Rumors of War and Infernal Machines Technomilitary Agenda-setting in American and British Speculative Fiction
In the United States, future-fictions and Cold War thrillers were an officially acknowledged factor in the Pentagon's research and development agendas, and often gave rise - and shape - to the R&D agendas that engendered technologies as diverse as automation, atomic weaponry, aerospace vehicles, and the Strategic Defense Initiative ("Star Wars"). Gannon's book uncovers a striking relationship between the increasing political influence of speculative military fiction and the parallel rise of superpower states and their technocentric ideologies. With its detailed political, historical, and literary analysis of the American and European fascination with hi-tech warfare, this study will appeal to students, general readers, literary and cultural scholars, and military and history enthusiasts alike."--BOOK JACKET.