THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

The United States is a constitutional federal republic made up of 50 states

and one federal district. Most of the country is located in the center of North
America where its 48 contiguous states and Washington D. are located. C., the
capital district, between the Pacific and Atlantic oceans, borders Canada to the
north and Mexico to the south. The state of Alaska is in the northwest of the
continent, bordering Canada to the east and separated from Russia to the west
by the Bering Strait. The state of Hawaii is a Polynesian archipelago in the
middle of the Pacific Ocean, and is the only American state not located in
America. The country also has several territories in the Caribbean Sea and the
Pacific.
With 9.83 million km² and more than 316 million inhabitants, the country is
the fourth largest in total area, the fifth largest in contiguous area and the third
largest in population. It is one of the most ethnically diverse and multicultural
nations in the world, a product of large-scale immigration.10 It is, on the other
hand, the largest national economy in the world, with an estimated GDP of 15.7
trillion dollars (a quarter part of nominal global GDP) and one fifth of global GDP
at purchasing power parity.
Its current President is Barack Obama, and its Vice President Joe Biden.

DATE OF ORDER OF
SURFACE (K
ENTRY POPULATIO ENTRY
STATE M²) CAPITAL FLAG
INTO THE N INTO THE
UNION UNION
Alabama 135.756 14-12-1819 4.779.736
Alaska 1.717.854 03-01-1959 710.231
Arizona 295.254 14-02-1912 6.392.017
Arkansas 137.732 15-06-1836 2.915.918
California 423.970 09-09-1850 37.253.956
North Carolina 139.389 21-11-1789 9.535.483
South Carolina 82.932 23-05-1788 4.625.364
Colorado 269.601 01-08-1876 5.029.196
Connecticut 14.357 09-01-1788 3.574.097
North Dakota 183.112 02-11-1889 672.591
South Dakota 199.731 02-11-1889 814.180
Delaware 6.447 07-12-1787 897.934
Florida 170.304 03-03-1845 18.801.310
Georgia 153.909 02-01-1788 9.687.653
 Hawaii 28.311 21-08-1959 1.360.301
Idaho 216.446 03-07-1890 1.567.582
Illinois 149.998 03-12-1818 12.830.632
Indiana 94.321 11-12-1816 6.483.802
Iowa 145.743 28-12-1846 3.046.355
Kansas 213.096 29-01-1861 2.853.118
Kentucky 104.659 01-06-1792 4.339.367
Louisiana 134.264 30-04-1812 4.533.372
Maine 91.646 15-03-1820 1.328.361
Maryland 32.133 28-04-1788 5.773.552
Massachusetts 27.336 06-02-1788 6.547.629
Michigan 250.494 26-01-1837 9.883.640
Minnesota 225.171 11-05-1858 5.303.925
Mississippi 125.434 10-12-1817 2.967.297
Missouri 180.533 10-08-1821 5.988.927
Mountain 380.838 08-11-1889 989.415
Nebraska 200.345 01-03-1867 1.826.341
Snowfall 286.351 31-10-1864 2.700.551
New Jersey 22.588 18-12-1787 8.791.894
NY 141.299 26-07-1788 19.378.102
New 24.216 21-06-1788 1.316.470
Hampshire
New Mexico 314.915 06-01-1912 2.059.179
Ohio 116.096 01-03-1803 11.536.504
Oklahoma 181.035 16-11-1907 3.751.351
Oregon 254.805 14-02-1859 3.831.074
Pennsylvania 119.283 12-12-1787 12.702.379
Rhode Island 4.002 29-05-1790 1.052.567
Tennessee 109.151 01-06-1796 6.346.105
Texas 695.621 29-12-1845 25.145.561
Utah 219.887 04-01-1896 2.763.885
Vermont 24.901 04-03-1791 625.741
Virginia 110.785 25-06-1788 8.001.024
W.V. 62.755 20-06-1863 1.852.994
Washington 184.665 11-11-1889 6.724.540
Wisconsin 169.639 29-05-1848 5.686.986
Wyoming 253.336 10-07-1890 563.626

COLONIZATION AND INDEPENDENCE OF THE

UNITED STATES
 America was found in an expedition commanded by Christopher Columbus
in the service of the Spanish Crown on October 12, 1492. The Spanish
conquest of the American territories covered the Caribbean, Central America,
South America and, in North America, territories from the West to Alaska and
the entire South-East. In this way, Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, Texas, New
Mexico, California, Oregon, Washington and Alaska were in the hands of Spain
within the Viceroyalty of New Spain. In Alaska the occupation would be limited
to some commercial factories that would later be abandoned.

