First Breakfast

When Napoleon smashed the Prussians at Jena and Auerstedt, it was the culmination of decades of stagnation by a Prussian army that was stuck in the past. Gerhard von Scharnhorst had labored in obscurity for years, training young officers to think about and fight modern wars. When the moment of crisis arrived, he—and a young disciple named Carl von Clausewitz—was ready to meet the moment. Today on First Breakfast, @peternmitchell profiles the heretical officers who built an alternate infrastructure in a hidebound system—and revived it from ruin to greatness. Better to reform your army before Napoleon wipes it out. But if by whatever misfortune you don't—pray you have a Scharnhorst waiting in reserve. firstbreakfast.com/p/a-voice-cryi…

Frederick the Great banned coffee in Prussia and told his officers to drink beer instead. Have yourself a Prussian @FirstBreakfast with my tale about a bold reformer who brewed a new army. firstbreakfast.com/p/a-voice-cryi…

WW2 buffs and defense tech experts are enjoying my @FirstBreakfast piece on why the Nazis didn't win World War II. Hope you'll enjoy it, as well: firstbreakfast.com/p/why-didnt-ge…

American defense policy isn't doomed to endless tinkering at the margins. A new report by @JoinFAI features five bold proposals for putting America on a "wartime footing," from a Defense Acquisitions Delta Force to a citizen's proving ground for weapons testing. These ideas are ambitious. More important, they're grounded in history: each proposal has a precedent. America has done big things before. The question is whether we have the will to do them again. Read the full article by @ssankar & @Madeline_Zimm: firstbreakfast.com/p/five-proposa…

Important and illuminating @FirstBreakfast piece by @ssankar and @Madeline_Zimm on where our defense industrial base needs to go next: firstbreakfast.com/p/five-proposa…

Loved @timhwang's Wartime Footing report so much I had to review it with @ssankar

Who better to answer the question of why Germany didn’t win World War II than the author of Freedom’s Forge? @ArthurLHerman's latest for @FirstBreakfast

Germany had some of the world's most advanced—or, to use the modern industry term, exquisite—weapons in World War II. Jet fighters. Ballistic missiles. Diesel-electric submarines. Even early forms of precision-guided munitions. So why didn't Germany win? Renowed historian @arthurlherman tackles this question today. He argues that innovation and whiz-bang tech alone are not enough to win a war. You need an industrial base deep, broad, and large enough to scale innovation—and bury your enemy under metal. What lessons should the United States learn from this history? firstbreakfast.com/p/why-didnt-ge…

My latest @FirstBreakfast essay: why didn't the Nazis win World War2? Didn't they have the most advanced technologies, from jets and ballistic missiles to a nuke weapons program? I explain: firstbreakfast.com/p/why-didnt-ge…

Thanks for having me on! One of the few people I can talk to about niche things like: -would Andrew Higgins fit in with the Gundo bros -was the caltech suicide squad of the 1930s just an early version of Tim’s proposed Citizen’s Proving Ground -do we really need 160k acquisitions personnel …and more questions that keep me up at night

The military spends billions each year on routine purchases. Those purchases can either strengthen American industrial capacity or accelerate its decline. Rebuilding American manufacturing requires acquisition professionals who refuse to be spectators—and route that money to American builders. Lucas Cristaldi and Matt Brien recount how they built relationships with American suppliers and manufacturers while serving as acquisition professionals at Moody Air Force Base in Valdosta, Georgia: x.com/FirstBreakfast…

The most dangerous man in the room isn't the tyrant. It's the brilliant idealist who's decided he knows better than everyone else what freedom looks like. Epistemic humility isn't weakness. It's the prerequisite to preserving democracy. Otherwise it is tyranny by tech bro. shyamsankar.com/p/the-jagged-i…

A really well written piece for anyone looking to understand some of the deftech speed challenges. Speed and cost when manufacturing at scale is a massive challenge. Prototype fast, fail fast, but if we don’t solve the manufacturing problem we won’t be able to build fast.

what do these books have in common? answer: New York Times Best Seller List

Strongly recommend @ssankar’s “Mobilize”. It is a story of how America needs to rebuild its industrial base but more than that it’s a story of many unsung patriots who have worked hard to give us our capabilities.