7 - American Military Families in West Germany

Summary

This chapter examines American views on the significance of service families in relations between the U.S. military and West Germany and in Cold War foreign relations. As the Cold War developed, families came to represent the American military's commitment to stand its ground against the Soviet attempt to take over Berlin, as well as resistance to the feared encroachment of Soviet power in Western Europe in the 1950s and 1960s. While projecting warmth, respect, and understanding of local cultures and customs in encounters with non-Americans, model military family members such as service wives, children, and servicemen as husbands and fathers, were expected to help wage the ideological war against communism by conveying the presumed superiority of American ideals and institutions through their deportment, family relations, and homes. Charitable activities constituted some of the earliest contacts between American military families and Germans.