Hegseth demands full military access to Anthropic’s AI model Claude and sets deadline for end of week

Trust is breaking down between the Pentagon and Anthropic over the use of its AI model, sources familiar with the situation told CBS News. 

In a meeting at the Pentagon on Tuesday morning, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth gave Anthropic’s CEO Dario Amodei until the end of this week to give the military a signed document that would grant full access to its artificial intelligence model, the sources said. 

Officials are considering invoking the Defense Production Act to make Anthropic adhere to what the military is seeking, they said. Axios reported earlier on some of what transpired in the meeting.

Defense officials want full control of Anthropic’s AI technology for use in its military operations, sources told CBS News. The company was awarded a $200 million contract by the Pentagon in July to develop AI capabilities that would advance U.S. national security.

Anthropic has repeatedly asked the Defense Department to agree to guardrails that would restrict the AI model, called Claude, from conducting mass surveillance of Americans, sources said. Defense officials noted that that’s illegal and said the military is simply asking for a license to use the AI strictly for lawful activities.

The Free Press: Are We at an AI Precipice?

Amodei also wants to ensure Claude is not used by the Pentagon for final targeting decisions in military operations without any human involvement, one source familiar with the meeting said. Claude is not immune from hallucinations and not reliable enough to avoid potentially lethal mistakes, like unintended escalation or mission failure without human judgment, the person said. 

But when asked for comment, a senior Pentagon official said: “This has nothing to do with mass surveillance and autonomous weapons being used. The Pentagon has only given out lawful orders.”

The official said Grok, which is owned by Elon Musk’s xAI, is on board with being used in a classified setting, and other AI companies are close.

In Tuesday’s meeting, Hegseth told Amodei that when the government purchases Boeing planes, the aerospace company has no say in how the Pentagon uses the planes. He argued the same should be true for the military’s use of Claude.

After Amodei left, officials discussed whether to use the Defense Production Act in this situation, which enables the government to exert control over domestic industries. 

But because officials say they aren’t sure the government can trust Anthropic at this point, the Pentagon may decide to officially designate the company as a “supply chain risk” to push them out of government, two sources said. Anthropic was the first tech company authorized to work on the military’s classified networks. 

An Anthropic spokesperson said in a statement, “We continued good-faith conversations about our usage policy to ensure Anthropic can continue to support the government’s national security mission in line with what our models can reliably and responsibly do.”

Hegseth gave Anthropic a deadline of 5 p.m. Friday.