A very interesting examination/history of America's expanding role in the world. As Engel has pointed out, this was all about power. A clear-eyed history, and recommended.

A Sense of Power is a very dense account of the period from roughly World War I to World War II as America grew in power towards becoming the country that Americans would recognize today. The book begins by positioning the book properly in political science theories. While this is important for academic work, I am concerned that readers not based in that tradition may put the book down before they get beyond the first part of the book.

Assuming the reader is still awake at this point, Thompson gets into a very interesting discussion of thirty years of history from just prior to WW1 to WW2. I call it interesting because you see a lot of histories that tend to take WW2 as a global jumping off point for the international power while the late 20's and part of the 30s where largely the pits because of domestic events. It's certainly not a perspective that I'm used to, but one that the author does a good job of telling.