Review Chapter 3: Gestation New world orders and the Second World War, 1921–45

In this chapter telling the future of superpowers nation. 

the years following 1921 have often been thought

of as a period of isolation. In fact, isolation was by no means complete on either

side: indeed, each had a concept of world order including itself but tending to

exclude the other. At a time when old rules of international relations had been

broken and new rules scarcely devised, let alone established, there was certainly

much concern among the other powers about the global roles to be played in

international relations by both USA and USSR, as more new world orders were

proclaimed to confront older empires. Italy from 1922, Japan from 1931 and

Germany from 1933 all put forward plans for expansion threatening to upset, in a

more violent manner than either the USA or USSR, the pre-war status quo which

Britain and France in particular strove to maintain.

The Second World War (1939–45)

On 3 September 1939, both Great Britain and France declared war on Germany.

While the USSR fought against Finland in the Winter War of 1939–40, a lull of

‘phoney war’ followed the fall of Poland in the West until Blitzkrieg quickly

subdued France in June 1940. Then, Hitler turned his attention to the east, broke

his non-aggression pact with Stalin without warning, and launched Operation

Barbarossa on 22 June 1941. Future US President Harry S. Truman observed

that, while he did not wish to see Hitler victorious under any circumstances, he

also considered that the USA should promote stalemate by supporting whichever

side appeared to be losing. There was no doubt about that in the short run, as

Blitzkrieg seemed to be heading for another early victory. However, without any

great sympathy for the Soviet Union, there were those in the USA who were

profoundly alarmed as Hitler pronounced his crusade against ‘Jewish bolshevism’

From universal revolution to new realism

In broad parallel with economic developments in the period 1921–45, cultural

developments may also be described in three chronological subdivisions:

‘universal revolution’ in the 1920s, followed by two successive phases of a new

realism, during the 1930s and then throughout the war years.

CHAPTER 2 Imperial showdown (1898–1914)

Imperial showdown (1898–1914)

Having considered the structure of the inheritance, we turn to the great

conjuncture of conception. C ertainly, we should not car ry our basic metaphor too

far, and we would not extract much enlightenment from speculating about

parentage, even though serious scholars have discussed the femininity of Russia

and the masculinity of the USA.1 In any case, in Chapter 1 we have given a

considerable amount of attention to the manner in which Europe made a

contribution to the political, economic and cultural development of both the USA

and Russia. And so, we would be better off noting simply that it was during the

period 1898–1921 that the ideological foundations of superpower, Wilsonism and

Leninism, were laid against a background of war and revolution.

The First World War and proletarian revolution

(1914–21)                                               

The well-known observation of Karl von Clausewitz that ‘War is nothing more

than the continuation of politics by other means’ gained unprecedented

justification from the events of 1914–21, the years of the First World War, the

Russian Revolution and the consequent Civil War.

Imperialism: the highest stage of capitalism?

At the beginning of the twentieth century, the world’s population amounted to

something over 1600 millions, scarcely more than a quarter of some recent

estimates for the end of the century, with the last decades seeing the steepest rise.

In 1900, more than half of humankind was to be found in Asia, a formidable

‘Yellow Peril’ for those who saw ‘Orientals’ as people apart.

The spread of liberalism

In 1913, James Bryce, author of The American Commonwealth and many other

books, set out a global liberal vision. He observed that the whole world was

governed by active minorities who originated ideas and compelled the attention

of the multitude.

Challenges to liberalism

War and revolution made a tremendous impact in cultural life as in political and

economic life. In the USA, the minimum of governmental control over individual

enterprise, which had been an important tradition, was at least temporarily

overthrown, while advertisement on a grand scale was used for governmental

propaganda.

CHAPTER 1 Inheritance: nations and empires, before 1898

Inheritance: nations and empires, before 1898

There were two superpowers in the twentieth century: the USA and the USSR. At

the beginning of the next century, from most points of view, there appears to be

only one, the USA. In the future, there may be others: China seems a prime

candidate. And in the past, before the superpowers, there were the ‘great

powers’, mainly the European empires but including both the USA and the USSR’s

predecessor, Tsarist Russia. Already in 1835, in a famous prediction, Alexis de

Tocqueville talked of them as ‘two great nations’ apparently tending towards the

same end, if starting from different points, each of which seemed to be ‘called by

some secret design of Providence one day to hold in its hands the destinies of half

the world’. As we shall soon see, we have to go far further back than 1835 in order

to understand the origins of the two twentieth century superpowers.

