Sarnoff's assaults on those who opposed him from outside his empire were even more brutal. He quickly calibrated the value of controlling patents, and used the power of RCA lawyers to crush the businesses and ruin the lives of any who got in the way. Edwin Howard Armstrong and Philo Farnsworth were two who had the genius and the audacity to challenge Sarnoff in patent litigation; both men paid dearly as a result.

In 1933, Armstrong, a friend of Sarnoff's since 1914, devised a new scheme for radio broadcasting called frequency modulation, or FM. Superior to amplitude modulation, or AM, radio which virtually all RCA broadcasting systems used, FM drastically reduced static and provided a much clearer sound. Armstrong proposed switching the RCA broadcasting system to FM; Sarnoff opposed this vigorously.

Armstrong left RCA to start his own FM station. In 1948, he sued RCA and NBC, alleging a conspiracy to influence the FCC in limiting the development of FM radio. Sarnoff sent for his lawyers, and bludgeoned his former friend in the courts for six years. In January, 1954, despondent and nearly destitute, Armstrong committed suicide.

In a blow to RCA, the FCC approved the CBS system in 1950. But Sarnoff's faith in his engineers paid off. They developed an electronic color system that worked compatibly with existing sets. Spurred by the mainstream press and Sarnoff's efficient public relations machine, the FCC reversed its decision in 1953. Under Sarnoff's tenacious leadership, RCA had won again.

Sarnoff's leadership skills extended into the political arena as well, with mixed results. He began his work with the government in 1929, negotiating a war reparations treaty with Germany. But with Hitler leading Germany, the treaty was ignored. During World War II, Sarnoff successfully directed the press communications for D-day, earning the rank of brigadier general in the process. General Sarnoff then returned home to fight the Cold War.

Sarnoff vigorously opposed Communism. In the 1950's and 60's, he wrote and lectured frequently, encouraging American's to "prosecute the Cold War to the point of victory." He corresponded frequently with Vice-President Richard Nixon about effective anti-communist strategy. Sarnoff proposed dropping millions of radios and compact phonographs on the Communist Bloc to broadcast pro-democracy propaganda, and influenced the formation of the Voice of America broadcasting network. His war against communism was even waged within his own company. Sarnoff supported Senator Joseph McCarthy's Communist witch hunts, and condoned blacklisting at RCA.

Sarnoff's belief in political solutions ran a distant second to his unflagging faith in science and technology. He foresaw a future in which technology would allow long-lasting peace, unmatched prosperity, and increased leisure time. As far back as 1956, Sarnoff's picture of the future included biotechnology, push-button weather control, aquaculture, nuclear reactors for the home, and the computer revolution.

Working well into his seventies, Sarnoff continued to push RCA and its engineers, investing money and work-hours in computers and aerospace technology. The man who came to America during the infancy of radio lived to see photographs delivered electronically from space to Earth in satellites his company had made. In 1970, at age seventy-nine, Sarnoff retired from RCA. He died in 1971, leaving behind a legacy of technological triumphs and insatiable ambition.