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Since the dawn of time, geography has influenced the destiny of entire nations. The three-part documentary series shows how mountains and rivers, seas and deserts shape the ability of governments to make decisions and how they influence the development of civilizations. Looking at the USA, Russia and China, it is clear that the power of geography is a constant in history.
The US owes its rise to a world power to its unique geography: two coastlines, wide plains and the great Mississippi River shape the nation.
The US owes its rise to a world power to its unique geography: two coastlines, wide plains and the great Mississippi River shape the nation.
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00:03The United States of America.
00:08How did it become a world power?
00:13A country between two oceans,
00:17with a temperate climate,
00:20fertile soils, and vast natural resources.
00:24The map shows you what is possible,
00:26what is difficult, and what is impossible.
00:31Countless rivers and lakes run through the land,
00:34ideal for trade and the transportation of people and ideas.
00:39It's just perfect for becoming a superpower.
00:44The Great Plains is home to thriving wheat and corn crops,
00:48the basis for a flourishing agricultural industry.
00:51Coal and iron drove industrialization forward,
00:54and gold financed the railroad's expansion.
00:57A geography that leads to wealth and power, but also to conflict.
01:18White sands, said to be the site of the first footprints of settlers in America.
01:24Thousands of years ago, the high gypsum content in the mud on a lake shore preserved the prints.
01:33The tracks were found in New Mexico, in the south of what is now the United States.
01:40But how did people get to the continent in the first place?
01:52During the Ice Age, the Bering Strait, which today separates North America and Russia,
01:58was connected by a land bridge called Beringia.
02:07According to existing theories, humans migrated eastwards from Asia over this land bridge.
02:18But because large glacier shields in Canada prevented further progress,
02:23they could only travel south at the end of the last ice age, about 11,500 years ago.
02:33The footprints found at White Sands in New Mexico tell a different story.
02:40Radiocarbon dating of the enclosed plant seeds indicates an age of about 23,000 years.
02:47According to the current theory, it would not have been possible to settle America via the Bering Strait at that
02:54time.
02:56We can definitively say that human beings were present here at White Sands during the last glacial maximum.
03:04And that is far older than they have been confirmed anywhere else in North or South America.
03:09The scientists discovered over 400 human footprints, including several left by children.
03:20The prints offer a glimpse of a time when our ancestors shared the continent with giant mammals,
03:26including mammoths and giant sloths as big as elephants.
03:37The mud the animals and people walked on dried quickly.
03:42So researchers have concluded that the footprints were made in a short period of time.
03:52This is how White Sands opens a window into prehistoric life.
04:00You can actually see, you know, a mother picking up a child to put him down,
04:04or different animals interacting with each other, places where children are jumping.
04:09This is just, you know, incredible scenes for your mind sort of to think about.
04:13You start to look at and see all these really amazing stories come to life.
04:23How the people of White Sands got there is unclear.
04:27According to some theories, they may have travelled by canoe along the ice-free western coast,
04:33or across the open sea.
04:37One thing is certain, long before the Europeans reached North America in the 15th century,
04:44the continent is already inhabited.
04:46According to estimates, there were up to 18 million people living there,
04:52organised into hundreds of tribal groups.
04:54The abundance of resources in the western hemisphere has been producing cultures for thousands of years.
05:02On October 12th, 1492, Christopher Columbus and his crew encountered these indigenous people
05:09while searching for a sea route to India.
05:14Back home, the sailors reported of a prosperous land that was just waiting to be taken over.
05:22The idea of emptiness is, of course, the strongest justification for dominance.
05:28The Atlantic separates the new world from the old.
05:32But for the European colonial powers, it is both a barrier and a bridge.
05:38The Spanish, French and English stake out extensive claims on the North American continent.
05:45Claims are being made about an area whose dimensions are not really well known.
05:49They don't have any idea how vast the country is in which they are operating.
05:55Maps became the decisive instrument of domination,
05:59because what is mapped can be conquered and controlled.
06:04Spain claimed present-day Florida and the southwest,
06:07and founded St. Augustine in 1565, the oldest European settlement in the United States.
06:14France claimed the Mississippi Basin and Canada, England parts of the East Coast.
06:23Europeans were attracted to America not only by its fertile farmland.
