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Throughout the twentieth century, the U.S. government willingly deployed power, hard and soft, to protect American investments all around the globe. Why did the United States get into the business of defending its citizens' property rights abroad? This book looks at how modern U.S. involvement in the empire business began, how American foreign policy became increasingly tied to the sway of private financial interests, and how postwar administrations finally extricated the United States from economic interventionism, even though the government had the will and power to continue. The book examines the ways that American investors initially influenced their government to intercede to protect investments in locations such as Central America and the Caribbean. Costs were small—at least at the outset—but with each incremental step, American policy became increasingly entangled with the goals of those they were backing, making disengagement more difficult. The book discusses how, all the way through the 1970s, the United States not only failed to resist pressure to defend American investments, but also remained unsuccessful at altering internal institutions of other countries in order to make property rights secure in the absence of active American involvement. Foreign nations expropriated American investments, but in almost every case the U.S. government's employment of economic sanctions or covert action obtained market value or more in compensation—despite the growing strategic risks. The advent of institutions focusing on international arbitration finally gave the executive branch a credible political excuse not to act. The book cautions that these institutions are now under strain and that a collapse might open the empire trap once more.

While America's relationship with Britain has often been deemed unique, especially during the two world wars when Germany was a common enemy, the American business sector actually had a greater affinity with Germany for most of the twentieth century. This book examines the triangular relationship between the American, British, and German business communities and how the special relationship that Britain believed it had with the United States was supplanted by one between America and Germany. The book begins with the pre-1914 period and moves through the 1920s, when American investments supported German reconstruction rather than British industry. The Nazi seizure of power in 1933 led to a reversal in German–American relations, forcing American corporations to consider cutting their losses or collaborating with a regime that was inexorably moving toward war. Although Britain hoped that the wartime economic alliance with the United States would continue after World War II, the American business community reconnected with West Germany to rebuild Europe's economy. And while Britain thought they had established their special relationship with America once again in the 1980s and 1990s, in actuality it was the Germans who, with American help, had acquired an informal economic empire on the European continent. This book uncovers the surprising and differing relationships of the American business community with two major European trading partners from 1900 through the twentieth century.

The deep relationship between the United States and Mexico has had repercussions felt around the world. This chronicle of the economic and social connections between the two nations opens a new window onto history from the Civil War to today and illuminates the course of events that made the United States a global empire. The Mexican Revolution, Manifest Destiny, World War II, and NAFTA are all part of the story, but this narrative transcends these moments of economic and political drama, resonating with the themes of wealth and power. Combining economic and historical analysis with personal memoirs and vivid descriptions of key episodes and players, this book is based on substantial amounts of previously unexplored source material. Recently declassified documents in the archives of the United States government have been examined for this book and the author has also traveled extensively in rural Mexico to uncover the rich sources for this gripping story of 135 years of intervention, cooperation, and corruption. Beginning just after the American Civil War, the book traces the activities of an elite group of financiers and industrialists who, sensing opportunities for wealth to the south, began to develop Mexico's infrastructure. It charts their activities through the pivotal regime of Porfirio Díaz, when Americans began to gain ownership of Mexico's natural resources, and through the Mexican Revolution, when Americans lost many of their holdings in Mexico. The book concentrates less on traditional political history in the twentieth century and more on the hidden interactions between Americans and Mexicans, especially the unfolding story of industrial production in Mexico for export to the United States. Throughout, this narrative illuminates the development and expansion of the American railroad, oil, mining, and banking industries. The book also shows how the export of the “American Dream” has shaped such areas as religion and work attitudes in Mexico. This book reveals much about the American psyche, especially the compulsion of American elites toward wealth, global power, and contact with other peoples, often in order to “save” them. These characteristics were first expressed internationally in Mexico, and the book shows that the Mexican experience was and continues to be a prototype for U.S. expansion around the world. This work demonstrates the often inconspicuous yet profoundly damaging impact of American investment in the underdeveloped countries of Latin America, Asia, and Africa.