Fortress California, 1910-1961
About the Book
Fortress California, now in paperback for the first time, links the growth of the U.S. military-industrial complex to civic leaders who competed for military bases and military contracts to ensure economic growth.Analyzing the growth of Los Angeles, San Diego, and San Francisco from 1910 to 1961, Roger W. Lotchin discredits the assumption that the industrialization of the Sunbelt was a result of a partnership between industry and the military. He provides instead a detailed and forceful argument that municipalities used federal resources to build urban empires and metropolitan-military complexes. These have increased the flow of federal dollars into the state, thereby shifting the focus of the military-industrial complex from warfare to welfare.
Reviews
"A major contribution to the history of the American West and to our understanding of the political economy of twentieth-century America."–- Pacific Historical Review"Fortress California is an important and impressive book. Lotchin offers a major reinterpretation of the military-industrial complex from its urban roots up."–- Journal of Urban History
"It is rare when a study makes a significant creative contribution to history with a radically new concept. Roger W. Lotchin has achieved this breakthrough with Fortress California."–- Journal of the West
"With this book, Lotchin emerges as a leading contributor to a growing body of work in American urban history that may best be characterized as critical realism."–- Journal of Interdisciplinary History
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