06:29Vast forests also promised profits from the fur and timber trades,
06:33and protection from persecution.
06:37In 1620, around 100 English pilgrim fathers boarded the Mayflower,
06:43and dared the journey across the Atlantic.
06:46Their objective? To be able to practise their puritanical faith unhindered.
06:53Before they went ashore, they agreed on a groundbreaking document,
06:58the Mayflower Compact, in which they pledged to live according to their own laws.
07:06Thus they established the core of the American ideal,
07:10a nation of free and equal citizens.
07:25But arriving in their new homeland proved difficult at first.
07:29The new world was barely explored.
07:32Oftentimes, survival was only possible with the help of the native population.
07:38The indigenous people helped the settlers find their way in the wilderness,
07:42and taught them which plants are edible or poisonous,
07:46an alliance that ensured their survival.
07:49In the fall of 1621, the pilgrims and the Wampanoag tribe
07:54are said to have celebrated the first Thanksgiving,
07:57the now traditional harvest feast.
07:59But the peace did not last long.
08:02Soon conflicts arose,
08:04and the indigenous population was expelled from the colonies.
08:09So it is the European greed for land and property that unfolds this destructive dynamic,
08:17at the end of which indigenous cultures are nearly destroyed.
08:26Another dark chapter in America's history began with the arrival of African slaves in the 16th century.
08:34From the 17th century onward, they were forced to work on plantations in British territories.
08:42The economic basis for this was the triangular trade between Europe, Africa and the Americas.
08:49European ships first headed for the West African coast.
08:53There, manufactured goods such as weapons and textiles were exchanged for African slaves.
08:59Up to 12.5 million Africans were displaced from their homeland in this way until the 19th century.
09:08They were taken to the plantations of the New World and forced to work under inhumane conditions
09:13to produce the goods demanded by the European market, sugar, indigo and tobacco, and later mainly cotton.
09:20Slavery wasn't about cheap labor. Slavery was about free labor. Big difference. That maximized profit.
09:32Europeans craved more and more land and resources at the expense of slaves and indigenous people.
09:42In 1763, King George III limited the British colonies to the East Coast in an effort to stabilize relations with
09:50the Native Americans.
09:55The idea was that European settlements, or the settlement process, would actually first concentrate east of the Appalachians.
10:03That the area west of the Appalachians would actually be secured as a large Indian reservation,
10:08or as the Indians' habitat. And that the English king, as the great white father in London and not in
10:14Washington,
10:14would ensure that the Indians could survive there.
10:17But that was one of the causes of the American Revolution.
10:21Because the American settlers had long since settled beyond the Appalachians.
10:26And, more importantly, had bought land that they then wanted to resell in the future.
10:32The British settlers were unwilling to accept any restrictions on their freedom of trade.
10:38Further limitations on their rights in 1775 ultimately led to the American Revolution.
10:45The following year, the 13 colonies declared their independence.
10:50It is the birth of the United States of America.
10:55After the end of the War of Independence in 1783, the young nation faced major challenges,
11:02especially when it came to opening up new territories in the West.
11:07At the end of the 18th century, there were other great powers on the continent.
11:12Importantly, the Mississippi flowed through French territory.
11:19Mississippi, Missouri, Ohio, and Arkansas rivers.
11:23The vast network of waterways is considered vital to the USA.
11:29What makes it special is that the rivers are slow-flowing.
11:33This makes them ideal for shipping, transport, and trade.
11:37The waters of the Mississippi take around 90 days to travel from its source in Minnesota in the north
11:43to the Gulf to the Gulf of Mexico.
11:45Today, its river system connects 10 states, spanning 3,700 kilometers.
11:52The Mississippi, Missouri, and Arkansas and Ohio river systems all connect.
11:59That's why I mentioned all four of them.
12:01And they don't flow north-south dividing the continent, except for the Mississippi,
12:06because they flow diagonally.
12:10If you look at a map of America's river systems, they cut north-south, south-north,
12:17a little bit east-to-west, and north-south.
12:20And what that does is it increases trade, because all these rivers are navigable.
12:25Long before the Europeans came to America, Native Americans used these waterways.
12:33Where St. Louis is located on the Mississippi today, the first major city in North America, Cahokia,
12:40was built more than a thousand years ago.
