Defense Spending And The Formation Of The US“Military-metropolitan-industrial Complex” (1950-1969)

Just after the World War II,the alliance reltionship of the United States and the Soviet Union quickly broken down,the two sides gradually embarked on the road for the Cold War.In order to match and even surpass the Soviet Union in the escalating arms race,defense spending accounted for a large share of the federal government's budget.As the largest single employer in the nation,the Pentagon allocated a large quantity of military prime contract awards to the west and south,forming a entity--“Military-Metropolitan-Industrial Complex”.The content configuration of the course of the paper mainly consists of preface,three chapters and conclusion.The preface part introduces the dissertations reason,the research value,the academic research,the innovation and the deficiency.Chapter 1 explains the definition of “Military-Metropolitan-Industrial Complex”,briefly,in order to share “military spending dividend” of the Cold War years,the military,metropolitan residents and defense contractors comprise the entity in terms of their respective interests.Besides,the chapter also reviews the military-industrial munitions alliance of American society during the years prior to the Cold War,describing the three stages of the evolution of “Military-Industrial Complex”,which can be divided into beginning,developing and maturing.Chapter 2 mainly discusses the formation of “Military-Metropolitan-Industrial Complex”.With the Cold War breaking out,in the situation where a series of critical incidents occurred,the American public gradually formed the identical “Cold War Consensus”.Meanwhile,the connotation of American concept of security has changed as well,giving rise to the national economy was increasingly militarized.As federal defense expenditures remained high and presented normalized tendency,some urban groups of the west and south strived to gain very substantial defense spending,and converted it to a monolithic catalyst which promoted the economic development,thus forming quite a few “Military-Metropolitan-Industrial Complexes”.Chapter 3 takes Orange County as an exmaple to explore the dual impact of“Military-Metropolitan-Industrial Complexes”.Starting with California gains the massive defense outlay,this chapter analyzes why it recieves the lion's share of the military defense budget and where the defense money is gong within it;Then,focusing on Orange County,fully demonstating the course of the county emerging as a metropolitan area,and revealing the advantages and disadvantages.The conclusion part summarizes the thesis and attempts to carry on brief evaluationabout “Military-Metropolitan-Industrial Complexes”.