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Beyond

On Americans’ connections to the larger world.

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Human figures colored either blue or green.

Mortality Wars

Estimating life and death in Iraq and Gaza.
by Shaan Sachdev via The Drift on July 8, 2024
NATO leaders in the 1950s sitting together at a conference.

Ill-Suited to Reality: NATO’s Delusions

It has suddenly become popular to cast NATO as the first benign military alliance in history, without concealed politics.
by Tom Stevenson via London Review of Books on July 25, 2024
Cover of "Aiding Ireland" featuring potato plant.

Aiding Ireland: The Politics Of How Donors Learned To Give To Far-Off Strangers

A new book argues that Irish famine philanthropy “went viral” in the nineteenth century because relief has been, and continues to be, politically potent.
by Anelise Hanson Shrout via HistPhil on June 13, 2024
Banner showing the logo of Chiquita.

Chiquita Must Pay for Its Crimes in Latin America

70 years since President Árbenz was ousted for standing up to Chiquita, the firm might finally be held to account for its ties to a far-right paramilitary group in Colombia.
by Klas Lundström via Jacobin on July 10, 2024

Exhibits

Landing of Columbus.
Exhibit

Imperial Ambitions

Five hundred years of empire building in North America and beyond its borders.

Exhibit

Crimes of War

Stories about the civilian victims of past wars, and the extent to which Americans have acknowledged and accounted for atrocities committed in their name.

Exhibit

The Lives of War Veterans

The experiences of veterans of American wars, from the Civil War to Afghanistan, and our collective obligation to those who have served.

Andrew Jackson meets a Creek military officer.

The Forgotten War that Made America

The overlooked Creek War set the tone for America to come.
by Sean Durns via The American Conservative on October 17, 2024
Jimmy Carter and Shah Pahlavi.

The US’s Long History of Destabilizing Iran

Kamala Harris called Iran a “destabilizing, dangerous force.” The appropriate context for this is the US’s own decades-long history of destabilizing Iran.
by Seraj Assi via Jacobin on October 9, 2024
Essay entitled "America," full of editorial markings.

America Is Not America Yet

On American history and the history of the word “America.”
by Alexander Aviña via The Dial on October 3, 2024
Letter from Wong Gin Fu to Wong Kim

Sadness of the Paper Son: The Travails of Asian Immigration to the U.S.

Despite the Chinese Exclusion Act, about 300,000 Chinese gained admission to the U.S. between 1882 and 1943. How did they do it?
by Ryan Reft via Tropics of Meta on October 3, 2024
Bill Clinton meeting with the Emir of Qatar, Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani, in the White House.
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How Qatar Became a Major Middle East Power Broker

The history behind the country's role as a key American ally that also maintains warm relations with Iran and others.
by Allen Fromherz via Made By History on September 30, 2024
Protesters march againts the US-backed government of El Salvador in 1985.

How US Trade Unionists Opposed the Dirty War in El Salvador

Progressive forces in US labor took a stand in solidarity with trade unionists facing murderous repression in El Salvador.
by Jeff Schuhrke via Jacobin on September 26, 2024
Person wearing Trump 2020 hat in front of protesters with signs being in opposition of funding the war in Ukraine.
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Will Foreign Policy Decide the Election?

While it is rare for foreign policy differences between the political parties to affect electoral outcomes, it has happened before.
by Lindsay M. Chervinsky via Made By History on September 19, 2024
Hideki Tojo in a courtroom testifying at the Tokyo Trial, guarded by American soldiers.

The Hypocrisies of International Justice

A recent history revisits the Tokyo trial.
by Colin Jones via The Nation on September 18, 2024
Donald Trump

Racism Against Haitians Didn’t Begin in Springfield, Ohio

In the early 19th century, US elites demonized the self-liberated slaves of the Haitian Revolution as dangerous practitioners of barbaric rituals.
by Ayendy Bonifacio via Jacobin on September 18, 2024
Black American soldiers pose with German women and mixed race children.

A Black Woman’s Activism in Postwar (West) Germany

Why one journalist worked with Black American families to adopt mixed-race German children after World War II.
by Silke Hackenesch via Black Perspectives on September 18, 2024

‘They’re Eating Pets’ – Another Example of US Politicians Smearing Haiti and Haitian Immigrants

Trump’s baseless claims about migrants in Ohio reflect a long history of prejudice against Haitians. In Washington, those falsehoods have driven policy.
by Nathan H. Dize via The Conversation on September 17, 2024
A pile of guns and rifle magazines on top of bullets.

More Guns, More Money: How America Turned Weapons Into a Consumer Commodity

How an American arms dealer and a surplus of guns in Europe after World War II popularized gun ownership.
by Andrew C. McKevitt via Literary Hub on September 12, 2024
Vietnamese refugees preparing to evacuate a village during an American air raid.

