To What Extent is the United States an Imperial Power?

Topics: United States, President of the United States, Theodore Roosevelt Pages: 1 (284 words) Published: January 29, 2014
To What Extent is the United States an Imperial Power?

After the Spanish-American War, the United States is ok with imperialism, therefore increasing the extent that the United States is an imperial power. The depression in the 1890s caused people to think we needed to imperialize because industrial production demanded more resources. Foreign trade was more important as well, so the U.S. thought it would be beneficial to acquire new colonies and expand further. Teddy Roosevelt had a vision of how to turn the world into an imperial power; we needed a two ocean navy. His idea is what led us to building the panama canal because it was too unconventional to sail around the tip of South America. With the US controlling the panama canal, we have control over everyone who goes through it, which encourages our imperialist ideals. After Teddy left office, Taft took over. His policy was called “Dollar Diplomacy”, which also continues Teddy Roosevelt's concepts. The purpose of Dollar Diplomacy was to use our economy as a weapon. We added embargo against other countries and added tariffs to goods, and we granted/denied loans to developing countries. Once the countries are in debt to us, we have control of them, which is another example of how we are an imperialist nation. Carter's presidency also played off Taft's Dollar Diplomacy. IMF and the world bank were the best way to fight off communism because communism was bread in poverty. By the United States taking control over those nations, it is the same thing as imperialism because as we took the other countries under our wing, we took their power away from them and their ability to become a communist nation.
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