Part of the reason we’re #1 is…we’re smart. Really smart. The industrialization of this country, complete with the world-changing inventions during the 1800s and 1900s, was as intimidating as anything that’s ever happened in history. We had a problem and, voila! We came up with a solution. Assembly lines, telephones, electricity, medicine, bombs, space travel, the cotton gin…all of these things paint a picture of a country that is determined to make it, and determined to make a good life for all it’s citizens. Yeah, on a number of fronts, we’ve failed a good many of our citizens, but we’re young and hopefully, we’re learning from our mistakes.
Except that most of those inventions weren’t strictly American - though the USA clearly utilized them better than most countries.
America is really the only superpower, because Europe (the EU) has opted out of world affairs. The Europeans endlessly complain about American “arrogance”, but THEY are unwilling to lift a finger in their own defense (except for Great Britain).The EU has a higher population, and a larger GDP than the US, but it spends only a tiny fraction of its wealth on its armed forces…it is much easier to let the US do all the heavy lifting. This is also advantageous to EU politicians, who can criticize the US endlessly, yet feel free to call on the US to bail them out of their own messes! Take Bosnia-why is it that the US has 50,000 soldiers in an area of NO strategic importance to the US-the reason is simple-the Euros would’nt be there without the US. Europe has fairley subatntial armies, but no means of deploying them beyond their borders-and the Germans hide behind their constitutionally-imposed ban on sending soldiers abroad.
jjimm, I know they weren’t strictly American, but they were fine-tuned by us and made widely available by us. We took the ball and ran with it, so to speak. Nobody uses technology like we do!
Apart from the Japanese.
The real answer is capitalism. The U.S. is number one because it adopted the most efficient structure for society when it was founded, and has never really strayed far from it. Other countries like the USSR, Germany and Japan that could have given the U.S. a run for its money took disastrous turns into statism and wrecked their own economies. Other countries in Europe and such as Canada adopted more socialistic policies, which slowed their rates of growth. A difference in growth rates of 1 or 2 percent compounded over a hundred years is a BIG difference.
Then there’s Britain - it was once THE world power. But it over-extended itself in the colonies, had to commit vast resources to fighting two large wars (which the U.S. also fought in, but not with the same level of commitment as a percentage of the economy), and had significant infrastructure damage during WWII. After the war, its government took a sharp turn to the left, and mired the economy in stagnation.
It’s the little things that the U.S. does right. Slightly freer trade than average, somewhat less regulation than average, slightly higher productivity than average, etc. Over the centuries, it all adds up.
America is the world’s strongest economic and military force. I believe the reason for this is that the conditions for producing, developing, and creating this might are better here than in any other country, and have been for some time now.
China and India are far more populous, Russia is far larger, The Middle East contains far more petrouleum, Africa and the Third World have huge reserves of resources, Labor is cheaper everywhere, and yet we have no problem holding onto our position as the world most free and wealthiest nation.
It is precisely this freedom that explains our acheivement. Somebody mentioned that China and India our developing into global forces. But what happens to the Indian entrepreneur who has the next great technology idea?? That individual comes to America to incorporate and develop that idea. Why? Because the corruption and bureaucracy and inefficiancy in theIndian system is to great a barrier to be overcome. (In general). In China, the goverment will not allow for someone to take it upon themselves to develop and grow an idea or innovation or business for themselves. Again, the barrier for success is generally to great to overcome.
People from all over the world wish to come here to put themselves in the type of environment where the only barrier to success is individual limitations.
So it is our system, our model for self-governence and individual freedom that allows greater things to happen here than anywhere in the world. If you could computer model all the different ways of organizing a nation politcally and economically, our system would produce time and time again the most vital economy. Other nations are productive and self-sufficient, so nobody is saying that America is superior per se , but if you want to create a global superpower, doing so in a large nation with tremendous personal liberties is the way to go.
I am an American.
By the way, Canada has more real time, in the trenches war experience in this century than we do. They go in first, they come out last, and they help anyone who asks. They don’t go when no one asks. Are they a superpower? No. It’s just not their shtick.
