Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei said Thursday that he “can’t in good conscience accede to [the Pentagon’s] request” to offer the navy unrestricted entry to its AI programs.
“Anthropic understands that the Division of Battle, not non-public corporations, makes navy choices,” Amodei wrote in an announcement. “Nevertheless, in a slender set of instances, we consider AI can undermine, quite than defend, democratic values. Some makes use of are additionally merely exterior the bounds of what right this moment’s know-how can safely and reliably do.”
The 2 instances are: mass surveillance of Individuals and totally autonomous weapons with no human within the loop. The Pentagon believes it ought to have the ability to use Anthropic’s mannequin for all lawful functions, and that its makes use of shouldn’t be dictated by a personal firm.
Amodei’s assertion comes lower than 24 hours forward of the Friday 5:01 p.m. deadline Protection Secretary Pete Hegseth has given Anthropic to both acquiesce to his calls for, or face the results. The Division of Protection has tried to drive Amodei’s hand by both labeling Anthropic a provide chain danger — a designation reserved for international adversaries — or invoke the Protection Manufacturing Act and successfully drive the agency to do its bidding. The DPA provides the president the authority to drive corporations to prioritize or increase manufacturing for nationwide protection.
Amodei identified the contradiction in these two threats. “One labels us a safety danger; the opposite labels Claude as important to nationwide safety.”
He added that it’s the Division’s proper to decide on contractors most aligned with its imaginative and prescient, “however given the substantial worth that Anthropic’s know-how offers to our armed forces, we hope they rethink.”
Anthropic is at present the one frontier AI lab that has classified-ready programs for the navy, although the DOD is reportedly getting xAI prepared for the job.
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June 9, 2026
“Our robust desire is to proceed to serve the Division and our warfighters—with our two requested safeguards in place,” Amodei mentioned. “Ought to the Division select to offboard Anthropic, we are going to work to allow a easy transition to a different supplier, avoiding any disruption to ongoing navy planning, operations, or different vital missions.”
TLDR, he’s saying: “We will simply half methods. There’s no have to be nasty about it.”
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