The Defense Tech revolution has its roots in a much-mentioned but seldom understood program to bring AI to modern warfare. That program's name is Project Maven. Before Anduril, Saronic and the latest crop of defense unicorns, there was only Maven, the effort by Marine Col Drew Cukor and a small team of rebels to use machines to support humans. The program achieved notoriety when a group of Google engineers signed an open letter protesting the company's involvement in the program, and Google backed out. That crucible moment catalyzed a generation of change, inspiring thousands in a way that gave rise to America's current defense tech bonanza, and provided the platform for Palantir to step into the limelight as a new "prime."

Bloomberg reporter Katrina Manson, in her new book Project Maven: A Marine Colonel, His Team, and the Dawn of AI Warfare, pulls back the curtain on the program for…