Anthropic-Pentagon Clash Spotlights Role of AI in War

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KQED

News Commentary, News, Politics

4.2 • 727 Ratings

🗓️ 10 March 2026

⏱️ 54 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Anthropic sued the U.S. Department of Defense on Monday over its decision to designate the San Francisco AI company a “supply-chain risk to America’s national security.” That’s after the firm refused to let its systems be used for mass surveillance or autonomous weapons. Meanwhile, OpenAI has struck a deal with the Pentagon to deploy its own AI tools – a move that has triggered backlash inside the tech world. We take a close look at the relationship between Silicon Valley and the Pentagon and the ethics and effectiveness of using AI in war. Guests: Paul Scharre, executive vice president, Center for the New American Security; author, "Four Battlegrounds: Power in the Age of Artificial Intelligence," and "Army of None: Autonomous Weapons and the Future of War" Ro Khanna, U.S. Congressman for California's 17th Congressional District (Silicon Valley) Sheera Frenkel, technology reporter, The New York Times; co-athor, "An Ugly Truth: Inside Facebook's Battle for Domination" Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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0:39.8	From KQED.
0:42.5	Welcome to Forum. I'm Mina Kim.
0:45.2	California Congressman Rokana has been busy introducing a war powers resolution,
0:50.0	along with Kentucky Republican Thomas Massey, saying that the president could not initiate major combat operations against Iran without Congress.
0:58.1	The resolution narrowly failed to come to a vote last week.
1:01.8	Kana and Massey are also the duo that forced the Department of Justice to release millions of pages of the Epstein files.
1:08.9	And Kana has been weighing in on the clash between the Pentagon and Anthropic as the ranking member of the Epstein files. And Kana has been weighing in on the clash between the Pentagon
1:11.8	and Anthropic as the ranking member of the House Armed Services Subcommittee on cyber.
1:18.2	The conflict over the DOD's use of Anthropics tools is the topic we'll dig into later
1:22.4	this hour. But first, I'm joined by Silicon Valley Congressman Rokana. And if you have
1:27.0	questions for the
1:27.6	congressman listeners, now is the time to email us or post them on our social channels. Congressman
1:32.3	Kana, welcome to forum.
1:34.8	Mina, it's good to be back. Thank you for having me.
1:37.3	I really appreciate you giving us your time. The president is giving conflicting statements on the war,
	...

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