
Unit X
How the Pentagon and Silicon Valley Are Transforming the Future of War
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Narrated by:
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Sean Patrick Hopkins
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Raj M. Shah
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Christopher Kirchhoff
About this listen
A riveting inside look at an elite unit within the Pentagon—the Defense Innovation Unit, also known as Unit X—whose mission is to bring Silicon Valley’s cutting-edge technology to America’s military: from the two men who launched the unit.
A vast and largely unseen transformation of how war is fought as profound as the invention of gunpowder or advent of the nuclear age is occurring. Flying cars that can land like helicopters, artificial intelligence-powered drones that can fly into buildings and map their interiors, microsatellites that can see through clouds and monitor rogue missile sites—all these and more are becoming part of America’s DIU-fast-tracked arsenal.
Until recently, the Pentagon was known for its uncomfortable relationship with Silicon Valley and for slow-moving processes that acted as a brake on innovation. Unit X was specifically designed as a bridge to Valley technologists that would accelerate bringing state of the art software and hardware to the battle space. Given authority to cut through red tape and function almost as a venture capital firm, Shah, Kirchhoff, and others in the Unit who came after were tasked particularly with meeting immediate military needs with technology from Valley startups rather than from so-called “primes”—behemoth companies like Lockheed, Raytheon, and Boeing.
Taking us inside AI labs, drone workshops, and battle command centers—and, also, overseas to Ukraine’s frontlines—Shah and Kirchhoff paint a fascinating picture of what it takes to stay dominant in a fast-changing and often precarious geopolitical landscape.
In an era when America’s chief rival, China, has ordered that all commercial firms within its borders make their research and technology available for military exploitation, strengthening the relationship between Washington and Silicon Valley was always advisable. Today, it is an urgent necessity.
©2024 Raj Shah and Christopher Kirchhoff (P)2024 Simon & Schuster AudioListeners also enjoyed...
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- By: Paul Scharre
- Narrated by: Steve Marvel
- Length: 13 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
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A new industrial revolution has begun. Like mechanization or electricity before it, artificial intelligence will touch every aspect of our lives—and cause profound disruptions in the balance of global power, especially among the AI superpowers: China, the United States, and Europe. Autonomous weapons expert Paul Scharre takes listeners inside the fierce competition to develop and implement this game-changing technology and dominate the future.
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Insights into AI military applications and possibilities
- By BErickson on 07-04-23
By: Paul Scharre
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The War Below
- Lithium, Copper, and the Global Battle to Power Our Lives
- By: Ernest Scheyder
- Narrated by: Matt Godfrey
- Length: 12 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
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The War Below reveals the explosive brawl among industry titans, conservationists, community groups, policymakers, and many others over whether the habitats of rare plants, sensitive ecosystems, Indigenous holy sites, and other places should be dug up for their riches.
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Misses its chance at greatness
- By B L on 09-16-24
By: Ernest Scheyder
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Growth
- A History and a Reckoning
- By: Daniel Susskind
- Narrated by: Daniel Susskind
- Length: 10 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
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Yet prosperity has come at a price: environmental destruction, desolation of local cultures, the rise of vast inequalities, and destabilizing technologies. Faced with such damage, many now claim that the only way forward is through "degrowth," deliberately shrinking our economic footprint. Instead, Daniel Susskind argues, we must keep growth but redirect it, making it better reflect what we truly value.
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Looking for a conclusion that will sell books
- By DCS on 10-05-24
By: Daniel Susskind
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The War for Ukraine
- Strategy and Adaptation Under Fire
- By: Mick Ryan
- Narrated by: Grant Cartwright
- Length: 11 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
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The Russo-Ukraine War is a vital learning opportunity for military strategists across the globe. The first and clearest lesson to be gleaned from it is this: the soundness of a military's strategy and the nimbleness with which it can adapt to unforeseen circumstances are the two most important factors in deciding victory or defeat. The War for Ukraine analyzes the war through these twin lenses of strategy and adaptation, detailing how each army has succeeded or failed to plan for and adapt to this twenty-first century war.
