Technology of one kind or another has always been a central ingredient in war. The Spartan king Archidamus, for instance, reacted with alarm when first witnessing a weapon that could shoot darts throu
The searing, deeply-reported story of a platoon of young American warriors, and the war they didn’t know they were fighting; now in paperback.This is a story that starts off small and goes very big. The small part of the story might sound familiar at first: It is a war story about a platoon of mostly nineteen-year-old boys sent to Afghanistan whose experience ends abruptly in catastrophe. The big part of the story―inexorably linked to the small story and never comprehensively reported before―is the Defense Department’s quest to build the world’s most powerful biometrics database with which to monitor and police the world. To pivot its warfighting capacity from lethal action to mass cyber-surveillance using military-grade systems to identify, track, and catalogue people all over the world by their unique biological markers.First Platoon is an American saga, a story that illuminates a developing transformation of society made possible by new technology. Part war story, part legal drama,
Since the end of the Cold War the United States and other major powers have wielded their air forces against much weaker state and non-state actors. In this age of primacy, air wars have been contests between unequals and characterized by asymmetries of power, interest, and technology. This volume examines ten contemporary wars where air power played a major and at times decisive role. Its chapters explore the evolving use of unmanned aircraft against global terrorist organizations as well as more conventional air conflicts in Bosnia, Kosovo, Afghanistan, Iraq, Lebanon, Libya, Yemen, Syria, and against ISIS. Air superiority could be assumed in this unique and brief period where the international system was largely absent great power competition. However, the reliable and unchallenged employment of a spectrum of manned and unmanned technologies permitted in the age of primacy may not prove effective in future conflicts.
Since the end of the Cold War the United States and other major powers have wielded their air forces against much weaker state and non-state actors. In this age of primacy, air wars have been contests between unequals and characterized by asymmetries of power, interest, and technology. This volume examines ten contemporary wars where air power played a major and at times decisive role. Its chapters explore the evolving use of unmanned aircraft against global terrorist organizations as well as more conventional air conflicts in Bosnia, Kosovo, Afghanistan, Iraq, Lebanon, Libya, Yemen, Syria, and against ISIS. Air superiority could be assumed in this unique and brief period where the international system was largely absent great power competition. However, the reliable and unchallenged employment of a spectrum of manned and unmanned technologies permitted in the age of primacy may not prove effective in future conflicts.
What is the function of art in the era of digital globalization?How can one think of art institutions in an age defined by planetary civil war, growing inequality, and proprietary digital technology?
Examining the influence of information technology on the art of war theoretical structure and, beyond, the concrete effects of those technologies on the conduct of war (thus, not warfare) itself. Wha
Features British technological ambition in the 1950s and 1960s - the Golden Age of British Aviation. It looks at Cold War fears and Cold War politics - Cuban missiles, Gary Powers and Jack Profumo. Wh
The idea of the earth as a vessel in space came of age in an era shaped by space travel and the Cold War. Hohler’s study brings together technology, science and ecology to explore the way this latter-
No single figure embodies Cold War science more than the renowned physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer. Although other scientists may have been more influential in establishing the institutions and policie
The idea of the earth as a vessel in space came of age in an era shaped by space travel and the Cold War. Höhler’s study brings together technology, science and ecology to explore the way this latter-
The histories of modern war and childhood were the result of competing urgencies. According to ideals of childhood widely accepted throughout the world by 1900, children should have been protected, even hidden, from conflict and danger. Yet at a time when modern ways of childhood became increasingly possible for economic, social, and political reasons, it became less possible to fully protect them in the face of massive industrialized warfare driven by geopolitical rivalries and expansionist policies. Taking a global perspective, the chapters in this book examine a wide range of experiences and places. In addition to showing how the engagement of children and youth with war differed according to geography, technology, class, age, race, gender, and the nature of the state, they reveal how children acquired agency during the twentieth century's greatest conflicts.
