Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is summoning Anthropic’s CEO Dario Amodei to the Pentagon on Tuesday morning to talk about the military application of Claude, as reported by Axios.

This gathering occurs as the Pentagon threatens to label Anthropic as a “supply chain risk” — a tag usually designated for foreign threats — following the AI company’s decision to deny the Department of Defense access to its technology for extensive surveillance of Americans and the creation of autonomous weaponry. 

Last summer, Anthropic entered into a $200 million agreement with the DOD, and Claude was allegedly utilized in the January 3 special operations mission that led to the detainment of Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro, an incident that highlighted the rising tensions between the two parties.

A source informed Axios that Hegseth is presenting Amodei with an ultimatum: cooperate or face exclusion. It’s uncertain if he is bluffing — replacing Anthropic would be a considerable challenge. However, the implications are serious: a supply chain risk classification would nullify Anthropic’s contract and compel other Pentagon affiliates to completely abandon Claude.