OpenAI Faces Backlash Over Pentagon Deal: 'Same Red Lines' or Opportunism?

On February 26, 2026, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman sent an internal memo to employees declaring: "We share the same red lines as Anthropic." The following day, February 27, Altman revealed at an all-hands meeting that OpenAI was negotiating a classified systems contract with the Pentagon. OpenAI was moving to fill the exact vacancy left by Anthropic's federal ban.

A declaration of solidarity and a seizure of opportunity, separated by just 24 hours. This contradiction immediately drew concentrated fire from the industry and online communities. Is OpenAI truly upholding the same principles as Anthropic, or is it converting a competitor's exit into its own opportunity?

1. The OpenAI All-Hands: What the Classified Deal Really Looks Like

What Altman disclosed at the February 27 all-hands meeting was remarkably specific. OpenAI is negotiating AI deployment in classified government systems, with agreement progressing on the condition that the government allows OpenAI to build its own 'safety stack.' The terms include embedding red lines in the contract, permitting only cloud-based deployment while excluding edge devices such as drones.

Altman described the foreign surveillance issue as 'the hardest part.' This statement suggests that while OpenAI rejects domestic surveillance, it is leaving room for negotiation on foreign surveillance. This is a fundamentally different posture from Anthropic's absolute prohibition on 'mass surveillance' itself.

The timing is the key. The fact that this negotiation was disclosed immediately after Anthropic's federal ban strongly suggests OpenAI is conscious of filling its competitor's vacancy.

2. The Reality of 'Same Red Lines': Similar Surface, Different Scope

Altman's claim of 'identical red lines' was quickly dissected. Daniel Kokotajlo, a former OpenAI employee and AI safety researcher, analyzed on LessWrong that the positioning 'looks similar on the surface but is optimized to make the administration choose OpenAI over Anthropic.'

The critical difference lies in the definition of 'surveillance.' Anthropic's red lines encompass surveillance that is 'legal but inappropriate in the age of AI.' Combining public space cameras with AI to identify opposition party members is not currently illegal, yet Anthropic explicitly refuses to enable it. OpenAI's red lines, by contrast, are limited to 'illegal uses only' — a much narrower scope.

LessWrong analyst Thane Ruthenis put it more sharply: 'Altman has once again succeeded in committing to nothing.' The criticism is that while using the identical word 'red lines,' OpenAI has effectively narrowed the scope to a level the Pentagon can accept.

3. OpenAI's Military Policy Evolution: From Ban to Classified Contract

Tracing OpenAI's military policy history further undermines the credibility of the 'same red lines' claim. Until 2023, OpenAI's terms of service explicitly prohibited use for 'military and warfare' purposes. It was the strongest level of military use prohibition among AI companies.

But on January 10, 2024, The Intercept reported that OpenAI had quietly deleted this clause. There was no official announcement, no blog post. The terms of service page was simply updated, and the 'military and warfare' prohibition vanished. OpenAI explained it had 'changed to more general language,' but the timing was significant.

The trajectory has only accelerated since. In July 2025, OpenAI signed a $200 million contract with the Pentagon. By February 2026, it is negotiating classified systems contracts. In three years, it has made a 180-degree turn from 'complete military use ban' to 'classified system deployment negotiations.'

4. Community Reaction: 'Belated Courage or Opportunism?'

The online community's response has been scathing. On Reddit's r/singularity, an analysis gained significant traction: 'Anthropic was banned for those exact safety guardrails, and now OpenAI is demanding the same guardrails while landing the contract. This is a textbook case of hypocrisy.'

On r/ChatGPT, the response was more direct: 'Belated courage? When number two exits, it's easy for number one to take the seat.' The dominant view was that OpenAI's solidarity declaration was not sincere but calculated positioning.

On r/ChatGPTcomplaints, a post tracing OpenAI's military policy timeline went viral with the conclusion: 'From a complete military ban to classified contract negotiations — is this company really moving for the sake of safety?' The common sentiment across communities is distrust of the gap between words and actions.

5. The 700,000 Tech Worker Coalition: A Different Voice From the Ranks

Separate from executive calculations, front-line employees are moving in a different direction. A coalition of 700,000 workers from Amazon, Google, Microsoft, OpenAI, and other Big Tech companies issued a statement urging the rejection of the Pentagon's demand for unlimited AI access.

The coalition's existence makes Altman's dilemma even more complex. Externally, he is pursuing a classified contract with the Pentagon; internally, he faces collective pressure from employees who oppose that very contract. The fact that 76 OpenAI employees signed the 'We Will Not Be Divided' petition reflects the same dynamic.

As Google's 2018 Project Maven affair demonstrated, tech companies' military cooperation ultimately ties directly to talent retention risk. How researchers who chose OpenAI precisely for its AI safety credentials will react to the company deploying AI in classified military systems remains an open question.

6. Altman's Tightrope: Is the Safety Stack a Real Safeguard?

The 'safety stack' concept Altman has proposed is intriguing. The idea is to provide AI to the Pentagon while building proprietary safety layers to block certain uses. The condition of deploying only in the cloud and not on edge devices is also included.

But critics point to the framework's limitations. Even cloud-based deployment can be used for intelligence analysis, target identification, and operational planning. Even without being directly mounted on drones, if the AI is used to support drone strike decision-making, is there a meaningful difference?

The more fundamental issue is enforcement. How can OpenAI monitor and control the actual use of an AI model deployed on the Pentagon's classified networks? Just as Anthropic learned of Claude's use through Palantir only after the fact, controlling usage in classified environments is extremely difficult both technically and institutionally.

Conclusion: What Red Lines Really Mean

What this controversy reveals at its core is that the word 'red lines' can carry entirely different meanings depending on how they are defined. Anthropic's red lines are a broad concept that encompasses 'uses that are legal but morally inappropriate.' OpenAI's red lines are a narrow concept that 'excludes only clearly illegal uses.' Same word, different scope.

Whether OpenAI's positioning is pure hypocrisy or pragmatic compromise may depend on one's perspective. What is clear is that OpenAI is leveraging Anthropic's federal ban as its own negotiating advantage. Declaring solidarity while simultaneously filling the vacancy left by the subject of that solidarity is, even in the most generous interpretation, contradictory.

The collective voice of 700,000 tech workers and the sharp criticism from online communities show that an era has arrived where AI companies can no longer claim principles through words alone. Red lines are not about declaring them — they are about keeping them.