🚀 OpenAI on Defence Contract

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Year To Date Performances:

1. In a tense all-hands meeting on Tuesday, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman told employees that the company will not have a "weigh-in" on specific military operations, asserting that decisions such as the recent strikes in Iran or the January capture of Nicolás Maduro in Venezuela are the sole province of the government. This internal defence follows OpenAI’s swift move to secure a classified Department of Defence contract last Friday, just as rival Anthropic was blacklisted by President Trump as a "supply-chain risk" for refusing to allow its AI to be used in fully autonomous weapons. Altman acknowledged the "sloppy" timing of the announcement—which preceded a massive joint U.S.-Israel bombardment of Iran—but maintained that while OpenAI will build its own "safety stack," it will ultimately defer to Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth on operational use cases. The fallout has exposed a deepening rift in Silicon Valley, as OpenAI and Elon Musk’s xAI signal a willingness to work within the administration’s "any lawful use" mandates, while Anthropic prepares to challenge its unprecedented national security blacklist in court.

2. As the U.S.-led invasion of Iran enters its third day, the Trump administration is facing intense criticism for a "whipsawing" narrative that has left both Congress and international allies confused regarding the war’s ultimate endgame. While President Trump has explicitly called for the Iranian people to topple their leadership following the confirmed death of Ayatollah Khamenei, Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth countered on Monday that this is "not a regime change war," focusing instead on dismantling Iran’s conventional missile shield and nuclear infrastructure. This internal messaging rift—compounded by Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s claim that the strikes were a preemptive move to protect U.S. forces from an inevitable Iranian response to Israeli action—has incensed Democrats like Senator Mark Warner, who noted that the mission's "objectives" have shifted five times in less than 72 hours. With the U.S. service member death toll rising to six and German Chancellor Friedrich Merz arriving in Washington for urgent consultations, analysts warn that the lack of a unified exit strategy could lead to a protracted entanglement if the administration cannot decide whether its goal is functional disarmament or the total collapse of the Islamic Republic.

3. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick has voluntarily agreed to a transcribed interview with the House Oversight Committee, following intense bipartisan scrutiny over newly surfaced ties to late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. The breakthrough comes after a tumultuous week in which a Department of Justice document dump—mandated by the 2025 Epstein Files Transparency Act—revealed a 2012 photo of Lutnick on Epstein’s private island, Little Saint James. The image was briefly removed from the DOJ website before being restored on February 26, 2026, with officials citing a "rolling review" for sensitive content. While Lutnick maintains he has "done nothing wrong" and initially claimed to have severed ties with his former neighbour in 2005, the released files include emails from as late as 2018 and evidence of shared business dealings in 2014. House Oversight Chairman James Comer praised Lutnick’s "commitment to transparency," though the interview is expected to be conducted behind closed doors in the coming weeks to address the Secretary's shifting timeline of his relationship with the financier.

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