In a rare public denial from the highest levels of government, the Pentagon, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, and President Donald Trump all swiftly responded to reports that tech billionaire Elon Musk was scheduled to receive a classified briefing on U.S. war plans for China.
On March 20, both the New York Times and Wall Street Journal independently reported that Elon Musk, CEO of SpaceX and leader of the Trump administration’s DOGE (Department of Government Executions … of Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, Education and so on), was set to receive a top-secret briefing on operational plans for potential conflict with China at the Pentagon. According to these reports, the briefing was scheduled for March 21 in the Pentagon’s secure conference room known as “the Tank,” typically reserved for high-level military discussions.
The reports triggered immediate responses from multiple government officials. President Donald Trump took to his Truth Social platform to declare, “Elon is NOT BEING BRIEFED ON ANYTHING CHINA BY THE DEPARTMENT OF WAR!!!” The emphatic denial, complete with all capital letters, underscored the issue’s sensitivity.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth contradicted the reports on social media platform X, writing: “This is NOT a meeting about ‘top secret China war plans.’ It’s an informal meeting about innovation, efficiencies, and smarter production.” This characterization attempted to reframe the meeting as focused on Musk’s expertise in technological innovation rather than military strategy.
Pentagon says he’s ‘just visiting’
Adding to these denials, Pentagon spokesperson Sean Parnell issued a statement describing Musk’s Pentagon visit simply as “just visiting,” a characterization that seemed deliberately vague given that the visitor was Elon Musk, owner of SpaceX, the most valuable (on Wall Street) defense contractor in the world.
According to Reuters, Musk did indeed visit the Pentagon. He reportedly met with Secretary Hegseth in his office rather than in the secure “Tank” facility mentioned in the original reporting.
Media coverage has primarily focused on the controversy surrounding Musk’s access to classified information rather than the detailed operational war plans against China being developed at the Pentagon. The real issue here is the existence of such advanced military planning rather than who might be briefed on it.
The Pentagon’s possible sharing of its most sensitive and closely guarded operational war plans regarding China with Musk underscores how advanced war preparations have become.
The Trump administration has publicly stated, through Defense Secretary Hegseth, its intention to shift from the conflict in Ukraine to China.
In February, Hegseth articulated this position by explaining that “stark strategic realities prevent the United States of America from being primarily focused on the security of Europe.” He emphasized that the administration is instead prioritizing possible war with China in the Pacific.
This strategic reorientation is not new. It began in 2011 with Barack Obama’s Pivot to Asia, a Cold War-style containment policy. The Pivot to Asia was primarily a military operation.
The military component of the Pivot began with the Obama administration reorienting U.S. military power toward Asia, moving Naval assets to the Pacific. This included stationing a full Marine task force in Australia, deploying combat ships to Singapore, and positioning MV-22 Ospreys in Japan.
However, by 2022, the United States still had more troops in Europe than it did in 2011, and high-end military systems continued to be routinely deployed to the Middle East and Ukraine rather than Asia.
SpaceX: A critical military contractor
Billionaire Elon Musk is both Donald Trump’s co-executive through DOGE and the owner of SpaceX, a company deeply integrated into U.S. military and intelligence operations.
SpaceX has emerged as one of the Pentagon’s most critical contractors, particularly in two key areas. First, its Starlink satellite network provides global high-speed data communications that military personnel rely on for worldwide operations. According to the New York Times, the company “has been paid hundreds of millions of dollars by the Pentagon that now relies heavily on SpaceX’s Starlink satellite communications network for military personnel to transmit data worldwide.”
Second, SpaceX has established near-monopoly status in orbital launch capabilities, accounting for approximately 90% of mass launched into orbit in 2024. This dominant position makes the company indispensable for military and intelligence satellite deployment. The New York Times reported that “in 2024, SpaceX was granted about $1.6 billion in Air Force contracts,” not including classified spending by intelligence agencies like the National Reconnaissance Office, which has contracted SpaceX to build “a new constellation of low-earth orbit satellites to spy on China, Russia, and other threats.”
The nature of Pentagon war plans
The alleged briefing would have involved highly classified operational plans, known in military terminology as “O-plans.” The New York Times described these as “among the military’s most closely guarded secrets,” explaining that the specific briefing prepared for the China war plan consists of “about 20 to 30 slides that lay out how the United States would fight such a conflict.”
Such plans typically cover the full spectrum of potential conflict,
beginning with the indications and warning of a threat from China to various options on what Chinese targets to hit, over what time period, that would be presented to Mr. Trump for decisions.
According to the initial reports, senior military leadership including Defense Secretary Hegseth, Acting Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Christopher W. Grady, and Indo-Pacific Command head Admiral Samuel J. Paparo were set to present these details to Musk.
The underlying significance of this incident extends beyond the immediate question of whether Musk received classified information. The controversy highlights the dominant role of the military-tech-industrial complex and the high-tech billionaires.