17 May 2017 - Professor Brian McAllister Linn

By the late 1950s, the Cold War threatened every American with world-ending thermonuclear annihilation. To help stem the bone-chilling fear gripping the country in the wake of fears over Soviet aggression, the U.S. Army pushed a radically new method of warfare into the public consciousness. The Army claimed it could, and would, limit the atomic warfare to the battlefield by revolutionizing its equipment, organization, and training practices. The Army accented its effort by recruiting none other than Elvis Presley, demonstrating that even this icon of youth culture was not too cool to wear the Army’s uniform. Dr. Brian Linn traces the origins, evolution, and ultimate failure of the Army’s attempt to transform itself for atomic warfare, revealing its vital role in the making of Cold War America.

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