Title: How to Hide an Empire

Author: Daniel ImmerWahr (White man, Jewish)

Genre: Nonfiction

Book published: 2019 and Read: late summer of 2026

Reason for reading: Saw in the bookstore while I was getting "The Secret History of Wonder Woman" and thought it looked super interesting

So I'm someone who kinda likes learning about history, and by that I mean I like learning about interesting history, and not the boring, repetitive, American propaganda I was taught in elementary through high school. Turns out, this book is all that interesting American history you're never taught but which shapes the world as we know it explained in 400 pages. If I were to summarize my key takeaway in a sentence: modern technology and pop culture is the result of WW2. To summarize it in a couple more sentences: Countries have been fighting for power for like, ever, and that power used to be largely based on how much land you controlled. Due to this, before WW2 Americans (kinda) kept grabbing land whenever they got the chance, and if people were already living on that land they'd likely be oppressed. Also, they really wanted islands full of bird poop because before Fritz Haber invented a way to draw nitrogen from the atmosphere, America's population was exploding and they didn't have enough nitrogen in the soil to grow food for everyone. (It also talks about how Americans kinda didn't want to expand at first because they didn't want to fight Native Americans, and how Native Americans weren't counted in the Census for a while). Now, during WW2 new technologies were invented, and those technologies made it so controlling so much physical land was at best pointless, and at worst costly. Instead, the American government gained power through controlling culture and setting worldwide standards and whatnot, which they could do because they were the most powerful country in the world during and after the fallout of WW2. It is SUPER interesting stuff, and in my expert opinion everyone should read this book forever and ever.