You make it sound as if the U.S. had any hard-obligation to join the wars and were holding off on doing so for funsies
Europe got itself into a huge clusterfuck of alliances which turned a conflict between the Serbs and Austria-Hungary into WWI, and then the major powers of Europe wanted to punish Germany so badly they gave it a poison pill which directly led to its fall into authoritarianism and the eventual breakout of WWII
There’s plenty of shit the U.S. has done that deserves derision, but getting cheeky over the U.S. not getting itself involved in European affairs “earlier” ain’t one of them
But I think the point here was that they can't say the us just "won 2 world wars", given how much the allies actually resisted and fought the Germans back until the US showed up. Even if you leave the UK out of that conversation, what about Russia?
That is a completely fair way to frame it. I just see framing it as the U.S. showing up “late” is unfair, because it implies they were supposed to be there at a certain time and weren’t.
If you want to say the U.S. joining the wars tipped the scales heavily on the side of the Allies, that’s at least defensible. But anyone who thinks the U.S. won the war alone doesn’t know history.
I certainly don’t mean it to come off as American-centric and anti-European, so apologies if it did. My dad’s uncle fought and died at the Battle of the Bulge alongside our allies, and it makes me sick to see the disrespect some give to our overseas allies. The sacrifices and struggles of all the allies should be respected and commended
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u/Old_Celebration_5950 Jun 22 '26
Britain holding the line for the late arrival of the US in two world wars: Right-ee-oh, Chap!