Science & Technology

From Russia With Blood

C.J. Chivers talks with Foreign Policy about the Kalashnikov, the world's real weapon of mass destruction.

INTERVIEW BY CHARLES HOMANS | OCTOBER 15, 2010

The Great Battery Race

A 19th-century technology could determine which nation triumphs in the 21st. Steve LeVine reports from the global competition to replace the combustion engine.

BY STEVE LEVINE | NOVEMBER 2010

Opening Gambit: Moore's Flaw

Why the tech industry's unbridled optimism won't save the world.

BY CHARLES HOMANS | NOVEMBER 2010

Plug and Play

The fast, clean, green automobile is no longer a dream. It's right around the corner and coming soon to your driveway.

BY STEVE LEVINE | OCTOBER 11, 2010

Gaming the Electric Car Chase

As the four front-runners sprint around the track, some favorites could end up in the dust.

NOVEMBER 2010

You Don't Bring a Praseodymium Knife to a Gunfight

China thinks it can withhold its exports of obscure but important minerals to get its way with its neighbors. Why it picked the wrong weapon.

BY TIM WORSTALL | SEPTEMBER 29, 2010

Reactor Reaction

An Iranian nuclear reactor will start operating in a few days. But Israel probably won't be bombing it.

BY CHRISTIAN CARYL | AUGUST 18, 2010

The Ice Kingdom

A photographic portrait of the Arctic -- or what's left of it -- in all its glacial beauty.

AUGUST 16, 2010

Awesome Aughties

The decade through rose-colored glasses.

BY SUZANNE MERKELSON | SEPT. / OCT. 2010

Best. Decade. Ever.

The first 10 years of the 21st century were humanity's finest -- even for the world's bottom billion.

BY CHARLES KENNY | SEPT. / OCT. 2010

Googlopolis

Eric Schmidt tells FP what makes a city smart, how not to lose $1 trillion -- and the one place he's never been.

INTERVIEW BY CHRISTINA LARSON | SEPT. / OCT. 2010

Don't Try This at Home

You can't build a new Silicon Valley just anywhere.

BY MARGARET O'MARA | SEPT. / OCT. 2010

This Week at War: Is Mexico's Drug War Doomed?

Learning to live with drug cartels -- and killer robots.

BY ROBERT HADDICK | AUGUST 13, 2010

Is the UAE Banning BlackBerrys Because of Israel?

Seven months after it happened, the mysterious assassination of a Hamas operative in Dubai is still causing fallout in the Middle East.

BY CHRISTIAN CARYL | AUGUST 10, 2010

Digital Diplomacy

So what if Hillary Clinton's "21st Century Statecraft" isn’t exactly reinventing international relations for the information age? It's still a worthy endeavor.

BY SAM DUPONT | AUGUST 3, 2010

"It's Going to Make a Huge Mess"

The man who coined the term "global warming" looks back at 35 years of climate change.

INTERVIEW BY ELIZABETH DICKINSON | AUGUST 3, 2010

Stop Panicking About the Stingers

The WikiLeaks war logs only confirmed what we already know: The Taliban simply doesn't have the firepower to wreak havoc on Afghanistan's skies.

BY MATTHEW SCHROEDER | JULY 28, 2010

Angle of Defection

Was Shahram Amiri's return to Iran politically motivated, or was he just miserable?

BY CHRISTIAN CARYL | JULY 16, 2010

Don't Even Think About It

The Cold War was scary enough. Now try to imagine a nuclear arms race between China and India.

BY CHRISTIAN CARYL | JULY 13, 2010

Life by a Thousand Cuts

The United States' defense-spending habit has been out of control for years. Will it ever change?

BY CHRISTIAN CARYL | JULY 7, 2010

Who Tried to Kill Fang Xuanchang?

A chilling attack on a controversial science journalist in Beijing bodes poorly for scientific progress.

BY SAM GEALL | JULY 6, 2010

What's the Frequency, Nkurunziza?

In central Africa, where on-air demagogues caused chaos in the 1990s, a Burundian radio broadcaster is playing with fire.

BY JINA MOORE | JUNE 25, 2010

An African iPhone? There’s No App for That.

Why Steve Jobs should let Africans buy his new toy.

BY DAYO OLOPADE | JUNE 24, 2010

The People's Capsule

How a clunky old Soviet rocket outlasted the space shuttle.

BY CHARLES HOMANS | JULY/AUGUST 2010

Epiphanies from Nathan Myhrvold

A theoretical physicist who spent 14 years as Bill Gates's ideas guru at Microsoft, Nathan Myhrvold might seem an odd candidate to take up the fight against malaria, long combated with technology no more advanced than bed nets and quinine. Here, he explains why geek power might be exactly what's needed to tackle the scourges of the developing world.

INTERVIEW BY ELIZABETH DICKINSON | JULY/AUGUST 2010

Who's Got the Right Stuff?

How the world's space programs match up.

JULY/AUGUST 2010

Are Rare Earth Elements Actually Rare?

Not if you're willing to dig for them.

BY CHARLES HOMANS | JUNE 15, 2010

Hapless Doesn't Mean Harmless

Burma has a nuclear program. It's a mess, but it's still a nuclear program.

BY CHRISTIAN CARYL | JUNE 14, 2010

Tehran's Lost Connection

Is the Iranian regime's cyberwar with the United States real, or a paranoid delusion?

BY GENEIVE ABDO | JUNE 10, 2010