June 2003
The Missile Defense Agency Coloring Book, an eleven-page booklet that opens with a portrait of Ronald Reagan, the godfather of missile defense, cements the Agency’s position as the premier domestic supplier of little-boy daydreams. The Agency spends $8 billion each year on really cool stuff. Agency technicians have set a land speed record with a four-stage rocket sled in the Utah desert , fired missiles into space from land and sea, and developed plans for a laser-armed jet. Its website features somewhat smaller-scale experiments kids can try at home.
Created from internal PowerPoint slides, the educational coloring book was distributed at a fair honoring government workers in Washington DC earlier this year. ” Kids liked them a lot,” says Agency spokesperson Rick Lehner. And they seem to do the trick. After expertly coloring in an Exoatmospheric Kill Vehicle, Jeremy Morgan, age 5, summed up the Agency’s position perfectly: “we need missiles so that enemies from other places don’t take over.”