On August 28, 1565, Pedro Menéndez de Avilés founded the city of San
Agustín (Florida). It is the oldest European settlement occupied today in the
United States. Only San Juan (Puerto Rico) surpasses it as the oldest city in
"the United States." The Spanish had already explored the area in expeditions
that took place between 1513 Juan Ponce de León and 1563, but without
building any stable fortification. However, the presence, in 1564, of a large
contingent of French Huguenots, who built a fort at the mouth of the San Juan
River, posed a serious threat, which led Spain to the decision to establish a
permanent military presence in the area. .
In 1583, Queen Elizabeth I of England granted authorization to the pirate Sir
Walter Raleigh to found a colony in North Florida, which she would call Virginia
and which would include South Carolina, North Carolina, Virginia, West Virginia
and Maine. The possibility of exploiting the area with tobacco crops was quickly
seen, creating the Virginia Company as a joint stock company in 1606, which
financed the first English settlement.
In 1607 a group of English settlers built a tiny village in Jamestown, Virginia.
Bearers of a charter from King James I of England, they founded a permanent
colony in the first seven months after their arrival. But the colony over time grew
and prospered, basing its economy on the cultivation of tobacco, which they
began to send to England in 1614.
In New England, the northeastern region of what is now the United States,
English Puritans established several colonies. These colonizers thought that the
Church of England had adopted too many practices of Catholicism, and they
came to America fleeing persecution in English lands and with the intention of
founding a colony based on their own religious ideals. A group of Puritans,
known as the Pilgrims, crossed the Atlantic on a ship called the Mayflower and
settled in Plymouth in 1620. A much larger Puritan colony was established in
the Boston area in 1630. By 1635, some settlers were already migrating to
nearby Connecticut.
Roger Williams, a Puritan who disagreed with community decisions,
maintained that the state should not intervene in religious matters. Forced to
leave Massachusetts in 1635, he founded the neighboring colony of Rhode
Island, which guaranteed religious freedom and the separation of state and
church. The colonies of Maryland, established in 1634 as a refuge for Catholics,
and Pennsylvania, founded in 1681 by the Quaker leader William Penn, were
also characterized by their religious tolerance. This tolerance, in turn, attracted
other groups of colonizers to the New World.
Over time, the British colonies in North America were also occupied by
many groups of non-British origin. German farmers settled in Pennsylvania, the
Swedes founded the Delaware colony, and the first African slaves arrived in
Virginia in 1619. In 1626, Dutch colonizers purchased the island of Manhattan
from the indigenous chiefs of the region and built the city of New Amsterdam; In
1664, this colony was taken by the English and renamed New York.
By the 1770s, several small but expanding urban centers had already
emerged, each with newspapers, shops, merchants and artisans. Philadelphia,
with 28,000 residents, was the largest city, followed by New York, Boston, and
Charleston. Unlike most other nations, the United States never had a feudal
aristocracy. In the colonial era land was abundant and labor scarce, and every
free man had the opportunity to achieve, if not prosperity, then at least
economic independence.
All the colonies shared the tradition of representative government. The
English monarch appointed many of the colonial governors, but all of them had
to govern jointly with an elected assembly. The vote was restricted to white
male landowners, but most white men owned enough property to vote. England
could not exercise direct control over its North American colonies. London was
too far away, and the colonists had a very independent spirit.
By 1733, the English had occupied thirteen colonies along the Atlantic coast,
from New Hampshire in the north to Georgia in the south:

New Hampshire.
Massachusetts.
Rhode Island.
Connecticut.
NY.
New Jersey.
Pennsylvania.
Delaware.
Maryland.
Virginia.
North Carolina.
South Carolina.
Georgia.
 (Flag designed by Betsy Ross with 13 stars
and 13 bands, representing the Thirteen Colonies.)

The French controlled Canada and Louisiana, which included the entire
Mississippi River: a vast empire with few inhabitants. Between 1689 and 1815,
France and Great Britain fought several wars, and North America was involved
in each of them. In 1756 France and England were engaged in the Seven
Years' War, known in the United States as the French and Indian War. British
Prime Minister William Pitt poured soldiers and money into North America and
gained an empire. British forces took the Canadian strongholds of Louisburg
(1758), Quebec (1759), and Montreal (1760). The Treaty of Paris, signed in
1763, gave Great Britain rights to Canada and all of North America east of the
Mississippi River.
England's victory led directly to conflict with its North American colonies. To
prevent them from fighting with the region's natives, called Indians by
Europeans, a royal proclamation denied the settlers the right to settle west of
the Appalachian Mountains. The British government began to punish smugglers
and imposed new taxes on sugar, coffee, textiles, and other imported goods.
The Quartering Act forced the colonies to house and feed British soldiers; and
with the passage of the Stamp Act, special tax stamps were to be affixed to all
newspapers, pamphlets, legal documents, and licenses.
These measures seemed very fair to British politicians, who had spent large
sums of money to defend their North American colonies during and after the
French and Indian War. Surely their reasoning was that the colonists should
cover part of those expenses. But the colonists feared that the new taxes would
hinder trade, and that British troops stationed in the colonies could be used to
crush the civil liberties that the colonists had until then enjoyed.
In 1765, representatives from nine colonies met as the "Stamp Law
Congress" and protested the new tax. Merchants refused to sell British goods,
stamp dealers were threatened by angry mobs, and most colonists simply
refused to buy the stamps. The British Parliament was forced to repeal the
Stamp Act, but it enforced the Lodging Act, imposed taxes on tea and other
products, and sent customs officials to Boston to collect those tariffs. Again the
colonists chose to disobey, so British soldiers were sent to Boston.
Tensions were eased when Lord North, the new British Prime Minister,
eliminated all new taxes except that on tea. In 1773, a group of colonists
responded to this tax by staging the Boston Tea Party: disguised as indigenous
people, they boarded British merchant ships and threw 342 crates of tea into
the water in Boston Harbor. Parliament then enacted the "Intolerable Acts":
independence from the colonial government of Massachusetts was drastically
restricted and more British soldiers were sent to Boston Harbor, which was
already closed to merchant ships. In September 1774, the First Continental
Congress took place in Philadelphia, a meeting of colonial leaders who opposed
what they perceived as British oppression in the colonies. These leaders urged
the colonists to disobey the Intolerable Laws and boycott British trade. The
settlers began to organize militias and stockpile weapons and ammunition.
In 1775 the war officially began, whose initial development was clearly
under English control, but its course would change when, after the Battle of
Saratoga, the first great American victory, France and later Spain would enter
the war supporting the American independentists.
By the Treaty of Versailles (1783), England is forced to recognize the
independence of the 13 American colonies, as they had drafted in the famous
Declaration of Independence of the United States of 1776.
Once independence was achieved, it was very difficult for all the former
colonies to agree on whether they would continue as independent states, or be
reunited into a single nation. After several years of negotiations, in 1787, 55
representatives of the former colonies met at the Philadelphia Congress in order
to draft a constitution. A single federal government was thus created, with a
President of the Republic and two Legislative Chambers (Congress and
Senate) as an intermediate solution. He also wrote the Constitution of 1787,
and called the elections by which George Washington was inaugurated as the
first President of the United States.