Well, anyway, we got into four big wars in the century, and a few small ones. We never got invaded, only been attacked twice, and never took a serious hit to our industrial infrastructure, or more than a minor military hit on our own turf. (Strictly speaking, Pearl Harbor didn’t accomplish anything but forcing us to abandon the concept of Battleship Navies, almost directly causing us to become the dominant military presence on the worlds oceans.)
Every other major military power has had the crap kicked out of it at least once in the last hundred years. Their homelands devastated, their populations decimated, and the best of their people turned into refugees. Where did the refugees go? Right.
Immigration is the golden goose. Freedom to fall, or rise higher. The long end of a history of industriousness, and willingness to create infrastructure that serves all the people have made the opportunities vast beyond the dreams of the wealthy in many other cultures. It attracts the risk takers, and the freethinkers. And it has done so for two hundred years. That matters a whole lot.
No, all the inventions are not American. But we certainly do put stuff on the shelf more easily, and more widely than most. We certainly have enough spare industrial capacity to build entire weapons systems, and then just decide, “Ahh, never mind.” Hell, we have enough spare industrial capacity to build seventeen types of abdominal exercise machines. Why? Because any asshole in the whole country can start up and flop six times building any damn thing at all. Every now and then, someone builds a better radar, scanner, or radar absorbing paint.
And we bitch about stuff pretty much non-stop. We whine about everything we don’t like, and we don’t give up. We are damned hard to please, and have enough wealth to make pleasing us an opportunity.
Tris
“It is no profit to have learned well, if you neglect to do well.” ~ Publilius Syrus ~
The whole USSR Vs US thing is fascinating. I think that the point could be made that without the USSR and the Cold war the US would never have achieved superpower status as we define it.
Well before VJ or even VE day it was readily apparent to the US that a large enemy still existed in the form of the Soviet Union. Without a somewhat-beaten-up-but-still-militarily-capable enemy to the east the US would have been likely to head home and let Europe solve its own problems. In such a scenario it isn’t hard to bet that the war machine gets dismantled and foreign policy again takes on an isolationist tone. Instead, the cold war inspired the superpower race and the loser dropped out of superpower contention.
Another hypothetical is to ask: What would have become of Soviet Union had the Cold War never happened? I can’t claim to know anything of long-term Soviet planning (they did get painted as wanting to “Take over the world” by the west) but how powerful would they have become? Others have made the assertion that the communist economy doomed the USSR from the start but that was when it was in direct competition with the far more robust US economy.
I will argue that without US intervention they would have been the major player in Europe post WWII and that would still be the case today. Without military expenditures dragging the rest of the economy down the drain they may have been able to put themselves into top dog status.
But the war machine did get dismantled. Even today we less than a third of our WWII armed forces, and even a smaller portion of combat troops. This is not a bad thing - America has long struck a better balance between light taxes, social programs, and military readiness than any other nation in our position before. Pretty much all of them (Rome, Spain, England, Russia) concentrated solely on military rule. We, however, have in the past decade shown the ability to crush heavily armed forces in tough terrain without even slowing the economy, much less damaging it.
No it didn’t. Or certainly not all the way. The main thrust was instead shifted to nuclear delivery (SAC etc.)
Not to mention a fair number of us natives. :rolleyes:
This part puzzles me a lot. I am not asking you for a cite because I really hate that. Any fool can come up with a couple of other fools to substantiate a statement. That still doesn’t make it correct.
I am curious about examples because I have never heard this idea expressed before. I know that you don’t mean in man-hours or dollars because that is simply impossible given the vastly different populations of the countries so what are you talking about?
Canadian troops, although less numerous than American troops, on the average have more actual combat experience. This has been true since World War II. During Vietnam, lots of Americans got one year of combat experience, but the overwhelming majority of those troops got out of service immediately after returning to the US. That demographic is not true in Canada. They have a far longer average enlistment time, and their Government has sent troops to every UN or NATO deployment since WWII. These guys know the drill. They fall out, and load up, ship out, and dig in. And they hardly ever even get mentioned in the papers.