12:43Gigantic mounds have been preserved as silent witnesses.
12:47People call Cahokia Mounds as America's first city, and that's because it was urbanized,
12:55meaning there's a large population here.
12:57If you go towards the higher end of 20,000 people, it was larger than London or Paris at the
13:04time.
13:05Archaeologist Angela Cooper has been studying the remains of the lost city for several years.
13:11The artificial hills, the mounds, are still visible today.
13:15The largest is Monk's Mound at the northern end of the site.
13:19At 30 meters high, the mound is the largest pre-Columbian structure in North America.
13:25Excavations show that large ceremonial buildings, such as a temple or palace, stood on the mound.
13:33The geographical location is ideal for a growing population.
13:38Fish and game provided plenty of food, and wood and prairie grass were used to build homes.
13:46The river sediment favored the planting of corn, beans and pumpkins.
13:51But the Mississippi also served as a trade route, helping to expand Cahokia's spear of influence.
14:00We sometimes call the waterways the highways of these people.
14:07From where we are, if we are walking, it's three hours to the Mississippi River.
14:14You're not going to carry a huge dugout canoe three hours to the Mississippi.
14:19So you're going to utilize what's around you and using those lakes and springs and creeks
14:26to get down to this bigger river.
14:29They're definitely using that watershed, Mississippi watershed, tributaries, rivers,
14:34to get to each other or meeting in the middle somewhere.
14:40For the USA too, the river became the decisive factor on the road to becoming a superpower.
14:47Because whoever rules the Mississippi controls trade in North America.
14:53Around 500 million tons of goods are transported by the river every year.
15:01At the beginning of the 19th century, however, the Mississippi still blocked the young USA's access to new settlement areas
15:09in the West.
15:11It took an extraordinary deal to pave the way.
15:17On April the 30th, 1803, an American delegation met with a senior minister of the French ruler Napoleon Bonaparte in
15:26Paris.
15:27Their primary aim was to secure control of New Orleans, thereby gaining access to vital Atlantic trade routes.
15:35But Napoleon wanted to sell all of France's territorial possessions in North America at once in order to finance his
15:43wars in Europe.
15:44The USA agreed and completed the largest land purchase in history with the Louisiana Purchase for just 15 million dollars.
15:56And with that, the United States doubled its territory in 1803, practically overnight.
16:02Neither Napoleon nor the American government in Washington knew exactly what had been sold there.
16:08The new territory stretches from the Gulf of Mexico to the Great Lakes in the Northeast and the Rocky Mountains
16:15in the West.
16:16It was the starting point for further conquest of the continent.
16:24Now the Americans have free access to the waterways of the Mississippi and its tributaries.
16:30Farmers and plantation owners transport their products to the ports and markets.
16:35Grain, livestock and cotton, the Mississippi brought the fruits of the vast agricultural areas of the Midwest to market and
16:45became the backbone of the American economy.
16:48An unprecedented wave of migration followed, leading more and more settlers to the Great Plains.
17:00This prairie landscape extends over 2.9 million square kilometers between the Appalachian and Rocky Mountains.
17:08That's about a third of the total area of the United States.
17:14Ten states share this unique landscape.
17:23In 1804, explorers Lewis and Clark set out to explore the newly acquired Louisiana Purchase on behalf of President Jefferson.
17:32They euphorically describe what they found.
17:38We camped in one of the most beautiful plains I ever saw.
17:42Open and beautifully diversified.
17:45With hills and valleys all presenting themselves to the river.
17:50Covered with grass and a few scattering trees.
17:54A handsome creek meandering through this place.
18:00The formation of the Great Plains extends far back into the geological past.
18:06Once covered by a tropical, shallow sea, the waters retreat from the Great Plains nearly 70 million years ago.
18:14Tectonic activity and sediment deposits left behind a flat, fertile plateau.
18:21Below them lies the Ogallala Aquifer, one of the largest freshwater reservoirs on Earth.
18:28This vast reservoir extends over eight states and was formed around 20 million years ago by the erosion of the
18:36Rocky Mountains.
18:44Almost a third of the water used in American agriculture comes from here.
18:50But this precious resource is under threat.
18:54Intensive farming is putting more pressure than ever on the Ogallala Aquifer.
