Why Our World Is: USA
By: Abhijay Bhosale
This is the start of a new series, a series that will go through 10 different parts of the world and provide their rise, fall, and change starting at the end of World War 2. All the headlines, all the superpowers, and all the finer details.
The series starts with the USA. What was once an isolationist breakaway colony from the UK in the middle of the Great Depression turned into one of the world's greatest powers after its involvement in World War 1 and 2. After making a lot of allies and a few enemies, the USA had a lot of potential to do great things on the global stage. Let's see what happened.
WWII to The Berlin Wall
The US did things in western Europe that really proved the country's worth. Its massive army came as a result of the unemployment of the Great Depression, and they utilized all of their people. Even though not being near any of the hostility in the European front, almost all the US was fully using every resource they had to stop the German war machine. And when Japan attacked, they handled the situation, liberating and helping many allies and allied colonies as they got closer to the Japanese mainland. But perhaps the biggest factor that led the world to thinking the US was a superpower was the nuclear bomb. It made the US not only a powerhouse, but also a technological hub. After getting closer to Western Europe and Russia through post-war talks in regard to Germany, the US used its booming economy to help France and the UK. Another thing to note is that although Germany was given to Russia due to their very important contributions to the war, singlehandedly defeating Germany on the East European front, Berlin (Germany's capital) was split between the US, UK, France, and Russia. The first 3 united their land holdings to make West Berlin and the Russian side turned into East Berlin. The US invested a lot in West Berlin, and after Russia saw this, they couldn't afford to renovate East Berlin and made a wall to stop East Berliners from moving to West Berlin and escaping the USSR. Although the Berlin Wall is a topic that could be dissected even more, it would be better to talk about the rivalry between the US and USSR.
The Cold War
The Cold War not only shaped up a lot the US's future in foreign relations but also major worldwide politics. Although both nations contributed a lot to growing tensions across the world, it's better to focus on the US for the purpose of this article. For one, the US was getting involved a little too much in foreign relations, things its allies loved and enemies hated. It made the US have more power in making vital decisions over an area that was a whole ocean away from the American homeland. While the USSR was struggling to get on its feet and make the most out of its land, the US was happy on its own continent and advancing. Not to mention the followers of both economic systems had strong and oftentimes valid reasons as to why they followed it. Such a strong divide ended in a result that led to power struggles on both sides. The struggles led to very tense wars and a lot of conflict. Think of the divide as a game of Monopoly gone too far. All properties are owned, each one has a hotel, and there's no room for expansion. But let's say that there's a property for auction. A small one, but a property nonetheless. The 2 biggest players will go all out to acquire the property and try to get it for themselves, build it from the ground up once again, then use it for personal gain. That's the reason behind basically all proxy wars. Vietnam, the Koreas, even fights in the Middle East. But all the while, the USSR needs to look around near its own country and the US gets to send its troops wherever and stay unaffected at the homeland.
Present Day
The US has showed itself to the world in many ways. It facilitated SEATO (Southeast Asia Trade Organization) and CENTO (Central Trade Organization), holds many allies and projects in Europe, and is currently helping Ukraine keep Russia away from American interests. It's making strides in entrepreneurs with many of the richest people in the world being in the US. It has amazing education that keeps its people ready to serve the country in the way it sees fit, has many spheres of influence, and has an amazing level or diversity that keeps it running. Although there are many issues that have been around for sometime and new issues that come with having a population that overthink a little too much, it still stays a unified country when at threat.
Getting into finer, realer details, the US also did a lot in the Middle East. Its trade with Saudi Arabia and other oil rich countries makes the US a country, that although very powerful, relies on countries that live in unstable areas to keep it running. It also has many policies with other countries and treaties like NATO that make the US be on its best behavior and have its decisions kept to extremely "safe" and painfully slow ways. It's knee-deep in foreign affairs and is arguably dealing with more than it's supposed to handle.
The recent Covid-19 pandemic has also made the US dollar lose its flair and made it a bit more inflated. A large percentage of US bills have been printed in the last 5 years. Another thing is the debt limit. It's something made in the Constitution that gave the power to Congress to change the amount of debt the government is allowed to have. The consequences would shut down the whole country with the US dollar, and although it isn't something that the Congress won't change, it's a bargaining chip against the President, so it keeps a lot of people on their toes. It's not just America that would be destroyed by this, it would also be a lot of other countries that rely on the dollar to reach a crisis. The US dollar is unstable, and it's especially scary once you see how high the value of it is and how low it could get.
In good news, the US has an amazing population. People from all over the world led to the country's many contributions. Elon Musk, inventor of Tesla, SpaceX, and more, came from South Africa. Robert Oppenheimer helped the US make the atomic bomb and was from Germany. There are many different ideas and talents that take root around the globe. The 2 giant oceans on each side make the legal immigrants that emigrate here the best of the best, only furthering the country.
The US industry, although having China make almost all its goods, still designs many things. Although it shows the US's top exports are Refined Petroleum, CPUs, and Crude Oil, it also exports many firearms and military machinery to allies. It's not necessarily bad, it's what the US is good at. It also has many designers that make new, top of the line inventions that are the fuel for cheap knock-off Chinese products.
In summary, the US is a diverse place. It definitely has a big stick diplomacy factor to it, but unlike other nations with a very impressive military prowess like North Korea doesn't need to flex its nuclear weapons. Perhaps it's a result of being a NATO and UN member and, as said previously, being on a close watch. The US's history is as clear cut, and a lot of things such as CIA influence and other things that would be extremely influential to the way our world is were not included just because of how speculative the things you find in those topics are. But yes, they are still a thing. The US is an amazing country on the global scale that really has profited off its potential and made the best it could with its preset connections to the world. Although the US still has a lot of criticism about what it has done in the past, it's still shown up as a great.
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There are things that could show the US's impact even further, but those will better be shown in other parts of the series.
US's involvement in the Korean War will be shown in the Korean Peninsula Edition
US's involvement in the Middle East will be shown in the Middle East Edition
US's impact on Russia will be shown in the Russia Edition
US's involvement in the China will be shown in the China Edition
US's involvement in Germany will be shown in the Germany Edition
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