Large-scale models have become weapons of war: The US military has designated xAI data centers as "arsenals" to obstruct environmental lawsuits.

According to Beating, the U.S. Department of Justice filed a motion in the Mississippi federal court to intervene in and dismiss the environmental lawsuit filed by the NAACP against xAI's data center. In their testimony, the Department of Justice and the Department of Defense confirmed for the first time that the U.S. military has deployed a customized version of Grok Gov in a classified military network for planning actual military strikes against Iran. The federal government argues that the computing power provided by the data center is equivalent to a modern military manufacturing plant, and cutting off the power supply would jeopardize national and military defense security. The lawsuit stems from xAI's illegal operation of multiple portable natural gas turbines for off-grid power generation at its Colossus 2 data center, causing severe pollution in the surrounding Black community. To protect the power supply necessary for Grok's normal operation, the Department of Justice, in addition to supporting xAI's claim that the mobile gas turbines are temporary facilities without permits, has introduced a new legal defense logic: if the executive branch opposes the lawsuit, private entities or citizens will not have the right to pursue environmental rights under the citizen suit provisions of the Clean Air Act. Environmental and civil rights lawyers point out that the Department of Justice's logic constitutes an overreach of executive branch power, aiming to use national security as a pretext to deprive communities of legal weapons to combat corporate pollution. The U.S. military's deep reliance on commercial AI is the underlying reason for the Department of Justice's strong intervention. In 2025, the Pentagon signed a $200 million government version of Grok with xAI. Cameron Stanley, the Department of Defense's chief digital and artificial intelligence officer, confirmed that a customized version of Grok Gov has been deployed in a classified network as part of the Maven intelligent system. During the U.S.-Iran conflict in February 2026, the Maven system delivered more than 2,000 munitions to 2,000 targets within 96 hours. The U.S. military's tactical dependence is prompting the Department of Justice to invoke national security provisions to grant exemptions for xAI supply chain violations.