AMERICAN CIVIL WAR

 The Civil War or American Civil War was a significant conflict in the history of
the United States of America, which took place between 1861 and 1865.
The two opposing sides were the forces of the Northern states (the Union)
against the newly formed Confederate States of America, made up of eleven
Southern states that proclaimed their independence.
Abraham Lincoln lost a senatorial race in which he demanded an end to the
expansion of slavery, but in 1860 he and Douglas faced off again: this time as
the Republican and Democratic presidential candidates. By then the tension
between the North and the South was extreme. In 1859, John Brown, a
supporter of abolitionism, had tried to start a slave rebellion in Virginia by
attacking an army ammunition depot. Brown was quickly captured, tried, and
sentenced to hang. After his execution, many inhabitants of the North hailed
him as a martyr. However, Southern whites became convinced that the North
was unwilling to maintain state liberties within the confederation of states that
then constituted the United States of America.
Douglas urged the southern Democrats to remain in the Union, but they in
turn nominated their own presidential candidate (John C. Breckinridge) and
threatened to secede if the Republicans were victorious; There was also
another southern candidate who opposed Lincoln, John C. Bell. The majority in
the Southern and border states voted against Lincoln, but the North supported
him and won the election.
In March 1861, when Lincoln took office, South Carolina, Mississippi,
Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana and Texas became the Confederate
States of America with Jefferson Davis as president, proclaiming their
secession from the Union, an act which Lincoln declared illegal in his inaugural
address.
The first act of war was the Confederate assault on the Fort Sumter garrison
on April 12, 1861. The repression of the army when recovering Fort Sumter
caused the Confederate states to join Virginia, Arkansas, Tennessee and North
Carolina. Thus began the civil war between the Confederate States of the South
and the States of the North, which would end with the victory of the latter in
1865.
Twenty-three states remained loyal to the Union: California, Connecticut,
Delaware, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Maine, Maryland,
Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, New Hampshire, New Jersey,
New York, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont, and
Wisconsin. During the war, Nevada and West Virginia were created and joined
the Union. Tennessee and Louisiana re-aligned with the northern states shortly
after the armed conflict began. The territories of Colorado, Dakota, Nebraska,
Nevada, New Mexico, Utah, and Washington fought on the Union side.
In the background, it was a struggle between two totally different types of
economies: an industrial-abolitionist one (North) and an agrarian-slavery one
(South). The Sureños declared that they were not fighting only for slavery. After
all, most Confederate soldiers were too poor to own slaves. The South was
committed to a war of independence that would maintain relations between the
North and the South. The Confederates generally had the advantage of fighting
on their own territory. They had soldiers very well dedicated to the cause, but
they were much smaller in number than the Northern Union forces. At the end
of the war, some of the members of these groups were persecuted as outlaws
for the outrages committed during the war.
To fight the war, the South financed itself with the export of cotton that was
shipped to Europe and the North, with the issuance of a new paper currency,
after Lincoln rejected a loan of $5,000,000 at 12% interest offered by Moses
Taylor. . Both sides suspended some civil liberties, printed mountains of paper
money, and resorted to forced conscription.
Lincoln's priority was to keep the United States as one country. After the
initial losses of the first battles, he had to recognize that the development of the
war could only be changed by making the war a battle against slavery and thus
could gain support for the Union both at home and abroad. Consequently, on
January 11, 1863, the second year of the war, he issued the Emancipation
Proclamation, which granted freedom to all slaves in areas still controlled by the
Confederacy.
The Southern army won important victories in the first stage of the war, but
in 1863 its commander, General Robert E. Lee, headed towards Pennsylvania.
At Gettysburg he encountered a Union army, and thus began the largest battle
ever fought on American soil. After three days of desperate fighting, the
Confederates were defeated. The Union navy quickly imposed a blockade that
created serious shortages of war materiel and consumer goods in the
confederacy. At the same time, on the Mississippi River, Union General Ulysses
S. Grant took the important city of Vicksburg. Union forces now controlled the
entire Mississippi Valley, dividing the Confederacy in two and choking its outlet
to the sea.
In 1864, a Union army under General William Tecumseh Sherman marched
through Georgia, destroying the countryside. Meanwhile, General Grant battled
relentlessly with Lee's forces in Virginia. On April 2, 1865, Lee was forced to
abandon Richmond, the capital of the Confederacy. A week later he
surrendered and all other Confederate forces surrendered soon after. On April
14, 1865, Lincoln was assassinated by actor John Wilkes Booth. On May 12,
1865, the Union attacked Rancho Palmito in Cameron County, on the Mexican
border, where Confederate forces still remained.
Slavery ended in the United States in the spring of 1865 when the
Confederate armies surrendered.

CAUSES OF WAR
 The difficult coexistence of slave states with anti-slavery northern states
eased the path to war. After expanding westward, the southern society wanted
to expand the number of states by conquering Cuba. For this he offered
command of the troops to Colonel Robert E. Lee, who was responsible from Rio
Grande City for order on the new border with Mexico. The Senate prohibited the
expedition against Cuba, a Spanish colony, based on the Neutrality Law that
both countries had signed.
Lincoln did not propose federal antislavery laws, but in an 1858 speech he
expressed his desire to stop the expansion of slavery and replace it with the
idea that it was on the path to ultimate extinction. Much of the political battle in
the 1850s focused on the expansion of slavery into the newly created territories.
All the new areas were to become free territories, which increased the
secessionist movement in the South. Both the North and the South assumed
that if slavery could not be expanded, it would eventually be eliminated entirely.
Both the North and the South were influenced by the ideas of Thomas
Jefferson.8 9 10 Southerners emphasized Jefferson's words about the rights of
the states to defend slavery. Northerners from abolitionist William Lloyd
Garrison to moderate Republican leader Abraham Lincoln focused on
Jefferson's declaration that all men were created equal.

Belligerents

United States of
Confederate States
America
of America
(" The Union ")
(" The
Confederation ")

Commanders

Abraham Lincoln Jefferson Davis

Ulysses S. grant Judah P.

Willian T. Benjamin
Sherman Robert E. read
Joseph E.
George B. Johnston
 McClellan Raphael
Semmes

Josiah Tattnall

Forces in combat

2,400,000 750,000-
soldiers 1,227,890 soldiers

Low

110,000 killed in 97,000 killed in

combat combat
360,000 dead 258,000 dead
275,200 injured 138,000 injured

ROLE OF THE UNITED STATES IN THE 1ST WORLD WAR

When war broke out in Europe, President Wilson formally proclaimed the
neutrality of the United States. This declaration, however, did not prevent
tendencies favorable to one or another contending side from emerging in the
country. In order to prevent food, ammunition and other supplies from reaching
Britain, Germany declared the waters around Britain and Ireland a war zone,
ordering its submarines to sink all enemy ships. To avoid the possibility that
neutral ships could be attacked by mistake, Germany recommended that they
not enter that area. In May 1915, a German submarine torpedoed a passenger
ship, the “Lusitania,” off the Irish coast without warning; 1,198 people died, of
whom 128 were Americans. German authorities claimed that the “Lusitania”
was transporting ammunition to Great Britain (an assertion that subsequent
investigation proved to be true); However, pressure from American public
opinion forced the State Department to obtain the German promise to adopt
precautions to guarantee the lives of civilians.
Despite these promises, in March 1916 a German submarine sank a steam
ferry in the English Channel, the Sussex, killing two American citizens. In May
the German government promised not to sink merchant ships without giving
prior warning and without first saving the lives of crew members and travelers.
At the end of January 1917, Germany declared unrestricted submarine
warfare in an even larger area than it had established in 1915. On February 3,
the United States broke diplomatic relations with Germany.
New submarine attacks against neutral ships and the discovery of a plan by
the German Foreign Office according to which Germany, Japan and Mexico
would unite against the United States if this country entered the war, caused
Wilson to request April 2, 1917 Congress to declare war on Germany.
President Wilson played a leading role in the Peace Conference held in
Paris in 1919 after Germany's defeat. His intention to restore peace on the
basis of his program known as the Fourteen Points was frustrated by the
diplomacy of the other Allied powers who wanted to impose harsh sanctions on
Germany.
The US Senate did not ratify either the country's entry into the League of
Nations or the Treaty, so the peace agreements with Germany, Austria and
Hungary later had to be negotiated separately.

EMERGENCE OF FORDISM IN THE UNITED STATES

The term “Fordism” refers to the chain mode of production.

which was put into practice by Henry Ford, a United States automobile
manufacturer, starting in 1908. It involves dividing production work into different
stages, in which workers or machines, specialized exclusively in that phase of
production, carry them out quickly and efficiently. The difference with Taylorism
is that this innovation was not achieved primarily at the expense of the worker,
but through a market expansion strategy.
In summary, we can count as central elements of the Fordist model:

-Increased division of labor.

-Deepening control of the worker's productive times (time/execution link).

-Reduction of costs and increase in the circulation of merchandise (interclass

market expansion) and interest in increasing the purchasing power of
employees (subaltern classes to the elite).

-Policies of agreement between organized workers (union) and the capitalist.

-Serial production.

