How did the USA get so powerful so fast?

The basic question is this: How and why did the United States get in the position to have the worldwide cultural, economic and military influence that it does today?

I heard the theory a while back that three things were required for “superpower” status. A large landmass, a large population and a powerful economy. The United States has all three, of course. But there are other countries that could possibly meet the same criteria. China, Russia, Brazil and India have the landmass and the population. Great Britan, France and Germany might also be able to pull it off. So that leaves economic power.

So why us? Why aren’t the Brazilians or Indians competing with us for influence? Did it have something to do with being the country in the best shape after World War II? Or were the pieces in place before then? Did the cultural influence of our european forefathers in the first hundred years of our history set the tone?

And perhaps the most loaded question of all…is there an aggressive/competitive streak inside the anglo-saxon culture that encouraged and enabled the world domination we see today?

Capitalism and no more than 2 weeks of vacation a year. :wink:

“the West won the world not by the superiority of its ideas or values or religion but rather by its superiority in applying organized violence. Westerners often forget this fact, non-Westerners never do.”

Samuel P. Huntington

Yeah what he said, and having slavery for 100 years always helps a country “start in the right direction.”

So you are saying that aggression and forced labor are the foundation upon which the United States built the empire of today?

Slavery assisted in the primarily agricultural setting of the south, but not in the factories of the north.

And neither “organized violence” or slavery had anything to do with the great number of inventions and other intellectual achievements of the West.

Brazil is western.
Brazil had slavery.

the 2 great wars played a major role, but im not sure how exactly. I’ve seen many documentaries about war that say WW1 was how the US became a world power and WW2 is how the US became a superpower.

I’ve wondered about this too somewhat, but mainly about the west. How did the west coast of the US go from being lawless indian territory with sparse wooden towns to having first world status in about 50 years?

Considering that the US evolved at the same rate as any other developed country i don’t see what is necessarily impossible about a country developing an industrial/economic base rapidly. Countries like Japan & Russia underwent pretty fast development during short periods (japan in the late 19th century, Russia mid-early 20th).

India & China used to be strong world powers 500 years ago or so. Then India got conquered by the British, and the Chinese went into isolation and the EUropeans overcame them technologically. Roughly 800 years ago empires like China, Ghengis Kahn and the muslim empire were more powerful than european empires. I don’t know exactly why that shifted or how the US rose to the top though. Probably the fact that the US has 5-8x the population of all the other developed countries. I dont think US per capita education rates or military spending as a % of GDP are much different than they are with other developed nations.

I wonder how much of that was on topic.

According to writer Frank Deford, America became great because soccer ISN’T the national sport, which makes sense to me. :smiley:

The interesting thing about the pseudo-explanations advanced so far is that they are all so very “only the USA really exists, everything else is but a backdrop”. I put forth the following hypothesis:

The USA did so very well not only because it had lots of land, resources on same land, and lots of people on that land, but also because, during some very important periods, there was nobody around that had both desire and a practical chance of knocking the USA back. Mexico couldn’t. Canada had no interest and far too little manpower. The UK wasn’t interested–too expensive. France? No interest and not enough navy to get past US naval power. Spain? We ripped them a new hole when the matter came to direct confrontation. Russia? No interest until after WWII. Ultimately, it’s as much an ecological question as an “historical” one. Much like European colonization of North America can be explained in terms of biological “swarming” events as much as any “social science” explanation would work, likewise, the power of the USA can be explained in terms of the “foreign weed” effect. The USA had no “natural competitors” who were close enough and strong enough to make a difference.

Off the top of my head, I’d say the US had opportunities for colonists to actually keep their wealth, instead of just exploiting the land and sailing back to the mother country and having the royalty get their cut. The original settlers rejected any notion of a caste system, so the poor weren’t kept illiterate and forced to do manual labor for no recompense. That means more citizens have the desire to contribute to the industry and wellbeing of their country.

Plus, the US’s geography is such that there’s a lot of fertile land, and it’s not crisscrossed by barely passable mountain ranges as Europe and Japan are. The climate is neither too cold or too hot, so the weather isn’t too oppressive for the most part. There’s plenty of shore line, accounting for a sizeable navy. I’m thinking when the US expanded westward, they adopted a frontier mentality that got them accustomed to facing any type of potential danger, so that philosophy got them steered on course to becoming a world power.

I don’t have the source with me, but the UK was aware of America’s quick rise to power in the late 19th century. They accepted this, saying “Thank God they speak English.”

What about the Louisiana Purchase? France enabled the expansion of the United States at a time when it was much less capable than it is today. Although I think if France had refused to sell the land, it would have been taken anyway. The French would have been forced to choose between fighting and giving up. If they had chosen to fight, would the UK have joined in? Perhaps France’s desire for cash prevented the fledgling union from being snuffed out or delayed…allowing Western European countries to build and consolidate power.

