HIST103: World History (1600–Present)

Weapons and technology improved rapidly during World War II and played a crucial role in determining the outcome. Many major technologies were used for the first time, including nuclear weapons, radar, jet engines, and electronic computers. Enormous advances were made in aircraft and tank design. Models that came into use at the beginning of the war were long obsolete by its end.

More new inventions, as measured in the United States by numbers of patent applications and weapon contracts issued to private contractors, were deployed to kill humans more effectively and, to a lesser degree, avoid being killed than ever before.

The massive research and development demands of the war had a great impact on the growth of the scientific community. After the war ended, these developments led to new sciences like cybernetics and computer science and created entirely new institutions of weapons design.