IN THE SPOTLIGHT

Army commissions tech execs as officer recruits

This month, the Army announced the creation of Detachment 201, dubbed the Pentagon's Executive Innovation Corps, to "fuse cutting-edge tech expertise with military innovation." While part of a broader effort to ensure the military has access to the most advanced assets available, this new initiative comes amid President Donald Trump's ongoing push to incorporate Silicon Valley's money and mindset into his vision of an American technocracy.

The corps has selected four Silicon Valley execs for its inaugural group of Army Reserve Lieutenant Colonels: Palantir's Shyam Sankar, Meta's Andrew Bosworth, Kevin Weil of OpenAI, and Thinking Machine Labs' Bob McGrew. They will not be required to complete the Army Fitness Test or the six-week-long Direct Commissioning Course.

'Uneasy alliance'
While in the past it has been considered "anathema in Silicon Valley" to work on projects with military applications, "never mind suiting up for service," this new initiative shows how much the "relationship between the Pentagon and the tech industry has deepened," said The Wall Street Journal. The historically "uneasy alliance" for "consumer-facing tech companies" worried about associating themselves with the Pentagon is "changing," said Gizmodo.

The military has "long turned to civilian experts" for "technological insight," but Detachment 201 takes the Pentagon's "desire to collaborate with the high-technology industry to a new level," said Defense News. The new officers are from companies "investing heavily in emerging fields like AI and machine learning," said Task and Purpose. The Pentagon is "looking to fold" both into "future weapon systems."

The officers likely will not be tapped for combat-specific roles but to "teach soldiers how to use AI-powered systems" or "use health data to improve fitness," said the Journal. They will also "advise the service on acquiring more commercial technology."

'Plenty of precedent'
The military is downplaying concerns that embedding tech execs in the field to which they might sell their wares could amount to a conflict of interest. There's "plenty of precedent" for programs like this, said Army Chief of Staff Spokesperson Col. Dave Butler to Breaking Defense. "We used to do it in wartime; now we are doing it ahead of wartime so that we can prepare and deter."

The "bigger mission" for Detachment 201 is to "inspire more tech pros to serve without leaving their careers," the Army said in a press release. These officers can show the next generation "how to make a difference in uniform."

Statistic of the day

16 billion: The number of passwords stolen for sites including Apple, Facebook and Google in a recent hack, according to tech industry outlet Cybernews. It's one of the largest data breaches in history, involving password records across 30 datasets, with the largest individual dataset containing more than 3.5 billion passwords.

QUOTE OF THE DAY

'They are all my children and will all have the same rights! I don't want them to tear each other apart after my death.'

Pavel Durov, the Russian-born founder of messaging app Telegram, announcing that the 106 children he fathered from a sperm donation at a clinic 15 years ago will one day share his $13.9 billion fortune, to French magazine Le Point. He was charged in France last year with crimes related to illicit activity on his app.

the explainer

'Tariff stacking' is creating problems for businesses

One of the results of President Donald Trump's back-and-forth trade war is that some business owners are paying much more than they had anticipated due to the economic phenomenon of tariff stacking, when separate tariffs are compounded. While tariff stacking is mostly being felt by Americans who import Chinese goods, business owners across the U.S. seem to be wary of the continuing trade war, no matter which country is importing goods.

What's 'tariff stacking'?
It's an economic scenario that occurs when "multiple tariffs apply to the same imported product under separate trade actions," according to trade policy tracker Global Trade Alert. This can create "cumulative duties that increase the product's final effective rate."

However, not all tariffs stack on top of each other. Some "apply cumulatively, others are mutually exclusive," said Global Trade Alert. Trump's Executive Order 14289 established rules for tariff stacking whereby "certain tariff regimes supersede others and cannot stack."

How's this affecting American businesses?
It can cause small business owners to pay more than just the initial cost of the tariffs, say economic experts. Tariff stacking is most often felt by companies that import Chinese goods, because China has been one of the main targets of Trump's tariffs.

Even when Trump paused his steepest tariffs on China in May 2025, not much relief was offered to importers, because stacking multiple import taxes sent the "true cost well above 30%," said CNBC. The "multiple layers of tariffs are a big problem for basic items like kids' backpacks that come largely from China," Dan Anthony, the president of Trade Partnership Worldwide, said to CNBC. "You are talking about rates of over 70%."

