Big Tech giants, from Google to OpenAI, alongside some top Silicon Valley AI companies, are shedding their pacifist veneer, securing lucrative military contracts under President Trump’s $1 trillion defense push.
One after the other, employees are protesting Big Tech government contracts and the industry’s AI militarization. Once-wary tech companies, now openly court Pentagon deals.
In this regard, Zuckerberg’s Meta is rewriting its weapons ban, while in parallel, Scale AI’s building combat ready-AI. In the past two years, throughout Israel’s bloody wars in the Middle East, the veil has been lifted as internal voice revolts erupt over tech projects, such as Israel’s $1.2 billion Nimbus contract.
Giants like Google, Microsoft, Meta, and Amazon have moved from avoiding military involvement to aggressively securing defense Big Tech government contracts with the Pentagon and Israel.
This shift of top AI companies in Silicon Valley accelerated under Trump, who plans to invest $1 trillion by 2026 to “modernize” the military largely by including AI. OpenAI, Google, Anthropic, and Elon Musk’s xAI have already signed contracts worth up to $200 million to build AI capabilities for the Department of Defense.
There’s a history of government funding of Silicon Valley as many have stopped hesitating to take part in military ventures.
Beyond the fact that Silicon Valley wins few government contracts, personnel overlap is tightening the military tech nexus. In June, the US Army named four Big Tech executives including Meta’s CTO and OpenAI’s product manager as reserve lieutenant colonels in its Executive Innovation Corps, aimed at fusing tech expertise with defense strategy.
Even AI for defense and intelligence company values are shifting. In February, Google quietly removed a clause from its code of conduct that prohibited building weapons or mass surveillance tools. OpenAI, too, amended its usage policy to permit “national security use cases” of its generative AI tools.
Silicon Valley Startups Are Invading the Military Market
Startups like Scale AI and Anduril are deepening the transformation under the Silicon Valley AI companies embodiment. In May, Scale AI, which recently secured $14.3 billion investment from Meta, was chosen by the Pentagon to test AI models for defense use. The company also partnered with Anduril to build mixed reality headsets for soldiers.
Meanwhile, Meta now allows its AI models to be used by defense contractors like Lockheed Martin and Booz Allen Hamilton. In this case, Lockheed Martin faces competition from tech companies in defense technologies.
These partnerships reflect how AI is changing how Silicon Valley builds startups and how they interact with governments.
But not everyone inside these companies agrees due to internal disagreements which are taking place. Back in April 28 Google employees were fired after protesting Project Nimbus, a $1.2 billion cloud contract with Israel’s military. Microsoft followed by also firing employees who protested its AI work with the Israeli military.
“Western democratic values are under threat,” said Google DeepMind co-founder Demis Hassabis, defending the company’s turning point.
AI Superpowers China, Silicon Valley, and the New World Order
National security is now the dominant narrative used to justify AI expansion.
Khlaaf warns that relying on commercial AI models like Meta’s Llama or OpenAI’s GPT-4 introduces cybersecurity vulnerabilities, potentially exploitable by foreign adversaries.
“AI companies have been able to circumvent the military standards that defense systems must follow, promoting an unfounded narrative of an AI arms race,” chief AI scientist at the AI Now Institute, Heidy Khlaaf mentioned to EL PAÍS.
Experts say this militarization has been embedded in history.
“From the perspective of the history of technology, I would say there is a continuity. Our Western concept of modern technology has its genesis in the military or security sphere,” stated ethics scholar Lorena Jaume-Palasí.
From GPS to the internet, many civilian tools were born from defense needs. The current AI arms race is seen by Trump and others as a strategic battle with China.
“American companies must beat China,” Trump has repeated, using that rhetoric to drive investment in AI and military tech.
But the fusion of tech and Silicon Valley military has worldwide consequences. The UN’s Francesca Albanese describes it as an “economy of genocide,” pointing to how IBM, Amazon, and Microsoft support surveillance in the Occupied Palestinian Territories. Still, critics like Khlaaf argue the greatest threat is how AI trained on personal data collected without consent is weaponized against civilians.
As the defense landscape intensifies, it’s crystal clear that Silicon Valley AI companies are no longer just shaping the future, it’s helping to fight its wars.
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