In the early fifties, the United government had to reckon with the escalating nuclear arms race. The cold war meant that ascendant rival superpowers were amassing the tools of apocalypse. Internal committees and think tanks decided that they had to avoid the American people becoming terrified, paralyzed, and panicked about the bomb.

The solution? Make people afraid.

Citizens should fear the bomb. But they shouldn’t lose their heads. Fear is manageable. Panic is not.

The Federal Civil Defense Administration organized messaging and educational campaigns to show how people could defeat potential nuclear destruction with can do American spirit. Officials hoped to fine tune nuclear anxiety, so it never lapsed into apathy or terror.

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Written by Travis View. Theme by Nick Sena (https://nicksenamusic.com). Additional music by Pontus Berghe and Nick Sena. Editing by Corey Klotz.

REFERENCES:

Chernus, Ira (2002) Eisenhower’s Atoms For Peace

Gladdis, John Lewis (2005) The Cold War: A New History

Masco, Jospeh (2014) The Theater of Operations: National Security Affect from the Cold War to the War on Terror

Oakes, Guy (1994) The Imaginary War: Civil Defense and American Cold War Culture

Osgood, Kenneth (2006) Total Cold War: Eisenhower's Secret Propaganda Battle at Home and Abroad

Starck, Kathleen (2010) Between Fear and Freedom: Cultural Representations of the Cold War

Alert America!, Google Arts & Culture
https://artsandculture.google.com/story/alert-america-u-s-national-archives/awVBMrc3sxGJLg?hl=en