America, the land of the free and brave…and wars.

Throughout its brief lifetime, America has constantly been in military conflicts both necessary and mostly unnecessary. Does the U.S.A still have a thin layer of imperialism left from the 20th century? Is the U.S.A addicted to war? Lots of people don’t like the war in the Middle East, but the U.S especially seems to be addicted to war in general throughout its history and even today in many parts of their society.

The U.S fought wars for their independence, against Mexico, Spain, and most especially Britain in the War of 1812. After World War II was fought by America, the country has been in the Korean War, the Vietnam War, with unknown wars in Laos and Cambodia with some other military operations in the regions of Asia. Then the U.S got into the Gulf War, Afghanistan War, Second Gulf War, and bordered on nuclear war with the former Soviet Union.

Moreover, the U.S invaded, bombed, isolated, stripped, and had any military presence in other regions in the world such as Cuba, Haiti, Somalia, the Sudan, Bosnia, Kosovo, Serbia, Libya, Panama, Grenada, Yemen, and other places.

The U.S is also the NUMBER ONE military spender, and as of 2008 according to the SIPRI, the U.S spent more than 607 billion dollars on their military alone.

That’s: More than 389 billion British Pounds

More than 444 billion Euros

More than 4 trillion Chinese Yuan

More than 54 trillion Japanese Yen

More than 710 trillion S.Korean Won

More than 8 trillion Mexican Pesos

…You get the idea.

Why does the U.S fight all these wars and conflicts? There are so many of them ranging from the “smallest” rebellion to the largest world war in history.

 

If any of us look at the wars in the past fought by the U.S, we see the War of 1812 which didn’t do anything except burn down Quebec and Washington D.C. We also see the Mexican War which just made Mexicans lose more than 50% of their land and had President Polk get criticized for starting a war in the non-American constitutional way.

America entered World War I for the wrong reasons. Anti-German propaganda infiltrated into America, leading to stereotypical images of Germans as “Huns”, them eating/killing babies, and committing other atrocious acts that never existed.

Then we see the Korean War, a war gone too far when General MacArthur bragged that he could easily bomb China after reaching the upmost region of North Korea which gave 300,000 Chinese troops enough reason to storm across the Yalu River and push the war back to the 38th parallel…the starting location of the war which did NOTHING.

Then we see the Vietnam War, a war that its own veterans were spit upon!! Just a waste of lives and delaying of the inevitable North Vietnamese victory. It even led to the peak of the ridiculous “Red Scare” that communists, war-protestors, hippies, and homosexuals are all woes of society!

Other “wars” we see that are ‘cold’ (not ‘hot’) wars necessairly did not lead to mass numbers of deaths but mass losses of resources such as the War on Poverty along with 70 other ‘hot’ wars in American history including those mentioned up to now.

America is also home to war genocides such as the extermination of more than 90% of Native Americans, the Trail of Tears above removed more than 15,000 Cherokee Indians from their homes and led to more than 4,000 deaths in the journey alone.

Finally we see President George W.(ar) Bush’s war in Iraq which is disapproved of by more than 75% of the world and the Iraqis are actually tired of U.S troops and recent surveys show that the majority feels the U.S military makes more conflicts than prevent the conflicts

Americans are addicted to war, it’s what shaped their country into a warrior culture that’s resented by a lot of the world.