The Complex by Nick Turse

The Complex by Nick Turse

"Fascinating, no matter where you place yourself on the ideological spectrum."--Wired

Now in paperback, a stunning breakdown of the modern military-industrial complex--an omnipresent, hidden-in-plain-sight system of systems that penetrates all our lives.

From iPods to Starbucks to Oakley sunglasses, historian Nick Turse explores the Pentagon's little-noticed contacts (and contracts) with the products and companies that now form the fabric of America. He investigates the remarkable range of military incursions into the civilian world: the Pentagon's collaborations with Hollywood filmmakers; its outlandish schemes to weaponize the wild kingdom; its joint ventures with Marvel Comics and NASCAR. Similarly disturbing is the way in which the military, desperate for fresh recruits, has tapped into the "culture of cool" by making "friends" on MySpace.

A striking vision of this brave new world of remote-controlled rats and super-soldiers who need no sleep, The Complex will change our understanding of the militarization of America. We are a long way from Eisenhower's military-industrial complex: this is the essential book for understanding its twenty-first-century progeny.

Nick Turse is the author of The Complex and a fellow at the Nation Institute. He is also the managing editor of TomDispatch.com. Among other outlets, his work has appeared in the Los Angeles Times, the San Francisco Chronicle, and The Nation. Turse won the Ridenhour Award for Reportorial Excellence, a Guggenheim Fellowship, and a fellowship at Harvard University's Radcliffe Center for Advanced Study for his investigations of American war crimes in Vietnam. He lives in the vicinity of New York City.