美国采取极端预防性行动的风险可能会上升。为增强自身安全以抵御预防性行动，美国可以寻求采取一种展示克制的战略，即表明其不会使用强大的人工智能来威胁其他国家的生存。借鉴国际关系文献中关于国家如何做出可信承诺的探讨，我们概述了一系列美国可用于实施该战略的选项。在最具挑战性的情境下，即美国确定将单方面获得强大新能力时，要可信地承诺克制是困难的，尽管将重大政策努力与技术突破相结合的方法可能使可信承诺成为可能。如果对手对美国的能力和意图存在现实层面的不确定性，克制战略则更具可行性。尽管克制面临诸多困难，但与为在向先进AI世界过渡期间避免冲突而提出的其他战略相比，它值得被慎重权衡。