We had a long time to practice democracy under the protection of the Brits during which we managed to work out a lot of the little kinks. So that after nearly 200 years at it we were ready for a go of it on our own. That seems to me to be very important. I look at all the revolutions and coups and whatnot of the past 220 years and it seems that so many leaders and people failed to really understand the nature and power of democracy and the length to which you have to go to protect it.

I’d wager that had a lot to do with the quality of our leaders in the early days. They had already learned not to trust themselves completely so we get checks and balances. They felt patriotism towards their nation and when confronted with opportunities to gravely injure the democracy chose not to do so. All of which gave our economic base a tremendously long and relatively stable period in which to grow. Our economy passed both Germany and the UK in size much earlier then I think most people would guess.

This question really highlights Dogface’s point that the US had virtually no real foreign threat to expansion and the fact that balance of power politics dominated the era. We went to France to negotiate for the purchase of New Orleans, so we would have a port for the Mississippi shipping. France, instead, offered us the Louisiana Territory. Why? Well, because there were a considerable number of “westerners” in America that were quite ready to take it. The farmers in what was then the western fronteir of America needed the navigation of the Mississippi in order to survive.

France, almost undoubtedly, could have defeated an American incursion into Louisiana. Remember, at the time, France was a military power - quite unlike what they are thought of today. America had no real naval power at the time, and France could have landed troops in the territory, and based naval operations in the West Indies. However, the Louisiana Terrotiry really wasn’t of much importance to the French. The West Indies were a much more profitable area, and the attentions of the French nation were turning toward the creation of a European Empire (short, funny looking guy called Napoleon was involved in that one).

Here is where balance of power politics come into play. With both a Euorpean war raging and and an attempt to make a move in North America, Britain would probably have come down hard on the French. France and Britain were hardly on good terms at the time, and a large French army on the NA continent would certainly be seen as a threat to British Canada and the British West Indies. The British Navy would have descended quickly on French ships trying to move and support troops and would have made the defense of Louisiana very difficult.

Spanish power was rapidly declining and soon after this period they would be a non-factor (Mexican-American war 1840s, Sp-American war 1890s?) in detering American expansionism. British Canada was not really a threat at all. The war of 1812 showed that. The British push south from Canada was effectively checked, the southern push into New Orleans was thwarted and it was really only the front in the middle states that amounted to anything, as it was heavily supported by naval power (which Britain had in spades).

Not only was America largely free from the interference of European powers from the early nineteenth century on (unlike most other parts of the globe), the US was also able to maintain its own desired level of isolationism from the problems the European nations created for themselves. The US was free to develop on its own terms. Throw in a healthy supply (as already mentioned) of arable land, good climate, natural resources, and population and you get a ready recipe for success.

Then there is the American attitude of the period. To their minds, not only was greatness in reach, but it was the American destiny. Read what European observers (such as de Toqueville or Chevalier) said about the spirit of the American people; their drive, their enthusiasm, their undying belief in progress. I’m not saying that the drive for greatness is unique to America or to the time period, but it was a singular passion for the almost the entire population (or at least of the entire free population) and it really drove the American people. One example of this is the practice, during the industrial revolution, of the Americans to build their machines out of wood. They did this, knowing that the machines would soon wear out, becuase they believed that by that (admittedly short) time a better machine design would be available. They were always looking to a better future.

With this freedom from interference and the resources and attitude to make the best of the country, America could develop to the point that when, during WW I, it decided to enter forcefully into world politics, it had the power and ability to do so at the height of power. Again, when we entered WW II, we were able to do so on our own terms. At this point, the current (or recently past) situation developed. Europe had been through two devastating wars, on their own territory, in the past 30 or so years. Their populations, resources, economies, and infrastructures were destroyed. America’s, on the other hand, were largely untouched (perhaps made stronger). Asia and Africa were just beginning to see the end of the actual colonizations of their lands; the effects are still felt in most, if not all, of those areas.

Russia grew as a counter-point to America, but their country had been ravaged by the wars and by a series of revolutions the likes of which we haven’t had. The lingering effects of the czars and the feudal-like state were still being felt. They had never fully industrialized, and skipped past capitalism direct to socialism/communism. This was not an economically good move. The driving force behind their actions was ideology, and one that most in the country probably did not believe (as the corrupt nature of most people kept it from being fully implemented). It was a hollow(with the very large exception of the development of nukes) threat to American supremacy, and rather than cehcking the growth of America, Russia fueled our rise.

