US Military Used Musk’s Grok AI to Fire 2,000 Missiles at Iran

The US military used Elon Musk’s Grok chatbot to fire 2,000 missiles at Iran in just 96 hours, a top defence official has said.

The Pentagon’s AI chief revealed the US Department of War’s reliance on Grok for the first time in a court statement defending Musk from allegations that his data centre power plants are illegally polluting residential neighbourhoods in Mississippi.

In a written submission to a district judge, Cameron Stanley said the Trump administration’s use of the AI software is “vital to national security”. In particular, it “greatly increased operational efficiency” during Operation Epic Fury, the US-Israeli joint military assault on Iran that eliminated supreme leader Ali Khamenei and killed thousands of civilians.

In a lawsuit filed in April, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People has alleged that trillionaire Musk is illegally running methane-gas turbines in north Mississippi to power xAI, the company that builds Grok. The group says that the surrounding community, which is predominantly Black, is suffering “increases in asthma, respiratory diseases, heart problems and certain cancers” as a result of toxic chemicals released by the plant.

The Trump administration directly intervened in the lawsuit this week, pressuring the judge to throw out the case entirely and claiming that efforts to shut down the gas turbines would threaten national security.

In his submission, Stanley argued that the gas turbines are used to power xAI’s Colossus 2 data centre, where a supercomputer trains the purpose-built Grok Gov Model software providing “critical support” to US military operations.

The testimony does not disclose the specific dates on which the technology was used.

The US bombardment of Iran began on February 28. On that same date, US munitions hit a school in Minab, killing 156 civilians, including 120 children, and a separate bomb assassinated Khamenei in a failed attempt to force regime change.

Nearly 3,500 people were killed in Iran by US-Israeli attacks between 28 February and May 5, according to Iran’s Foundation of Martyrs.

Sophia Sheera is a journalist in Novara Media’s social media team.