Why the Pentagon Wants to Destroy Anthropic

[Lonestarblue]

This article about the breakdown in the DoD-Anthropic contract is quite long (does the NYT have no editors anymore), but well worth reading. According to the article, Hegseth wants to use AI as much as possible, but we all know that AI makes mistakes. One question the media should be asking is whether the US military bombed a girl's school, killing 175 children, teachers, and parents, because AI mistakenly targeted it. The excuse Hegseth is giving is that it was close to a military site. How close? Supposedly we have precision targeting.

We should also be asking why the US military wants the capability to spy on every US citizen. The obvious intention of an untrustworthy administration to collect such data without cause should alarm everyone.

"Anthropic was the company most enthusiastic about these national security uses, and they came to an agreement with the Biden administration to do this with a couple of usage restrictions: Domestic mass surveillance was a prohibited use, in addition to use for fully autonomous lethal weapons.

In the summer of 2025, during the Trump administration — and full disclosure, I was in the Trump administration when this happened, though not at all involved in this deal — the administration made the decision to expand that contract and kept the same terms. So the Trump administration agreed to those restrictions, as well.

Then in the fall of 2025 — I suspect that this correlates with the Senate confirmation of Emil Michael as under secretary of war for research and engineering. He comes in, he looks at these things, I think, or perhaps is involved in looking at these things, and he comes to the conclusion that no, we cannot be bound by these usage restrictions."


https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/06/opinion/ezra-klein-podcast-dean-ball.html?unlocked_article_code=1.RFA.zSlw.jv3YqgBQyyBz&smid=url-share

[walkingman]

1. IMO, this should be headline news. No one in their right mind would want this.

Domestic Mass Surveillance: Agreements explicitly prohibit the use of AI models for "deliberate tracking, surveillance, or monitoring of U.S. persons or nationals, including through the procurement or use of commercially acquired personal or identifiable information".

Fully Autonomous Lethal Weapons: The agreements prohibit using the AI for systems that "select and engage targets without human intervention or oversight".

The problem is that this administration is so evil that this is just the tip of the iceberg. The problem is not only at the federal level because once "permission" is given it works it's way to the State level.

[Lonestarblue]

2. Ron DeSantis is already creating a CIA-type organization in Florida to collect and analyze data.

You can bet its data collection will be aimed at people who vote for Democrats and anyone critical of Trump for now and whoever follows him. The Republican Party is openly building a police state, and no one in the media is sounding an alarm.

[LymphocyteLover]

3. No one in their right mind would want 99% of what this evil administration is doing and yet, they are still doing it

because they are evil fascist psychopaths