In the US, this kind of professionalism is limited to elite units. In the Canadian armed forces, it is pretty much the job. You sign up, you generally sign up for the long term. Very nice to have them on your flank.
And on the topic at hand, as a nation; Very nice to have them on our flank. Mexico never attacked us, but Canada has guarded our northern front for two hundred years. Makes it fairly easy to defend the rest, when you have a staunch, and experienced military ally camped out right next door.
Tris
“Victorious warriors win first and then go to war, while defeated warriors go to war first and then seek to win.” ~ Sun-tzu ~
The same is said of the Australian troops.
How did America become the Worlds greatest superpower?
By being the greatest and most mixed nation on Earth!
Is this still true after the end of the draft? I’d be curious to see if reenlistement rates are up since then, but I wouldn’t be surprised if they weren’t. Many soldiers sign up for one tour of duty for college money or something and don’t reenlist.
As for Canada guarding the northern border…even during the War of 1812?
[QUOTE]
*Originally posted by Triskadecamus *
In the US, this kind of professionalism is limited to elite units. In the Canadian armed forces, it is pretty much the job. You sign up, you generally sign up for the long term. Very nice to have them on your flank.
And on the topic at hand, as a nation; Very nice to have them on our flank. Mexico never attacked us, but Canada has guarded our northern front for two hundred years. Makes it fairly easy to defend the rest, when you have a staunch, and experienced military ally camped out right next door.
[QUOTE]
Like most long-time friendships, it’s had its rocky moments. The Trent Affair, the Fenians and “Fifty-four forty or fight!” come to mind.
[dreaming] I’m kinda hoping Global Warming will make the Canadian winter more tolerable, so we can encourage vastly increased immigration and hit the 100 million mark by mid-century. Then you’d better watch out. When we rattle our sabres, we’ll be polite but firm. [/dreaming]
While I don’t disagree with most of the posts made here, they omit the more unpleasant side of American history.
1500’s to 1600’s: As the Europeans entered this land, they found it already cultivated - it was not an untamed land, rather a very tamed land. Some historians say that native agriculture was better than European. Additionally, due to the great amount of natural resources, including native slaves, present, the developing nation quickly had a net trade surplus.
1600’s to 1800’s: Labor was nearly free for much of the agribusiness, increasing GDP substantially, and providing resources for growth.
This is in addition to the points mentioned above, not in lieu of. IMHO, the U.S. made better use of slaves for driving growth than did any other nation which used them.
Please don’t read that as condoning slavery in any way, shape or form. It’s historical fact; I can’t change the past, only keep the truth alive.
You can’t use slavery or other events that happened long ago, for the simple reason that America’s rise to the top of the herd didn’t occur then. It’s pretty much a 20th century phenomenon.
To give you an example of where the U.S. gained momentum: The United States was the only country to go through WWII without falling into recession. It showed growth in every quarter throughout the war. Every other combatant (with the possible exception of Canada) was severely damaged by the war effort.
As a result, a major power shift occured after the war. Before the war, Europe was still supreme. But at the end of the war, North America was HUGE. And not just the U.S. - at the end of the war, Canada had the 2nd largest navy in the world, and the 4th largest air force, despite having only 1/10 the population of the U.S.
North America emerged unscathed from the war, and continued massive economic growth while most European countries were engaged in rebuilding. Europe then took a sharp turn to the left and adopted socialist policies which kept growth down.
Canada’s military: A favorite subject of mine. Canada has the 3rd largest number of soldiers in Afghanistan, but the highest kill ratio. Canada’s air force routinely bests the Americans (and every other country in NATO) in wargames. Canada’s tank commanders are so good that a bi-annual NATO tank competition used to be affectionately called “The Canada Cup”. Canada’s soldiers are some of the best regular troops in the world. And Canada’s special forces are very, very good. So good that most people haven’t heard of them. If you’re interested, look up “JTF-2” on the web.