Elvis's army : Cold War GIs and the atomic battlefield / Brian McAllister Linn.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Linn, Brian McAllister, author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Presley, Elvis, 1935-1977.

United States. Army--History--20th century.

United States.

United States. Army--Reorganization--History--20th century.

Presley, Elvis, 1935-1977--Career in the military.

Presley, Elvis.

United States. Army.

Sociology, Military--United States--History--20th century.

Sociology, Military.

Draft--Social aspects--United States.

Draft.

Cold War.

Draft--Social aspects.

History.

Physical Description:

444 pages : illustrations ; 25 cm

Place of Publication:

Cambridge, Massachusetts : Harvard University Press, 2016.

Summary:

"What kind of army wants the king of rock-n-roll? Elvis's Army explores the great military and social experiment that was the Cold War atomic army. Militarily, the US Army transformed for the revolution in warfare initiated by the nuclear weapons. Traumatized by Cold War reductions and Korea, it seized on the vision of a great atomic land war against the Soviet Union. It not only adapted a radically new way of fighting, but fundamental changes in its equipment, concepts, and training. Socially, the 1950s the service underwent even more of a transformation. In large part due to the draft, the Fifties Army became the nation's most racially and economically egalitarian institution, the only place where black and white, college graduates and illiterates, rich and poor, urban and rural had to live, work, and, if necessary, fight together. In return for their service, the army was expected to provide young males not only with military skills, but also education, technical training, entertainment, and moral instruction. This social transformation was nowhere more evident than with Elvis Presley. He entered the service a notorious musical rebel hated by adult society; he emerged two years later a clean-cut young all-American boy in the movie G.I. Blues. Elvis's Army is the first history of the US Army's transformation for the atomic battlefield. But it also reveals the cultural importance of the US Army in Fifties America, from draft calls to ROTC, from basic training to overseas service, from Madison Avenue to Hollywood, and from atomic maneuvers to rock-n-roll."-- Provided by publisher.

Contents:

Prologue

The army was coming apart

The catalyst of the Korean War

The atomic battlefield

The tools of modern war

Who's in the army now?

The officer corps's generation gap

Training for nuclear war

Marketing the new, improved army

The renovation of the American soldier

Next stop is Vietnam?

Epilogue.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

9780674737686

0674737687

OCLC:

941582637