Amid all the talk about wars and aggression throughout the world in recent years and the central role played by the United States, an obvious, but seldom mentioned factor is omitted in the avalanche of rhetoric.   It is the all-too-apparent fact that there is a definite Big Bully component in American imperialism not significantly different from that which one could expect to see on a school playground.  The bottom line often comes down to as simple an assessment as that.  For many decades the US has reveled in picking up by the hair little nations 1/50th its size and smacking their faces around until blood flows.  They certainly never dared to use that approach toward the SU or China.  Panama, Haiti, Grenada, Afghanistan, Somalia, Vietnam, Iraq, Lebanon, the Dominican Republic, and Korea are only some of the small nations invaded in just the last 50 years and there seems to be no let-up in sight.  In view of this proclivity for unequal power imposition one can’t help but ask the obvious question, namely, when was the last time the United States picked on somebody its own size, somebody as powerful as, or more powerful than, itself.  The answer will startle many Americans in view of the fact that they have been brainwashed to believe that we live in the “home of the brave.”
             In view of the fact that there have been no world wars since 1945, the most common answer one could expect to receive would be when the US fought Nazi Germany.  But that answer would be entirely incorrect because its proponents have been deceived with regard to the history of WWII in some major respects.
 First, Nazi Germany and its allies of Hungary, Rumania, Italy, Spain, and Finland invaded the Soviet Union in June 1941 with approximately 240 divisions or about 3,000,000 soldiers stretching from the Black Sea to the Baltic.  By contrast, they never had more than 60 divisions on the Western Front against the US and Britain at any time.  So the vast bulk of the manpower, material and fighting was done on the Eastern Front, not the Western or African.  That is where WWII was really fought.  The Russians were constantly calling for England and America to open a Second Front which was promised in 1942, postponed until 1943 and again postponed until 1944.
             Second, and even more importantly, by the time the Second Front was opened in June 1944 the Third Reich had already been defeated and was in full retreat.  The critical and stupendous battles of Moscow, Stalingrad and Kursk, resulting in Wehrmacht defeats, were history and the Red Army was approaching the border of Poland.  Knowledgeable Nazi generals could easily see Germany had lost the war which accounts for the attempt by some to assassinate Hitler at the Wolf’s Lair in July 1944.  He would not immediately negotiate a conditional surrender.
             The US and England did not enter the war with a Second Front until everyone could see that the Germans had been defeated by the Red Army and it was only a matter of time before the latter went through Germany and reached the English Channel effectively putting all of continental Europe under Marxist leadership.  England and America firmly opposed such a prospect and for that reason chose to attack after Germany had been sufficiently weakened and in order to seize as much as possible before what would have been the inevitable came to fruition.  In effect, the US and England did not defeat Germany but only seized part of the spoils after the outcome had already been determined.  It is analogous to watching a hyena seize and run with sizable chunks of a nearly dead cheetah that has been brought down by the lion.  So WWII is not an example of the US fighting a power as powerful or more powerful than itself.  Germany was already defeated when the US arrived with real force.
             Some respondents, on the other hand, will no doubt refer to WWI as an example of the US fighting a power with comparable force and they, too, would be incorrect.  WWI began in Aug 1914 and by the time the US entered in April 1917 the Allies (England, France, Russia) and Central Powers (Germany, Austria-Hungary, Bulgaria and Turkey) had pounded one another to such a degree in such tremendous battles as the Somme, the Marne and Tannenberg that both sides were little more than punch drunk fighters leaning on one another as if in the last few minutes of the 15th round.  By the time the US arrived, it was merely a matter of providing fresh troops for the few final battles needed to knock one side or the other out of the ring. So this war, too, does not represent an example of the US fighting an equal or superior force.
             Moving backward in history we come to the Spanish-American War of 1898 which was initiated by the US specifically for the purpose of stealing some colonies from a declining Spanish empire that had become little more than an obvious push-over.
             Moving further backward we come to the Civil War which does not involve fighting a foreign power and for that reason can be discounted.
             This takes us back to 1848 and the Mexican War in which the US stole what is now the Southwestern part of the United States from a Mexico that was in no condition to provide significant military resistance.  The war was little more than a cake-walk and the US realized it would be such before initiating conflict.
             In our historical journey back in time we now come to the War of 1812, the conflict we are looking for.  The United States actually fought a power more potent than itself, namely Great Britain, and only because of the unwillingness of the Brits to submit the amount of force needed for victory did the Americans emerge victorious.  There can be no doubt that the US was fighting a power superior to itself militarily, but one can’t help noticing that we had to go back nearly 200 years to find a war in which the US as a nation can rightfully claim any degree of real fortitude or mettle when it comes to fighting other powers.
            So when you hear the US referred to as the “home of the brave” ask the source to relate an example of national bravery in action as opposed to that of individuals or units.  When it comes to national nerve and fearlessnes, to say reality clashes with the common misconception fostered by American propaganda is an understatement of the first magnitude.