Could anyone explain (or refer me to a book or website that would help me understand) why the US and the Soviet Union emerged from WWII as superpowers? Why those two countries? Why did Britain lose its status?

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Originally posted by Sarai:
Could anyone explain (or refer me to a book or website that would help me understand) why the US and the Soviet Union emerged from WWII as superpowers? Why those two countries? Why did Britain lose its status?

The UK lacked the resources to continue to compete on the global scale. The expenditure of national resources of two world wars, the rise of indpendance movements in the colonies, and the cost of reconstruction were disabling.

The United States profited from the expulsion of European thinkers during the fascist era -- this was what let us catch up to several European countries in the physical sciences -- and from the fact that there was no important destruction of our economic and industrial establishments.

The war set the USSR back a very long way, but even so, their centralized economic system, combined with the motivation provided by the destruction of the invasion, enabled them to make very rapid progress during the postwar period. They actually emerged from the war with the largest, most highly mechanized army in the world, the most experienced, and, to a large degree the best equipped. Being able to draw on the resources of Eastern Europe was also an undoubted aid, given that so much of their own productive capacity had been destroyed by the war.

I don't know of any particular book that discusses the origins of superpowers as such, but much can be learned from Prof. D. F. Fleming's _The Cold War and Its Origins_, in two hefty volumes. Your local public library may not have it, but a university library certainly should.

Alan Moore

I will address the issue of Britain's loss on the world stage first. Britain was involved in WWII from 1939 onward. That, plus its loss of a whole generation of young men in WWI (Flanders Fields, The Somme, etc.) led to a tremendous drain on the relatively small population of Britain. WWII also led to a tremendous drain of youthful manpower in Britain. In addition, Britain was within bombing range of the Axis Powers, leading to further destruction of their manufacturing power.

Throughout the 20th Century and accelerating at the end of WWI and even more so at the end of WWII, a tremendous world push for autonomy and independence occurred. This wave crested and broke over the European colonial powers but perhaps affected no other nation as much as Great Britain. The British had the most extensive empire in the 19th and 20th centuries of any country on earth. They relied upon this empire to feed the home islands need for raw materials for production making Britain the most powerful country in the world up until WWI.

After WWII, Britain lost most of her colonies due to a tremendous independence movement highlighted by Gandhi's leading India to independence from Britain in 1948. By 1950, the previous 50 years had caused Britain to lose too many of its young men who were just beginning the prime of their lives. They had also lost the bulk of their cheap raw material supply as well as the cheap labor they took advantage of in their colonial possessions.

There was no way for Great Britain to compete with the USA or USSR, both of whom retained a sufficient number of their young males (even though the USSR lost BY FAR the most young males of any country involved in WWII, it still was relatively low in comparison to the country's total population) and continued to have a plentiful supply of raw materials for production in their own countries.

Will answer other parts of the question in further postings.

Wewlcome to AP, greenize !

You're dead right about Britain; the country was bankrupt. I'm not sure what the bulk of our raw materials was that you say we lost with the loss of the Empire, though Such industrial raw materials as we imported principally came from outside the Empire. However, with food and clothing it was a different matter. Never mind the grain from Canada or the wool from Australia, what about the tea from India and the sugar from the West Indies ...and the bananas of course ! How could we live without those being cheap ? Not that we'd notice; we had food rationing here until the mid 1950s . Sugar rationing was introduced twice, as if that wasn't bad enough. The first time it was removed there was such a rush to buy this necessity to the British way of life that the controls had to be reimposed

We did in fact retain preferential trading arrangements with what became the Commonwealth countries. A big question at the time when Britain was trying to enter the Common Market, what is now the European Union, was the fate of those countries, notably Australia and New Zealand. Objectors thought that we would end up with dearer food imports and, in any case, these countries would suffer enormously.

