US Under Secretary Jacob Helberg confirmed sensitive national security talks with India on rolling out Anthropic’s Fable.
The talks follow a June 12 US order that suspended Anthropic’s Fable 5 and Mythos 5 for all foreign nationals.
India sought assurances against abrupt cutoffs, and the US said trusted partners will keep reliable access.
The United States and India are quietly negotiating who gets access to the most powerful AI models, and Anthropic’s Claude is at the center of it. Speaking to ANI on June 25 at the second Pax Silica Summit in Washington, US Under Secretary of Economic Affairs Jacob Helberg confirmed the two countries are in active talks over rolling out Anthropic’s Fable model.
What was said
Helberg described the discussions as sensitive national security matters that are not fully fit for public detail, but said both sides understand each other’s positions. He framed the US plan as a “gradual, measured approach” to releasing Anthropic’s models safely, for the US, for India, and for other trusted partners that run critical infrastructure like power grids.
Why the talks are happening
The backdrop is a June 12 export control directive from the US Commerce Department. It ordered Anthropic to halt access to its newest models, Fable 5 and Mythos 5, for any foreign national, whether inside or outside the US, including the company’s own foreign-national staff.
Anthropic complied but called the move a misunderstanding, saying the security technique cited was minor and already known. The full order has not been made public.
What India wants
India’s concern is reliability. MeitY Secretary S. Krishnan said India pressed for clarity because, in his words, “we can’t have abrupt cutoffs.” India is integrating advanced AI across sectors like healthcare, agriculture, and governance, and does not want sudden disruptions tied to geopolitics or a vendor decision.
The US assured India that trusted partners will not face abrupt loss of access. Krishnan also pushed the broader point that no single country can do this alone, and that supply chains need diversification so no one geography becomes a chokepoint.
Why it matters
This is a sign of where AI is heading. Frontier models are now being treated like controlled strategic goods, not ordinary software. For India, it is both an opportunity to deepen the US tech partnership and a reminder of the risk of depending on access that Washington can restrict overnight.
For businesses anywhere, it is a warning that the AI tools they build on can become subject to export rules with little notice.
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