IsisCB Explore

Article ID: CBB001212896

Selling Greenland: The Big Picture Television Series and the Army's Bid for Relevance during the Early Cold War (2013)

Centaurus: International Magazine of the History of Mathematics, Science, and Technology
Volume: 55, no. 3
Issue: 3
Pages: 344-357

Publication Date: 2013
Edition Details: Part of a special issue, “Perspectives on Cold War Science in Small European States”
Language: English

Outside Links

WorldCat

Google Scholar

JSTOR

Academia.edu

Public understanding of science Cold War Mass media Science and war; science and the military Cross-national interaction 20th century Greenland United States

With an increased emphasis on air defense and missile technology at the outset of the Cold War, the role of the US Army's conventional ground forces seemed in doubt. The US Air Force achieved a position of primacy among the armed forces as it expanded its reach into outer space with a new ballistic missile force, while the US Navy set about a project of seafaring exploration and militarization with the submerged trans-polar crossings. To counter this perception, the US Army mounted a campaign to prove its relevance in matters of technology and national defense. The key technical vehicle in this endeavor would prove to be mass media, and the staging area for the effort would be Greenland. Greenland would be the venue for the Army's most audacious appeals to the American people and the Congress to recognize its relevance to Cold War science and technology. Greenland would be called a `forward defense system,' and a `cordon against aggression,' and while the Air Force's bombers would be stationed on the coast at Thule, the Greenland icecap would be the realm of the US Army alone.

...More

Included in

Article Heymann, Matthias; Martin-Nielsen, Janet (2013) Introduction: Perspectives on Cold War Science in Small European States. Centaurus: International Magazine of the History of Mathematics, Science, and Technology (pp. 221-242). unapi

Citation URI

https://data.isiscb.org/isis/citation/CBB001212896/

Citations Indexes

Similar Citations

Article Doel, Ronald E.; Friedman, Robert Marc; Lajus, Julia; Sörline, Sverker; Wråkberg, Urban; (2014)
Strategic Arctic Science: National Interests in Building Natural Knowledge---Interwar Era through the Cold War (/isis/citation/CBB001450344/)

Article Petersen, Nikolaj; (2013)
The Politics of US Military Research in Greenland in the Early Cold War (/isis/citation/CBB001212894/)

Article Heymann, Matthias; Knudsen, Henrik; Lolck, Maiken L.; Nielsen, Henry; Nielsen, Kristian H.; Ries, Christopher J.; (2010)
Exploring Greenland: Science and Technology in Cold War Settings (/isis/citation/CBB001211528/)

Book Henry Nielsen; Kristian Hvidtfeldt Nielsen; (2021)
Camp Century: The Untold Story of America's Secret Arctic Military Base Under the Greenland Ice (/isis/citation/CBB637613279/)

Article Martin-Nielsen, Janet; (2013)
“The Deepest and Most Rewarding Hole Ever Drilled”: Ice Cores and the Cold War in Greenland (/isis/citation/CBB001252176/)

Chapter Roberts, Peder; (2013)
Nordic or National? Post-War Visions of Polar Conflict and Cooperation (/isis/citation/CBB001421149/)

Article Roberts, Peder; (2013)
Intelligence and Internationalism: The Cold War Career of Anton Bruun (/isis/citation/CBB001212892/)

Essay Review Olwell, Russell; (2010)
Two Views of Cassandra: Lawrence Badash, A Nuclear Winter's Tale; John Mueller, Atomic Obsession (/isis/citation/CBB001566396/)

Article Heymann, Matthias; Martin-Nielsen, Janet; (2013)
Introduction: Perspectives on Cold War Science in Small European States (/isis/citation/CBB001212891/)

Article Kaiser, David; (2005)
The Atomic Secret in Red Hands? American Suspicions of Theoretical Physicists during the Early Cold War (/isis/citation/CBB001021588/)

Book Gaudilliére, Jean-Paul; Thoms, Ulrike; (2015)
The Development of Scientific Marketing in the Twentieth Century (/isis/citation/CBB001551088/)

Article Nielsen, Henry; Knudsen, Henrik; (2013)
Too Hot to Handle: The Controversial Hunt for Uranium in Greenland in the Early Cold War (/isis/citation/CBB001212895/)

Book Timothy Barney; (2015)
Mapping the Cold War: Cartography and the Framing of America's International Power (/isis/citation/CBB005380302/)

Article Nielsena, Kristian H.; Nielsena, Henry; Martin-Nielsen, Janet; (2014)
City under the Ice: The Closed World of Camp Century in Cold War Culture (/isis/citation/CBB001451287/)

Book Brian McAllister Linn; (2016)
Elvis’s Army: Cold War GIs and the Atomic Battlefield (/isis/citation/CBB955668338/)

Chapter Sörlin, Sverker; (2013)
Introduction: Polar Extensions---Nordic States and Their Polar Strategies (/isis/citation/CBB001421147/)

Article O'Reagan, Douglas Michael; (2014)
Science, Technology, and Know-How: Exploitation of German Science and the Challenges of Technology Transfer in the Postwar World (/isis/citation/CBB001560375/)

Article Tsvetkova, Natalia; (2014)
Making a New and Pliable Professor: American and Soviet Transformations in German Universities, 1945--1990 (/isis/citation/CBB001420876/)

Article Grant, Susan-Mary; Heale, Michael; Parafianowicz, Halina; Vaudagna, Maurizio; (2014)
Characteristics and Contours: Mapping American History in Europe (/isis/citation/CBB001451936/)

Book Laura Ciglioni; (2020)
Culture atomiche. Gli Stati Uniti, la Francia e l'Italia di fronte alla questione nucleare (1962-68) (/isis/citation/CBB178026218/)

Comments

{{ comment.created_by.username }} on {{ comment.created_on | date:'medium' }}