Thanks, FredPuli for setting me straight on some issues. It sure helps to have the input of a person who lived through those tough times. But I do think I got a little sidetracked by the issue of empire loss and the loss of contribution the commonwealth nations made to the home islands of Britain. The question was about the loss of status of Britain and not about the loss of empire.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I feel that three major issues contributed to Britain's loss of status on the world stage:
1) The profound loss of a large percentage of young healthy males in the prime (or near prime) of their lives. I also feel I must bring up the even more profound loss of British lives (not to mention commonwealth lives) in WWI. I believe there were more British lives lost in WWI as a percentage of the country's population than in WWII, and possibly, Britain suffered the greatest loss of lives as a percentage of its population than any other nation in WWI (although I'm not entirely certain of the accuracy of this statement). The point is that the loss of a generation of young men 20 years before WWII did have a significant impact on the British need for assistance and allies in WWII (not to imply that Britain didn't do a stellar job of confronting Germany during the Battle of Britain and the years before Barbarosa and Pearl Harbor) and the eventual suffering of the British economy and loss of status on the world stage.
2) Britain's involvement in fighting Germany and the Axis powers lasted longer than any other nation in WWII. They also fought a war on two fronts--European front and the far east. This again took a tremendous toll in young, healthy British lives and a tremendous economic toll.
Incidentally, numbers 1) and 2) above are also the major factors in determining British strategy in WWII--especially in the later years on the European front. Bernard Law Montgomery was hailed as a hero in Britain (and has been railed against by many other historians) for his strategy of doing everything possible to save lives--this included taking time to build up an overwhelming material superiority prior to beginning any battle, policies of cautious advance only when intelligence led him to believe advance was safe, etc. The British people suffered more than any other western ally any preservation of lives became an essential policy--for better or worse.
3) The tremendous suffering of the British economy--one that was on nearly an exclusive war footing--from 1939 to 1945 invariably led to the British mortgaging their economic future for years to come. I'm not judging the British government for this, the country had no choice in order to survive and defeat fascist imperialism. The economic suffering of the British People can be appreciated by the fact that the British soldiers in country resented American troops for their enormous monetary superiority. Also, at the meeting of the "Big Three" in Yalta, Winston Churchill realized that the post war spoils and world control was going to be dominated by the countries with the greatest ecomonic superiority--the US and USSR. He resented the fact that Britain was involved with the Axis defeat the longest, but he essentially felt like the "unwanted stepchild" at the meeting. He also strongly cautioned FDR to be wary of and untrusting of "Uncle Joe", but of course, FDR unwittingly hoped that Stalin and the USSR would cooperate for peace and national autonomy in the post-WWII era. History would redeem Churchill and it would take 50 more years to destroy the most evil of systems in the 20th Century--Soviet Socialism.

The economic status of the countries of the world ensured that only two nations could "hit the ground running" economically at the end of 1945--the US and USSR. It was analogous to running a mile race where the US and USSR start at the 1/2 mile mark and Britain began at the true start line with a 200lb. weight strapped to her back.

I feel these are the main reasons why Britain lost world status in the post-WWII era. Any other possible reasons I may have missed?

Agreed,greenize, but the British people, and their leaders had another problem, one which long delayed Britain's becoming a player again. That problem to come was the failure to understand that the future prosperity of Britain lay not in some feeble trade association with her Commonwealth but in Europe. For young people now, who have no memory of the Commonwealth or the Empire before it, it is difficult to imagine the delusional belief that Britain could stand alone economically.Of course, most people, back in the late 1950s, and for at least a decade beyond, had an image and memory of British India and British much-everywhere-else. They could not imagine a world in which Britain was not a great economic power.Still less could they ever conceive of a world in which Britain joined with France, Germany and the rest; a world in which their own children thought nothing more natural than that.

Footnote: Britain lost 908,000 killed in in World War One but only 326,000 (and 62,000 civilians) killed in World War Two

Thanks again for your unique perspective, FredPuli and thanks for taking the time to look up the number of British deaths in the two WWs.

I think we have both inferred the answer to the question of why the US and USSR both emerged from WWII as the world's superpowers by discussing the question of Britain in post-WWII.