CRISIS OF 1929 (THE GREAT DEPRESSION)

The Great Depression, also known as the twenty-nine crisis, was a global
economic crisis that lasted during the 1930s, in the years before World War II.
Its duration depends on the countries analyzed, but in most it began around
1929 and lasted until the late 1930s or early 1940s. It was the longest
depression in time, the deepest, and the one that affected the most countries in
the 20th century. In the 21st century it has been used as a paradigm of how far
the world economy can decline. The so-called Great Depression originated in
the United States, starting with the stock market crash on October 29, 1929
(known as Black Tuesday, although five days before, on October 24, Black
Thursday had already occurred), and quickly spread to almost all countries in
the world.
The depression had devastating effects on almost all countries, rich and
poor. National income, tax revenues, profits and prices fell, and international
trade fell by 50 to 66%. Unemployment in the United States rose to 25%, and in
some countries reached 33%.1 Cities around the world were severely affected,
especially those dependent on heavy industry, and construction came to a
virtual halt in many areas. Agriculture and rural areas suffered from a drop in
crop prices that reached approximately 60%. Given the drop in demand, areas
dependent on primary sector industries, with few alternative sources of
employment, were the most affected.
Countries began to progressively recover in the mid-1930s, but its negative
effects in many countries lasted until the beginning of World War II. The election
of Franklin Delano Roosevelt as president and the establishment of the New
Deal in 1932 marked the beginning of the end of the Great Depression in the
United States.

ROLE OF THE UNITED STATES IN THE 2nd WORLD WAR

World War II began on September 1, 1939. The war began when Germany
invaded Poland. Within a few days, other countries joined one of the largest
conflicts in history. The countries hostile to each other were known as the Axis
and the Allied Forces. The Axis Powers consisted of Germany, Japan, Hungary,
Romania, and Bulgaria. The Allied powers were the United States, Great
Britain, France, the Soviet Union, Australia, Brazil, China, Belgium, Canada,
Yugoslavia, South Africa, Poland, Norway, New Zealand, Denmark, Greece and
Holland.
The United States, officially neutral during the early stages of World War II,
began supplying supplies to the Allies in March 1941, through the Lend-Lease
Program. On December 7, 1941, the country joined the Allied fight against the
Axis Powers, after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. World War II boosted
the economy by providing investment capital and jobs, causing many women to
enter the workforce. Of the major combatants, the United States was the only
nation to become rich from the war. The conferences at Bretton Woods and
Yalta created a new system of international organization that placed the country
and the Soviet Union at the center of world affairs. In 1945, as World War II
came to an end in Europe, an international conference in San Francisco drafted
the United Nations Charter, which came into force after the war. After having
developed the first nuclear weapon, the government decided to use it in the
Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August of that same year. Japan
surrendered on September 2, ending the war.

COLD WAR
The Cold War was a political, economic, social, military, informational and
even sporting confrontation that began at the end of the Second World War,
whose origin is usually placed in 1947, during the post-war tensions, and lasted
until the dissolution of the Union. Soviet (beginning of Perestroika in 1985, fall of
the Berlin Wall in 1989 and coup d'état in the USSR in 1991), between the
Western-capitalist blocs led by the United States, and the Eastern-communist
one led by the Soviet Union. The reasons for this confrontation were essentially
ideological and political.
Although these confrontations did not lead to a world war, the entity and
severity of the economic, political and ideological conflicts that were involved
significantly marked much of the history of the second half of the 20th century.
The two superpowers certainly wanted to implement their model of government
throughout the planet.
Neither bloc ever took direct action against the other, which is why the
conflict was called the "Cold War."

CUTTON POLICY
The Big Stick doctrine or policy is the name given to a trend in American
diplomatic relations at the beginning of the 20th century. The expression
originates from a phrase written by the president of the United States, Theodore
Roosevelt, in 1901, where he expressed his pleasure because the New York
Republican Party committee had expelled a corrupt advisor. The phrase, taken
from a West African proverb, was: "speak softly and carry a big club, so you will
go far."
Such a concept illustrates Roosevelt's willingness to carry out negotiations
and pacts with his internal and external adversaries, but always showing the
possibility of violent action as a means of pressure. Applied to United States
policy in Latin America, the phrase showed that the Roosevelt regime could
pressure Latin American countries, particularly those bordering the Caribbean
Sea, with armed intervention.
It marks the beginning of American imperialism and its performance as a
world power. In Latin America, a wave of American political and economic
dominance would begin (at the beginning of the 20th century) justified by the
marked extension of the "right" of the United States to intervene in the affairs of
other countries in defense of the interests of American citizens, found in the
"Roosevelt Corollary to the Monroe Doctrine" issued by Theodore Roosevelt in
his annual message of 1904 as a consequence of the intervention of the
European powers in the Naval Blockade of Venezuela of 1902-1903.

ATTACK OF SEPTEMBER 11, 2001

The attacks of September 11, 2001 (commonly known as 9/11 or, in Spain, with
the number 11-S) were a series of suicide terrorist attacks committed that day in
the United States by members of the jihadist network Al Qaeda through the
hijacking of airliners to be hit against several targets and causing the death of
nearly 3,000 people and the injury of another 6,000, as well as the destruction
of the surroundings of the World Trade Center in New York and serious damage
to the Pentagon, in the State of Virginia, being the episode that would precede
the war in Afghanistan and the adoption by the US Government and its allies of
the policy called the War on Terrorism.
The attacks were committed by nineteen members of the Al-Qaeda jihadist
network, divided into four groups of hijackers, each of them with a terrorist pilot
who would be in charge of flying the plane once the cabin crew had been
reduced. The planes of American Airlines Flight 11 and United Airlines Flight
175 were the first to be hijacked, both crashing into the two twin towers of the
World Trade Center, the first against the North tower and the second shortly
after against the South, causing that both skyscrapers collapsed within the next
two hours.
The third hijacked plane belonged to American Airlines Flight 77 and was
used to be hit against one of the facades of the Pentagon in Virginia. The fourth
plane, belonging to United Airlines Flight 93, did not reach any target when it
crashed in an open field, near Shanksville, in Pennsylvania, after losing control
in the cabin as a result of the confrontation between the passengers and crew
with the terrorist commando. It would eventually target the United States
Capitol, located in the city of Washington DC.
The attacks caused more than 6,000 injuries, the death of 2,973 people and
the disappearance of another 24.4, with the 19 terrorists also being killed.

GOVERNMENT AND POLITICS

The United States is the oldest federation in the world. It is a constitutional,
democratic and representative republic, "in which the mandate of the majority is
regulated by the rights of minorities, protected by law." The government is
regulated by a system of checks and balances, defined by the Constitution,
which serves as the country's supreme legal document. In the American
federalist system, citizens are generally subject to three levels of government:
federal, state, and local; Local government duties are commonly divided
between county and municipal governments. In almost all cases, executive and
legislative branch officials are elected by direct suffrage of the citizens of the
district.
 EXTERNAL RELATIONSHIPS
The United States exerts global economic, political and military influence. It is
a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council, and the
Headquarters of the United Nations is located in New York City. It is also a
member of the G8, the G-20 and the Organization for Economic Cooperation
and Development. The vast majority of countries have an embassy or consulate
in Washington D. c. or another important city in the country. In turn, almost
every country in the world has a US diplomatic mission. However, Cuba, Iran,
North Korea, Bhutan, Sudan, and the Republic of China (Taiwan) do not have
formal diplomatic relations with the nation.
It also enjoys strong ties with the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, New
Zealand, Japan, South Korea and Israel. It works closely with its colleagues in
the North Atlantic Treaty Organization on military and security issues, and with
its neighbors through the Organization of American States and international
treaties such as the American Free Trade Agreement trilateral agreement. of
the North with Canada and Mexico. In 2012, the United States spent a net
$30.46 billion on official development assistance, the most in the world,
although in terms of percentage of Gross Domestic Product (GDP), its
contribution of 0.19% ranked one of the last places among the twenty-three
donor nations. In contrast, private American companies are relatively more
generous.

TERRITORIAL ORGANIZATION
The United States is a federal union of fifty states. The original thirteen
states were the successors of the Thirteen colonies that rebelled against the
British Empire. Shortly after independence, three new states were created from
existing ones: Kentucky from Virginia; Tennessee from North Carolina and
Maine from Massachusetts. Most other states were created from territories
obtained through war or government purchase. Vermont, Texas, and Hawaii are
the exception: each was an independent republic before joining the Union.
During the Civil War, West Virginia separated from Virginia. The most recent
state is Hawaii, which achieved statehood recognition on August 21, 1959.
States do not have the right to secede from the Union.
The states make up much of the US territory; The other two areas that are
considered an integral part of the country is the District of Columbia, the federal
district where the capital Washington D. is located. C., and the Palmyra Atoll, an
uninhabited but incorporated territory, located in the Pacific Ocean. The United
States also has five large overseas territories: Puerto Rico and the United
States Virgin Islands in the Caribbean and American Samoa, Guam, and the
Northern Mariana Islands in the Pacific. Those who were born in those
territories (except for American Samoa) possess US citizenship. U.S. citizens
residing in the territories have many of the rights and responsibilities of citizens
residing in the states; However, they are generally exempt from paying federal
taxes, cannot vote in presidential elections, and are only represented as
observers in Congress.

GEOGRAPHY
The national territory has multiple landforms and geographical features. As
you move inland, the coastal plain of the Atlantic coast gives way to the
deciduous forest and the Piedmont plateau. The Appalachians separate the
eastern coast of the Great Lakes from the prairies of the Midwest. The
Mississippi–Missouri River, the fourth-longest river system in the world, runs
north to south through the center of the country. The flat, fertile grassland of the
Great Plains extends westward, until it is interrupted by a highland region in the
southeast. The Rocky Mountains, on the western edge of the Great Plains,
cross the entire country from north to south, reaching altitudes above 4,300
meters above sea level in Colorado. Further west is the Great Basin and
deserts such as the Mojave, Sonoran and Chihuahuan Deserts. The Sierra
Nevada mountains and the Cascade range are located near the Pacific coast.
At 6,194 meters above sea level, Mount McKinley in Alaska is the highest point
in the country and on the entire continent. Active volcanoes are common
throughout Alaska and the Aleutian Islands, plus Hawaii consists of only
volcanic islands. The supervolcano located beneath Yellowstone National Park
in the Rocky Mountains is the largest volcanic form on the continent.

CLIMATE
Due to its large size and geographical variety, the country has most types of
climate. East of the 100th meridian, the climate varies from humid continental in
the north to humid subtropical in the south. The southern tip of Florida and the
Hawaiian Islands have a tropical climate. The Great Plains west of the 100th
meridian are semiarid, while much of the western mountains have an alpine
climate. The climate is arid in the Great Basin and in the deserts of the
southwest, it is Mediterranean on the California coast and oceanic on the
southern coast of Alaska, Oregon and Washington. Most of the Alaskan territory
has a subarctic or polar climate. Extreme weather events are not uncommon—
the states bordering the Gulf of Mexico are prone to hurricanes, and most of the
world's tornadoes develop within the country, primarily in the Tornado Alley
area of the Midwest.

FLORA AND FAUNA

The United States is considered a megadiverse country: about 17,000 species
of vascular plants live in the contiguous United States and Alaska and more
than 1,800 species of flowering plants can be found in Hawaii alone, few of
which grow on the mainland. The country is home to more than 400 species of
mammals, 750 species of birds and 500 species of reptiles and amphibians.
More than 91,000 different kinds of insects have also been discovered here.
 The Endangered Species Act of 1973 protects threatened and endangered
species and their habitats, which are overseen by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife
Service. In total, the federal government owns 28.8% of the country's total area.
Most of this percentage is made up of the fifty-eight national parks and
hundreds of other protected natural areas managed by federal and state
authorities. Of the rest of the government lands, some are rented for the
extraction of oil and natural gas, for mining, agriculture or livestock; only 2.4% is
used for military purposes.

ECONOMY
The United States economy is a mixed capitalist economy, characterized by
abundant natural resources, developed infrastructure, and high productivity.
According to the International Monetary Fund, its GDP of US$15.7 trillion
constitutes 24% of the Gross World Product and about 21% of it in purchasing
power parity (PPP) terms.7 This is the largest GDP in the world, although in
2008 it was 5% less than the GDP (PPP) of the European Union. The country
has the 17th highest nominal GDP per capita and the 6th highest GDP (PPP)
per capita in the world. In addition, the country is in second place in the 2010
Global Competitiveness Index.

INFRASTRUCTURE: TRANSPORTATION
As a developed country, the United States has an advanced transportation
infrastructure: 6,465,799 km of highways, 226,427 km of railroads, 15,095
airports and 41,009 km of waterways.81 Most of its inhabitants use the
automobile as their main means of transportation.

DEMOGRAPHY
According to estimates by the National Census Bureau, in June 2013 the
population of the United States amounted to 315,990,000 inhabitants, including
an estimated 11.2 million illegal immigrants. This makes it the third most
populous nation in the world, after China and India.

EDUCATION
American public education is operated by state and local governments,
regulated by the United States Department of Education. Children are required
to attend school from the age of six or seven (usually kindergarten or the first
grade of primary school) until they turn eighteen (usually until twelfth grade, the
end of primary school). high school); Some states allow students to leave
school at sixteen or seventeen.

LANGUAGE
 English is the de facto national language. Although there is no official
language at the federal level, some laws such as the Naturalization
Requirements make English a mandatory language. In 2006, nearly 224 million,
or 80% of the population over the age of five, spoke only English at home.
Spanish, spoken by 12% of the population, is the second most spoken
language, and the one most commonly learned as a second language.

RELIGION
The United States is officially a secular state; The First Amendment
guarantees the free exercise of religion and prohibits the establishment of any
religious government. In a 2002 study, 59% of Americans said religion played a
"very important role in their lives," higher than any other developed nation.
According to a 2007 survey, 78.4% of adults identified as Christians, a decline
from 1990, when it was 86.4%. Protestant denominations represented 51.3%,
while the Catholic Church, with 23.9%, was the largest religious current.

HEALTH
In 2006, life expectancy was 77.8 years,167 one year shorter than the
Western European average, and much shorter than that of countries such as
Norway, Switzerland and Canada. Over the past two decades, life expectancy
has fallen from 11th in the world to 42nd. Infant mortality is 6.37 deaths per
1,000 live births. Approximately one third of the adult population is obese
and another third is overweight; The obesity rate, one of the highest in the
world, has doubled in the last twenty-five years.

SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY

The United States has been a leader in scientific research and technological
innovation since the 19th century. In 1876, Alexander Graham Bell received the
first American patent for the telephone. Thomas Edison's laboratory developed
the phonograph, the first incandescent lamp, and the first movie projector.
Nikola Tesla was a pioneer in experimenting with alternating current, the
alternating current motor, and the radio. In the 20th century, Ransom Eli Olds
and Henry Ford's automobile companies promoted mass production. In 1903,
the Wright Brothers made the first powered flight in their Wright Flyer aircraft.
The rise of Nazism in the 1930s led many European scientists, including
Albert Einstein and Enrico Fermi, to emigrate to the country. During World War
II, the Manhattan Project had already developed the first nuclear weapons,
heralding the beginning of the nuclear age. The space race also produced rapid
advances in rocket construction and development, materials science, and
computing.

GASTRONOMY
 The cuisine of the United States is similar to that of other Western countries,
with wheat being the most used cereal. Traditional American cuisine uses
ingredients such as turkey, venison, potatoes, sweet potatoes, corn, pumpkins,
maple syrup and other indigenous elements used by Native Americans and
early European settlers. Pork and beef barbecues, crab cakes, potato chips,
and chocolate chip cookies are some of the dishes made "American style." Soul
food, the traditional cuisine of African slaves, is still popular in the South and
among African Americans in other parts of the country. Syncretic cuisines, such
as Louisiana Creole, Cajun, and Tex-Mex, have great regional importance.

