A senior executive at a top U.S. robotics firm once told P.W. Singer, America’s foremost expert on modern warfare technology, that before September 11, 2001, “we couldn’t get anyone to return our calls.” After the attacks? “We were told, ‘Make them as fast as you can,’” the exec claimed. And so it’s gone.

To check the pulse on today’s scary-awesome military technologies, we had a chance to sit down with Singer, who recently wrote Wired for War and currently sits as a Brookings Institute scholar. He told us a bit about what robotics, drones, and other game-changing kill-or spy-toys mean for the future of warfare, and what all this may ultimately say about us as humans.

Reach this writer at brian@motherboard.tv. @thebanderson

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