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The Imagineers of War: The Untold Story of DARPA, the Pentagon Agency That Changed the World
The definitive history of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, the Pentagon agency that has quietly shaped war and technology for nearly sixty years.
Founded in 1958 in response to the launch of Sputnik, the agency’s original mission was to create “the unimagined weapons of the future.” Over the decades, DARPA has been responsible for countless inventions and technologies that extend well beyond military technology. Sharon Weinberger gives us a riveting account of DARPA’s successes and failures, its remarkable innovations, and its wild-eyed schemes. We see how the threat of nuclear Armageddon sparked investment in computer networking, leading to the Internet, as well as to a proposal to power a missile-destroying particle beam by draining the Great Lakes. We learn how DARPA was responsible during the Vietnam War for both Agent Orange and the development of the world’s first armed drones, and how after 9/11 the agency sparked a national controversy over surveillance with its data-mining research. And we see how DARPA’s success with self-driving cars was followed by disappointing contributions to the Afghanistan and Iraq wars.
Weinberger has interviewed more than one hundred former Pentagon officials and scientists involved in DARPA’s projects—many of whom have never spoken publicly about their work with the agency—and pored over countless declassified records from archives around the country, documents obtained under the Freedom of Information Act, and exclusive materials provided by sources. The Imagineers of War is a compelling and groundbreaking history in which science, technology, and politics collide.
Founded in 1958 in response to the launch of Sputnik, the agency’s original mission was to create “the unimagined weapons of the future.” Over the decades, DARPA has been responsible for countless inventions and technologies that extend well beyond military technology. Sharon Weinberger gives us a riveting account of DARPA’s successes and failures, its remarkable innovations, and its wild-eyed schemes. We see how the threat of nuclear Armageddon sparked investment in computer networking, leading to the Internet, as well as to a proposal to power a missile-destroying particle beam by draining the Great Lakes. We learn how DARPA was responsible during the Vietnam War for both Agent Orange and the development of the world’s first armed drones, and how after 9/11 the agency sparked a national controversy over surveillance with its data-mining research. And we see how DARPA’s success with self-driving cars was followed by disappointing contributions to the Afghanistan and Iraq wars.
Weinberger has interviewed more than one hundred former Pentagon officials and scientists involved in DARPA’s projects—many of whom have never spoken publicly about their work with the agency—and pored over countless declassified records from archives around the country, documents obtained under the Freedom of Information Act, and exclusive materials provided by sources. The Imagineers of War is a compelling and groundbreaking history in which science, technology, and politics collide.
496 pages, Paperback
Published February 20, 2018
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
December 5, 2019
Some firms project an aura of sophistication that helps form and cement a narrative of themselves as trailblazing, agenda setting, institutions where every employee is a genius. DARPA is such an organization. Yet, when its history is examined closely one notices most of the effusive praise and deference reserved for the firm is propped up on hype surrounding a few outsized successes and a studied silence about the astounding number of obviously retarded cash burning monster projects that turned out to be duds. Among the latter are the likes of: an electron powered dome meant to fry incoming enemy projectiles, an invisible fighter jet, sci-fi fantasy style jet-packs, building a moat around Saigon to seal off insurgents, building strategic hamlets to forcibly resettle civilians in conflict zones etc.
DARPA is the go to example trotted out by anti-market ideologues in support of their view that only the public sector carries out cost intensive research and development projects with uncertain returns. A less well known chapter in DARPA's history which gives the lie to that bit of nonsense is one where it was effectively an angel investor in private firms doing work on pet projects of eccentric scientists. Marketing men with no technical or military expertise were hired and placed in managerial positions. Large sums of government money were expended on what amounted to building and testing prototypes of bizarre comic book defense equipment ideas that were the products of back-of-napkin calculations slurred out in drunken shitpost sessions of an assortment of heavyweight scientists and spherical-cow-dynamics experts under the leadership of a buffoon bossman with absolute discretion. DARPA's personnel history provides many counterexamples to the Peter Principle which states people rise to their level of incompetence; there is no height of lunacy to which a determined and charismatic fool cannot rise.
DARPA is the go to example trotted out by anti-market ideologues in support of their view that only the public sector carries out cost intensive research and development projects with uncertain returns. A less well known chapter in DARPA's history which gives the lie to that bit of nonsense is one where it was effectively an angel investor in private firms doing work on pet projects of eccentric scientists. Marketing men with no technical or military expertise were hired and placed in managerial positions. Large sums of government money were expended on what amounted to building and testing prototypes of bizarre comic book defense equipment ideas that were the products of back-of-napkin calculations slurred out in drunken shitpost sessions of an assortment of heavyweight scientists and spherical-cow-dynamics experts under the leadership of a buffoon bossman with absolute discretion. DARPA's personnel history provides many counterexamples to the Peter Principle which states people rise to their level of incompetence; there is no height of lunacy to which a determined and charismatic fool cannot rise.
November 1, 2021
What I expected: A look inside an institutional culture that sustained innovation almost miraculously for decades.
The impression I got: Multiple agencies over time, each evolving into the next and taking on the personality of the leadership and the obsessions of the day.
The view from the inside was a lot more mundane than the view from the outside of all the innovations it's been involved with. More about the bureaucracy behind the technology than the technology itself. Absolutely worthy of documentation, but not like a Neal Stephenson novel brought to life.
The impression I got: Multiple agencies over time, each evolving into the next and taking on the personality of the leadership and the obsessions of the day.
The view from the inside was a lot more mundane than the view from the outside of all the innovations it's been involved with. More about the bureaucracy behind the technology than the technology itself. Absolutely worthy of documentation, but not like a Neal Stephenson novel brought to life.
October 1, 2020
Having spent much of my career on support of DARPA - initially HAVE BLUE/F-117 (stealth fighter) and later the ATO/TTO offices - I found the subject matter interesting and remember many of the people involved. I was not as familiar with the origins of the agency (prior to late 70s) in space and then counterinsurgency. Well written and detailed, a memoir of the days when America was dominant in science and breakthrough military technologies. Good stuff.
September 15, 2021
I was disappointed that the author takes an uncritical approach to documenting the history of DARPA, which has been profoundly involved in many of the worst conflicts of the past hundred years. Perhaps this approach was necessary in order to get access to the personalities and archives, but it's still disappointing.
October 7, 2020
What can I say? God bless America, only she can produce such a page-turning non-fiction.
March 19, 2025
ok to know history of DARPA.
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews