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U United States military

History

Dated history of United States military (1775 origins; 1861-65 mass army; 1941-45 global peak; 1947 National Security Act as the modern department hinge) in A continental republic that became a global basing and alliance system after 1941.

Educational history. Casualty figures are documented ranges. This is not operational advice, a ranking of nations, or a how-to for weapons or coups.

1775 and 1861 are origins of scale, not of the Pentagon. 1947 is the legal hinge.

1950 belongs in the opening, not in a "later wars" shrug.

Timeline

  1. Continental forces

    A revolutionary origin, not yet a Pentagon.

  2. Civil War mass army

    The first industrial-scale US force.

  3. AEF in France

    A late mass expedition.

  4. Global mobilisation

    The industrial peak.

  5. National Security Act

    Department, CIA, USAF as a legal shape.

  6. NATO

    A European alliance structure.

  7. Korea begins

    The first hot war of the new department.

  8. MacArthur relieved

    Civilian control as a crisis.

  9. US-ROK treaty signed

    The peninsula bargain (into force 1954).

  10. AVF and Goldwater-Nichols

    Social then jointness hinges.

Eras

Republic to mass war

Militia politics then Grant's war.

Expedition to peak

AEF then a two-ocean war.

Department and Korea

A legal hinge and a hot war.

Vietnam and the draft's end

The social hinge.

Volunteer and joint

AVF; Goldwater-Nichols; long wars as public file -- not a tracker.

Milestones

26 July 1947

A department is written into law.

1950-53

The first hot war of that department.

1 October 1953

A treaty that still structures a peninsula -- as history.

The all-volunteer force is a social fact with a 1973 date.

This page will not become a post-9/11 tracker.

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