Scoop Jackson

Founders of the American Garrison State (1945-1960) - Part 2

PART THREE: The Founding of the National Security State

In the 1930s, the US was still "building out" to its continental dimensions. The Interior Department was on a dam construction spree that tamed wild rivers and brought electricity to the West. The Hoover Dam, built at the bottom of the Great Depression, was the capstone of these civilian projects. It enabled the prolific growth of Southern California, home to much military industry and to a rabidly rightwing electorate that would spawn Richard Nixon.

WW2 kept alive the spirit of gigantic national projects; it just shifted this build out to the military.