SPORTS
Since the late 19th century, baseball has been considered the national sport,
while American football, basketball, and ice hockey are the three other major
professional team sports.
While most major sports in the United States have evolved from European
practices, basketball, volleyball, cheerleading, and snowboarding are local
inventions.

KU KLUX KLAN (KKK)

Ku Klux Klan (KKK) is the name adopted by several far-right organizations in
the United States, created in the 19th century, immediately after the Civil War,
and which mainly promote xenophobia, as well as the supremacy of the white
race, homophobia, anti-Semitism, racism and anti-communism. These
organizations have often resorted to terrorism, violence and acts of intimidation
such as cross burning, to oppress their victims.

The first incarnation of the Klan was founded in late 1865 by post-Civil War
veterans who wanted to resist Reconstruction. The organization quickly adopted
violent methods to achieve its goals. However, there was a reaction that quickly
led the organization to decline, as southern elites saw the Klan as a pretext for
federal troops to be active in the Southern States. The KKK was formally
dissolved in 1870 by Republican President Ulysses S. Grant, through the Civil
Rights Act of 1871 (known as "The Ku-Klux Klan Act").

RACISM IN THE UNITED STATES

Racism in the United States has primarily manifested itself among white
Anglo-Saxons and native-born Americans against African Americans, and more
recently against Chinese, Japanese, Latin Americans, Jews, and Muslims.

After their liberation during the Civil War by Abraham Lincoln, Southern
states, resentful of their defeat during the Civil War, passed a variety of laws to
discriminate against black citizens. This phenomenon occurred during the
"reconstruction" period after the civil war. With the election of Rutherford B.
Hayes as the 19th president, discrimination spread to the northern states that
initially did not have it, to the point that at the beginning of the 20th century the
severity of discrimination and racism could be seen in places like New York,
Boston, Detroit, Chicago and Los Angeles.

The reality was that educational, employment, housing, and economic

opportunities were not equal. For example, white public schools received more
money and new supplies, while black schools received as little money as
possible.

ORGANIZATION OF AMERICAN STATES (OAS)

The Organization of American States (OAS) is a Pan-American international
organization of regional and continental scope created on May 8, 1948, with the
objective of being a political forum for decision-making, multilateral dialogue and
the integration of America or the Americas. The organization's statement
says that it works to strengthen peace, security and consolidate democracy,
promote human rights, support social and economic development, favoring
sustainable growth in America or the Americas. In its actions it seeks to build
stronger relationships between the nations and peoples of the continent. The
official languages of the organization are Spanish, Portuguese, English and
French. Its acronym in Spanish is OEA and in English OAS (Organization of
American States).

The OAS is headquartered in the District of Columbia, United States. It also

has regional offices in the different member countries. The organization is made
up of 35 member countries.

CUBAN-US DIPLOMATIC RELATIONS

Diplomatic relations between Cuba and the United States of America have
been influenced by mutual interest, especially since before the struggles for
independence. Plans to purchase the island were revealed by the United States
on several occasions. While Spanish influence in the Caribbean diminished, the
United States progressively gained a position of political and economic
domination over the island, with a significant weight of foreign investment, and
the majority of imports and exports, as well as strong political influence. .

After the Cuban Revolution of 1959, relations deteriorated substantially,

and have been marked ever since by tension and confrontation. The United
States does not have formal diplomatic relations with Cuba and has maintained
an embargo that makes commercial relations between US companies and Cuba
illegal. The diplomatic representation of the United States in Cuba is held by the
United States Interests Office in Havana, as is the case on the part of Cuba in
Washington; both are, officially, part of the respective embassies in Switzerland.
 On the other hand, the United States continues to occupy Guantánamo
Bay, in the Guantánamo Province, a point of tension between both countries
since Cuban independence in 1902.

AFGHANISTAN WAR
The war on terrorism is a United States campaign supported by several
members of NATO and other allies, with the declared purpose of ending
international terrorism, systematically eliminating the so-called terrorist groups,
considered as such by the United Nations Organization. (UN) and all those
suspected of belonging to these groups, and putting an end to the alleged
sponsorship of terrorism by States. This international offensive was launched by
the Bush Administration after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 in New
York and Washington, DC, carried out by al-Qaeda, becoming a central part of
that administration's foreign and domestic policy regarding the countries
integrated into the so-called axis of evil. According to information appearing in
various media, Bush's successor, Barack Obama, has started a "secret war"
against terrorism by authorizing drone attacks against alleged leaders and
militants of Al Qaeda and associated jihadist groups in Yemen, Somalia and
Pakistan.

IRAQ WAR
After the invasion of Afghanistan, and within the strategy set by the United
States, Iraq began to be positioned as a geostrategic objective, due to its
unfavorable political orientation for the West and its geographical location in the
heart of the Middle East and with large borders with the Republic. Islamic Iran
and Saudi Arabia. The vast majority of Western societies were opposed to a
possible war against Iraq. Despite the political cost it represented, twenty
countries around the world positioned themselves favorably towards an
intervention, led politically by the rulers of the US, the United Kingdom and
Spain.