What wars actually benefited America?

Question

When did we actually engage in a war that was actually for a good reason?

Answer 1

Your question is an oxymoron. War never has good reasons.
However in the case of WWII, I guess our reasons were good enough or at least necessary. This would also go for the revolutionary war and the civil war.
Korea and Vietnam were wars against communism which was a trumped up threat. The Mexican American and the Spanish American Wars may have had victorious outcomes, but were not necessarily justified. The USA has never shrunk from taking her place as a world power. This, it appears, is the reason we go to war...because we can.

Answer 2

Apart from self defence, most wars are entered into for economic reasons. WWI and WWII while seeming to have altruistic intentions both helped to consolidate American economic interests abroad, with the IMF and World Bank set up to protect and propagate these interests post WWII. The war of Independence and the Civil war both established America as a nation and not a colony, and unified its economy. Wars in Mexico the Caribbean and Panama have further consolidated US power and control over resources and trade routes in it's immediate area, bolstering the US economy.
I think there are only about 2 or 3 years out of the last 230 when the US has not been at war with someone or other. Most of these wars have been fought on economic grounds, protecting US interests, weakening or subverting economically threatening non compliant rival states. A large amount of these have succeeded to this end, so you could say they have benefited America. The messy ones that don't work out so well are the ones you'll hear more about.
As for "good reason", I guess imposing your power and authority over outside populations in order reap the economic benefits for your own people at the expense of others could hardly be seen as "good" in a moral sense, but as a nation state looking after its own interests, looking to expand etc, as is in its nature, then these wars could be seen as being perpetrated for "good reason" - for the "good" of the nation.

Answer 3

All of our wars have "benefited" the U.S. or its economic interests on one level or another. We've never engaged in a war for purely idealistic reasons. The American Revolution was as much about economics as it was about freedom from Britain, the Mexican-American War gave us most of the western territory we have now, the Civil War was fought not just to abolish slavery but to keep the agrarian south firmly in the Union, the Spanish-American War brought us pseudo-colonial interests in Cuba and the Philipines, we sold tons of war material to Britain and France prior to entering World War I (and WW II). During and after WWII we built bases overseas wherever we could to ensure our economic dominance in the years that followed. As for Korea and Vietnam, the American military industrial complex made tons of money on defense contracts supplying both our troops and those of our allies with guns, tanks, planes, etc. The merits and justifications for entering those last two conflicts have been debated extensively but there's no denying that large defense contractors made mountains of cash from those wars.

Answer 4

Kosovo to stop the slaughter of Muslims by the Serbian Christians - no economic or strategic benefit to the USA, just goodwill.

Somalia intervention - to save people from slaughter and starvation - we pulled out because we lost that one.

Kuwait/Operation Desert Storm - maybe an economic benefit, but doubtful since Saddam would have sold us or our allies the oil anyway - we went to war just to free that little country from Iraq and to protect Saudi Arabia.

What's interesting is that these three examples were all to protect Muslims - you don't hear about that from this country's enemies at all.

Answer 5

Basically all of them.

American Revolution
Civil War
Spanish American War
World War I
World War II
Korea (some good)
Vietnam (some good)
Gulf War I
War in Afghanistan
War in Iraq

-Aztec276

Answer 6

The Revolution of course because we exist because of that. Also, the Civil War, because it strenghtened our union. And World War Two because it was a just cause that helped our economy boom.

Answer 7

One of the world wars brought us out of the great depression.

Answer 8

The revolutionary war, the war of 1812,the civil war because it stopped slavery, all of them except vietnam.

Answer 9

Desert Storm, USA, got more oil, Now Iraq, USA got some more Oil and Saddam Goddamit !

Answer 10

how about the American Revolution? (independance)
the Civil War? (abolish slavery)
WWII (stop Hitler)
yes, even Viet Nam (end the goverments slaughter of millions of their own people)
. . .