As reported by the New York Times, later today the Pentagon will provide Elon Musk with a briefing on the U.S. military’s plans in the event of a conflict with China. This decision marks an unprecedented expansion of the current DOGE secretary’s role as an adviser to President Trump.
Trump for his part, said that the meeting between Musk and the Pentagon officials would not affect Beijing in any way. The affair also raised several questions about possible conflicts of interest involving Musk, who ranges widely in the federal bureaucracy while continuing to run companies that hold government contracts.
The DOGE leader is himself a major Pentagon contractor and has extensive financial interests in China. As the New York Times reports, the top-secret briefing for the war plan against Beijing contains between 20 and 30 slides illustrating how the U.S. might deal with such a conflict. The plan starts from indications and warnings of a threat from China to various options regarding which targets to strike and in what time frame.
Despite the rumors in recent hours, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, who reportedly personally invited Musk to Arlington, was keen to clarify that the 53-year-old’s will be a simple visit.
“This is NOT a meeting about ‘top secret China war plans”, Hegseth said, “It’s an informal meeting about innovation, efficiencies & smarter production. Gonna be great!”.
“Elon Musk is a patriot”, spokesman Sean Parnell announced instead, “We are proud to have him at the Pentagon.” Nevertheless, some of the most influential U.S. media outlets, including the Wall Street Journal, reiterated that a possible conflict with Beijing will be discussed at today’s meeting.
At the moment, it is unclear to what details Musk will be made privy. Related operational plans and possible wars are extremely difficult for people without extensive experience in military planning to understand.
Several insiders have wondered why the Pentagon felt the “need” to explain the program in question to the SpaceX and Tesla patron. According to some, Musk and his DOGE, in order to responsibly reduce the Pentagon’s budget, need to know what weapons the latter intends to use in a potential battle with China.
At the same time, participating in a confidential briefing on the Chinese threat with some of the country’s highest military officials would represent a hugely valuable opportunity for any defense contractor willing to sell its services to the military, an opportunity Musk might not want to miss.
His SpaceX is already receiving billions of dollars from the Pentagon and federal spy agencies to help the United States build new military satellite networks and to try to deal with growing threats from China.
