Term 4 Extra Credit

Tiffany Cai

Purple Block

Term 4 Extra Credit: What defines global dominance in the modern world?

In the modern world, global dominance is defined as having strong strategic leaders and a powerful military. In the mid-1800's Otto Von Bismarck was the leader of Germany and he was best known by his use of the strategy, real politik. That is defined as being able to do whatever it takes in order to reach your goals, and Bismarck was fine with doing anything if it meant he could get his way. The use of this strategy led to the unification of Germany as well a strong military, two aspects of a globally dominant nation. Despite the fact that Bismarck used subversive tactics in order to unify Germany, he was still able to achieve his goal through a powerful military. In order to unify Germany, Bismarck strategically edited the Ems telegram by turning France and Prussia against each other, "Fight we must if we do not want to act the part of the vanquished [defeated] without a battle"^. Even though this caused war, the people of Prussia united to work towards a common goal, which led to the formation of a unified Germany adding land from Austria and other parts of Europe in the process. The unified states of Germany proved to be extremely useful because it allowed people to work as a whole. Unifying the people also led to a larger, more powerful military; the fact that they were motivated to work towards a common goal helped make them stronger, which was helpful in winning other wars.  Bismarck's clever use of real politik led to unification, a strong military, as well as the ability to make Germany one of the strongest world powers by the time World War I began.  In addition, during the Korean War, the United States was considered as one of the two main powers in the United Nations. This high status translated to the military, when North Korea invaded South Korea in 1950 and the United States intervened. Although the United Nations condemned the invasion and sent troops to help, 90% of those troops were from the United States which reveals their militaristic power. The United State's influential power and large military demonstrated how countries became globally dominant.