Finding the Core Issues
If a tree has hundreds of branches, examining every leaf will not tell us how the tree grows. We must also investigate its trunk and roots. The same principle can help with world problems. What appear to be separate conflicts may share influential underlying conditions.
One such condition worth investigating is the American pursuit of global primacy: the idea that the United States should retain a leading, sometimes dominant, position in the international order and the capacity to shape outcomes well beyond its borders.
This is a hypothesis about one major source of international influence—not a claim that America causes every war or that other countries lack ambitions of their own. The question is more precise: How many international difficulties are affected by policies designed to maintain American predominance, and what follows from that influence?
Why this particular trunk deserves examination
The scale of American power is unusually large. According to SIPRI, the United States spent about $954 billion on its military in 2025, around one-third of total world military expenditure. [1] A 2024 Congressional Research Service assessment identified at least 128 U.S. overseas military bases in at least 51 countries under its counting method. [2] The exact base count depends on how facilities and temporary access arrangements are defined; the broader point is the worldwide reach of American power.
Such reach can serve several purposes. Allies may regard U.S. deployments as protection from attack. Patrols and security partnerships may support trade and reassure smaller states. Yet the same deployments may appear threatening to competing powers, encourage arms races, or make distant confrontations more likely.
History provides cases in which American influence altered other countries’ politics. Declassified records document U.S. and British involvement in the 1953 overthrow of Iranian prime minister Mohammad Mosaddegh. [3] The 2003 invasion of Iraq offers a different lesson: a U.S. commission later concluded that central prewar intelligence judgments about Iraqi weapons of mass destruction were wrong. [4] These events differ greatly, but both illustrate why actions undertaken by a powerful state can have consequences far beyond their stated objectives.
The story is not entirely one of coercion. U.S. security guarantees and diplomatic initiatives have also supported international stability and negotiated agreements. An honest examination must account for those effects as well. The issue is not whether American power has ever done good; it is whether the continuing pursuit of primacy sometimes generates avoidable costs and conflicts.
The branches are not merely military
Military strategy is connected to trade, sanctions, technological competition, energy security, alliance expectations, domestic politics, and ideas of national identity. A government may describe its policy as the defense of a rules-based order; another may see it as enforcement of rules shaped by the stronger power. Both claims require examination in particular cases.
Established interests complicate the picture. Defense contractors, industries dependent on international markets, political organizations, military institutions, and allied governments may all favor particular arrangements. Benefits may be real, and influence may be lawful. But identifying who benefits, who pays, and who can block change is necessary if we want to understand why certain policies survive disappointment or failure.
We also need to distinguish pursued interests from established interests. The first concern objectives leaders actively seek; the second concern arrangements, institutions, and expectations already in place. A policy may persist long after the assumptions that originally justified it have weakened.
Where this investigation should lead
A serious analysis would trace specific links: a stated objective; the policies adopted to pursue it; the responses they provoke; the resulting costs and benefits; and the interests that sustain those policies. It would also ask what would likely have happened under a different approach.
The tree analogy helps us find possible points of intervention, but it is not proof of causation. Several roots can feed the same branch. Some tensions may persist even if American behavior changes. Identifying a major influence therefore invites investigation, not automatic blame.
Once a significant underlying condition has been identified, however, an important possibility opens: what if the United States chose to exercise its influence differently?
Developed through an inquiry initiated and directed by Raymond Iannello, with collaborative analysis, refinement, and writing assistance from ChatGPT.
Sources
[1] SIPRI, Trends in World Military Expenditure, 2025 (Apr. 2026)
https://www.sipri.org/publications/2026/sipri-fact-sheets/trends-world-military-expenditure-2025
[2] Congressional Research Service, U.S. Overseas Basing (July 2024)
https://www.everycrsreport.com/files/2024-07-10_R48123_44023b7587a1d5980af3e288bb50f6be16480a0d.html
[3] National Security Archive, declassified CIA material on Iran’s 1953 coup
https://nsarchive.gwu.edu/briefing-book/iran/2018-02-12/cia-declassifies-more-zendebad-shah-internal-study-1953-iran-coup
[4] U.S. Commission on Intelligence Capabilities Regarding WMD, report on Iraq (2005)
https://govinfo.library.unt.edu/wmd/report/report.html