Microsoft said on Friday that it would sell the military and intelligence agencies whatever advanced technologies they needed "to build a strong defense," just months after Google told the Pentagon it would refuse to provide artificial intelligence products that could build more accurate drones or compete with China for next-generation weapons. The announcement -- made quietly in a small, town-hall-style meeting with the software giant's leadership and employees on Thursday, then published on a blog on Friday afternoon -- starkly illustrated the radically different paths these leading American technology companies are taking as they struggle with their role in creating a new generation of cyberweapons to help, and perhaps someday replace, American warriors. But the divergent paths also underscore concerns inside the American defense and intelligence establishments about how the United States will take on a rising China. In the past two years, the Chinese government has set goals for dominance in the next decade in artificial intelligence, quantum computing and other technologies that it believes will allow its military and intelligence agencies to surpass those of the United States. Pentagon officials have questioned how committed domestic technology companies are to keeping the country on the leading edge, the way Raytheon, Boeing, IBM and McDonnell Douglas did during the Cold War.