With the collapse of the USSR, there was a power-vacuum as a nemesis to the US. It won’t be filled for a very long time, if at all. Asymetric battles will now be the rule whenever the US is involved. I see a parallel between our position and that of Rome at its height. Their will be skirmishes and threats in hot-spots across the world, but no real enemy we can march against (or who can march against us). The major difference being that the American Empire is not one of lands, but cultural and economic. Like Rome, we will fall - not at the hands of an equal rival, but by overextending our reach, schisms at home, and opportunistic thrusts by less powerful enemies. Only then will American power be within striking distance of another nation or confederacy.

IMHO, right?

No, not aggressiveness, per se. Starting with the Greeks, Western/European culture developed an attitude toward warfare that was generally not matched elsewhere. An army had to get a decisive victory; soldiers were commanded, tactics were developed, and hesitancy was suppressed. IIRC, John Keegan described the difference in the Greek vs. the Persion attitude to battle: The Persians would come in quick & perhaps a little pell mell and retreat, everyone was in fear for his life and acted as such; the Greeks had no hesitancy–they charged in as one with no regard for their lives, fortified by the knowledge that only when soldiers are prepared to give their lives will they be ready to win.

This idea of giving up individuality, of using organized tactics, and of seeking decisive victories was developed through the Romans and so-on in Europe. They didn’t have a monopoly on it, of course, the Mongols & Shaka Zulu being a striking examples that these notions were not strictly European. Elsewhere, even major organized empires failed to see warfare in this sense. The Inca empire, for example, didn’t fight to win war in any sense that we’d understand, but instead needed a supply of sacrificial victims. Some native Californians would actually take the arrow heads off their arrows for battle, generating reports of combatants leaving the field looking like pin cushions and surviving without too much trouble.

It is this attitude toward warfare that made Europeans so effective. Spain, for example, had just finished a long and terribly brutal war to kick out the Moors. It was a war to eliminate an enemy; to totally dominate the opponent using whatever means were available; to execute faithfully assigned tactical operations with both vigor and fatalism. Cultures that were not prepared for this simply could not stand against it. Imagine yourself as a member of an army ten-thousand strong. Your intention is to run up to your enemy and klonk him on the knee and cripple him, or bonk him on the head to kill him, and retreat before his buddies could get at you. Your method is to dance like a boxer, waiting for the right opportunity to strike and then get out of harm’s way without getting hurt; to show that you can do it and get some recognition from your community. You want glory in battle. Inasmuch as you have a battle line, it is fluid and not cohesive; individual members and groups darting out to strike when opportunity is there; dropping back as the opponent thrusts forward, trying to strike you.

The other army, unbeknown to you, has no such attitude. No individual waits for an opportunity; no individual retreats to avoid danger. They form in an organized line–every so often you see a guy up front with no weapon at all, he’s just holding a flag–and no steps out of the line. On a signal from their commander, they all rush you in unison. They don’t wait for opportunity; they all come charging at once with nothing but determination on their faces; no fear, no hesitancy, no doubt. Your army has ten-thousand members and out-number them by ten or twenty to one, but that is of little comfort as you watch them barrel in en masse and crash into the ranks in front of you with reckless abandon. Since your battle line wasn’t well organized, those who were farther in front are mowed down effortlessly as they face two or three opponents at once. Your front ranks, decimated, seek to retreat from danger, as they normally would, but doing it all at once and crowding and shoving in an attempt to get out of the enemy’s reach. Of course, the enemy keeps coming and those who fell trying to run backwards are eaten by the machine. As the retreating ranks create a wave of congestion, those nearest the front have no where to go and, probably overwhelmed by shock and fear, are set upon by the enemy. Of course, those front ranks are too packed together to effectively parry or block, being reduced to swinging their weapons up and down, and are helpless against the simple, straight thrusts of the enemy’s sword coming in repeatedly with accuracy and speed. Those not quite in the front see those in the front being disembowled by the enemy, who have nothing but blood-lust and rage in their eyes, and realize something very important: I’m next. Now they truly panic and turn to run, but they can’t because everybody else is in their way. With their backs turned and tightly packed in a frenzy of fear, the enemy advances at walking pace slaughtering men left and right who are literally helpless and unable to defend themselves. There is no battle taking place, it is nothing more than a grade-A slaughter of a helpless foe.

Based on what I’ve read, that’s how I picture the arrival of the Spanish in the New World. The Europeans had developed a model of warfare that was simply too effective for anyone without it to stand a chance. Thunder-sticks and metal breast-plates wouldn’t make a bit of difference, IMO.

We had the climate and culture to embrace the Industrial Revolution. The expansion of capital is a significant element in macroeconomic growth, and the higher growth rate over time adds up. By the time Brazil or India may have gotten on track to industrialize, we had a huge head start that just keeps adding more growth. I don’t know about Brazil, but as far as I know India wasn’t a place that the British tried to industrialize. So if they started to do so in, say, 1940, we would still have had a massive head start. With all the existing capital, human capital, and infrastructure, along with our already larger economy, catching up would be very difficult.

