While the AI Council probed Alpha Centauri for us, they also helped us colonize the Solar System. From Mars and Venus in the inner system to Jupiter, Saturn, and even Nepturne in the outer system. They helped us maintain peace inside Luna’s orbit, and kept us from going to outright war in the rest of the system. We were constantly arguing over who owned which peace of rock out there, but they brushed over most of that by being the first to arrive in each location. No, the Chinese and the Russians never officially accepted that the AIs were alive, but they accepted the reality that the AIs at least said they were. And as long as the AIs avoided being hostile with them, they refrained from starting outright hostilities with the AIs.