19:02Intensive farming is the most important part of the river.
19:03Experts estimate that it would take hundreds of thousands of years for natural precipitation to replenish the ground water that
19:10has been extracted.
19:12Climate change with longer and more intense droughts is further exacerbating the problem.
19:25Dry by nature, the Great Plains experience hot summers and cold winters.
19:34The 100th meridian divides the region.
19:37In the east, high rainfall allows the cultivation of wheat, corn and soy, while cattle ranching dominates in the dry
19:45west.
19:45As early as the end of the 19th century, the Homestead Act was attracting numerous settlers to the region.
19:52It promised land to anyone who could cultivate it.
19:58In the 18th century, the American dream actually developed as an agricultural dream,
20:03culminating in a European settler acquiring a piece of land through his own labor and working the land as its
20:10owner.
20:13To this day, the Great Plains forms the backbone of the American livestock industry.
20:19Almost half of all cattle and sheep in the United States are bred here.
20:24The region's wheat crops have earned it its nickname, America's bread basket.
20:31Every year, local farms produce up to 50% of the country's total output.
20:36For a long time now, the seemingly endless fields have been feeding more than 340 million US citizens.
20:49But the region's geography also has drawbacks.
20:54Cyclones regularly sweep through Tornado Alley.
20:58They destroy harvests and lay waste to entire swathes of land.
21:12That's because of the Appalachian and Rocky Mountains, which form a weather divide.
21:20Between them, warm, humid air masses from the Gulf of Mexico meet cold air from the north.
21:26This leads to unstable weather and thunderstorms.
21:39And as the thunderstorms get into this vertical shear, they can become supercells.
21:44And then when you have a supercell, it can, sometimes, create a tornado.
21:49But not every supercell automatically produces a tornado.
21:53This is one reason for researchers to take a closer look at the mechanisms that lead to tornado formation.
22:00Using specially designed light aircraft with various sensors on board,
22:05they hope to uncover the secret ingredient needed for a tornado to form.
22:10The ultimate goal of our research is to increase tornado warning time
22:15and to improve forecasts and better understanding of how the storms form and how they evolve.
22:21Around 1,000 tornadoes sweep across the Great Plains every year during tornado season,
22:28which lasts from early March to May.
22:30But it is still not possible to predict with certainty which route the supercells will take.
22:37A better early warning system for cyclones should save lives in the future,
22:42as well as benefit agriculture.
22:50In early November 1805, Lewis and Clark reached the Pacific Ocean in Oregon.
22:56And with that, the natural western border of North America.
23:09Further south, the United States annexed Texas from 40 years later.
23:13and eventually went to war with Mexico.
23:20After victory in 1848, it gained numerous new territories,
23:25including Nevada, Utah, parts of Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado, Wyoming and California.
23:40Once you get over the Rockies and become a two-ocean power,
23:43when you can project power, you know, you're so rich, you're so wealthy,
23:47you're so big, you're so safe, once you're a two-ocean power.
23:55That same year, a fortunate discovery made the United States a modern-day El Dorado overnight.
24:06In 1848, worker James Marshall stumbled upon gold while building a sawmill in Northern California.
24:20The news spread like wildfire igniting the California gold rush.
24:29Thousands of fortune-seekers were soon drawn to the Wild West in search of the precious metal.
24:41It's a what-if of history, which is fun but irrelevant in some ways.
24:46But a what-if is, what if they hadn't got there and the Mexicans were still there?
24:50It would have allowed Mexico to be richer than it was,
24:56which would have allowed it to have had a bigger military
24:59and perhaps now the shape of the United States would sort of stop there and curve around there
25:05and Mexico would go up there.
25:07But it's a what-if of history.
25:10Settlements and towns sprang up around the gold deposits.
25:14San Francisco developed into a metropolis within a short period of time.
25:19At the same time, the gold mined drove industrialization throughout the country,
25:25enabling the construction of the railroad.
25:29From the 1830s, rails were laid mainly on the East Coast.
25:34But now, the first transcontinental connection was to be created.
25:39The centerpiece was the more than 3,000-kilometer-long first transcontinental railroad
25:45between Omaha in Nebraska and California's capital Sacramento.
