a short war, invention has no time to apply its full weight; in a long-term conflict, the role of inventive ingenuity will be powerful, if not ultimately decisive. In as thoroughly unpleasant a world as we now inhabit, there’s a definite element of comfort in that. A people with the record of inventive ability that Americans have proven can, if forced to it, make of itself a most terrible enemy. —JOHN W. CAMPBELL, ASTOUNDING, JANUARY 1941 7.
