Emergence of the American Military Power


Have you ever wondered where the military power of the United States came from? We haven’t always been a super power capable of destroying our enemies, our friends, and ourselves.  For most of the early years of the American republic we had to rely on allies to assists us in our military campaigns. The French aided us in the American Revolution, although we did have minor successes prior to their entry into the war. We fought to a stalemate with the English during the War of 1812, yet our Nation’s Capital was burned down.

We were able to defeat the Mexicans during the Mexican-American War, but we still weren’t a super power. We had to rely on the British to enforce the Monroe Doctrine, which stated that the Western Hemisphere is closed to European Colonization. Yet, one event in American History stands alone as ushering in the advent of American military supremacy.

During the Civil War advancements in technology were made that made obsolete all other militaries in the world. The mini ball made for more accurate gun fire, destroying a military fighting style that had spanned centuries. The CSS Hunley was only the second major attempt by Americans to create submarine power (the USS Turtle was used during the American Revolution, which was a one man submarine that operated on a similar concept as the Hunley.) And ultimately, the clash of the Iron Clads (CSS Merrimack & USS Monitor) made all other navies in the world obsolete. By the end of the Civil War there were over 1 Million soldiers in America’s Army. Within a couple years that number would drop significantly to 125,000 military personal.

In the wake of the Civil War and the assassination, and attempted assassination, of President Abraham Lincoln, Vice President Andrew Johnson and Secretary of State Seward two nations attempted to capitalize on a war torn nation. Emperor Louis Napoleon III had fashioned himself as a French Andrew Jackson, but like his famous ancestor became an Emperor. With the coup that destroyed the French Second Republic, Napoleon sought to take advantage of a perceived weak America.

Napoleon conspired with the Arch-Duke Maximilian of Austria to take over Mexico and create an Empire that would threaten the existence of the United States. Secretary Seward recovered from a carriage accident and being stabbed in a failed assassination attempt the night Lincoln was shot by Booth to challenge Napoleon’s plan. General Grant sent 50,000 soldiers and General Sheridan to the Texas-Mexican border to secure America from an attack. In the mean time Seward sent General Schofield to deter Napoleon from his plan. Publicly Seward published a letter to the Emperor that was more diplomatic than what Schofield was sent to deliver. Napoleon backed down and the Mexicans murdered the Arch-Duke.

In the mean time, the British were attempting to secure Canada from the United States. War was England was eminent during the Civil War, it was only Ambassador Charles Francis Adams  (Son of John Q. Adams and grandson of John Adams) that helped prevent war from breaking out. The British, Sir John A.  MacDonald created a plan to create the Kingdom of Canada, a confederacy of the Canada territories. When northerners along the border cried for war, the English monarch Queen Victoria signed into law a bill creating the Dominion of Canada; regardless, the damage was done and a permanent reminder of the English monarchy was created. And in a major coup for the United States, Secretary of State Seward purchased Alaska from the Russians. This purchased, declared “Seward’s Folly” and “Seward’s Ice Box” was actually a tactical victory for the United States. With Alaska, the United States surrounded Canada from the South and the West. The arctic circle to the north meant that Canada only had it’s Eastern boarder free from America. In the event of a war with England, the United States could secure Canada and blockade it’s Eastern shore ports.

The United States came out of the Civil War a military power house. Over the next thirty years the US would continue to grow stronger as the industrial revolution took hold. By the time the United States went to war with Spain she had one of the strongest navies in the world, and was able to defeat the once mighty Spanish. Following the destruction of Europe in World War I, the United States stood as the most complete and most powerful military in the world. It wouldn’t be until the end of the Second World War that the U.S. was officially a super power, with enough fire power to destroy the world.

Published in: on June 18, 2010 at 19:32  Leave a Comment  
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Why We Went to War.


 

“But what do we mean by the American Revolution? Do we mean the American war? The Revolution was effected before the war commenced. The Revolution was in the minds and hearts of the people.”