One other advantage would be the fact that individual states couldn’t impose tariffs on other states. I’d imagine that if Europe shared the same arrangement, then we wouldn’t be so powerful relative to the Europeans.

IMHO, of course. :slight_smile:

Well, since this is IMHO…

Not to be un-PC, but don’t discount the superiority of “ideas” here. After all, the growth of America is but a subset of the rise of western European civilization to global pre-eminence from 1400-1945. For over 500 years, the American continent had the luxury of having the intellectual and financial resources of a much greater civilization than itself to draw on.

For example, the Declaration of Independence was written in the same summer that saw the printing of Adam Smith’s Wealth of Nations and the first installment of Gibbon’s Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire: American intellectuals, such as they were, had almost a decade to mull over these two books (and others, like Locke), and when it came time to create a country, the ideal that they chose was a federated Republic in which the individual citizenry were endowed with inalienable rights to assembly, speech, press, etc.

Take that, add to it the ongoing scientific revolution, the brand new industrial revolution, no income tax for the first 120 years of the country, an immigration policy second to none in accepting new people (yet always chronically short), and an unspoiled continent roughly equal in size to Old Europe itself and you have what Tony Bruno calls a stonecold leadpipe lock.

Samuel Huntington is an idiot, and the Clash of Civilizations theory is essentially a big lie designed to keep American policymakers in a Cold War mindset. Huntington and his ideas have no place in the twenty-first century, no matter how much he tarts them up to make the appear fresh and modern; the bipolar order of international power politics is gone, and won’t come back no matter how hard Washington think tanks wish for it.

None of those things are required for ‘superpower’ status. Great Britain had neither a large landmass nor a large population when it became the de facto kingmaker in the Concert of Europe. The Soviet Union had neither a powerful economy nor a particularly large population.

The term “superpower” is entirely relative; the United States became a superpower after World War II not because it had become incredibly powerful, but because its competitors had been savaged enough by the war that they were no longer in a position to challenge it. Aside from the extremely unlikely chain of events which resulted in the Manhattan Project, we might still be simply the dominant state of the New World.

I vote for:

  1. Lots of resources

  2. Lots of people

  3. Lots of industrious people, the type who would say, “Lets move off the continent, Ingrid, this place just isn’t working for us anymore.”

  4. Incentive to work and invent, because the government isn’t going to just grab anything you do.

  5. Isolation from destruction in wars (unless you happen to fight amongst yourselves).

  6. Openness to good ideas from everywhere.
    I argue that slavery slowed down the advancement of the economy, because it would have been better to bring in immigrants of the same numbers who were free to work AND think and create.

The US profited greatly from WWII, particularly during the early parts of the War. Also, it was the only major power that escaped destruction.

Rarely can it be said that a nation was DESTINED for greatness, simply by virtue of its geography or population.

Fact of the matter is that there are lots of factors that can make a nation stronger, but in almost every case great nations are built by great leaders (relative to their peers), men (and women-theoretically) that are able to tame the aristocrats, control the army, unify the state, inspire the people, and install a government that can carry out their vision for the continued greatness of the nation.

Damnit Damnit Damnit. I was saying to myself before I used the quote - “maybe I should check this guy out to see who he actually is before posting.” Nah. Too lazy.
Didn’t know he had that clash of civilizations idea. I agree that is one of the stupidest things I’ve ever heard.

/lesson learned

You should feel neither stupid nor naive for buying what he’s selling.

a) he does sneak in a good point here and there, and

b) some very important people subscribe wholeheartedly to his views.

To those of you who don’t know what I’m talking about, Samuel Huntington is a foreign policy wonk who came up with the idea that the Islamic world and China would band together to fight the West. He makes his theories plausible by lumping entire continents into a group of seven “civilizations” (as well as a few sub-civilizations, like Africa). The general rub is that the Cold War mindset which led to NATO and the EU and similar institutions is a good thing and ought to be retained, because when the Chinese and the Arabs attack we’ll need it.

His ideas are stupid because a) his civilizations are often connected by geography or a language and nothing else, and b) the Chinese and the “Islamic world” (as if such a thing existed in united form) each have as much in common with the West as they do with each other, and c) because his ideas are essentially based around preserving an old world order completely at odds with the reality of modern international relations.

I was a little harsh when I called him an idiot, because he has done some remarkable things, and at the close of the Cold War his theories were mostly spot-on. Idiots aren’t generally named President of the American Political Science Association. Still, the whole Clash of Civilizations concept is at best inaccurate, and at worst a lie being parroted to preserve the status quo.