by Aseem Gupta | Jan 11, 2016 | Geopolitics, States & Global Power
For almost half a century, the world lived with a strange contradiction. The United States and the Soviet Union never fought each other in a direct, declared war. No American army marched on Moscow. No Soviet army invaded Washington. Yet the fear of war was...
by Aseem Gupta | Jan 10, 2016 | History, Empires & Civilizations
The Great Emu War sounds like something invented by the internet. Australia, a country already famous for deadly snakes, giant spiders, crocodiles, kangaroos, and animals that seem specifically designed to test human confidence, once sent soldiers with machine guns to...
by Aseem Gupta | Jan 9, 2016 | History, Empires & Civilizations
The American Revolution did not begin as a clean, heroic march toward independence. It began as an argument inside an empire. For more than a century, Britain’s mainland colonies in North America had lived in an uneasy middle ground. They were British subjects. They...
by Aseem Gupta | Jan 8, 2016 | History, Empires & Civilizations
English is a strange language because it remembers its invaders. You can ask someone to “come in,” or you can invite them to “enter.” You can talk about a “kingly” duty, or a “royal” one. You can “buy” something, or you can “purchase” it. You can raise a cow in a...
by Aseem Gupta | Jan 7, 2016 | History, Empires & Civilizations
There is a version of this story that sounds almost too ridiculous to be true. Two countries play a football match. The fans riot. National pride boils over. A few days later, the armies march. That is how the 1969 war between Honduras and El Salvador is usually...
