Let us now imagine a $100 million movie about Midori Naka

What is left to say about Hiroshima on this anniversary? Much, of course. So far we have mostly covered the window dressing that came with victory and has lasted for three generations after the blood stopped flowing. It took 50 years for revisionist historians to enter the mainstream with evidence that there was no […]

#NoBarbenheimer

B-21 Raider: Coming to a Super Bowl Near You

Flying Blind

“B-21 is being acquired through nontraditional means, using the Air Force’s Rapid Capability Office instead of a standard dedicated program office, as is more typical. Although this approach may improve the speed and ease of the acquisition, Congress has relatively little experience overseeing rapid acquisitions processes. At $3 billion a year, this […]

Paraders Out of the Past, 1992

“No One Noticed—Paraders Out of the Past” in The Nation, April 6, 1992

The Other Donald, 1932-2021

from ”The Passion of the Rumsfeld” in Harper’s Magazine, May 2004

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Leif Parsons

Blue Sky Metropolis

Hiroshima, Again

This essay originally appeared in HuffPost on August 6, 2013. I bring it back today to mark the 75th anniversary.

What is left to say about Hiroshima on this anniversary? Much, of course. So far we have mostly covered the window dressing that came with victory and has lasted for three generations after […]

For All Mankind

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Dora-Mittelbau, April 1945

 

 

 

in memory of Yves Béon, 1925-2011, and Guido Zembsch-Schreve, 1916-2003

Exeunt

Spring semester’s end marks my retirement from teaching after 20 years at Johns Hopkins. Now the old unsolved mystery: Where does the time go? I will miss the students, some more than others. (The faculty are already remembered like odd ducks from childhood. It is highly possible that I have become one, too.) They brought […]

Project Maven: Cease and Desist

A report that Google is hedging on its pledge to stop participating in Project Maven, the military program to adopt artificial intelligence for drone targeting, brings to mind Hans Bethe’s 1995 plea to scientists and engineers developing new nuclear weapons: “cease and desist.” For the old lion of Los Alamos, there was only one way […]