4 ms·

never in our modern history has an up and coming superpower wanted or desired the mantle of top superpower. the UK was economically beneath the US a full 3 dec

by kmlx 8y ago

never in our modern history has an up and coming superpower wanted or desired the mantle of top superpower. the UK was economically beneath the US a full 3 decades before the US actually decided they wanted to be the world leading superpower. almost two years in a world war, and after a massive attack by the japanese empire did the US finally took the reigns. the reason for this is that the top global superpower needs to have an extensive network of diplomacy and military, things that come with huge costs domestically. when you’re top dog, everyone looks at you for guidance and rules.

pm90 8y ago
Its important to point out that American entry into WW2 did not establish American hegemony, but only accelerated it. Roosevelt had been supplying Allied forces with Material for a long time before Japan bombed Pearl Harbor (from historical records, its pretty clear that the Japanese understood it was only a matter of time before the US entered the war and thus attacked pre-emptively). The event that solidified US as the superpower was actually the Suez crisis, where the UK and French had to begrudgingly agree to American demands, making it clear who was the top dog.
TaylorAlexander 8y ago
Kind of reminds me of how Nintendo decided with the Wii not to compete with Sony and Microsoft on graphics and raw compute capabilities. By offering a machine that was much cheaper to manufacture than Sony or Microsoft, Nintendo was able to solidly occupy the #3 spot in the market (on graphics quality) without huge expenses on hardware development. They intentionally chose not to compete for first place because it was so much more cost effective not to.
nostrademons 8y ago
That seems to presume a lot about superpower motivations. I think a more realistic assessment is that there is a high degree of uncertainty in the relative balance of power between two nations, made worse by nationalism, ethnocentrism, and the tendency of charismatic leaders to believe their own hype. Peaceful, commerce-based regimes - the ones most likely to become economic superpowers - tend to be risk averse when it comes to pushing geopolitical boundaries, because war destroys the economic development that led to them becoming superpowers. Militaristic or fundamentalist regimes tend to be risk-embracing, because you don't come to power as a militaristic regime unless the populace believes they can win (a belief which is often distorted in fundamentalist or fascist regimes). WW2 proved that the U.S. was light years ahead of Japan's industrial capacity. This was known to Japanese military officers who had visited the U.S, but the ruling cabal in Japan discounted their assessment as impossible. Similarly, Cold War propaganda (in both the U.S. and Russia) painted them both as roughly equal superpowers, but we learned after the Iron Curtain fell that the Soviet Union was never really an economic threat to the U.S. The U.S. may have passed the UK as an industrial superpower in WW1, but in the eyes of much of the world they were still an unknown quantity, enough that Japan directed simultaneous attacks on Hong Kong, Singapore, and Malaya at the same time as Pearl Harbor and the Philippines.

by kmlx 8y ago

pm90 8y ago

Its important to point out that American entry into WW2 did not establish American hegemony, but only accelerated it. Roosevelt had been supplying Allied forces with Material for a long time before Japan bombed Pearl Harbor (from historical records, its pretty clear that the Japanese understood it was only a matter of time before the US entered the war and thus attacked pre-emptively). The event that solidified US as the superpower was actually the Suez crisis, where the UK and French had to begrudgingly agree to American demands, making it clear who was the top dog.

TaylorAlexander 8y ago

Kind of reminds me of how Nintendo decided with the Wii not to compete with Sony and Microsoft on graphics and raw compute capabilities. By offering a machine that was much cheaper to manufacture than Sony or Microsoft, Nintendo was able to solidly occupy the #3 spot in the market (on graphics quality) without huge expenses on hardware development. They intentionally chose not to compete for first place because it was so much more cost effective not to.

nostrademons 8y ago

That seems to presume a lot about superpower motivations. I think a more realistic assessment is that there is a high degree of uncertainty in the relative balance of power between two nations, made worse by nationalism, ethnocentrism, and the tendency of charismatic leaders to believe their own hype. Peaceful, commerce-based regimes - the ones most likely to become economic superpowers - tend to be risk averse when it comes to pushing geopolitical boundaries, because war destroys the economic development that led to them becoming superpowers. Militaristic or fundamentalist regimes tend to be risk-embracing, because you don't come to power as a militaristic regime unless the populace believes they can win (a belief which is often distorted in fundamentalist or fascist regimes). WW2 proved that the U.S. was light years ahead of Japan's industrial capacity. This was known to Japanese military officers who had visited the U.S, but the ruling cabal in Japan discounted their assessment as impossible. Similarly, Cold War propaganda (in both the U.S. and Russia) painted them both as roughly equal superpowers, but we learned after the Iron Curtain fell that the Soviet Union was never really an economic threat to the U.S. The U.S. may have passed the UK as an industrial superpower in WW1, but in the eyes of much of the world they were still an unknown quantity, enough that Japan directed simultaneous attacks on Hong Kong, Singapore, and Malaya at the same time as Pearl Harbor and the Philippines.