The Pentagon kills language. Housing the brain and central coordinating organs of the most advanced military the world has ever known, the Depart of Defense headquarters can take an announcement as exciting as "the U.S. Army is working on laser guns" and distill it to, in the words of Mary J. Miller, deputy assistant secretary of the Army for Research and Technology, "aligned to transition into a program of record in the fiscal 2023 timeframe." Make no mistake: bland phrasing aside, the Army is going to fund laser weapon development in the next decade.