While many aspects of Ronald Reagan’s legacy continue to be hotly debated in the more than thirty years since he left the White House as President of the United States, one facet that is widely agreed upon is that the vast majority of his time and attention during his tenure was focused on strengthening U.S. forces vis-à-vis their paramount Cold War enemy, the Soviet Union. In Reagan’s War Stories: A Cold War Presidency, Benjamin Griffin deftly analyzes the impact of popular culture on the decisions Reagan made that directly impacted upon the course of the Cold War. Griffin uses a plethora of primary and secondary sources to craft a convincing argument that Reagan, who has been considered by some contemporaries and historians alike as an “intellectual lightweight,” was, in actuality, laser focused on improving the U.S. position against the Soviet Union, effectively using popular culture, especially as conveyed through novels in the current zeitgeist, to help his platform resonate with the general public.[1]
Reagan was infamous for boiling down a complex argument into an easily digestible, if not always accurate, summation. Griffin argues throughout the book that Reagan was highly impressionable, particularly through novels and movies, and that he leaned on these resources to help him make decisions over the course of his life. Reagan’s War Stories can essentially be broken down into three main areas, all of which are novels, movies, or genres of fiction Griffin argues shaped Reagan’s perception and would weigh heavily in his decision-making during his time in public office, at times even more so than formal reports or briefings.
The first novels in question were the books Reagan enjoyed as a youth, particularly the John Carter books by Edgar Burroughs, a science fiction series incredibly popular during Reagan’s childhood, along with other significant books such as That Printer of Udell’s by Harold Bell Wright. Griffin argues that the strong characters, virtuous plot lines, and prevailing savior tropes resonated with Reagan, who lacked a reliable father figure in his life. This is not a groundbreaking or earth shattering observation, and it is a link that any amateur psychologist could make. However, what makes this book special and worthwhile is how Griffin ties the impact of these novels on a young Reagan’s psyche to his actions as president. An example of how these novels led to Reagan’s decisions later in life is when Griffin ascribes Reagan’s continued support of futuristic technology to the initial exposure he received on the subject from his reading of Burroughs as a youth. Griffin argues these works would play a major role in the eventual culmination of the Cold War, when Reagan would announce his support for the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI); science fiction novels from his childhood would “help Reagan conceptualize the impact of technology, a technique he saw as perfectly reasonable.”[2]
