User:Skakkle/Oppenheimer

The dropping of the atomic bomb on Japan in 1945 was the beginning of an era that changed the war calculus going forward. The decades after were shaped to promote peace, at least in prevention of another conflict of the scale of WWII. With great power came great responsibility for the Allied nations, with the US at the forefront. In this new era of American power, US leaders made many mistakes, and the US showed its imperial tendencies many times. But I think a reasonable case can be made that preserving the global order that came next— at least for a few decades— was a serious responsibility that Western powers did not take lightly.

So many crises that have come since then happened in the context of this decades-long relative peace— the collapse of the Soviet Union, 9/11, the 2008 financial crisis, the Snowden revelations, even the COVID pandemic. The expansion of the EU and NATO and the rise of China are also notable examples in this context.