Pentagon’s Michael on Anthropic Talks, Military Use of AI

Well, what happened is we've been negotiating in good faith on the Department of War side for about three months, and we're working pretty diligently. And we sent over a proposal that we thought made a lot of concessions to the language that Anthropic wanted. And then, without any notice, they published an article where we thought we were getting close, saying that they were breaking off talks well before the deadline, which is generally not good partner-oriented practice, if you will.

Yeah, the concessions are pretty simple. We agreed in writing to ensure that the Department of War was following all laws and regulations, including the National Security Act of 1947, the FISA Act, and all other applicable laws and regulations because mass surveillance of Americans is already illegal. So we were offering to put all of that language and affirm that we were following all laws, and then contract when it comes to autonomous weapons. Similarly, we said we'll follow all laws, including a DOD directive that's been in place for years that governs how we would use any such weapons. And then we affirmed that there would be human oversight over every kind of part of the development process or engagement process or use of autonomous weapons. And he didn't like the word, I guess, "as appropriate" at the end of that sentence. But we believe we conceded to all their substantive demands. So it was surprising that out of nowhere they had cut off negotiations.

Yeah. No, that's what was surprising is usually if your differences are minor, you get in a room, you try to hash them out, and instead, without any notice, he publishes something about his conscience and then doesn't engage. And it was difficult to understand why, because we were working pretty diligently on this and we were at the final stages of a few words here or there where we agreed to what they wanted in substance. So it was very surprising given that we've negotiated with hundreds of technology companies, and this is the only one we've ever had that behavior from.

They're two different things, and I think depending on how today goes at 5:00, the Secretary of War, Pete Hegseth, gets to make the decision on how to reply. I maintain my openness to continue dialogue through that deadline, but they seem to have launched sort of a PR campaign that was planned well before these negotiations sort of restarted on Tuesday. So I don't know, and so their behavior is, frankly, unpredictable. I'm not sure what to expect.

I offered more talks as long as they're in good faith. We're always open to talks, and we set a deadline and we meant that deadline, and up until that deadline, I'm open to more talks and I told them so.