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Backgrounder: Major wars America has fought in history Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter described the United States as "the most warlike nation in the history of the world" in remarks made in April 2019.
The United States has fought a lot of wars and is said to have only had less than 20 years of peace in its history. Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter described the United States as "the most warlike nation in the history of the world" in remarks made in April 2019. The following are major wars in which the United States fought or participated. AMERICAN REVOLUTIONARY WAR The American Revolutionary War erupted in 1775 as a result of growing tensions between 13 North American colonies and Great Britain and was fought over the issue of U.S. independence from the British Empire. The Continental Congress approved the Declaration of Independence, the founding document of the United States, in July 1776. The conflict ended in September 1783 when Great Britain formally recognized the independence of the United States in the Treaty of Paris. WAR OF 1812 The War of 1812 was fought over maritime rights issues between the United States and Great Britain. The United States suffered costly defeats at the hands of British, Canadian, and Native American troops over the course of the war, including the capture and burning of Washington, D.C., the nation's capital, in August 1814. U.S. troops, nonetheless, were able to repulse British offensives in New York, Baltimore, and New Orleans. The Treaty of Ghent was ratified in February 1815, putting an end to the conflict. MEXICAN-AMERICAN WAR In 1846, the United States declared war on Mexico after the neighboring country, refusing to recognize the annexation of Texas, assaulted American troops. The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, signed in 1848, brought the war to an end. Mexico ceded the states of California, Utah, Nevada, as well as parts of New Mexico, Colorado, Arizona, and Wyoming. AMERICAN CIVIL WAR The American Civil War was fought by 11 southern states known as the Confederacy and Union states between 1861 and 1865. The war, which ended after the Confederacy surrendered, preserved the United States as one nation and ended the institution of slavery. Roughly 2 percent of the population, an estimated 620,000 men, lost their lives in the battles. SPANISH-AMERICAN WAR In April 1898, a conflict broke out between the United States and Spain over Cuba's struggle for independence from Spanish colonial rule. It ended four months later, in December 1898, when the U.S. and Spanish governments signed the Treaty of Paris. The deal compelled Spain to hand over Guam and Puerto Rico to the United States. In addition, Spain agreed to sell the Philippines to the United States for 20 million U.S. dollars. WORLD WAR I The First World War was fought between the Allied Powers (Great Britain, France, Russia, Italy, Romania, Japan, and the United States) and the Central Powers (Germany, Austria-Hungary, Bulgaria, and the Ottoman Empire) beginning in 1914. In 1918, the Allied Powers claimed victory. WORLD WAR II After Germany invaded Poland in 1939, the Second World War erupted. Following the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor in 1941, the United States declared war on Japan. Germany and Italy declared war on the United States very immediately. The Axis powers unconditionally surrendered at the end of the global conflict in 1945. KOREAN WAR The United States entered the Korean War shortly after it began on the Korean Peninsula in June 1950. The fighting came to a stop in July 1953 when the Korean Armistice Agreement was reached. The Korean Demilitarized Zone was also established as a result of the agreement. VIETNAM WAR The United States became fully involved in the Vietnam War in 1965. That year, the United States launched a massive campaign of sustained bombing of targets in Vietnam, as well as sending American combat forces into battle in the country. With the signing of the Paris Peace Accords in 1973, the United States ended its direct engagement in the war and completed its withdrawal in 1975. GULF WAR The war was fought in 1991 between Iraq and the coalition forces of over 30 countries led by the United States. The United States declared a ceasefire after 42 days of continuous air and ground attacks by the coalition. AFGHANISTAN WAR The United States announced its "War on Terror" and invaded Afghanistan in 2001, soon after militants linked with the Islamic extremist group al-Qaida hijacked passenger planes and carried out suicide attacks against America, killing almost 3,000 people on its soil. The longest-running war in U.S. history concluded when the last American service members in Afghanistan were airlifted from Kabul in August 2021. IRAQ WAR The United States and its allies invaded Iraq in 2003 based on what turned out to be false claims that the Iraqi government possesses weapons of mass destruction. The U.S. military formally declared the end of the conflict in a ceremony in Baghdad in December 2011, as U.S. troops prepared to exit from the country.
