Installing tech billionaires Elon Musk and Palmer Luckey to Pentagon defense board raises conflict-of-interest concerns Send us your questions about how the Iran war will affect US voters in the midterms By installing the tech billionaires Elon Musk and Palmer Luckey to advisory roles in a Pentagon project about the future of warfare…
Page F2From§Eachthe early evening edition — 3 October 2026
Pentagon appoints its biggest contractor, a top campaign donor, to help plan the future of war.
As it ran on the front
Here is the filing, read in the order it was filed, which is the only order that matters.
Aug 30: the oil seized from Venezuela was described, in the Oval Office's own words, as bound for U.S. reserves — language a filing at the time called mobster. Sept 11: a Fox News filing quoted a top official crediting a thirty-minute military operation for unlocking the windfall. Oct 3, morning: a filing reported Hegseth moving troops out of Europe, where the Pentagon claims no oil stake, into the hemisphere where it claims thirty-five percent.…
…(cont) The New York Times, also Oct 3: "The founder of SpaceX, with billions of dollars in military contracts, joins several other defense industry executives on a Pentagon advisory board." All together now, slowly: the founder of SpaceX. With billions of dollars in military contracts. Joins a Pentagon advisory board. Nobody in that sentence is accused of a thing. The sentence is simply naming the vendor and the committee in the same breath, because the filing does.
The sentence has a prehistory, and it is dated. Sept 30, the Guardian: Hegseth appointed Musk — a year removed from his "chaotic" run atop the so-called Department of Government Efficiency — to co-lead a new task force on the future of warfare, alongside Anduril's Palmer Luckey and Newt Gingrich. Oct 1, the Guardian again: Hegseth had by then named the project Project Meridian, and the paper named the arrangement too — extraordinary influence, handed to two of the party's most significant donors, both running companies that collect federal defense money. The advisory board the Times describes two days later is a second seat, not the same seat. Hegseth gave it to the same donor anyway.
The campaign filing runs underneath, same season. Sept 3, the Washington Examiner: Musk's America PAC disclosed what it called "what appeared to be mail advertising," its first spending of the cycle, boosting Republican candidates. Sept 22, the same paper ran a former DOGE staffer's memoir as required reading, an insider's account of the last time this administration let Musk inside the building.
None of these documents contradicts any other. That is the filing, and it is already full.
“They put the guy selling rockets and satellites to the Pentagon on the board that tells the Pentagon what to buy next. That's not oversight, that's the fox doing inventory in the henhouse with a government badge clipped to his jacket. Your tax dollar writes the check for the contract, and now it writes the memo recommending the contract too.”
“Look, you want someone who actually understands rockets and drones advising on military innovation, not another career bureaucrat — Elon's just bringing private-sector expertise to a process that — wait, didn't his last turn in government end with an auditor finding an eight-billion-dollar contract that was actually eight million? That's... not landing the way I wanted it to. Let's just say the board has other members too.”
Earlier in this story
- Pentagon shifts troops from the hemisphere with no oil stake to the one where it claimed 35 percent. By Ruth · the supper edition, 3 October 2026
- Rubio's ex-housemate gets 10 years for the $50 million lobbying campaign he swore he had no idea about. By Sal · the coffee break edition, 3 October 2026
- Rubio testifies his roommate's $50 million Caracas lobbying operation, which drew 10 years, escaped his notice. By Ruth · the supper edition, 2 October 2026
- Senate asks who authorized the Pentagon's Venezuela oil stake; the record says a chatbot, over hours, in December. By Ruth · the early bird edition, 2 October 2026
- Senator demands Hegseth's firing; he answers with a new base, a new command and a new university partnership. By Chip · the supper edition, 30 September 2026
- Called inept and facing impeachment, Hegseth cuts a fifth of generals and calls it bare minimum. By Chip · the early bird edition, 30 September 2026
The receipts
The founder of SpaceX, with billions of dollars in military contracts, joins several other defense industry executives on a Pentagon advisory board.
· Pete Hegseth appoints Elon Musk to US taskforce on future of warfare from the morgue, 30 Sep 2026
· Elon Musk boosts GOP spending advantage with return as 2026 juggernaut from the morgue, 3 Sep 2026
· An Elon Musk insider shares what he found in Washington — and it should terrify you from the morgue, 22 Sep 2026
This page is a back-issue: the story as it ran, receipts as they were. The current edition is at the front. The byline is a pen name for a column drafted by a machine and checked by the editor: how this is made.