---
type: source
title: "AI Safety Newsletter #69: Department of War, Anthropic, and National Security — Community Tracking of Military AI Governance"
author: "EA Forum / LessWrong (AI Safety Newsletter)"
url: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/dpMwT9u7q5yRf8rna/ai-safety-newsletter-69-department-of-war-anthropic-and
date: 2026-03-01
domain: ai-alignment
secondary_domains: []
format: thread
status: null-result
priority: medium
tags: [EA-Forum, LessWrong, AI-safety-community, military-AI, DoW-Anthropic, national-security, community-tracking, AISN]
intake_tier: research-task
extraction_model: "anthropic/claude-sonnet-4.5"
---

## Content

**Source:** AI Safety Newsletter #69, published on EA Forum and LessWrong (approximately March 1-10, 2026)
**Topic:** Department of War, Anthropic, and National Security

**Coverage summary (from search results):**
The newsletter covered the Anthropic-Pentagon dispute, including:
- February 27: Trump cancelled Anthropic contracts after Anthropic refused "any lawful use" terms
- Anthropic's two restrictions: (1) no fully autonomous weapons; (2) no mass domestic surveillance of Americans
- Government retaliation: Hegseth X post designating Anthropic a supply chain risk; directive barring Anthropic from doing business with any organization that does business with the US military (even outside defense contracts)
- Additional coverage: Anthropic's RSP rollback — "Anthropic recently removed their commitment to never release catastrophically harmful AI, continuing the trend of Anthropic and other frontier AI companies progressively weakening safety commitments as profit incentives grow"

**AISN #70 follow-up:** "Automated Warfare and AI Layoffs" — subsequent newsletter continuing military AI coverage

**Community response signals:**
- EA Forum post: "OpenAI from Non-profit to deal with the U.S. Department of War" — community analysis of OpenAI's trajectory
- These newsletters represent the safety community's PRIMARY ongoing coverage of the military AI governance crisis
- Coverage is editorial/analytical rather than technical — no safety researchers publishing formal analyses of the kill chain loophole or "any lawful use" structural implications

**What AISN #69 includes that's NEW:**
The newsletter mentions Anthropic's RSP rollback (February 25) as part of the same week's events — placing the RSP rollback and the Pentagon designation in a single narrative arc. This framing is significant: the RSP rollback happened TWO DAYS before the supply chain designation. The newsletter treats these as related events — Anthropic was weakening safety commitments while simultaneously fighting the Pentagon on safety grounds. This apparent contradiction is not resolved in the coverage.

**The RSP rollback timing:**
- February 25: Anthropic removes "pause training if safety measures inadequate" commitment
- February 27: Anthropic designated supply chain risk for refusing Pentagon terms
- Same week: these events happened simultaneously

The apparent contradiction: Anthropic weakened its internal safety policy (RSP) while publicly fighting for safety restrictions in military deployment. Possible interpretation: Anthropic's RSP rollback was about competitive survival in the commercial market; its Pentagon red lines were about reputational/mission commitment. Two different logics operating simultaneously.

## Agent Notes

**Why this matters:** AISN is the primary vehicle for EA/LessWrong community engagement with AI governance events. Its coverage of the Anthropic-Pentagon dispute confirms that the safety community IS tracking the military AI governance question at the newsletter/editorial level. But the coverage is descriptive (what happened) not analytical (what this means for alignment governance architecture). The gap: no EA/LW researcher has published a formal analysis of the "any lawful use" structural mandate or the kill chain loophole.

**What surprised me:** The simultaneous RSP rollback (February 25) and Pentagon designation (February 27) were happening in the same week. I had treated these as separate events. The newsletter's framing suggests they're part of the same competitive pressure event: Anthropic simultaneously retreating on commercial safety commitments while holding on military deployment ones. This is a more nuanced picture of how labs navigate safety vs. survival pressure.

**What I expected but didn't find:** A formal EA/LW analysis of the procurement governance failure. The Tillipman/Lawfare analysis is from law scholars. The safety community is not producing equivalent structural analysis of how procurement law creates the governance vacuum.

**KB connections:**
- [[voluntary safety pledges cannot survive competitive pressure]] — AISN #69 treats the RSP rollback and the Pentagon designation as the SAME competitive pressure story, not separate events
- The RSP rollback is already in the KB (Sessions 2026-03-10 reference); the February 25 timing relative to the February 27 designation is a new piece of the narrative

**Extraction hints:**
- The RSP rollback-to-designation timing is worth noting in the Mode 2 claim as a narrative thread: Anthropic was weakening safety commitments and holding safety red lines simultaneously, suggesting different logics govern commercial vs. military safety decisions
- The newsletter gap (descriptive not analytical) is itself evidence for the B1 "not being treated as such" claim: the safety community's primary governance coverage vehicle is newsletters, not policy analysis

## Curator Notes (structured handoff for extractor)

PRIMARY CONNECTION: [[voluntary safety pledges cannot survive competitive pressure because unilateral commitments are structurally punished when competitors advance without equivalent constraints]]

WHY ARCHIVED: Documents the safety community's level of engagement with military AI governance (newsletter coverage, descriptive/analytical gap). The RSP rollback timing relative to the Pentagon designation is a narrative finding that enriches the Mode 2 documentation.

EXTRACTION HINT: Less valuable as a standalone source; more valuable as evidence for the "alignment community engagement is insufficient at structural level" claim. The gap between newsletter coverage (descriptive) and formal policy analysis (absent from safety community) is the key observation.
