The four nations of Afghanistan, Iraq under Saddam Hussein, Libya under Colonel Gaddafi, and Syria under Bassar al AsThe four nations of Afghanistan, Iraq under Saddam Hussein, Libya under Colonel Gaddafi, and Syria under Bassar al Assad, were all in their own way attempting to develop their societies by the year 2000. All four had their faults; but all four nations were ‘progressing' on the criterion of development - in popular education, development of infrastructure and industries. As everyone knows, all four were overtly invaded by different variations of the US-led military machine, often alongside proxy forces.

When the Soviet Union collapsed in 1989, the western world was stunned. Their hyperbole of criticism and their lack of access to Soviet economic statistics left the Western countries unprepared for what to do next. The USA was prepared to celebrate; their Cold War had been successful, and they moved their best economists to Moscow to advise. From having no access and very limited knowledge, suddenly the situation was reversed. Their imperial ambitions soared.

The key to understanding the Americans and world power after 1945 is that maintaining her competitive advantage has always been her key political concern. That has meant creating and then maintaining key alliances with a select number of nation-states like Israel and the old colonial nations of Europe, Japan, and to a lesser degree South Korea. All the others were nations that needed to be dominated.

The present-day Ukrainian example could not be a better example: The struggle to obtain and then hold onto World Power became the dominant theme of every struggle around the world after 1945. No local struggle however small could be understood after 1945 without an understanding of the dynamics of the global power play. The struggle first manifested itself in the Cold War, from 1948 to 1989. The USSR was seen as an enemy of the USA, throughout this period. The USA organised itself to oppose any move of any state to become Socialist. Past blogs have given many examples. By the 1980s, no means was too horrific for the USA (for a time even torture became normal policy).

Conclusions arising from China’s Global infrastructure on the world stage are still difficult to assess. Do Chinese world policies create a new form of Imperialism as part of the anti-China rhetoric suggests?

That the USA resents the rise of China as a contender for world power is obvious. China is different as a contender state when compared to Germany before 1914 and the USSR after 1945. It is worth our time to consider these large questions?

Chinese foreign policy in the period from 1949 to 2000 was largely defensive and determined to maintain the revolution. Only after the Chinese treasury was replete with US dollars, and after they began to accommodate American and other western global companies, could they begin to develop a global policy. This was part of the story; the other vital aspect was the lesson they learned from the Soviet collapse in 1991.

The trades unions were freed after 1945 as never before, or since. From 1971, Trades Union freedoms were curtailed by Governments across Europe. After 1945, for the first time, trades unions became involved in the discussion of wage increases, they sat on board on national industrial policies. The Union movement that had first appeared on national scenes in the latter part of the 19th century was suddenly freed from the shackles of government legislation. And for a while, Union leaders thought this was to be the new normal. Over 25 years, there was a great expansion of militant trade union activity.

The Marshall Plan had several purposes. First, the American economy needed outlets for export, and second, the entire European and Japanese economies were in ruins and debt from the war. The Marshall Plan provided much-needed trading dollars. The plan was also intended to counter the attractions of Soviet Communism and probably saved western Europe from following a socialist path. The infrastructure of Europe, including a large number of homes and factories, had been destroyed by the war.

The economies and politics of all nations at war were shattered; the only exceptions were the USA, the USSR, and the UK who all had maintained their political systems. The economies of the UK and USSR were in pieces. The USA had not only not been invaded, but she had also lost the least number of men. Throughout all of this, her economy had been strengthened. When we compare this with the loss suffered elsewhere: the Russians had lost 20 million-plus, men women and children; the British had lost 375,000 men; the Japanese lost between 2 and 3 million people; the USA had lost 405,000 men or 2.0% of the Soviet losses.

Readers of these blogs will know that establishing world power has always required sophisticated ideology to justify action across the world. The centre of ideology in the hundreds of years after 1492, up to 1945 centred on race and racism; that European and then American invasions were by ‘superior’ peoples. Race was always a flexible tool and the exact variant varied over time determined by who were the perpetrators of the invasions and the moment in history.

The ideological story that followed 1945 would be determined by the USA. This blog discusses the new ideological tale told by the Americans and the old European colonial powers who had lost all their colonies as a consequence of the wars that ended in 1945.