Hans Jonas here rethinks the foundations of ethics in light of the awesome transformations wrought by modern technology: the threat of nuclear war, ecological ravage, genetic engineering, and the lik
The Chinese invented gunpowder and began exploring its military uses as early as the 900s, four centuries before the technology passed to the West. But by the early 1800s, China had fallen so far behind the West in gunpowder warfare that it was easily defeated by Britain in the Opium War of 1839-42. What happened? In The Gunpowder Age, Tonio Andrade offers a compelling new answer, opening a fresh perspective on a key question of world history: why did the countries of western Europe surge to global importance starting in the 1500s while China slipped behind?Historians have long argued that gunpowder weapons helped Europeans establish global hegemony. Yet the inhabitants of what is today China not only invented guns and bombs but also, Andrade shows, continued to innovate in gunpowder technology through the early 1700s--much longer than previously thought. Why, then, did China become so vulnerable? Andrade argues that one significant reason is that it was out of practice fighting wars,
After the second World War, the term “technology” came to signify both the anxieties of possible annihilation in a rapidly changing world and the exhilaration of accelerating cultural change. Technomo
Explore the lands of Eberron in this campaign sourcebook for the world's greatest roleplaying game.This book provides everything players and Dungeon Masters need to play Dungeons & Dragons in Eberron--a war-torn world filled with magic-fueled technology, airships and lightning trains, where noir-inspired mystery meets swashbuckling adventure. Will Eberron enter a prosperous new age or will the shadow of war descend once again?- Dive straight into your pulp adventures with easy-to-use locations, complete with maps of floating castles, skyscrapers, and more.- Explore Sharn, a city of skyscrapers, airships, and noirish intrigue and a crossroads for the world's war-ravaged peoples.- Include a campaign for characters venturing into the Mournland, a mist-cloaked, corpse-littered land twisted by magic.- Meld magic and invention to craft objects of wonder as an artificer--the first official class to be released for fifth edition D&D since the Player's Handbook.- Flesh out your characte
Thomas Rid's revelatory history of cybernetics pulls together disparate threads in the history of technology, from the invention of radar and pilotless flying bombs in World War Two to today's age of
The period between the repeal of the Corn Laws and the First World War is crucial to the understanding of contemporary rural issues. The unifying theme of this monumental 2000 volume is the changing role of architecture and the countryside in national life, and the impact of social and economic forces unleashed by industrialisation and the growth of towns. Although science and technology had promised unprecedented advances in agricultural productivity, English agriculture had by 1914 lost both its 'headship among industries' and its technical supremacy among nations. Agriculture now produced less than one tenth of national income and employment, and less than half the nation's food. Only one fifth of the population was classified 'rural'; most traditional rural crafts had long since decayed; and the influence of the landowning classes was declining. Beginning with a critical view of the 'Golden Age' and Great Depression, this book goes on to consider separate elements relating to the t
This study investigated the nature of the future combat air staff in the context of air war in the information age and how application of information-age technology could reduce deployment of personne
In the first cultural and political history of the Russian nuclear age, Paul Josephson describes the rise of nuclear physics in the USSR, the enthusiastic pursuit of military and peaceful nuclear programs through the Chernobyl disaster and the collapse of the Soviet Union, and the ongoing, self-proclaimed ‘renaissance’ of nuclear power in Russia in the 21st century. At the height of their power, the Soviets commanded 39,000 nuclear warheads, yet claimed to be servants of the ‘peaceful atom’ – which they also pursued avidly. This book examines both military and peaceful Soviet and post-Soviet nuclear programs for the long durée – before the war, during the Cold War, and in Russia to the present – whilst also grappling with the political and ideological importance of nuclear technologies, the associated economic goals, the social and environmental costs, and the cultural embrace of nuclear power. Nuclear Russia probes the juncture of history of science and technology, political and c
In the first cultural and political history of the Russian nuclear age, Paul Josephson describes the rise of nuclear physics in the USSR, the enthusiastic pursuit of military and peaceful nuclear programs through the Chernobyl disaster and the collapse of the Soviet Union, and the ongoing, self-proclaimed ‘renaissance’ of nuclear power in Russia in the 21st century. At the height of their power, the Soviets commanded 39,000 nuclear warheads, yet claimed to be servants of the ‘peaceful atom’ – which they also pursued avidly. This book examines both military and peaceful Soviet and post-Soviet nuclear programs for the long durée – before the war, during the Cold War, and in Russia to the present – whilst also grappling with the political and ideological importance of nuclear technologies, the associated economic goals, the social and environmental costs, and the cultural embrace of nuclear power. Nuclear Russia probes the juncture of history of science and technology, political and c
