History

Essay Question: Answer 2. 50 points each. You will submit your answers on a Microsoft word document and send as email attachment. Please include your name and section number. You should write the equivalent of at least 2 and a half pages in a bluebook. Due Monday, May 11. You can use Foner and/or sources on Canvas, but please make sure you use your own words.

1) In 1918, US Senator Hiram Warren Johnson apparently said, “The first casualty when war comes is truth.” Thinking about the US’s wars and invasions in the period after World War II (both official and covert), tell me if you agree with this statement. Why or Why not? Furthermore, tell me what types of myths US warmakers and war-backers have employed to justify military interventions. Identify at least three myths in at least two different wars and explain the significance of each. Why do warmakers and their backers use myths before, during, and after wars? Provide specific examples from Foner and readings on Canvas.

2) Why do historians call the period between 1980 and 1992 “the resurgence of conservatism?” Do you believe that there was indeed a “resurgence of conservatism” in this era? If so, in what ways was this period different from the forty-year period between the 1930s and the 1970s? How did this conservatism find expression? Do you believe that modern conservatism really emerged in 1980 or earlier? Consider politics, foreign affairs, economics, class, gender, and race relations. Provide specific examples from Canvas and Foner.

3) Observers of US foreign policy from the Second World War to the present have debated how best to characterize the US’s role in the world. Indeed, this question can become somewhat polarizing, with some viewing the US as a force for good; others have insisted that the US has created considerable harm. Consider the differences between, say, Johns Hopkins University’s Michael Mandelbaum and former president Jimmy Carter. In Mandelbaum’s words, “American foreign policy, for all its shortcomings, has underpinned political stability around the world.” At some point last year, Carter struck a different chord, noting that, in his view, the United States is “the most warlike nation in the history of the world.” Are you more inclined to agree with Mandelbaum or with Carter? Why? Provide specific examples from at least three countries where the US intervened militarily, either overly or covertly.