by Val Germann
The end of World War II saw the United States as the only modern, industrial economy untouched by the recent carnage. From a purely business perspective the situation could hardly have been better — we had been able to bomb all of our major competitors flat. It was the ultimate exercise in what is now called “creative destruction” and the U.S. was going to be in the catbird’s seat when everything was rebuilt, in its own image, if possible. No one wanted to fight World War III anytime soon.
The combination of a gigantic energy supply and the productive might it made possible created a U.S. military power beyond anything ever seen before. Our armies, navies and air forces ran on pure petroleum during World War II and were faster, more powerful and more numerous than those of any of our enemies. Once the American economic machine got going after Pearl Harbor it crushed all before it, in every way, even technically.
We could afford the best and soon had the best, in both men and materiel. The jet plane, the atomic bomb and the submarine-based ICBM came hard on the heels of the Big War, projecting American power to even higher realms, giving us an invulnerable deterrent against any enemy.
As had happened in the Mediterranean after the Roman destruction of both Carthage and Corinth (146 B.C.), one single power controlled nearly everything that counted in the known world. The Med had experienced its “Pax Romana” and now the whole planet was feeling a new “Pax Americana,” for better or for worse.
Here at home it was definitely for the better. The war scares of the mid-1930s had started U.S. rearmament in 1937, and real incomes for working Americans had been going up since that time. The U.S. was the workplace of the world in the 1940s, churning out materiel for the war and then domestic durable goods on an enormous scale.
We had what seemed like an endless supply of coal, oil and gas, here at home and totally secure. That coal, oil and gas was there to validate our victory, helping to create a new post-war prosperity on an unprecedented scale, the envy of the world.