Book Review: Internment in Switzerland during the First World War by Susan Barton

requirements of different services and domains (e.g. carrier versus land-based aircraft). Thirdly, the book challenges popular understandings of the nature of conservativism in naval organizations. Resistance to innovation stems less from vested interests in the status quo and more from lacking systems to decipher strategic uncertainty and make difficult choices among a confusing and wide range of alternatives. This is understandable. There can be an inherent contradiction between what a navy needs right now and the technologies it needs later but that have long gestation periods. Moreover, technologies such as searchlights, shipborne rockets, and rams were dead ends. In addition, countermeasures can be relatively cheap and easily deployable against a now-promising technology. The simple fact that each of the book’s case studies span more than a century of testing and development reinforces these intuitions. Since technological trajectories are so difficult to anticipate, prudent stewardship of national treasure and power demand prolonged testing and listening to feedback from users, especially as technical complexity intensifies. Innovating Victory will appeal to several audiences. Historians of technology will appreciate the way each naval technology developed in relatively unpredictable ways under varying pressures ranging from strategic context to organizational culture. O’Hara and Heinz also consistently emphasize the importance of users and user innovation in determining technological trajectories—another significant theme in technology and culture studies. For political scientists, the case studies blend a mix of top-down and bottom-up innovation processes, a dominant approach in military innovation studies. Finally, for policymakers, the book can increase awareness that emerging technologies today will likely take decades to mature, and inevitably be used in unexpected ways to address unanticipated needs.