At first look, it looks like Silicon Valley executives have the proper life, what with the unimaginable wealth and energy and such. However what in the event that they’re unhappy they don’t get to placed on large boy pants and fake they’re warfighters? What then, America?
Fortunately the Military has invented a method to give tech execs participation trophies—absolutely that’s the finest and most noble use of our armed forces.
A brand new Military initiative titled “Detachment 201: The Army’s Executive Innovation Corps” guarantees to “fuse cutting-edge tech expertise with military innovation.”
Will they do this by tapping 18F, the federal company devoted to working with different companies on know-how merchandise, staffed by folks with experience in each authorities and tech? Heavens, no. Not since President Donald Trump disbanded that company as a result of Elon Musk thought it was too woke.
President Donald Trump is seen saluting throughout his birthday navy parade on June 14.
No, as an alternative they’ll do it by making some tech execs part-time lieutenant colonels within the Military Reserve whereas retaining their present full-time jobs. Welcome your latest recruits: Andrew Bosworth, CTO of Meta; Shyam Sankar, CTO Palantir; Kevin Weil, CPO of OpenAI; and Bob McGrew, OpenAI’s former analysis chief and present advisor to Pondering Machines Lab.
The entire thing looks like nothing greater than a make-believe outing meant to make some tech bros really feel essential. The Military already does these types of direct commissions, the place civilians are instantly appointed to officer positions. However that’s often used for folks eager to serve within the medical corps, not for getting a fake Military gig to steer federal contracts to your personal firm.
The Military introduced the initiative the identical day the 4 execs had been sworn in, which makes it look so much like they invented this “detachment” as a method to carry Silicon Valley moguls in-house with out formally doing so. This manner, the Trump administration didn’t should appoint or rent any trade titans, and so they didn’t have to surrender their extremely profitable day jobs.
“Detachment 201” would look so much much less sketchy if the Military hadn’t solely tapped executives from corporations which have donated thousands and thousands to Trump. OpenAI’s CEO Sam Altman dropped 1,000,000 on his inauguration, as did Palantir CEO Alexander Karp and Meta. Palantir even went above and past, sponsoring Trump’s pathetic navy parade.
These 4 execs had been sworn in on June 13, and it solely took till June 16 for the Protection Division to announce it had awarded a $200 million no-bid contract to OpenAI to “develop prototype frontier AI capabilities to address critical national security challenges in both warfighting and enterprise domains.”
A cartoon by Clay Bennett.
Equally, Palantir has already been the recipient of greater than $100 million in taxpayer {dollars} since Trump took workplace in January. And simply final month, The New York Occasions revealed an in depth account of presidency use of Foundry, a Palantir software for organizing and analyzing knowledge. As everybody is aware of, it’s because the Trump administration desires to create a unified grasp database of presidency knowledge to raised torment immigrants. However Palantir desires you to comprehend it’s undoubtedly not constructing a unified grasp database, and the way dare you ask.
Meta, in the meantime, hasn’t but reaped its rewards, however don’t fear—it’s getting there. The corporate is actively courting the navy for contracts and has partnered with Palmer Luckey’s Anduril Industries to design, construct, and discipline merchandise for the navy to “provide warfighters with enhanced perception and enable intuitive control of autonomous platforms on the battlefield.”
In different phrases, they’re constructing a VR helmet to promote to the navy.
Notably absent from the record of Large Particular Boys with Large Particular Military Jobs is Musk and any of his corporations. Within the halcyon days of the Trump-Musk alliance, he was getting literal billions in authorities contracts, awarded with no oversight and no regard for the plain battle of curiosity.
SpaceX was on monitor to assist construct the Golden Dome missile defend, a Trump fixation and boondoggle that won’t work however will nonetheless price someplace between $119 billion and $6.4 trillion. However now there’s nary a point out of SpaceX whereas Golden Dome missile defend accomplice Palantir’s star is quickly ascending.
Clearly, Trump’s gratitude for the $250 million Musk spent to get him elected is now exhausted, partially because of their cheesy, messy blowup, but additionally as a result of Trump requires fixed infusions of each cash and fealty.
However different billionaires are desperate to fill that void and able to reap the riches. And, not like Musk, they get to play soldier, too!
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