Iran and Anthropic: My Thoughts

The two biggest stories right now is Trump waging war on Iran (Operation Epic Fury), and the Department of War declaring Anthropic a supply chain risk. Related, OpenAI was accused of ‘front running’ the announcement to secure a Pentagon contract before that fact was made public, which has led to predictable outrage against OpenAI and calls to boycott the platform.

My prediction is this isn’t that big of a deal and neither AI company will be affected much. Private valuations will keep rising for both companies, despite the alleged supply chain risk for Anthropic and anger directed against OpenAI. In his usual overly-dramatic fashion, Yudkowsky tweeted:

This is much less of a big deal than people are making it out to be. The sensationalism or absolutist thinking on this story from both sides–either such as Tyler Cowen calling it a crisis, to others calling it a big win for ‘AI safety’, are both wrong. For one, 80%+ of Anthropic earnings are from enterprise customers, such as Fortune 500 companies. Its revenue streams are highly diversified. He writes:

The act of Hegseth crushing Anthropic, makes *every* AI company executive look less important and less like they are the ones in charge of the Future, because it makes — not even Trump, but Trump’s appointees –look like they get the final say instead of AI executives.

Sam Altman does not now look more powerful because you crushed his competitor. He looks less important because *you*, politicians, crushed his competitor, and did so in a way that made clear that Altman would have to take the orders of any Trump appointee as well.

Compared to other governments, the U.S. holds the private sector by a really long leash. This was just a vague ultimatum, and when Anthropic refused to its terms, the Pentagon terminated the contract for some contrived reason. This does not threaten Anthropic’s autonomy or business model. This is just wishful thinking and confirmation bias by Yudkowsky, misreading a small setback for Anthropic as somehow an earth-shattering repudiation of AI or a lessening of Silicon Valley’s power.

Part 2: Iran

I was going to write a post about how the stock market would recover from the Iran attacks, but as of publishing this post, the Nasdaq had already recovered.

I predict, yet again, the ‘doomers’ and ‘black-pillers’ will be wrong, just as they were wrong in June 2025 when Trump attacked Iran. Trump saw no net loss of approval despite the insistence by a vocal online minority that he had ‘betrayed his base’. The same applies here, too. The ‘all or nothing’ thinking is the worst. No, this is not an indictment on Trump. His support has not ‘collapsed’. His supporters do not feel ‘betrayed’–only those who never supported him in the first place.

Some desperately want to invent this narrative where large swaths of voters will disavow Trump, but the evidence just doesn’t support it. Support or opposition to the strikes fall along predictable party lines, with Republicans overwhelmingly supporting it and Democrats opposing it. Independents are split. From CNN, “59% of Americans disapprove of Iran strikes and most think a long-term conflict is likely,”

Nearly 6 in 10 Americans disapprove of the US decision to take military action in Iran, as most say a long-term military conflict between the two nations is likely, according to a new CNN poll conducted by SSRS.

The poll, fielded shortly after US and Israeli attacks launched the war with Iran, finds majorities express doubts about President Donald Trump’s handling of the situation. Most say they lack trust in Trump to make the right decisions about US use of force in Iran, with 60% saying they do not think he has a clear plan for handling the situation and 62% saying he should get congressional approval for any further military action.

“Six in ten disapproving” is hardly a mass repudiation, a collapse of confidence, or an indictment of Trump. This is what you would expect given the polarization of American politics and the inherent biases in polling. It’s amusing how the anti-war online-Right are under the illusion of speaking on behalf of the entirely of the ‘MAGA base’ on Iran. That is not how politics works. The offline-Right, despite mattering much less online, matter more at the polls and fundraising.

Moreover, similar to the Gulf War and the Iraq War, we would expect support to rise after the declaration of war rather, versus before it (ex-ante). That is, the act of going to war itself can shift public sentiment. Once Americans are invested and patriotism increases, support typically rises. However, as we saw from 2006-2008, there are limits to this effect when it becomes apparent that a war is unwinnable or that its objectives have changed.

As for the outcome, the tendency has been for Iran to suddenly cave. They put up initial resistance, and then quickly capitulate when overwhelmed by U.S. and or Israel forces. Tentative ‘peace,’ talks begin, which 6-12 months later predictably fail, and the process repeats. That is how it’s been since 2024. Neither side side wants a huge, costly land war, so this is the best option even if it goes nowhere. Iran apparently has an inexhaustible supply of generals and nuclear scientists.

As expected, Nick Fuentes jumped on the opportunity to criticize Trump. He is a genius at inserting himself into the center of every geopolitical event. There is nothing he wants more than for the Iran situation to get worse, because it raises his relative status and also his brand benefits from disorder. He doesn’t really have a consistent worldview. He just wants to be able to scream “I told you so,” and for Trump to look bad.

Recall after the Maduro raid, Nick initially endorsed it, tweeting a U.S. flag emoji, and on Alex Jones’ show, invoking the Monroe Doctrine to justify Maduro’s arrest. After getting a lot of pushback by his followers, he appended a follow-up tweet showing skepticism:

He did a 180, having misread his fans. His followers did not buy it and accused him of whitewashing:

This proves he will say wherever he feels is necessary to project the image of being an outsider to Trump, even if it means contradicting himself hours later.

And also as @captive_dreamer noted, Fuentes has flipped-flopped on Iran: