China has rejected as "fearmongering" calls from Anthropic chief executive Dario Amodei for the US to actively hinder Beijing's progress in artificial intelligence, even as one of its own top intelligence officials publicly warned that AI could pose a threat to Communist party rule. The exchange highlights growing anxiety on both sides of the US-China rivalry over AI, with Washington and Beijing each framing the other's technological advances as a strategic and even existential risk, ahead of a planned meeting between the two countries' leaders later this month.

Amodei's essay, published over the weekend, argued for a global slowdown in AI development while urging Washington to impede China's advancement to preserve a democratic technological edge, warning a Chinese lead could let the Communist party "militarily dominate democracies". China's foreign ministry spokesperson Guo Jiakun dismissed this as unhelpful "confrontation", while Global Times called it a "cold war playbook". Separately, state security minister Chen Yixin wrote in China Cyberspace magazine that hostile actors were using AI, including US models such as Claude and OpenAI's GPT-5.5-Cyber, to wage a "cognitive war" threatening China's political and ideological security. Donald Trump, meanwhile, dismissed AI safety concerns, saying the only guardrail needed was a "strong and smart" president; the two nations' leaders are due to discuss AI governance on 24 September.