25:51Opened in 1869 and connected to the existing rail network,
25:56there was now finally a continuous rail connection between the East and West Coasts.
26:06That is definitely a significant part of the history of industrialization.
26:12That this area is now being opened up by transcontinental railways.
26:16And that this, of course, creates a huge domestic market in which people, goods and ideas can freely circulate.
26:29Thousands of workers, many of them immigrants from China and Eastern Europe, were involved.
26:35They laid tracks through plains, deserts and mountains.
26:41But the expansion came at a price.
26:44Native Americans lost more of their homeland.
26:50Over just 200 years, disease, violence and displacement reduced them to a fraction of their original number.
27:04There are hardly any descendants of the original inhabitants among today's Americans.
27:11Only 3% of the population describe themselves as indigenous in the census.
27:21Another dark chapter in history was written by the USA with the institution of slavery.
27:34In the mid-1800s, the nation was deeply torn.
27:38The Mason-Dixon line divided the USA.
27:42In the North, industry was flourishing.
27:45While in the South, slaves were exploited in the plantation economy.
27:52The size and interests of cash crops, meaning tobacco and sugar, indigo, things like that, were the cornerstone of the
28:04economy in the South,
28:05because those states were also larger, and the climate being warmer provided an advantageous edge for farmers and landowners there.
28:22Slave labor has become the most important economic factor in the United States.
28:27Its value exceeded the sum of all investments in railroads, factories and banks.
28:33The price, an entire population group, was deprived of its human rights and systematically exploited.
28:45So it is difficult to talk about a nation being great when its roots are steeped in violence, exploitation, subjugation
28:59of a set of different races and ethnicities.
29:05In 1860, almost 4 million slaves lived in the southern United States.
29:20That year, Republican presidential candidate Abraham Lincoln pledged to end slavery.
29:29And he was elected by a large majority.
29:35Seven southern states felt their economic existence threatened by the election and seceded from the Union.
29:43Four more followed suit after the civil war began.
29:49The conflict raged for four years, claiming more than half a million lives.
29:56This is a war that, for the first time, shows the traits of a modern industrial war.
30:01And it is more destructive than almost any war before it.
30:05From Lincoln's perspective, this war begins as a war to preserve the Union,
30:09to undo the secession of the southern states, but then it becomes a war to abolish slavery.
30:17The war ended in 1865.
30:20Slavery was officially abolished.
30:26But systemic discrimination against black people continued.
30:30In the south, slavery was followed by segregation.
30:37Until the 1964 Civil Rights Act, there were separate schools and restaurants,
30:42even toilets and water fountains.
30:45A legacy that continues to this day in people's minds.
30:56Racial difference is deeply rooted in the U.S. through many different ways.
31:02Every tenet of society justified these differences.
31:06We are talking legally, we are talking religiously, and certainly socially.
31:13The southern states lost not only the war.
31:16With the end of slavery, their economic system was also collapsing.
31:26Shortly before the outbreak of the Civil War in 1860,
31:29the south was still significantly richer.
31:32But by 1870, its wealth had declined drastically.
31:36At the same time, industrialisation had begun in the north.
31:45Here, geography favours the nation once again.
31:48Abundant natural resources help pave the way for the country
31:52to become a superpower at the turn of the 20th century.
31:58The East Appalachians, especially Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Kentucky,
32:04are rich in bitumous coal.
32:07It fuelled the steam engines and blast furnaces of the burgeoning heavy industry.
32:20The rise of the United States as an industrial power was also favoured above all by the fact
32:26that the United States is the country that has all the raw materials necessary
32:31for industrialisation in one country.
32:34In contrast to, for example, Latin American countries.
32:37There, each country has one important raw material, but the United States has them all.
32:43Iron ore was also helping to fuel the boom.
32:46It came from the iron range along Lake Superior,
32:50along the border region of Minnesota, Wisconsin and Michigan.
32:57There's the iron range, which has lots of iron ore.
33:02And that's why the industrial centre moved to the Great Lakes beyond the Appalachians.
33:08That's when the steel industry emerged in places like Detroit and Pittsburgh and so on.
33:14Because all the natural resources needed for steel production were available in the country.
33:21And finally, emerging near the iron and coal regions, is what is being called the Manufacturing Belt,
33:27the largest and oldest industrial region in the United States.