The case of America's emergence as a superpower is not terribly complicated to understand.The story of the tremendous economic/manufacturing capability of America, especially an America stirred and steeled in its resolve post-Pearl Harbor, is well known.America, because of its culture of hard work, adaptability, and history of its people overcoming adversity, was able to rapidly adapt from a peacetime to a wartime economy with ease (i.e.-"Rosie the Riveter"). This led to tremendous economic success at home, and more importantly, overseas where America became the "Arsenal of Democracy".And except for some damage to a naval installation (Pearl Harbor), America sustained virtually no damage to her infrastructure (except in the Merchant Marine where many ships were torpedoed in the German U-boat campaign in the North Atlantic).Compare America's situation to that of Europe where virtually every factory, farm, road, bridge, and railroad sustained significant damage or total destruction.And this occurred west--from the Atlantic coast of Europe (France, the low countries, Norway) to east--across the continent to the Volga River in the USSR (Stalingrad).It occurred north-- from Norway and Denmark in Scandanavia and at Murmansk and Archangel in the USSR to the south--the southern fringes of habitable north Africa (at the northern fringes of the Sahara Desert) and the Mediteranean countries and the Levant.

It wasn't a simple matter of firing up the factories and farms in a Europe where nearly all the factories were damaged and nearly all the farms ravaged (especially immediately post-WWII when millions of displaced persons were attempting to return to their homes--in some cases a journey of several thousand kilometers. Therefore, not only couldn't Europe compete on the world stage for superpower status, it was dependent on the goodwill of the only two nations with any wealth left--the US and USSR--for food, clothing, shelter, security and guidance.In early 1946, most American troops were home and factories,after a quick turnaround to production of consumer goods, began churning out products designed to make the average American's life better/easier.While Europeans were struggling to meet their essential human needs in systems marred by staggering inflation, Americans were purchasing radios, tvs, cars, hula-hoops and other such "essentials".I only make light of this because it's hard to be a superpower when half or more of your population is preoccupied with wondering where their next meal is coming from.

So by default, most of the potential superpower nations couldn't make it to the starting line of the race.(Notice I left Britain out of this discussion--we covered it earlier--because of its unique geographic position in the European Continent.While Britain did suffer considerable damage to its cities and countryside from German bombing raids and V-1/V-2 bombs, she did not have legions of land armies marching across her, annhialating(sp?) everything in their path(s).(I am, of course, leaving out the damage done by "overpaid, oversexed, and over here" American troops, especially when on leave in London!!!)

Unlike prior to WWII, America was very eager to take its seat at the head of the world stage in the post-WWII era.This was partly because we understood that there was no other power in the world to balance Soviet Communism and Stalin's strategy of communist imperialism at any price.In addition, if we weren't aware of Soviet and Uncle Joe's intentions during the war, we soon realized it afterwards.Part of this was because of American naivette.Part was because FDR did have an idealistic hope that out of the ruins of the single event in history that had more examples of cruelty, prejudice, murder and torture, rape, pillage, and utter destruction, it was worth it taking the risk of being fooled by Stalin in exchange for the possibility of a new, better world.We were fooled.And it didn't take very long to realize it.The other reason America stepped up to the plate after WWII came out of the can-do attitude of an entire generation which gained tremendous confidence from its experience in WWII.Once Pearl Harbor news broke, the attitude was "we have a job to do, so lets get to it, get it done quickly and efficiently, and get home".A similar type of job became evident in the post-WWII era.Success begets success and confidence begets confidence, so why shouldn't we step up to our responsibility of being the only superpower whose message was one of freedom, independence, the right of self-determination of peoples and countries, and morality.Not only did we have the economic power to step up but, more importantly, America seized the moral high ground.America and its citizens felt empowered and impassioned and garnished an extreme amount of strength for the fight to come (Cold War) by reversing the standard so many countries lived (and died) by in that terrible time--"Right Makes Might".