Wired for War
book by P. W. Singer
Wired for War: The Robotics Revolution and Conflict in the 21st Century (Penguin, 2009) is a best-selling book by P. W. Singer. It explores how science fiction has started to play out on modern day battlefields, with robots used more and more in war.
About the book
For the book research, Singer, a senior fellow at Brookings Institution, interviewed hundreds of robot scientists, science fiction writers, soldiers, insurgents, politicians, lawyers, journalists, and human rights activists from around the world. Even before publication, the work had already been featured in the video game Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots, as well as in presentations to audiences as diverse as the U.S. Army War College, Air Force Institute of Technology and the National Student Leadership Conference. Singer's 2009 book tour included stops on NPR's Fresh Air, the Daily Show with Jon Stewart, the opening of the TED conference, the Royal Court of the United Arab Emirates and presentations at 75 venues around the United States. The book was a non-fiction book of the year by the Financial Times and named to the official reading lists for the US Air Force, US Navy, and Royal Australian Navy.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Wired for War” is book by P. W. Singer. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Wired, book and Singer, not as a finished interpretation.
Why this record matters
The phrase “book by P. W. Singer” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.
The entry’s evidential value lies in the named roles, institutions and publications that can be tested against primary documentation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 2, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q2585560. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 2009.
Later biographies can compress uncertainty and repeat inherited reputations, so apparently settled claims may still require comparison. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Read biographical claims against dates, named institutions and the cited references. Distinguish a subject’s later reputation from evidence produced during their lifetime.
- Establishing names and roles
- Building a first chronology
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Personal papers, civil or court records, institutional files and the scholarship cited by the source.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “Wired for War”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow Wired for War primary sources, Wired for War archive and Wired research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
- Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Wired for War”?
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Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “Wired for War” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.