-John Adams

It might be easy to say that the American Revolution began on that night in 1775 when the British regulars came ashore in Boston headed for weapon caches in Lexington and Concord. To say that the shots fired at Lexington and Concord were the cause the of the American Revolution is to completely ignore the events that lead to that night in 1775. Following the French and Indian War (also know as the 7 Years War to Europeans), the British government determined that they would make the Americans pay for the war that they started. While the British government taxed the American colonists before, following the French and Indian War the involvement of the British government grew to something unseen in the American colonies. In 1765 the British Parliament began efforts to pay off the debts from the war through the Stamp Act. The Stamp Act was a means of taxing the American colonies by requiring all commercial and legal documents to bear a legal stamp. This was the first time the British had ever directly taxed the American colonies. The act, which took effect in November of 1765, met with harsh resistance from the people. It was from this first taxation that the Revolution era saying, “No Taxation without Representation” took hold. The colonists were involved in various forms of resistance including boycotting British made products to destroying the prints where the stamps were made. The Sons of Liberty were the radicals who encouraged the more violent forms of protest that lead to the destruction of the prints. In October of that year the Massachusetts legislature spearheaded an effort to hold an inter-colonial meeting for the first time.

The Stamp Act Congress convened in October of 1765 in New York City. Nine of the thirteen colonies attended the Congress including, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland and South Carolina. From this Stamp Act Congress came a letter to King George III, petitions to the British Parliament and the Declaration of Rights and Grievances. Among the points raised in the Declaration of Rights and Grievances are:

1.Only Colonial assemblies have a right to tax the colonies.

2.Trial by Jury was a right, and the use of Admiralty Courts was abusive.

3.Colonists possessed all the rights of Englishmen.

4. Without voting rights, Parliament could not represent the colonists.

Parliament repealed the Stamp Act in March1766 and a year later with they adopted the Townshend Acts, which among other things asserted that Parliament could legislate for the colonies. But by admitting that the British crown in fact had no right to tax the colonies, a right held by the government to do, the Americans were in fact rebelling against British imperial rule over America. The Stamp Act Congress was the first time the colonies came together from all three major regions: New England, Middle, and South. It was in 1765 that the wheels began to turn that caused the colonists to refer to themselves not as Englishmen but as Americans. The American Revolution began the day the colonies met in the Stamp Act Congress.

The American Revolution was not just the war that occurred between 1775 and 1783. The war itself was a product of the Revolution. In the Declaration of Independence the fighting at Lexington and Concord did not even receive direct mention. At the heart of the charges against the King is the fact the British interfered in the running of affairs in North America. Since the establishment of the Royal Colony of Virginia  the colonists had maintained a certain level of self-government without interference from the British. The Stamp Act, a tax, was at the heart of the molestation by the British. The American colonists believed that laws could not be forced upon someone without their consent. Taxation was only permitted if you have the consent of those whom you are taxing. The American Revolution began in October of 1765 when nine of the thirteen colonies formally questioned the authority of the King to rule in America.[5] The American Revolution did in fact begin long before the war itself commenced. It was because of taxation that the people of Boston stored caches of weapons in Lexington and Concord. Sparked byt he Tea Act, it was because of the Boston Tea Part  that caused the British to send troops into Boston. Lexington and Concord were products of the actions taken by the American colonists to prevent illegal taxation by the British. The American Revolution and the War for Independence are two different ideas that encompass each other. The American Revolution was the intellectual developments that occurred beginning in 1765. The War for Independence started off in 1775 in Lexington and Concord and served as the military arm of the Revolution. But as Adams said, the Revolution was already affected in the minds of the people long before the shot heard around the world. The events that took place that night in Lexington and Concord were the climax of a decade’s worth of resistance by the colonies to English taxation.

Footnotes

 [1]It is interesting to note that the Constitution of 1787 required 9 of the 13 colonies to ratify and make it the legal form of government in the United States.

 

Published in: on April 2, 2008 at 18:33  Comments (1)  
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