The Power of FORCE.

• Author: Whitney, Craig R.
• Position: Brief Article

As June 6, 1944, dawned, a German artillery major scanning the English Channel from Normandy could not believe his eyes: "I picked up my artillery binoculars and stepped back with amazement when I saw that the horizon was literally filling with ships."

Many nations took part in the landings on the French coast that day--D-Day--but it was American might that made the landings happen. They led to the defeat of Nazi Germany in World War II. And that decisive U.S. role, along with the U.S. atom-bomb attack that helped break the war-making will of Japan, marked the rise of a superpower.

It didn't happen overnight. Growing U.S. industry and the increasing importance of trade had led the nation to build a modern navy. In 1898, the U.S. won the Spanish-American War, spreading U.S. influence from the Caribbean to the Pacific.

Still, Americans tried to stay out of great powers' quarrels rather than win them. In World War I (1914-1918) and again in World War II (1939-1945), the nation was a reluctant, late-coming warrior--but one that helped...