What Big Tech’s Band of Execs Will Do in the Army
When I read One tweet on four leaders of the leaders of Silicon Valley being inducted in a special detachment from the United States Army Reserve, including the Meta-Cto Andrew “Boz” Bosworth, I questioned its veracity. It is very difficult to discern the truth of satire in 2025, in part because of social media sites belonging to the Bosworth Society. But it was indeed true. According to an official press release, they are now in the army, specifically detached 201: The Executive Innovation Corps. Boz is now a lieutenant-colonel bosworth.
The other newly ordered officers are Kevin Weil, head of the Openai product; Bob McGrew, a former OPENAI research chief now advising the Mira Murati Thinking Machines laboratory; And shyam Sankar, the Palantir CTO. These average age technological frameworks were sworn in in their poles carrying camoufacious fatigue, as if they had just walked in a base of the army in Kandahar, to join a body which bears the name of a HTTP status code. (Colonel David Butler, communications advisor to the chief of staff of the army, told me that their clothing uniforms were not yet ready.) Detachment 201, wrote the army in a press release, is part of a military transformation initiative which “aims to make the force leaner, smarter and righteous”.
Don’t blame Donald Trump for that. The program has been underway for more than a year, the original idea of Brynt Parmeter, the first director of the Pentagon talent management. The parmeter, a former combat soldier who led the support of veterans in Walmart before joining the Ministry of Defense in 2023, had thought about how to update experienced technologists to update an insufficiently informed militia when he met Sankar at a conference at the start of last year. The idea, he said, was to create “an Oppenheimer type situation” where the senior executives could be used immediately, while keeping their job current.
The two men collaborated on a plan to call on people like, well, Sankar, which was a vocal puzzle of the recent embarrassment of the Valley army, proclaiming that the United States is in an “unconvolved state of emergency” which requires military rehabitation led by technology. When the Wall Street Journal wrote on the next program last October, Sankar promised to be “the first online”.
In a sign that he is no longer taboo in the valley to cope with the fact that his creations go hand in hand with a deadly force in the army, the program has been accelerated and is now in service. “Ten years ago, it would probably have made me cancel,” said Weil. “It is a much better state in the world where people are looking at this and say:” Oh, wow, it’s important. Freedom is not free. »»
The four new officers are full members of the army reserve. Unlike other reservists, however, they will not be required to undergo basic training, although they will undergo less immersive fitness and fire training after induction. They will also have the flexibility to spend part of the approximately 120 hours annual by working remotely, an advantage not offered to other reservists.
The army also says that these men will not be sent to combat, they will therefore not risk their lives in potential war theaters in Iran, Greenland or downtown Los Angeles, California. Their mission is to use their undeniable expertise to educate their colleagues and superiors in the military on how to use advanced technologies for efficiency and deadly strength.
One could assume that the army would have done an in -depth study of the specific talents necessary for this pilot program and drawn these people from a call open to the best candidates. It did not happen. Sankar has helped recruit the other three future officers – all men who, by intention or by coincidence, seem to satisfy the folded anti -dei of the military today – and they all accepted. According to Butler, “Lieutenant-Colonel Sankar said,” I want to wear the uniform. And I have three other guys ready to go with me. ” Confirms that he joined after a request for Sankar. (The Parmeter told me that as it is a pilot program with an unknown result, a closed process was appropriate.)