33:34A prime example is Chicago. It became the cradle of American steel production.
33:40In 1885, a ten-storey building with a steel skeleton was constructed there.
33:47Known as the Home Insurance Building, it is considered the first high-rise building in the world.
33:53In just one decade, 50 more skyscrapers followed.
33:59All this was made possible by domestic raw materials.
34:03In the 1950s, 85% of the iron processed in the United States came from the Great Lakes region.
34:15In just 50 years, between 1865 and 1913, the United States developed from an agrarian backwater into the world's leading
34:25industrial power.
34:26In 1913, the United States alone produced more than the next two industrialized countries on the list, Germany and England
34:34put together.
34:36The meteoric rise of the United States made it the number one destination for immigrants.
34:43Most of them came from Europe, Ireland, Germany, Italy.
34:47Towards the end of the 19th century, the arrival of newcomers from Eastern Europe increased, especially from Russia, Poland and
34:55Hungary.
34:58Chicago exploded. The city was booming, driven by railroads and immigrants.
35:04Chicago was growing faster than any other major city in history.
35:10Around 1900, it is a city of millions.
35:13So the transition from an agricultural economy to an industrial economy is something that many industrialized countries go through.
35:20But that dynamics, the pace and also the disruptiveness with which it happens, I think makes the United States something
35:27special.
35:29In addition to coal and steel, oil became a vital pillar of the economy.
35:34Large deposits were found in Texas, Louisiana and Oklahoma.
35:38They ensured that the steadily growing demand for energy was met in the 20th century.
35:44On top of this, the United States made a lucky geopolitical move when it purchased Alaska from Russia for around
35:50$7 million in 1867.
35:52In addition to gold, copper and silver deposits, it also acquired huge oil and gas fields, which were discovered there
35:59in the 20th century.
36:00When the Russians offered to sell Alaska to the United States, it was called Seaward's Folly.
36:08He was the Secretary of State, Seaward.
36:10It was also called Seaward's Ice Box because they said, why are you spending $7 million on buying some ice?
36:20Now, it turned out to be a fantastic purchase, of course. It's a fifth the size of the rest of
36:27the United States.
36:28And then there's all that oil and gas up there, which they didn't know about at the time.
36:32All of this laid the groundwork for America's rise as one of the world's largest industrialized nations.
36:40Its gross domestic product is now higher than that of the next three countries in the ranking, China, Germany and
36:47Japan combined.
36:50The purchase of Alaska in the 19th century finally gave the United States dominance over the North American continent.
36:59Since then, the country has been protected from attack by its isolated location, by the Pacific Ocean to the west,
37:07the Atlantic Ocean to the east, the Canadian Shield in the north and the Gulf of Mexico in the south.
37:15From this position, the USA began to exert influence beyond its borders, to open up new markets, but also to
37:25enforce strategic interests, if necessary, by military means.
37:37February 15th, 1898, Havana.
37:41The USS Maine, an American battleship, was anchored in the harbour of the Cuban capital.
37:49Suddenly, there was a huge explosion. The Maine sank, killing 266 US soldiers.
37:58Although experts today assume that it was an accident, the incident provided a pretext for a war with Cuba's colonial
38:06power, Spain.
38:08After a few months, the US had won and Cuba became independent under its protection.
38:17They'd already kicked the Spanish out of Cuba, and Cuba was very important because Cuba holds the sort of fort
38:26which could theoretically prevent you from coming out from the Gulf of Mexico.
38:32And with it, access to the major ports in the southern United States, above all, New Orleans.
38:42The Spanish-American War of 1898 marked a turning point.
38:47For the first time, the United States deployed its military might far beyond its own territory.
38:54In the brief conflict, the Americans snatched the remains of a once world-spanning colonial empire from Spain.
39:01Puerto Rico in the Caribbean and Guam in the Pacific became unincorporated US territories.
39:09The Philippines in Southeast Asia became America's only colony until its independence in 1946.
39:20From the mid-19th century, American businessmen and Christian missionaries expanded their influence in Hawaii.
39:28American sugar and pineapple plantations boomed on the islands.
39:33And in 1887, the US Navy established a naval base in Pearl Harbor.
