CNN stated that the 1867 purchase of Alaska by the United States “didn’t work out so well” in an analysis article outlining potential problems if the U.S. pursued the purchase of Greenland.
“One of the last times the United States bought land from a foreign country was in 1867, when Seward orchestrated the purchase of Alaska from the Russians for $7.2 million,” reporter Chris Cillizza wrote. “It didn’t work out so well — and has gone down as ‘Seward’s Folly’ in the history books.”
On Friday evening, the language of the article was adjusted to remove the sentence, “It didn’t work out so well.” The new version stated that the purchase of Alaska was “heavily criticized.”
A notation from CNN said, “CORRECTION: This story has been updated to correctly state the history of US land purchases.”
Alaska, which became the 49th U.S. state in 1959, encompasses 663,268 square miles of land and is the most northwestern portion of North America. Positioned in the Arctic, which is seen as an increasingly strategic region by the Pentagon as the U.S. shifts its national defense posture toward a great power struggle in the 21st century.
Mainland Alaska is less than 100 miles from mainland Russia, and Alaskan radar detection systems have been put in the spotlight as Russian planes have periodically tested U.S. air defense responses in the region.
Alaskan missile defense systems are considered a crucial part of protecting the continental United States and the state is uniquely positioned for supporting space surveillance and satellite control networks, tracking thousands of orbital objects on a daily basis.
After the purchase of Alaska in 1867, many were critical of the transaction, overseen by Secretary of State William Seward, involving what many saw as uninhabitable land. But in 1896 throngs of people swarmed to the American territory during the Klondike Gold Rush and more than 100,000 prospectors found use of the Alaskan land and many “boom towns” full of saloons and businesses began to attract settlers to the area.
Alaska is now home to cities like Anchorage and Juneau and has the largest oil field in North America. Its location in the far Northwest reach of the country gives the United States defensive and rescue advantages providing access to refueling tankers and the Greenland ice sheet.
