teleo-codex/entities/grand-strategy/anthropic-rsp-v3.md

Anthropic RSP v3.0

Type: Corporate safety governance framework
Released: February 24, 2026
Parent Organization: Anthropic
Predecessor: RSP v2 (October 2024)

Overview

Anthropic's Responsible Scaling Policy version 3.0, released February 24, 2026—the same day Defense Secretary Hegseth gave CEO Dario Amodei a deadline to allow unrestricted military use of Claude.

Key Changes from RSP v2

Removed:

• Binding pause commitment: RSP v2 pledged to halt development/deployment if adequate mitigations couldn't be implemented before reaching the next ASL threshold
• Hard stop operational mechanism: "if we cannot implement adequate mitigations before reaching ASL-X, we will pause"

Added:

• "Frontier Safety Roadmap" — detailed list of non-binding safety goals
• "Risk Reports" — comprehensive risk assessments every 3-6 months (beyond current system cards)
• Commitment to publicly grade progress toward goals
• Commitment to match competitors' mitigations if more effective and implementable at similar cost
• "Missile defense carveout" — autonomous missile interception systems exempted from autonomous weapons prohibition

Stated Rationale

• "Stopping the training of AI models wouldn't actually help anyone if other developers with fewer scruples continue to advance"
• "Some commitments in the old RSP only make sense if they're matched by other companies"
• "Unilateral pauses are ineffective in a market where competitors continue to race forward"
• Strategy of "non-binding but publicly-declared" targets borrows from transparency approaches championed for frontier AI legislation

External Reception

GovAI Analysis:

• Initial reaction: "rather negative, particularly concerned about the pause commitment being dropped"
• After deeper engagement: "more positive"
• Conclusion: "better to be honest about constraints than to keep commitments that won't be followed in practice"

Timeline

• October 2024 — RSP v2 released with binding pause commitments and ASL framework
• February 24, 2026 — RSP v3.0 released; same day as Hegseth ultimatum to Anthropic
• February 26, 2026 — Anthropic publicly refuses Pentagon terms (RSP v3 already released)
• February 27, 2026 — Pentagon designates Anthropic supply chain risk; $200M contract canceled

Significance

RSP v3 represents the first major corporate-level instantiation of Mutually Assured Deregulation logic, with explicit invocation of competitive disadvantage reasoning to justify removing binding safety commitments. The timing—simultaneous with Pentagon pressure—raises questions about whether external coercion accelerated or merely coincided with the policy change.