By: Mick Ryan
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Rinsed
- From Cartels to Crypto: How the Tech Industry Washes Money for the World's Deadliest Crooks
- By: Geoff White
- Narrated by: Geoff White
- Length: 9 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
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Money laundering has been around for centuries. For as long as people have been stealing money, there's been an industry ready to wash it. But recent tech innovations have created vastly complex new systems for laundering that threaten to overwhelm authorities, destabilise economies and disrupt societies. Ranging from the flamboyant luxury of Dubai hotels to quiet coastal Ireland, from the UK to Nigeria and from Indonesia to North Korea, Rinsed is a truly global relevatory investigation into the new army of innovative launderers ... and the consequences for all of us.
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Almost but not quite plagiarism
- By T.T. on 06-19-24
By: Geoff White
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Tribal
- How the Cultural Instincts That Divide Us Can Help Bring Us Together
- By: Michael Morris
- Narrated by: Michael Morris
- Length: 9 hrs
- Unabridged
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Tribalism is our most misunderstood buzzword. We’ve all heard pundits bemoan its rise, and it’s been blamed for everything from political polarization to workplace discrimination. But as acclaimed cultural psychologist and Columbia professor Michael Morris argues, our tribal instincts are humanity’s secret weapon. Ours is the only species that lives in tribes: groups glued together by their distinctive cultures that can grow to a scale far beyond clans and bands. Morris argues that our psychology is wired by evolution in three distinctive ways.
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Well educated, institutionally, but otherwise naive
- By Zirrus on 12-14-24
By: Michael Morris
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Dark Wire
- The Incredible True Story of the Largest Sting Operation Ever
- By: Joseph Cox
- Narrated by: Peter Ganim
- Length: 11 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
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Beginning in 2018, a powerful app for secure communications, called Anom, began to take root among drug dealers and other criminals. It had extraordinary safeguards to keep out prying eyes--the power to quickly wipe data, voice-masking technology, and more. It was better than other apps popular among organized crime syndicates, except for one thing: it was secretly run by law enforcement. Over the next few years, the FBI, along with law enforcement partners in Australia and parts of Europe, got a front row seat to the global criminal underworld.
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Amazing story
- By Katie W. on 06-08-24
By: Joseph Cox
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Chip War
- The Quest to Dominate the World's Most Critical Technology
- By: Chris Miller
- Narrated by: Stephen Graybill
- Length: 12 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
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You may be surprised to learn that microchips are the new oil—the scarce resource on which the modern world depends. Today, military, economic, and geopolitical power are built on a foundation of computer chips. Virtually everything—from missiles to microwaves—runs on chips, including cars, smartphones, the stock market, even the electric grid. Until recently, America designed and built the fastest chips and maintained its lead as the #1 superpower, but America’s edge is in danger of slipping, undermined by players in Taiwan, Korea, and Europe taking over manufacturing.
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Great history, but could poor narration
- By Lily Wong on 10-26-22
By: Chris Miller
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Default
- The Landmark Court Battle over Argentina's $100 Billion Debt Restructuring
- By: Gregory Makoff, Lee C. Buchheit - foreword
- Narrated by: Timothy Andrés Pabon
- Length: 12 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
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Default is the riveting story of Argentina's sovereign debt drama, which reveals the obscure inner workings of sovereign debt restructuring. This detailed case study describes the intense fight over the role of the IMF in Argentina's 2005 debt restructuring and the ensuing bitter decade of litigation with holdout creditors, demonstrating that outcomes for sovereign debt are determined by a complex interplay between financial markets, governments, the IMF, the press, and the courts.
