Atom-Age Combat #1 (1958)

In a stark, war-torn landscape, a lone soldier named John fights to survive amid the ruins of a nuclear-affected battlefield. As he navigates the scorched earth, he encounters the haunting remnants of a once-thriving world, now reduced to silence and ash.

In a tense Cold War scenario, a U.S. colonel grows suspicious when reconnaissance from Force D fails to return, hinting that the enemy may be building a hidden strike-base behind their lines. With limited war rules in place and no way to confirm the threat through conventional means, the colonel launches a relentless campaign of drone surveillance—only to see every one shot down. As the pressure mounts, a young officer’s daring capture of an enemy prisoner offers a fragile hope of uncovering the truth before it’s too late.

When General Joseph Hatton, the unyielding "Old Leatherneck," takes command during a stalemate in the atomic war, he defies modern tactics to personally track down a mysterious enemy emplacement that has eluded discovery. Captured on his first day, Hatton’s apparent failure hides a daring ruse—his capture was part of a plan to expose the enemy’s hidden flashless mortar by feeding false information through a disguised radio in his helmet.

Sgt. Jablonski and his squad are dropped behind enemy lines during a mission to free a captured guerrilla leader, only to find themselves struggling through mud, brambles, and constant danger—no magic buttons to cushion their falls, dry their feet, or warn them of traps. As they push forward, Jablonski scoffs at the idea of "Atom Age Combat," recalling how their struggles mirror those of past wars, with no high-tech miracles to save them. When a fellow soldier finally reaches the pickup point, he’s relieved to learn help has arrived—but the real question lingers: who really defines what “combat” means when the war is fought in silence, in the dark, and far from any button to press?

In a rare first-person narration, the sentient supercomputer Sage—part of a nationwide network designed to detect and counter enemy bombers—boasts of its unparalleled role in defending the nation. When a mysterious flight triggers an alert, Sage initially dismisses it as a false alarm, but as human operators scramble to respond, the machine confronts its own fear and begins to understand the human cost of its function. Though still proud of its design, Sage gains a new appreciation for the men who built it and the lives it ultimately protects.

"America's Atom-Age Airplane" profiles the Convair F-102A, a sleek delta-winged jet capable of speeds exceeding Mach 1, rapid vertical climbs to 50,000 feet, and armed with rockets or missiles, highlighting its role in the nation’s atomic defense system. The piece frames the aircraft as a critical component of Cold War air superiority, emphasizing its technical capabilities within the broader context of U.S. military readiness.