39:40After the overthrow of the Hawaiian queen in a US-backed coup, Hawaii was annexed in 1898.
39:50The United States also extended its influence with a network of protectorates and zones of influence.
39:58Parts of Samoa, the Dominican Republic, Haiti, Nicaragua and Panama were influenced politically.
40:06In just a decade, the United States had become the dominant power in the Pacific.
40:19Access to two oceans meant enormous strategic potential.
40:24And the opportunity to secure military and economic interests through bases and trade routes.
40:36The Americans realized from the British example that if you want to be a global power, you better have a
40:41global presence via your navy.
40:44At the beginning of the 20th century, the construction of the Panama Canal began.
40:49This connection between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, which was controlled by the United States alone for a long time,
40:55became one of the most important trade routes and helped seal the rise of the United States.
41:01When the Panama Canal is built, it really helps with trade.
41:06If you're going down a certain trade in certain directions, you no longer have to go all the way down
41:12past the very tip
41:13and come round Argentina, where the weather is not so nice for many parts of the year.
41:19And so it really facilitates trade in both directions and is very advantageous, I'd say to global trade, but certainly
41:29to American trade.
41:31Opened in 1914, the canal was a feat of engineering and a milestone in globalization.
41:38Today, it remains one of the most important trade routes in the world, with more than 14,000 ships passing
41:45through it every year.
41:47Without the Panama Canal, the United States would not be an international power the way it is,
41:54because it would have been trapped in the Caribbean Sea into the south rather than open to all the sea
42:01lanes.
42:02The Panama Canal marks the rise of the United States as a world power.
42:07When the Americans ceded control of the waterway to Panama in 1999, their hegemony had long been cemented.
42:17When World War One broke out, the US intended to remain neutral, but was drawn into the conflict through its
42:24global trade network.
42:27Already a world power economically, it now strengthened its military forces.
42:34American banks are financing the European war.
42:37American farmers are feeding European societies and armies.
42:41American industry is providing a lot of the war material.
42:44In this respect, there is a discrepancy that continued to intensify until 1917.
42:49The country was officially neutral, rigorously, dogmatically.
42:53But in economic terms, it was increasingly becoming a belligerent party.
43:00In 1917, German submarines began attacking British ships, causing civilian American casualties.
43:10When a telegram was intercepted showing Berlin's attempt to persuade Mexico to attack the United States, a red line had
43:18been crossed.
43:19President Woodrow Wilson finally succeeded in convincing Congress to enter the war.
43:30A victory would give the United States leverage and help it influence the political order in Europe.
43:37President Wilson saw democracy as an important export.
43:41It promised free trade and access to raw materials and new markets for the US.
43:50The problem is always autocracies, despots, dictatorships.
43:54That is actually the lever he uses to say, we must now use our power to make the world safe
44:00for democracy.
44:01That is, to transform the international environment so that democracies, liberal systems, can safely exist in it.
44:11However, the United States returned to an isolationist policy before the outbreak of World War II in 1939.
44:19This nation will remain a neutral nation.
44:23But I cannot ask that every American remain neutral in thought as well.
44:31Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941 ended neutrality.
44:50Yesterday, December 7th, 1941, a date which will live in infamy, the United States of America was suddenly and deliberately
45:02attacked...
45:03...by naval and air forces of the Empire of Japan.
45:11Franklin Delano Roosevelt could financially help Great Britain, but he couldn't join the war...
45:18...because of this strong isolationist tendency in the Congress and the Republican Party at that time.
45:25It was only the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor that gave President Roosevelt the political ability to join the war.
45:44After the Allies' victory, the United States benefited above all from its great distance to the battlefields.
45:54After the war was over, the United States found itself, and this is also a creature of geography.
46:02It found itself as the only major power in the world that did not have its infrastructure destroyed or heavily
46:13damaged by the war.
46:16The war was never fought in the United States because of geography.
46:22So the United States had this great material and economic advantage that went on for decades afterwards.
46:31The end of World War II also marked the beginning of a new conflict, the Cold War.
46:37In the West, NATO, under US leadership, formed a defense alliance.
46:42In the East, the Soviet Union led the communist states of the Warsaw Pact.
46:47Both sides faced each other with their nuclear arsenals, ready to obliterate the enemy in case of a major threat.
