| ID | 132013 |
| Title Proper | Transnational generations |
| Other Title Information | organizing youth in the Cold War |
| Language | ENG |
| Author | Honeck, Mischa ; Rosenberg, Gabriel |
| Publication | 2014. |
| Summary / Abstract (Note) |
The Cold War had just turned hot on the Korean Peninsula in late June 1950 when Deon Smith, a young Boy Scout from Mt. Vernon, Illinois, pitched his tent in Valley Forge. Fears of a global cataclysm loomed over the Revolutionary War battlefield, where nearly 50,000 Boy Scouts from the United States and twenty allied nations had gathered to celebrate Independence Day. Their jamboree marked the biggest encampment of youth on American soil to date, big enough to garner an address by President Harry Truman. "I hope that you young men … will take home from this jamboree a clearer understanding of the meaning of human brotherhood," said Truman. "I hope that you will work for freedom and peace with the same burning faith that inspired the men of George Washington's Army here at Valley Forge."1 Given the geopolitical context, the subtext was clear: "freedom and peace" required the "burning faith" of fighting men. Irony, as well as faith, burned in Truman's comments. Beyond the rhetoric of global brotherhood, Truman's internationalist overtures obscured particular national geopolitical interests on the peninsula and cast communism as an inhuman menace. Meanwhile, even as the grand statesman rallied the crowd, Deon Smith was busy forging international ties of his own-ties that did not grow out of security concerns but were driven by juvenile excitement and curiosity. He took part in various "Scoutcraft events" and "inter-camp visits," traded souvenirs with his distant peers, and formed friendships with Scouts from near and far. "Some of the most interesting groups we have met," Smith wrote, "are the Scouts from foreign lands," including boys from the former enemy nations of Germany and Japan. In this, Smith explored internationalism rather than merely assuming it. Who, then, assembled universal brotherhood more decisively at this jamboree: the president, whose speech recoded the chaos, flux, and pleasures of a sprawling encampment in the overdetermined, ironically nationalist registers of liberal internationalism, or the boy, whose handshakes gave literal flesh to Truman's rhetoric?2 |
| `In' analytical Note | Diplomatic History Vol.38, No.2; April 2014: p.233-239 |
| Journal Source | Diplomatic History Vol.38, No.2; April 2014: p.233-239 |
| Key Words | Cold War ; Transnational Generation ; Warfare - History ; Youth Organizations ; Liberal Internationalism ; United States - US ; Global Cataclysm ; Geopolitical Context ; Korean Peninsula ; Freedom and Peace ; Rhetoric Context ; Geopolitical Interests ; International Ties ; Chaos ; Germany ; Japan ; International Relations - IR ; Bilateral Relations ; International Regime ; International Accord |