Solitaire Book Club: How to Hide an Empire

How to Hide an Empire by Daniel Immerwahr. At its peak, the British Empire controlled 24% of the land mass of the globe. The U.S.does not hold nearly that much, but it does have over 800 overseas military bases (more than 30 times the rest of the nations in the world combined) and several overseas possessions and territories which might be of the U.S. but which are in important ways not in the U.S. In this scholarly but accessible tome, Immerwahr shows how the U.S. developed a "pointillist empire" not by seizing land but by using economic power, industrial strength,and technological advances to secure its interests. The confluence of circumstances that resulted in the U.S. coming to into its prime after the second world war allowed it to eschew the traditional colonialism with which it had experimented early in the 20th century and create the hegemony it enjoys today. An important read, especially for anyone who doesn't know that the U.S. held The Philippines as a colony for over the 30 years and that Guamanians are American citizens but cannot vote in federal elections.