47:04For four decades, Americans and Soviets competed for power and influence around the globe.
47:11The logic of the Cold War maintained the balance of power through deterrence.
47:17Until the world was actually brought to the brink of nuclear war during the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962.
47:26Spheres of influence were negotiated by force of arms in proxy conflicts between 1947 and 1991.
47:33In addition to the wars and the unprecedented nuclear arms race, there was the race for supremacy in space.
47:44Economically, however, the USA was the undisputed superpower during the Cold War.
47:50At that time, over 60% of the world's industrial goods were produced in the USA,
47:56and the world market was virtually unchallenged.
48:00By the 20th century, the United States had overcome its geographical boundaries.
48:06With around 800 military bases, it is now present all over the world.
48:13From Guam to Hawaii to Tokyo Bay, from Eastern Europe to the Middle East to Africa and Latin America.
48:23That's a real map of American power, a real map of the United States, is put US on the map
48:31of the globe, but then show the other bits of concrete all over the globe.
48:38These military bases serve a variety of purposes.
48:43They are designed to provide military cover for the US as a superpower, to keep rivals in check, and to
48:49secure access to trade routes and raw materials.
48:55At the same time, they support allies and enable intervention in crisis regions.
49:07That the US itself is not invulnerable was something the country had to learn on September 11th, 2001.
49:18The terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon in Washington, a turning point.
49:30I think the psychological shock of 9-11 in 2001 is not always understood by much of the world.
49:39Because you have to understand the American psyche thinks that no one can reach them.
49:45Which is true in an existential matter in that there is not an existential threat to the United States of
49:51being invaded.
49:51They're safe.
49:53And then out of the clear blue sky on that day came this attack and 3,000 deaths.
50:06It was such a psychological shock to their core.
50:13It really shook them.
50:26A new political era dawned in the wake of the terrorist attacks of September 11th.
50:35The United States no longer used its bases only for defence and peacekeeping.
50:40Rather, some of them now served to enforce American interests, not always in line with the law.
50:48Secret prisons known as black sites were set up around the world.
50:55Terror suspects are held without trial in camps like Guantanamo Bay in Cuba.
51:01Critics accuse the USA of torture and serious human rights violations,
51:06all in the name of the war on terror.
51:13Let's pray, let's go.
51:14Former US President George W. Bush proclaimed his country's war on the so-called Axis of evil.
51:24I think they lashed out in a blind rage and I understand that.
51:28But strategically, they took their eye off the ball and they went to places,
51:34Afghanistan and then Iraq, which strategically are really not that important to them.
51:38And in that time, that 20 years that they spent with their focus there, China and Russia just thought, wow,
51:47we've got the whole of the world to play in.
51:49And they've done so very successfully.
51:53Since 2013, China has been consistently expanding its influence in the Indo-Pacific region with the so-called New Silk
52:01Road and numerous military and trade bases.
52:04This is strong competition for the U.S. because the economies of the future are located here.
52:12More than 60% of the world's population lives in the region.
52:17Almost two-thirds of the global gross domestic product is now generated here.
52:25Asia is the heart of the world.
52:28To the degree that the world economy has a geographic centerpiece, it would be the Asia-Pacific even more than
52:38Europe or the United States as we go forward.
52:42And that is a challenge for the United States because the United States cannot dominate the world as an imperial
52:50-like power.
52:51We're entering a more multipolar world.
52:55It's impossible to deny it.
52:57The history of the United States is inextricably linked to its geography.
53:03Its location between two oceans offers protection and at the same time opens the door to the world.
53:10Rich soils, raw materials and navigable waterways form the basis for trade and progress.
53:16The U.S.A. took advantage of these benefits and rose to become the global superpower of the 20th century.
53:24But in the meantime, the balance of power is shifting, with new and old rivals claiming supremacy.
53:31Whether America's influence in the world will endure depends in part on how it acts in the global power game.
53:38Its geographical advantages alone will no longer be sufficient in the 21st century.
53:44And of the IMAMS of mandatory.
53:45The U.S.A. Jake Towns
53:47The U.S.A. Jake Towns
53:47The U.S.A. Jake Towns
53:50The U.S.A. Jake Towns
53:52The U.S.A. Jake Towns