Our Germans
Project Paperclip and the National Security State
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 4157313 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Rebecca Slayton (0000-0002-5234-0870, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2019 |
| Volume | 105 |
| Issue | 4 |
| Pages | 1078-1079 |
| Publication date | 2019-03-01 |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Journal of American History (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0021-8723 • E-ISSN: 1945-2314 |
| Publisher | Oxford University Press (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1093/jahist/jaz133 |
| OpenAlex | W2915848059 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 3 |
How and why did more than 1,600 scientists and engineers from Nazi Germany become part of the U.S. military-industrial complex during the Cold War? Brian E. Crim's recent book tackles this perplexing question, among other puzzles surrounding Operation Paperclip—named for the device used to expedite review of some scientists' dossiers. The simple answer is that the U.S. military feared losing German genius to the Soviet Union. Nonetheless, both the U.S. government and civil society bitterly contested the ethics and strategic wisdom of the project. The historiography of Operation Paperclip reflects the political controversies that surrounded it. In the 1960s the U.S. military and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) granted one scholar selective access to historical records, helping create a positive account of their work. However, in the 1980s, investigative journalists exposed the complicity of many Operation Paperclip scientists in wartime atrocities. Between 1998 and 2007, millions of documents were declassified, prompting additional books. Crim draws on these archival materials, framing them in the context of scholarship on the role of technology in the national security state
Complicity · Framing (construction · German · National security · Nazi Germany · Nazism · Political science · Politics · Scholarship · Sociology · State (computer science · Computer Science · European history and politics · German History and Society · History · Law
| Citations per year | 0.43 |
|---|---|
| Citation span | 2019 - 2025 (7) |
| Highly cited | No |