The Second World War locked the trajectory in. That war gave the United States more than two thousand overseas base sites. And it was hard to imagine giving them all back. Right at the war’s end, Harry Truman announced that his country coveted no territory. It was an anodyne statement, nearly identical to those his predecessors had often made. Yet this time it triggered what the State Department called a “storm of comment” from the press, Congress, and military leaders. What about the bases? they asked. Surely Truman wasn’t going to let them go, was he? Truman hastily clarified. The United
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