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Delivers on promise
- By Lukk on 06-28-24
By: Gregory Makoff, and others
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The Longevity Imperative
- How to Build a Healthier and More Productive Society to Support Our Longer Lives
- By: Andrew J. Scott
- Narrated by: Michael Chance
- Length: 10 hrs and 50 mins
- Unabridged
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Thanks to increases in life expectancy, we can now expect to live for a long time. Most of us would welcome an extra day in the week, so why do so many of us view the prospect of additional years with fear and skepticism? The reason is simple: society is not currently structured to support long lives. Rather than thinking in terms of the needs of a rising number of older people, we must instead support the young and middle-aged to prepare differently for the longer futures they can expect.
By: Andrew J. Scott
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7 Seconds to Die
- A Military Analysis of the Second Nagorno-Karabakh War and the Future of Warfighting
- By: John Antal, Alexander Kott - foreword
- Narrated by: Jim Seybert
- Length: 6 hrs and 39 mins
- Unabridged
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The second Nagorno-Karabakh war—fought between Armenia and Azerbaijan between September 24 and November 10, 2020—was the first war in history won primarily by unmanned systems. This forty-four-day war resulted in a decisive military victory for Azerbaijan. Armenia was outfought, outnumbered, and outspent and lost even though they controlled the high ground in a mountainous region. The fact that Azerbaijan won the war is not extraordinary. What is exceptional is that this was the first modern war primarily decided by unmanned weapons.
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Military tactic summary for the 2nd Azerbijan and Armenia conflict
- By George Burdick on 01-03-25
By: John Antal, and others
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The Corporation in the 21st Century
- Why (Almost) Everything We Are Told About Business Is Wrong
- By: John Kay
- Narrated by: Peter Wicks
- Length: 14 hrs and 19 mins
- Unabridged
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John Kay's incisive overhaul of our ideas about business redefines our understanding of successful commercial activity and the corporation—and describes how we have come to "love the product" as we "hate the producer." This is a brilliant and original work from one of the greatest economists.
By: John Kay
What listeners say about Unit X
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- Charles McKissick
- 07-10-24
Hope for our national security!
A fabulous tale of how forward leaning patriots can tackle hard problems, address world challenges, and develop a path forward for our collective national security.
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- TJ Kerins
- 01-05-25
Excellent Current Event
Read this book if you want an excellent summarization to the cute of technology and defense
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- bryan
- 11-27-24
Cautionary tale
This is the world we live in. Good book. Its a must read for Defense related Champions,
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- Ruslan
- 12-24-24
More on politics than on technology
The book opening was promising, but then went into geopolitics. I was hoping to learn about technological advances in military but very little was dedicated to that topic.
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- Anonymous User
- 09-11-24
Connects the dots
This book helped me decipher some trends that are apparent in defense for better or worse. Certainly, legacy defense companies have a lofty price tag but house incredibly capabilities. PM management and resistance to committing to networked model based systems has led to lofty price tags, rework and common delays. That said, it’s systems based models that enable agility. Let’s not throw the baby out with the bath water. Let’s also not undermine the advanced technology that does exist. Meaning AI and ML have been apart of every platform I have worked, not new or even improved across all applications.
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- Ann
- 09-07-24
Great eye opener
Great look at the relationship between modern technology and national security, as well as the roadblocks and reality of changing our ways and getting new programs started
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- Chris M
- 09-03-24
Thoroughly Enjoyed
I’ve been thinking about executing on some ideas I’ve been considering for some time. I found the book illuminating, and I’m excited at the prospect of a more accessible ecosystem in the defense hemisphere.
This was an excellent read, and I highly recommend.
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- Pauly
- 12-04-24
Government got it right
This book captures the effort it took to convince the government to take a risk and create a group that truly seeks innovative solutions that are efficiently developed in cooperation with commercial industry. Solid read. I really appreciated the work that the authors did to capture the creation, struggles to survive, and the impact of DIU.
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- Vasilis
- 12-11-24
Cool story but not too much substance
It’s the story of Unit X and the glorification of the people involved. Interesting insights about how the US had fallen behind technologically and how it is now playing catch up and how important it is for militaries to adopt to commercial technologies that are both cheaper and involve the latest tech.
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- Jason
- 01-13-25
A must read
If you are in national security or want to defend the country this is a must read.
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