The End of a Village

Jonathan Schell’s account of the US military’s destruction of the village of Ben Suc in Vietnam laid bare the problem with many American interventions.
by Wallace Shawn via New York Review of Books on September 12, 2024
Charles Gates Dawes.
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History Shows How Dangerous 'America First' Really Is

In the 1920s and 1930s, the U.S. tried America First. This philosophy helped lead to World War II.
by Cyrus Veeser via Made By History on September 10, 2024
The signing of the Alaska Purchase Agreement on March 30, 1867.

Russia’s First Secret Influence Campaign: Convincing the U.S. to Buy Alaska

Russia has been peddling influence for a long time, using a playbook that it still uses today.
by Casey Michel via Politico Magazine on September 8, 2024
Soldiers honoring Robert Imbrie's casket in Washington, D.C. on September 29, 1924.

A Century Ago, a Mob Brutally Attacked an American Diplomat in Persia

The July 1924 killing of Robert Imbrie fueled the rise of the Pahlavi dynasty and set the stage for a CIA-backed 1953 coup and the 1979 Iran hostage crisis.
by Francine Uenuma via Smithsonian on September 5, 2024
Physicists posing in front of a 60-inch cyclotron at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in 1944.

How Professors Helped Win World War II

College professors were vital in the fight to win WWII, lending their time and research to building bombs to creating effective wartime propaganda.
by Will Mari via The Saturday Evening Post on September 4, 2024
Richard Nixon gestures toward George Meany during a speech at the 1971 AFL-CIO convention.

How the “AFL-CIA” Undermined Labor Movements Abroad

During the Cold War, the AFL-CIO actively participated in efforts to suppress left-wing labor movements abroad.
by Jeff Schuhrke, Cal Turner, Sara Van Horne via Jacobin on September 2, 2024
The bombing of Baghdad during the US invasion of Iraq, March 21, 2003.

A Terrible Mistake

The long history of confusions, misconceptions, and miscalculations in the relationship between the US and Iraq, from 1979 to 2003.
by Charlie Savage via New York Review of Books on August 29, 2024
Tigers, painted by Charles Towne, ca. 1800.

Whatever Happened to Martin Van Buren’s Presidential Tigers?

It's a great story. The only problem is that the whole thing is probably made up.
by Isabel Sans via Boundary Stones on August 23, 2024
Art piece of a hand holding barbed wire.

Do Border

Who can migrate to the US and make their home here? Who gets to drop US-made bombs, and who is expected to suffer them? These are not unrelated questions.
by Daniel Denvir via n+1 on August 22, 2024
Francisco Franco and Ronald Reagan in Madrid, 1972.

The Autocratic Allure

Why the far right embraces foreign tyrants.
by Beverly Gage via Foreign Affairs on August 20, 2024
Palm trees on an island made of cash.

The American Con Man Who Pioneered Offshore Finance

How a now-obscure financier turned the Bahamas into a tax haven—and created a cornerstone of global plutocracy.
by Brooke Harrington via The Atlantic on August 19, 2024
Chart of wholesale prices in the UK, showing inflation peaking in 1920.

Dollar Dominance and Modern Monetary Macro in the 1920s

How the U.S. created a new kind of managed and political monetary system in the wake of World War I.
by Adam Tooze via Chartbook on August 18, 2024
Iranian leaders.

Who Benefits From Sanctions?

According to authors of a new book on how Iran has coped with economic sanctions imposed by the U.S., no one does.
by Zep Kalb via Phenomenal World on August 15, 2024
Chinese immigrants and American immigration officers at Ellis Island.
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The Perils of Vilifying Chinese Migrants

As Chinese migrants arrive at the U.S.-Mexico border, politicians are reviving old anti-Chinese rhetoric that has done lasting harm.
by Meredith Oyen via Made By History on August 13, 2024
President Eisenhower sitting beside President Gamal Abdel Nasser of Egypt at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel in New York, September 26, 1960

The Foreign Policy Mistake the U.S. Keeps Repeating in the Middle East

In 2024, the U.S. faces some of the same challenges in the region that it did in 1954.
by Jordan Michael Smith via The New Republic on August 2, 2024

We Can Breathe! Anti-Fascists United

What was the Popular Front? Where did it come from, and where did its energies go?
by Gabriel Winant via London Review of Books on August 1, 2024
Parade of U.S. Olympic team members, 1960.

At the 1960 Olympics, American Athletes Recruited by the CIA Tried to Convince Soviets to Defect

Al Cantello, a star of the U.S. track and field team, arranged a covert meeting between a government agent and a Ukrainian long jumper.
by Erik Ofgang via Smithsonian on August 1, 2024
Bruce Springsteen.

Berlin’s Cold War of Rock

Did music really bring down the Wall?
by Katja Hoyer via Zeitgeist on August 1, 2024
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