Selling War in a Media Age
Selling War in a Media Age

Author: Kenneth Osgood

Publisher: University Press of Florida

Published: 2010-06-27

Total Pages: 372

ISBN-13: 0813040884

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George W. Bush's "Mission Accomplished" banner in 2003 and the misleading linkages of Saddam Hussein to the 9/11 terrorist attacks awoke many Americans to the techniques used by the White House to put the country on a war footing. Yet Bush was simply following in the footsteps of his predecessors, as the essays in this standout volume reveal in illuminating detail. Written in a lively and accessible style, Selling War in a Media Age is a fascinating, thought-provoking, must-read volume that reveals the often-brutal ways that the goal of influencing public opinion has shaped how American presidents have approached the most momentous duty of their office: waging war.

The Divo and the Duce
The Divo and the Duce

Author: Giorgio Bertellini

Publisher: University of California Press

Published: 2019-01-15

Total Pages: 328

ISBN-13: 0520301366

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At publication date, a free ebook version of this title will be available through Luminos, University of California Press's Open Access publishing program. Visit www.luminosoa.org to learn more. In the post–World War I American climate of isolationism, nativism, democratic expansion of civic rights, and consumerism, Italian-born star Rodolfo Valentino and Italy’s dictator Benito Mussolini became surprising paragons of authoritarian male power and mass appeal. Drawing on extensive archival research in the United States and Italy, Giorgio Bertellini’s work shows how their popularity, both political and erotic, largely depended on the efforts of public opinion managers, including publicists, journalists, and even ambassadors. Beyond the democratic celebrations of the Jazz Age, the promotion of their charismatic masculinity through spectacle and press coverage inaugurated the now-familiar convergence of popular celebrity and political authority. This is the first volume in the new Cinema Cultures in Contact series, coedited by Giorgio Bertellini, Richard Abel, and Matthew Solomon.

Historians on the Homefront
Historians on the Homefront

Author: George T. Blakey

Publisher: University Press of Kentucky

Published: 2021-10-21

Total Pages: 208

ISBN-13: 081318584X

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When Woodrow Wilson called on the American people to mobilize for war in April 1917, it was hardly surprising that historians should respond to their one-time colleague. Mobilization produced three organizations staffed by many of America's leading historians. All three organizations, the author shows, viewed as their task the mobilizing of America's intellectual resources in support of Wilson's war policies. The postwar decade saw an inevitable cooling of wartime passions and a reevaluation of the causes of the war. George T. Blakey examines the postwar reaction to the activities of the CPI, NBHS, and NSL, which included congressional investigations and acerbic attacks in popular and scholarly periodicals. A number of the historians came to regret their wartime propaganda work; a few of these joined the ranks of the revisionists and turned on their colleagues. Others merely strengthened their Germanophobia. The majority, Mr. Blakely finds, resumed their academic careers, apparently untouched by the part they had played in mobilizing the American war effort. The question of scholarly integrity versus propaganda has never been fully resolved, the author concludes, but later generations of historians can still learn much from the example of America's World War I historians-turned-propagandists.

The Bully Pulpit and the Melting Pot
The Bully Pulpit and the Melting Pot

Author: Hans P. Vought

Publisher: Mercer University Press

Published: 2004

Total Pages: 302

ISBN-13: 9780865548879

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Between 1897 and 1933 the presidents of the United States joined progressive reformers in redefining the concept of the United States as a melting pot. Their use of this metaphor to describe assimilation never meant that immigrants had to completely abandon their ethnic cultures. Instead, they argued that the melting pot blended the best of the immigrants traits and traditions to create a new American race united by patriotism and committed to liberal political and economic ideals. While nativists regarded new immigrants from southern and eastern Europe as incapable of assimilation, the presidents celebrated immigrant contributions to America and emphasized the need to improve immigrants' lives through education, resettlement away from urban ghettoes, and economic uplift. The president's speeches, letters, and administrative records reveal consistent support for the melting pot model as an alternative to nativist racism. While McKinley, Roosevelt, Taft and Wilson supported the exclusion of racial aliens and those with mental or physical illness, they repeatedly praised the new immigrants for embracing American ideals while maintaining their ethnic cultures. They argued that everyone should be judged by their moral character rather than their ancestry. World War I raised fears of disloyal aliens that Roosevelt and Wilson heightened by denouncing hyphenated Americans. Harding, Coolidge, and Hoover continued to use melting pot rhetoric, however, rather than endorsing coercive assimilation. The melting pot legacy lives on, and still offers a middle ground between the demands for national unity and multiculturalism.

Chemical Warfare
Chemical Warfare

Author: Fredric Brown

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2017-09-04

Total Pages: 285

ISBN-13: 135152920X

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In the aftermath of 9/11, the potential terror of weapons of mass destruction--from nuclear, biological, and chemical to dirty bombs--preoccupies national security experts. In Chemical Warfare, Frederic J. Brown, presents a cogent, innovative framework for understanding the historical forces that have restrained the use of WMD and how they continue to have relevance today. Analyzing both world wars, he argues that the restraints on use were complex and often unpredictable and ranged from the political to the technological. The author offers a detailed examination of American chemical warfare policy as it was shaped by industry and public sentiment, as well as national and military leaders. The organization of the book into three parts reflects the importance of battlefield experiences during the First World War and of international political restraints as they evolved during the interwar years and culminated in ""no first use"" policies by major powers in World War II. Part I examines the use of chemical weapons in World War I as it influenced subsequent national policy decisions. Part II focuses on the evolution of political, military, economic, and psychological restraints from 1919 to 1939. Part III discusses World War II during two critical periods: 1939 to early 1942, when the environment of the war was being established largely without American influence; and during 1945, when the United States faced no credible threat of retaliation to deter its strategic and battlefield use of chemical weapons. Written at the height of controversy about the U.S. use of chemicals in Vietnam, Chemical Warfare offers a valuable historical perspective, as relevant now in its analysis of chemical and also nuclear policy as it was when first published.