Geography and history (before 1492)

If, as was often alleged during the years of the Cold War, the twentieth-century

struggle was indeed one between godless Communism and Christian democracy,

there could be little doubt that the Almighty weighted the scales in favour of his

principal adherents and against his chief adversaries when he arranged the basic

conditions of the USA and the USSR.

Early modern colonisation (1492–1776)

Certainly, these voyages bring us to another phase in our search for the origins of

the ‘two great nations’. Russia was ‘discovered’ in 1553, and in a manner recalling

the more famous ‘discovery’ of America in 1492.

Democratic revolution (1776–1815)

The American Revolution was a consequence of a crisis of empire. From 1754 to

1763, Great Britain fought France for domination in North America and elsewere

‘Two great nations’ (1815–56)

During the years before and after Alexis de Tocqueville’s famous prediction of the

future superpowers as ‘two great nations’ predestined to share world domination,

the American people went forth and multiplied. In what seemed no time at all,

the USA acquired vast lands to the west of the Mississippi, at the expense of

Spain, Russia and Great Britain and, above all, of Mexicans and other Native

Americans.

Two great empires (1856–98)

Both future superpowers suffered the experience of war on their own soil early in

the second half of the nineteenth century. Russia was invaded again little more

than forty years after Napoleon had reached Moscow. On this occasion, hostilities

from 1854–6 were confined mostly to the Black Sea and the Crimea.

YOU CAN SEE THE WHOLE OF THE WORLD WITH BOOKS

Tittle        : The Superpowers: A Short History

Author     : Paul Dukes

Page       : 197 pages

Synopsis : 

The Superpowers traces the development of the USA and Russia (later USSR) from 1898 through to 2000, placing the Cold War, from inception to ending, into the wider social, economic and political context. This is the first history of the two major participants and their relationship throughout the twentieth century.

The Superpowers: explores the intertwining history of the two powers chronologically and includes discussion of: 

* the inheritance of the two great powers and their imperial background

* World War One and the Russian Revolution

* Capitalism and Socialism

* World War Two and its impact

* the conflicts in Berlin, Czechoslovakia, Vietnam and Afghanistan

* Perestroika and the end of the USSR

* the significance of the events of 1991 and their legacy.

LIGHT NOVEL THAT YOU HAVE TO READ!

Title:  終末なにしてますか？忙しいですか？救ってもらっていいですか？(Shuumatsu Nani Shitemasu ka? Isogashii desu ka? Sukutte Moratte Ii desu ka? )

English    :  What are you doing at the end? Are you busy? Can you save me?

Author     :  枯野瑛 (Akira Kareno)

Page         : 489 pages ( 4 Volume and 1 Volume extra ) 

Synopsis : 

Five hundred years have passed since the humans went extinct at the hands of the fearsome and mysterious ‘Beasts’. The surviving races now make their homes up on floating islands in the sky, out of reach of all but the most mobile of Beasts.

Only a small group of young girls, the Leprechauns, can wield the ancient weapons needed to fend off invasions from these creatures. Into the girls’ unstable and fleeting lives, where a call to certain death could come at any moment, enters an unlikely character: a young man who lost everything in his final battle five hundred years ago, the last living human awakened from a long, icy slumber.

Unable to fight any longer, Willem becomes the father that the girls never had, caring for and nurturing them even as he struggles to come to terms with his new life, in which he feels the pain of helplessly waiting for his loved ones to return home from battle that his ‘Daughter’ once felt for him so long ago. Together, Willem and the girls gradually come to understand what family means and what is truly worth protecting.

My personal opinion : (WARNING SPOILER ALERT ) this light novel is absolutely WORTH TO READ. The story is so deep that can make you cry a lot at the end of the ending :'(
if you finish the LN you can continue by watching the Animation series of this novel follow this link to see animation information and the downloadable SukaSuka light novel :
Anime adaptation info :
https://myanimelist.net/anime/33502/Shuumatsu_Nani_Shitemasu_ka_Isogashii_desu_ka_Sukutte_Moratte_Ii_desu_ka

Download LN PDF :
https://fgilantranslations.com/shuumatsu-nani-shitemasu-ka-isogashii-desu-ka-sukutte-moratte-ii-desu-ka/