Pirate Wires@PirateWires
EXCLUSIVE: Department of War AI Chief On How The Anthropic Deal Collapsed
When Emil Michael (@USWREMichael) took over the Department of War’s AI portfolio last August, he discovered the Biden admin had been “asleep at the wheel” when it came to top military contracts.
“I was like, ‘Holy cow,’” Michael said of Anthropic’s contract, “There’s 25 pages of terms and conditions of things I can’t do.”
For example: as written, the contract would not allow Anthropic to plan any kinetic strikes, generally considered a central activity of war.
“This is a contract that should be made with GEICO Insurance, not with the Department of War,” he told us.
A renegotiation ensued. What followed, in Michael’s words, were “three months of knockdown, drag-out negotiations” which involved Michael imagining every possible future wartime scenario that would require a carveout in Anthropic’s terms of service, and asking them for approval.
Anthropic was also quite slow: “It’s not like mano a mano negotiation, me and Dario,” Michael says. “It’s like every time we discuss something, he has to take it back to his politburo of co-founders and their ethics panel.”
Then, after an Anthropic exec reached out to Palantir to ask for classified info about how Claude was used to capture Nicolás Maduro — allegedly implying they could pull the plug on a military raid if they disagreed with how AI was used (which Anthropic denies) — Michael and the DOW concluded the company was a supply-chain risk.
Many speculated that the Pentagon was punishing Anthropic for ideological differences. But Michael feared that certain ideological differences could, in fact, harm or undermine the performance of DOW products, potentially threatening soldiers’ safety.
“I can’t have a gun not work because they decide they don’t like guns,” Michael says. That’s “putting real lives at risk. It’s no joke, right?”
Anthropic’s unreliable behavior led Michael to believe they may have never really wanted to reach a deal. Still: he’s open to renegotiating if Anthropic can prove they’re acting in good faith.
“I have a responsibility to the Department of War, and if there was a way to ensure that we had the best technology, I have no ego about it.” he said.
“I mean, look, I’m a deal guy.”
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