The World’s Militaries, Counted

The World’s Militaries, Counted

Aviation World, Military Aviation

In 2025 the world spent $2,887 billion on its armed forces. That is the highest figure SIPRI has ever recorded, the eleventh consecutive annual increase, and it works out at $352 for every person alive.Below is what that money bought, counted as carefully as open...
The Race for the Bomb: A Focus Series

The Race for the Bomb: A Focus Series

History & Legends

An Afterburner focus series in ten parts, inspired by Richard Rhodes’ masterpiece The Making of the Atomic Bomb. It is the biggest story of the twentieth century, and it is also, from start to finish, an aviation story. It begins with a refugee physicist at a...
A Cheesesteak, a MiG-21, and Mach 1

A Cheesesteak, a MiG-21, and Mach 1

Inside MiGFlug, News

Somewhere over the Florida coast, at better than a thousand miles an hour, a man in an oxygen helmet unwrapped a cheesesteak, took a bite, and pulled a face you don’t usually see outside a rollercoaster. That, apparently, is what it now takes to sell a sandwich....