DoD’s Silicon Valley Recruits, OpenAI Pivot to Defence, and Bill Gates’ View on AI

The US Defense Department wants to offer Silicon Valley tech executives positions as part-time military officers.

OpenAI is pivoting towards defence contracts: they hired Dan Stuckey from Palantir this week.

But first, Bill Gates recognises the benefits of AI, but is wary of its dangers and groups AI with bioterrorism and nuclear weapons:

The Big Story

DoD Is Recruiting from Silicon Valley

The US Defense Department wants to offer technology executives positions as part-time military officers as part of an initiative to improve its capabilities by tapping the country’s top technical minds.

The department is evaluating offering chief technology officers and other senior tech professionals high-ranking positions in the reserves. These reservists would be periodically summoned to help with short-term projects in cybersecurity, data analytics, and other areas.

“We’re creating this people industrial base that is going to help us to solve our national-security problems and national-security challenges in the decades to come,” said Brynt Parmeter, DoD Chief Talent Management Officer to the Wall Street Journal.

This is the first time the armed forces will bring in private-sector technology professionals as uniformed, paid reservists. The plan is that the initial group of tech professionals will be in their military service roles by September, starting with a dozen and increasing to thousands over the next couple of years.

The program’s details, such as which organisations the tech professionals should be placed within and how to determine rankings, are currently being defined. Parmeter imagines that the recruits would come into the reserves at a mid- or high-ranking appointment, major or lieutenant colonel in the Army and Air Force Reserve or lieutenant commander or commander in the Navy Reserve.

Shyam Sankar, the CTO of Palantir, is supporting the effort. Sankar said that he “would be the first in line to join” and said that:
“This new talent program creates an opportunity for America’s elite technical leaders to serve.”

Until recently, the sentiment in Silicon Valley was against working with the Pentagon.
“Ten years ago,” Parmeter said, “you never led with ‘I work with the DoD.’”

The military currently has more than 700,000 reservists who attend training a weekend monthly. The reservists can be called up to active duty.

OpenAI’s Pivot Towards Pentagon

This week, Dan Stuckey announced on X that he’s joining OpenAI as its newest chief information security officer after a decade at Palantir. The hire is part of OpenAI’s pivot toward the world of defence and military contracts.

In January, OpenAI quietly removed language from its usage policies that prohibited using its products for “military and warfare.” Shortly after, news came out that the company was working on software projects for the Pentagon. Recently, OpenAI has partnered with Carasoft, a government contractor that helps the government buy services from private companies quickly and with little administrative burden.

Fortune reported that the DoD has 83 active contracts with various companies and entities for generative AI work, ranging from $4 million to $60 million. OpenAI was not specifically named among the contractors, but its work is still done through partnerships. For example, OpenAI’s GPT-4 model was central to a recent partnership between Microsoft, Palantir and various US defence and intelligence agencies. The entities joined in August to make AI and analytic services available to the US defence and intelligence agencies in classified environments.

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