by Stephen Prager | Feb 27, 2026 | AI, Article, big tech, Politics and Movements: US, Reprint
This story originally appeared in Common Dreams on Feb. 25, 2026. It is shared here under a Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0) license.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has threatened to punish the artificial intelligence company Anthropic if it doesn’t let the Pentagon use its technology however it wants—apparently even to create autonomous killer drones or conduct surveillance of Americans.
Anthropic’s powerful AI model, Claude, is currently the only one permitted to handle classified military data, and the company was awarded a $200 million contract last year to develop AI capabilities for the Department of Defense to use alongside other AI firms.
However, the company’s usage policy prohibits its use for mass surveillance and for the development of autonomous weapons—such as drones that attack targets without a human operator.
These limitations have infuriated the Defense Department leadership. On Tuesday, Hegseth called Anthropic’s CEO, Dario Amodei, to a meeting at the Pentagon, where he demanded “unfettered” access to Claude without any guardrails.
This goal was outlined last month in the department’s “AI Strategy” memo, which called for the US to adopt an “AI-first warfighting force” and for companies to allow their technology to be deployed for “any lawful use,” free from ethical safeguards.
According to a senior defense official who spoke to Axios, Hegseth issued an ultimatum to Amodei on Tuesday: If he does not grant the Pentagon unrestricted use of Anthropic’s technology by 5:01 pm on Friday, the department would take measures to coerce the company.
It would either declare Anthropic a “supply chain risk,” effectively blacklisting it for military use and ending its contract, or it would invoke the Defense Production Act, which would force the company to tailor the product to the military’s needs.
While it would not be an
by Jake Johnson | Feb 27, 2026 | Article, cuba, Politics and Movements: International, Politics and Movements: US, Reprint
This story originally appeared in Common Dreams on Feb. 26, 2026. It is shared here under a Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0) license.
The Cuban government said Wednesday that the men on a Florida-registered boat who opened fire on Cuban soldiers in the island’s territorial waters were bent on carrying out “an infiltration for terrorist purposes.”
In a statement following news that Cuban forces had killed four people on the boat, the besieged Caribbean nation’s Interior Ministry said the vessel was carrying 10 men, all “Cuban nationals residing in the United States.”
The ministry said it seized assault rifles, explosives, body armor, and other items from the boat and identified seven of its passengers, six of whom were detained. Four men on the boat—which, according to reports, was last purchased in 2022—were killed in the gunfight with Cuban soldiers, who had reportedly “approached the vessel for identification.”
Cuban authorities also said another individual, Duniel Hernández Santos, was arrested “within national territory.” The Interior Ministry said Santos “had allegedly been sent from the United States to facilitate the landing and reception of the armed group and has confessed to his role.”
“The investigation remains ongoing until all facts have been fully established,” the ministry said.
Participants in Foiled Armed Infiltration in Villa Clara IdentifiedAs part of the ongoing investigation into the armed attack against a patrol vessel of the Border Guard Troops of the Ministry of the Interior, in the northeastern area of the El Pino channel, at Cayo Falcones,… pic.twitter.com/s9IFmUkqvk— Cuban Embassy in US (@EmbaCubaUS) February 26, 2026
The deadly incident came as Cuba continued to reel from the Trump administration’s recent intensification of decades-long economic warfare against the island. The administration is “actively seeking regime change in Cuba,” according to Wall
by Glenn Diesen | Feb 25, 2026 | Article, Europe, NATO, Politics and Movements: International, Reprint, Russia, Ukraine
by Brett Wilkins | Feb 25, 2026 | Article, Epstein, Politics and Movements: US, Reprint, Trump
This story originally appeared in Common Dreams on Feb. 24, 2026. It is shared here under a Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0) license.
The top Democrat on the House Oversight Committee announced Tuesday that an investigation will be opened into the US Department of Justice’s withholding of Epstein files related to an alleged sexual assault on a 13-year-old girl committed by President Donald Trump decades ago.
“For the last few weeks, Oversight Democrats have been investigating the FBI’s handling of allegations from 2019 of sexual assault on a minor made against President Donald Trump by a survivor,” Oversight Committee Ranking Member Robert Garcia (D-Calif.) said in a statement.
“Yesterday, I reviewed unredacted evidence logs at the Department of Justice. Oversight Democrats can confirm that the DOJ appears to have illegally withheld FBI interviews with this survivor who accused President Trump of heinous crimes,” he continued. “Oversight Democrats will open a parallel investigation into this.”
“Under the Oversight Committee’s subpoena and the Epstein Files Transparency Act, these records must immediately be shared with Congress and the American public,” Garcia added. “Covering up direct evidence of a potential assault by the president of the United States is the most serious possible crime in this White House cover-up.”
Oversight Dems have access to a list of documents, including interviews detailing serious allegations against President Trump, that are missing from the DOJ’s so-called “unredacted” files.Where are the missing files? What do they say? This all points to yet another cover up.— Rep. Robert Garcia (@robertgarcia.house.gov) 2026-02-24T22:21:35.629Z
The Trump administration is accused of continuously flouting the Epstein Files Transparency Act—which mandated that all materials related to convicted child sex criminal and longtime former Trump friend Jeffrey Epstein be released by December 19. But critically, the law gives Attorney General Pam Bondi wide discretion to redact
by Glenn Diesen | Feb 24, 2026 | Article, China, Opinion, Politics and Movements: International, Reprint, Russia
by Jake Johnson | Feb 24, 2026 | Article, Iran, Politics and Movements: International, Politics and Movements: US, Reprint, Trump
This story originally appeared in Common Dreams on Feb. 24, 2026. It is shared here under a Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0) license.
President Donald Trump admitted Monday that a US assault on Iran would be disastrous for the Middle East nation’s people as he considers options for a military attack, reportedly drawing private warnings from the United States’ top general.
In a Truth Social post, Trump pushed back against reports that Gen. Dan Caine, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, has voiced concerns about the potentially massive risks of attacking Iran, a country of more than 90 million people. Trump has previously claimed that Caine believed any military conflict with Iran would be “something easily won.”
“He has not spoken of not doing Iran, or even the fake limited strikes that I have been reading about, he only knows one thing, how to WIN and, if he is told to do so, he will be leading the pack,” Trump wrote of Caine in his Monday post.
The US president—who blew up a landmark diplomatic agreement with Iran during his first term—added that if a new deal with the Iranian government doesn’t materialize, “it will be a very bad day for that Country and, very sadly, its people, because they are great and wonderful, and something like this should never have happened to them.”
Trump’s acknowledgment that a US military assault would likely be devastating for ordinary Iranians runs counter to the narrative pushed by supporters of war, who claim conflict and regime change is necessary to aid Iran’s population.
“The stakes are clear,” the National Iranian American Council, an advocacy organization that has vocally opposed a US attack on Iran, wrote late Monday. “President
