Great Basin Opposition to the Mx Missile : a Case

The campaign of opposition to MX missile deployment in the Great Basin of Nevada and Utah stands as a unique case of grassroots mobilization, because it took place in a region whose inhabitants both supported a strong U.S. military defense posture and considered the decision-making processes of foreign policy and national security remote to their overall concerns. This study holds that the two paramount components of the Great Basin belief structure were support of a strong military sector to protect U.S. national security and a traditional skepticism of federal involvement in domestic affairs of the region. From this the author derives that the proposal to emplace the MX in Nevada and Utah posed a discrepancy in this value structure, in that while it was ostensibly indicative of the national security orientation that the residents favored, it also.symbolized the high degree of federal involvement which they criticized. In an effort to resolve this discrepancy, Great Basin residents factored incoming information about the missile into their pre-existing value structure according to principles of cognitive dissonance, absorbing those aspects that complied with this structure and avoiding confrontation with those that conflicted.I The study then proceeds to examine certain contextual elements, namely the ongoing Sagebrush Rebellion, launched in protest of federal ownership of western states' territory, and the Western Shoshone struggle over entitlement to land as stated in the Treaty of Ruby Valley. These elements enhanced opposition to the MX within the traditional Great Basin criticism of federal involvement. Finally, the essay addresses the role of external actors in promoting the indigenous nature of the campaign. By allowing protest of the MX to evolve within the pre-existing value structure of the Great Basin residents, rather than trying to introduce a separate structure of opposition, these actors facilitated both cohesion and permanence in the protest effort. Thesis Supervisor: Lincoln P. Bloomfield, Professor of Political Science 2