Mfcttrf

I'm at a critical point in a sci-fi novel where a couple of thousand Superintelligent artificial intelligences end up going haywire. Naturally, they're extremely intelligent, and thus, much harder to deal with than an average human.

Up to here, these AIs have been almost docile. The power lust of the man who created them forces these AIs into servitude, and then he leverages them like an army against an attacking force in order to defend a city.

This city is effectively an experiment put into action years ago by six scientists, who lead the entire place. Since the whole city counts as a private place, run by a private company, the US government has only some minor influence inside.

The nebulous part is this attacking force. Even if I was from the US, no US defence organization would really list 'to stop invasions, insurrections, rebellions and other forms of conflict caused by goddamn robots'. My best guess is Homeland Security, which sounds suited to responding to internal threats like this. What do you think?

Invent it.

Big changes have taken place in the US, I gather. If there are thousands of superintelligent AIs milling about to be conscripted, over previous years there were probably other issues involving AIs and semisentitent automatons.

You can invent your government agency to deal with these. Heck, The Department of Motherland Security was only invented after 911 so the US is allowed to make new ones. Then you will also have some immunity from any concrete-thinking readers who protest "hey! hey! The NSA is not allowed to carry stun guns!" because you have invented your agency and its rules for your near future scenario. I suspect this new agency would itself employ some Daneel Olivaw type AIs as well as regular detectives. The agency personnel sometimes bump up against the older branches like the FBI, with political shenanigans, prejudice and backbiting helping to leaven your story.

Maybe you could repurpose ATF for your agency, so you could have some continuity with existing institutions. They could be Alcohol Tobacco Firearms and Robots.

The first people on the scene will almost certainly be law enforcement of some kind. Accordingly, the people who are sent in will depend on the laws they think the science team has broken.

The act of setting up a new, company-owned city in the middle of nowhere, as opposed to establishing oneself in an existing city (which would be, by all accounts, far cheaper and easier) is going to raise a lot of red flags. Probably the most benign case is that they're using it to launder money and/or dodge taxes on a grand scale. That will get the FBI (in its anti-racketeering role) and the IRS interested in their operations.

Once they're actually accused of a federal crime and a warrant issued, it becomes the job of the US Marshals Service to bring in the suspect(s) to stand trial.

On the other hand, if at any point the scientists want to equip their robot army with anything more menacing than various semiautomatics, they're going to end up breaking any number of federal gun laws. (It's also possible that, seeing the potential threat they pose, the government declares that the robots themselves are restricted munitions.) This will get the ATF involved right quick, and that will tend to bring events to a head fairly soon - gun crimes being both dangerous to the federal agents and not that complicated to prove.

If law enforcement feels that it needs more firepower, it can call in the National Guard (including state National Guards) for backup. Under the Posse Comitatus Act, actual-as-such armed forces - the Army, Air Force, Navy, and Marines - are not allowed to act in a law enforcement role within the US. However, they can act in support and provide information and logistics, so e.g. the FBI could ask for drone surveillance of the city, but could not request troops to be on hand when making arrests.

However, this is only a temporary condition. Under the Insurrection Act, the military can be deployed in a condition of "insurrection, domestic [i.e., internal, not international] violence, unlawful combination, or conspiracy" if the state proves unable to do so on its own. There's red tape involved, and the President (who makes the call in this situation) might want to request an act of Congress for the show of things. However, if it proves absolutely necessary they can be deployed.

(There's also an exemption in the law for cases involving nuclear materials. Hopefully your robots aren't fission-powered.)

Stepping from worldbuilding to writing for a moment, my personal feeling would be to put the ATF in the drivers' seat. Drawing a comparison to Ruby Ridge or Waco, writ however large, makes the government response sound more plausible.

The National Guard is the highest level of response I'd expect to show up unless things have really gone south. The Army/Navy/Airforce are all specifically prohibited against operating on American soil, and things need to be at Civil War or invasion levels before those prohibitions get lifted. Basically, you only get the Army roll into town if the incident is a threat to the US as a whole.

Assuming he only wants to control the city area, this will likely be treated as if someone barricaded their house and took hostages, but on a larger scale. Objectives will be to remove everyone possible from the area, and talk the guy down. (While our scientists attempt to break his control over the AIs.) Objectives will get a lot more bloody a lot faster if he's expanding the area he controls, or is killing people, but without that aspect, the goal will be to keep things peaceful.

Every branch of the military has an engagement plan. They're already looking in to how to deal with a space threat that hits the US, today. They're constantly searching for new ways they can be attacked, and they have engagement specialists looking in to it. every kind of battlefield, every kind of engagement.

Regardless of who is actually engaging in the fighting, they can all talk. National guard may be on the front lines, but they can bring in a specialist from the marines who is in the command room giving advice on how they've simulated this before.

You can essentially do whatever you want. And if you want to have the airforce come in, call an emergency session of congress. Why would they have an emergency session at congress? because the CIA has already been monitoring this threat, and they're putting their response into action.

By the way, every branch of the military can own a war machine. Planes aren't limited to the airforce and ships aren't limited to the navy.

To win over your military audience. Consider engaging in their own language. Watch a few interviews with military persons.

Look at this amazing interview with a 4-star general