Some businesses are reportedly rethinking their models. As a "small business owner handling so much on my own, I can't afford the added stress," Anjali Bhargava, the founder of spice company Anjali's Cup, said to CNBC. Her company will be "discontinuing products as the special vacuum seal tins she uses sell out."

Good day 🎻

… for classical music. Playing classical tunes to plants could help them grow more, according to a study published in the journal Evolutionary Studies in Imaginative Culture. Plants that were played a series of Bach concertos ended up heavier and leafier, while those exposed to rock music grew more poorly, said the team of crop scientists and an Oxford psychologist.

Bad day 📱

… for period-tracking apps. Women who use period tracker apps face "real and frightening privacy and safety risks," warn academics from the University of Cambridge. Personal information on the app can be collected and "sold at scale," according to the university's Minderoo Centre for Technology and Democracy.

Puzzles

Daily crossword

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The Week recommends

Food books to inspire through the summer months

Upcoming books about cooking and food in general are on quite a travel bender. They include a YouTube star from South Texas, a British social critic, and India's leading nutritionist. So are you ready for a jaunt?

'ArnieTex: Over 100 Recipes for Mexican-American Cooking and Texas-Style BBQ'
"No local celebrity turns heads in the Rio Grande Valley as much as cook and YouTuber Arnie Segovia," said Ryan Cantu at Texas Monthly. Segovia's more than 1 million YouTube subscribers know that this South Texas pitmaster knows his brisket from his carne guisada. With the release of Segovia's book, "ArnieTex: Over 100 Recipes for Mexican-American Cooking and Texas-Style BBQ," you too can learn to cook Texas-style chili and Mexican-American dishes like fajitas at home. (July 15, $35, DK / Penguin Random House)

'All Consuming: Why We Eat the Way We Eat Now'
British thinker Ruby Tandoh scurries across a wild range of topics in "All Consuming": bubble tea, Martha Stewart, tradwife influencer Nara Smith, TikTok and lobster. She does all this in an attempt to explicate the forces that shape the manner in which we consume food and food-related content. (Sept. 9, $29, Knopf)

'Mitahara: Food Wisdom from My Indian Kitchen'
This recipe collection's core tenet is the idea of mitahara, an "ancient Indian philosophy" that embodies the "practice of moderate, mindful eating," said The Week India. Rujuta Diwekar is one of the most famous nutritionists in India, and now her approach to homestyle cooking and how to think about what, when and why to eat will be available to American eaters with this book. (July 15, $30, DK / Penguin Random House)

Poll watch

A majority (70%) of Democrats support progressive liberals like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Bernie Sanders, while 30% support more moderate liberals, according to a recent Harvard-Harris survey. The poll of 2,097 adults also found that 67% of Democrats want their party to oppose efforts to cut government expenditures.

INSTANT OPINION

Today's best commentary

'The nation encourages political violence by allowing it to seem normal'
The New York Times editorial board
The "surge in political violence during the Trump years has imperiled not only American lives but also our country's collective memory," says The New York Times editorial board. Melissa Hortman, a member of the Minnesota state legislature, and her husband, Mark, became the "latest casualties of our nihilistic politics." Fear has become a "fact of life for politicians." When "we move on too quickly from an attack against our society's organizing ideas, we normalize it."

'We have come far since the first Juneteenth. But we still have a long way to go.'
Bea L. Hines at the Miami Herald
As we "think about Juneteenth and its meaning to Blacks, and indeed all Americans, I think of how far we as a nation have come. I think, too, of how far back some people want to send us," says Bea L. Hines. Juneteenth "should remind us of the reasons why we as a nation cannot put our efforts into making America 'great again.'" Making America "'greater again' doesn't look too promising to people who look like me."

'Single moms will bear the brunt of the Republicans' budget cuts'
Grace Segers at The New Republic
Republican budget cuts have "largely focused their efforts on tightening work requirements for childless adults," but "portions of the measure would also affect parents receiving benefits," says Grace Segers. This is "indicative of the struggles that single mothers in the United States have faced since the inception of the modern social safety net." Federal support for poor families is "often crucial for single parents, especially single mothers," because single mothers are "disproportionately likely to be struggling economically."

WORD OF THE DAY

loris

The Amazon World Zoo Park on England's Isle of Wight is celebrating the birth of rare and endangered pygmy slow loris twins — a big win for the European Endangered Species Program. This species of miniature primate comes from the rainforests of Vietnam, Laos, eastern Cambodia and southern China.

Can MAGA survive a US war on Iran?