United States of Amnesia

World War II Memorial, Washington, DC

Americans are very good at forgetting things. Of course, all peoples have this capacity, but it seems that affluent nations are especially adept at ignoring the lessons of history. Perhaps there is an unavoidable correlation between affluence and cultural and political amnesia. Perhaps this is history's "safety valve" which ultimately deflates empires, from Babylon to Rome to the British Empire.

In defense of my fellow citizens, it is tempting in the extreme to live in the moment when the moment is luxurious (and I use that term comparatively). Why remember failures and fiascos of the past when one has 200 cable channels and cold beer? Why study history at all? It seems that the level of historical awareness of students entering university studies in the United States has declined alarmingly, even in the past 12 years in which I have been a full-time professor. Identifying important dates in American or world history is all but impossible for the vast majority of college students I see. Lest you feel too smug about your own history IQ, here are a few important dates. Take a moment to list the corresponding events (answers follow at the end of this article):

44 BCE
314 AD
800
1066
1492
1620
1776
1789
1812
1815
1861
1917
1929
1939
1941
1945
1949
1953
1964
1968
1974
1981
1986
1991
1995
2001

Of course, not everybody will score 100% on this little quiz, but I've seen students fail to identify any of the dates (well, perhaps with the exception of the last one).

The United States is only recently a powerful nation, following the enormous industrial buildup of World War II, and the devastation of the world's primary European powers in that conflict. We have thus only been a "superpower" for half a century. Yet, in this relatively brief span of time, we appear to have forgotten that before WWII, we had a very modest military for a country of our size (under 190,000 troops). By 1945, this had swelled to 1.6 million. Having been finally drawn into the conflict, with its industrial capacity and relatively large population, the US became, along with the Soviet Union, the major actor on the world stage.

Americans born after World War II can scarcely imagine a world in which the United States is a second- or third-rate military and political power. We might consider the microcosm of a family over several generations as a parallel.

Most Americans of today are descended from immigrants, who in most cases left their countries of origin precisely because they were not rich or powerful. They came in search of a better life - economically, politically, and spiritually. As one traces a family from its immigrant generation through subsequent generations, the affluence of the family almost invariably increases. A conflict develops between a desire to remember and honor ethnic and cultural origins and a desire to forget the hardships and sacrifices of earlier generations. Over time, at least in the American experience, the forgetting appears to gain the upper hand.

So it is with nations. Americans, and notably those in power, prefer not to remember our precarious national origins as a "breakaway" colony. I do not suggest that the founders of this nation were anything but thoughtful and courageous people. On the other hand, the framers of our Constitution were very well aware of history's lessons, and incorporated concepts drawn from these lessons into the documents that still today form the basis of our republic. Sadly, in the midst of our great military might and economic power, today's leaders scarcely seem to grasp even the most fundamental principles of the agreeable conduct of nations, and thus commit the most egregious blunders.

There is a remedy, of course. We must teach our children our history - with all its warts and blemishes. We must insist that they understand the fluid nature of international politics and power, and they must know something of our nation's founders and their vision (as well as their disagreements and struggles). We can start by teaching our children the history of their own families, of the courage of pioneer ancestors, the selfless sacrifice of veterans, the struggle of slaves for freedom, and the desperation of the Dust Bowl and the Depression. There are heroes and villains in every family history, and lessons for each of us to learn from them. As we learn our personal and familial histories, we learn how our ancestors shaped this nation and their nations of origin. Perhaps we also learn from their failures.

Mark Twain was once quoted as saying that history doesn't repeat itself, but it does "rhyme." There is a great deal of rhyming going on at this very moment. However, with no sense of history much of our population lacks the ear to hearken to the poet's warning.

Answers to some significant dates:

44 BCE - Murder of Julius Ceasar
312 AD - Conversion of the Emperor Constantine to Christianity
800 - Charlemagne crowned Holy Roman Emperor
1066 - Normans invade England, William I "The Conqueror" becomes King
1492 - Christopher Columbus discovers the "New World"
1620 - The Mayflower lands and Plymouth Plantation is established by the Puritans
1776 - Declaration of Independence (July 4th)
1789 - French Revolution
1812 - War of 1812 begins. (Washington captured and burned by the British in 1814)
1815 - Defeat of Napoleon at Waterloo (June 18th)
1861 - US Civil War Begins (Ft. Sumter, SC - April 12th / Bull Run, VA - July 21st)
1917 - US Enters Word War I (war began in 1914)
1929 - Stock Market Crash (October 29th)
1939 - World War II Begins (Germany invades Poland September 1st)
1941 - Japan attacks Pearl Harbor, Hawaii (Dec. 7th. US joins WWII Dec. 8th)
1945 - End of World War II (May 8th in Europe, Aug. 15th in Pacific)
1945 - US drops Atomic bombs on Hiroshima (Aug. 6th) and Nagasaki (Aug. 9th)
1949 - First Soviet atomic bomb test (August 29th).
1953 - Death of Josef Stalin (March 5th)
1964 - Gulf of Tonkin Incident (US dramatically increases troop presence in Vietnam)
1968 - Assassinations of Martin Luther King, Jr. (April 4th) and Robert F. Kennedy (June 6th)
1974 - Watergate Scandal (break-ins of 1972) results in resignation of President Nixon (August 9th)
1981 - Assassination attempts on President Reagan (March 30th) and Pope John Paul II (May 13th)
1986 - Space Shuttle Challenger explodes 73 seconds after takeoff (January 28th)
1991 - Operation Desert Storm "Gulf War" (air assault begins Jan. 17th, ground assault Feb. 24th)
1995 - Oklahoma City Federal Building Bombing (April 19th)
2001 - Terrorist Attacks on World Trade Center, NYC and the Pentagon (Sept. 11th)