At the end of World War II, America emerged as the foremost superpower of the West. The other European allies’ power was waning. France was humbled by a swift defeat and occupation during the War. Britain joined America in victory, but over the course of the coming decades, it lost more and more of the colonies and economic dominance that made it a superpower.
With superpower status also came America’s role as chief adversary of the Soviet Union in the post-war era, the next four-plus decades of which would become known as the Cold War. Two events at the end of the War helped set the stage for this conflict.
First, the Yalta Conference in February 1945. The “Big Three” – US President Franklin D. Roosevelt, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, and Soviet leader Joseph Stalin – divided post-war Berlin into 4 quadrants; one each controlled by the US, Britain, France, and the Soviet Union. Along with their quadrant in Berlin, the Soviets were also ceded a “sphere of influence” in Eastern Europe, where they would spread their Communist rule.
Second, the atomic bombs dropped by the US in Japan both ended the war in the Pacific and marked the start of the technological side of the Cold War. From the nuclear bomb to the space race, both the US and the Soviets invested heavily in science and technology during the Cold War, each feeling that technological superiority would also result in a victory in the war of ideas and philosophy: democracy and capitalism versus communism.
Along with its prominent status as a political and military superpower, America also became a world economic giant. America’s actions in the mid-to-late 1940s accelerated the rate of globalization. The US played a chief role in establishing the United Nations. It established the World Bank, International Monetary Fund, and World Trade Organization. Passed in 1948, the Marshall Plan led to $12 billion of investment in post-war Europe. The American economy was easily able to support these bold actions. The war had rescued America from the Great Depression. By the end of the war, unemployment was nearly non-existent, and America was the world leader in manufacturing and energy production.
To understand America's role in the post-war world, one first must understand America's role before entering WW2. It is fair to say that America and a great majority of Americans had no interest at all in entering another foreign war. Isolationism ruled the day throughout FDR's first two terms and into the third.
Recent scholarship suggests that FDR was more fully apprised of the dire situation in Europe than previously thought. His natural inclination was to assist the Allies in any way he could, but Congress was firmly against any proposal for aid. FDR (and others) thus arrived at the concept of the Lend-Lease Act, which provided materiel to the Allies without direct U.S. participation in the war.
Ultimately, America would not enter the war until the Japanese invasion of Pearl Harbor in 1941, despite the fact that FDR, his Cabinet and many members of Congress understood Hitler's megalomania. This reluctance to get involved, some would argue, prolonged and exacerbated the impacts of the war for Europe, causing ripple effects that continue until today.
Much has been written about the war itself and it is virtually impossible to succinctly boil down all the ways in which WW2 shaped America's role in the post-war world, but perhaps the largest single global impact, then and now, was the Manhattan Project and the use of the atomic bombs in Japan.
The Manhattan Project was a top-secret government program that recruited, housed and equipped the greatest scientific minds in America, many of them European Jews who had fled the Nazis, with the aim of creating the world's first true weapon of mass destruction, the atomic bomb. Primarily housed in a military compound in Los Alamos, NM, the Project began in earnest in 1939, but was not fully active until 1942, and grew to employ over 130,000 people.
On August 6 and 9, 1945, the United States, with assistance and cooperation from the governments of Canada and the United Kingdom, dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan, respectively. The resultant destruction, both in terms of human life and infrastructure, shocked the world and has reverberated until today.
The Manhattan Project thus began a global proliferation of atomic weapons, an arms race between the U.S. and the then-USSR (today's Russian Federation), and the Cold War, the effects of which are felt worldwide by virtually every country in the world even now.
Due to the geographical separation of the United States from the other countries involved in World War II, the United States had a serious post-war advantage. Unlike most of Europe, the United States was not physically devastated and therefore did not need to take the time to rebuild the country's economy. The Second World War also proved the United States' abilities militarily, economically, and politically. The country created a nuclear weapon, which was entirely unique at that point in time, reducing the number of countries/groups willing to challenge US preeminence. Economically, the United States was better off as well since the majority of its competition was in post-war shambles. This allowed the United States to emerge as the economic power of the era. Politically, the United States had a significant role in ending hostilities and creating the United Nations which further cemented its power in the post-war world.
World War 2 was a major turning point for American foreign affairs. Because of the nation's geographical separation it was easy for them to remain neutral and stay out of other affairs. However, seeing the effects of fascism and communism (and how rampant they were becoming) as well as the United States' necessity in winning the war, the nation took it upon itself to become the bearer of democracy and the enforcer of western morals for the rest of the world.
Because of the conflict and the resulting rise of communism in the Soviet Union, the United States feared there would be similar actions from other countries as Nazi Germany had displayed (military aggression, genocide, etc.). So the US became aggressive in its foreign policy, taking measures to prevent the spread of Communism (such as by engaging in the Korean and Vietnam wars).
In addition to actively setting men on foreign soil, they also became much more engaged in political discussion throughout the world, connecting with other countries as much as possible so that their political and economic ties would prevent future conflict—due to the subsequent repercussions that would result from cutting ties with such a powerful country.
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