The US Military vs. the Environment, With Gretchen Heefner
An American Prestige bonus interview.
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The US Military vs. the Environment w/ Gretchen Heefner | American Prestige
Danny and Derek speak with historian Gretchen Heefner about how the US military (unsuccessfully) set out to conquer extreme environments and what those efforts reveal about empire, climate, and power. They discuss the US Army training for a desert war that turned out to be mud, the Pentagon’s disastrous attempts to master Greenland’s ice, early blueprints for building on the moon, efforts to gather “environmental intelligence” across the globe, and other failed endeavors showing the limits of American military power.
Read Gretchen’s book Sand, Snow, and Stardust: How U.S. Military Engineers Conquered Extreme Environments now!
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Vice President JD Vance and second lady Usha Vance stand with Col. Susan Meyers, commander of the US military’s Pituffik Space Base, as they tour the base on March 28, 2025 in Pituffik, Greenland.
(Jim Watson / Pool / Getty Images)Danny and Derek speak with historian Gretchen Heefner about how the US military (unsuccessfully) set out to conquer extreme environments and what those efforts reveal about empire, climate, and power. They discuss the US Army training for a desert war that turned out to be fought in mud, the Pentagon’s disastrous attempts to master Greenland’s ice, early blueprints for building on the moon, efforts to gather “environmental intelligence” across the globe, and other failed endeavors showing the limits of American military power.
Read Gretchen’s book Sand, Snow, and Stardust: How U.S. Military Engineers Conquered Extreme Environments now!
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The Nation Podcasts
Here's where to find podcasts from The Nation. Political talk without the boring parts, featuring the writers, activists and artists who shape the news, from a progressive perspective.
Journalism in the Age of Oligarchy w/ David Sirota / American Prestige
Danny and Derek speak with David Sirota, founder and EIC of The Lever, about journalism, independent media, and the consolidation of presidential power. They discuss the difference between journalism and media, the attention economy, capitalist media, audience capture, the decline of local news, the Powell Memo, the unitary executive theory, war powers, and Donald Trump’s use of executive power.
Be sure to listen to The Kingmakers, the second season of David’s investigative podcast Master Plan.
Don’t forget that AP’s new, weekly livestream is back this Wednesday at 8pm ET on our YouTube channel.
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