Has the U.S. ever won a conflict on it's own ?

Question

Outside the U.S , not just by a group of disgruntled people , with no assistance from another country and where war has been declared on the U.S. specifically .

Answer 1

No, sorry - you can strike the war of 1812 off your list.

"The War of 1812 is one of the forgotten wars of the United States. The war lasted for over two years, and while it ended much like it started; in stalemate..."

Nice try, though... I guess that's why it's called the "Forgotten War" - Americans forget they didn't actually win it.

Answer 2

"on its own" is one thing. . . I don't quite understand why you add some of the other qualifications

TWO of your qualifications may rule out ANY country winning ANY war! "outside the country" and "war has been declared on the country" -- that will typically mean that the other country ATTACKED you, and that is almost always IN your own country!!

At any rate, leaving out wars in which a substantial part of the action was outside the country eliminates not only the Civil War (obvioiusly) but the War of 1812 (which no one quite "won" anyway)

"Declaring war" -- countries do this is different ways, so it can be a difficult thing to know how to apply....
"war has been declared on the U.S. specifically" would, of course, eliminate the Mexican War and the Spanish American War, at least if by this you mean to leave out cases where we were FIRST to "declare war"

As someone else has noted, there is scarcely such a thing in the past few centuries as "NO assistance from another country", since even when countries do not enter the fighting it is typical for many of them to at least take some sort of stance and steps (e.g., to restrict trade to one side or the other)

Twentieth century wars were basicallyl international affairs, which effectively eliminates them from the list....

By my reckoning that leaves us with

The BARBARY Wars (esp the second one) vs. the 'Barbary pirate state' of North Africa.

The first ended in 1805 -- we actually conceded more than we needed to, but we did win it.

The second, in 1815, immediately after the War of 1812 was VERY successful, and fully and finally ended the Barbary raids on American ships. (In fact, in the next few years, European states decided to follow suit, and stopped the tribute they had been paying these regimes for CENTURIES!)

THESE (and NOT the War of 1812) are the truly "forgotten wars" in U.S. history... which is odd, since they (esp. the second) were so successful

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barbary_Wars


Now, unless you insist that because those states also (separately) were warring vs. other countries, I don't think you can eliminate them. The wars were all treated separately and w did NOT fight with any other nation.

Answer 3

The Civil War was won by Americans. Maybe the war of 1812, but that involved French, maybe some of the Alamo and Texan stuff.

Answer 4

The War of 1812, the Mexican-American War, The Civil War, and the Spanish-American war were all won by the US unilaterally.

Answer 5

the US won the Spanish-American War without help

Answer 6

The mexican war, spanish american war. The rest of the ones we fought were multinational afairs, and every modern war the US has gotten into has involved several countries.

Answer 7

I think you have to exclude the Civil War if only on the grounds that it was impossible for Americans to lose it.

Answer 8

Winfield Scott waxed Mexico pretty good and we didn't get help unless you consider Mississippi's volunteers outside assistance.

Ahhh...the good old days when we were the ones crossing the border.

Answer 9

Well, no...but the question is skewed. I know of NO country who would meet your conditions.

Answer 10

There was no such thing, silly. Dumb question.