History’s Superpowers

[Барбоса]

A superpower is usually described as a state that has become so powerful that it can project its influence and promote its interests on a global scale. Normally, only the British Empire, the United States of America and the Soviet Union are accredited with attaining such a status.

However, I disagree with such a short list and some of the parameters involved. Personally, I think that ‘global’ influence is applied a little too rigidly, technically disqualifying any state from before the Age of Exploration. Also I feel that longevity and cultural influence should play a more prominent role in determining a ‘superpower.’

With these in mind I feel that there have been three definite ‘superpowers.’

Roman Empire

British Empire

USA

I also think that there is a long list of potential candidates:

Persian Empire

Arab Caliphate

Chinese Empire

Mongolian Khanate

Ottoman Empire

Soviet Union

China

However, I have great difficulty thinking that any of these candidates meet the complete criteria for ‘superpower’ status. In my opinion, while extremely powerful in their own right, many of them did not survive long enough to have a lasting influence.

On a side note, I think there is also room for a “Cultural Superpower” list populated by those who have had a lasting impact on cultural and social development on a massive scale. In my mind, perhaps only the Roman Empire, the Arab Caliphate and the British Empire have had such influence, although states such as the Chinese Empire and maybe the Spanish Empire may be arguable.

What do any of you think? As I right to only consider the Soviet Union as a ‘possible’ candidate? Have I missed any out?

 

[Shocky]

If you're going to include the pre-exploration eras, then don't forget to include the likes of the New World Empires like the Incan, Aztec or Mayan. All three of these empires were able to hold onto their territories and had great influence over the areas they controlled.

The Incans had a complicated highway system set up to run the entire length of the Andes to control their Empire, which is an amazing feat in and amongst itself. If I were to make a choice of any of the three, the Incan would get my vote, because they essentially controlled the known lands of South America at the time of first contact. They controlled their known world, really without any resistance.

 

[Mantaur Rodeo Clown]

I'm not sure for the Ottoman Empire in terms of them projecting their power over the rest of the world, but their presence was certainly felt. After the fall of Contantinople at the hands of the Turks in the 15th Century, they controlled most of the land route to Asia, and effectively managed to control all trade coming from both the Silk and Spice roads. They managed to control the area for 5 centuries at least, and were far more advanced than Europe at that point in time.

Hence they definitely exerted their power over the known world, forcing people like Christopher Colombus to try and find a sea route to India, and thus, should certainly be considered after holding the region for many centuries.

 

[Барбоса]

If you're going to include the pre-exploration eras, then don't forget to include the likes of the New World Empires like the Incan, Aztec or Mayan. All three of these empires were able to hold onto their territories and had great influence over the areas they controlled.

I'm find it very difficult to associate the New World peoples as 'superpower' candidates. State still basically stuck in the Bronze Age by the late fifteenth century with ill-defined boundaries and limited administrative structure are a very hard sell in my opinion.

Each of the Incas, Aztecs or Mayans qualify as a regional power but therein also lies a problem for me. The sheer fact that you have to chose between them which one to put forward as a 'superpower' suggests to me that either all of them are worthy or none of them are.

Having said that, I am more than willing to concede that the Mesoamerican empires might qualify as a 'cultural superpower.' They certainly had the longevity necessary. Perhaps the Toltecs are the real candidate, if the theories around their spreading of their culture to the Incas, Aztecs and Mayans are proven correct.

I'm not sure for the Ottoman Empire in terms of them projecting their power over the rest of the world, but their presence was certainly felt. After the fall of Contantinople at the hands of the Turks in the 15th Century, they controlled most of the land route to Asia, and effectively managed to control all trade coming from both the Silk and Spice roads. They managed to control the area for 5 centuries at least, and were far more advanced than Europe at that point in time.

Hence they definitely exerted their power over the known world, forcing people like Christopher Colombus to try and find a sea route to India, and thus, should certainly be considered after holding the region for many centuries.

I would definitely consider the Ottomans from a temporal power point of view as worthy of being a 'superpower.' By 1600, Ottoman power and influence virtually spread from the Atlantic in the west to the Caspian Sea and Persian Gulf in the east and from the Sahara in the south to beyond the Danube and into southern Russia in the north.

My reservation about the Ottomans is their lack of impact culturally and socially. Aside from the final defeat of what was left of the Roman Empire in the east, what effects did they have on the regions they controlled? The Ottoman Empire collapsed less than a century ago and aside from the state of Turkey, I see little evidence of its prior existence.

Most of its territory was culturally Islamic and more advanced than large parts of Europe long before its conquest while the non-Muslim areas of Europe that it conquered on the surface do no seem to have been greatly altered by their 500 years of subjugation - the Greeks are still Greek, the Hungarians are still Magyars and the rest of the Balkans are still Slavic with the vast majority having retained Christianity with a few exceptions such as Albania and Kosovo.

This is of course the opinion of an outsider who has never visited any of the places formerly ruled by the Ottomans so I will readily concede that outward appearance of the Balkan nations may betray a more widespread influence of the Ottomans beneath the surface.

 

[Mantaur Rodeo Clown]

I would definitely consider the Ottomans from a temporal power point of view as worthy of being a 'superpower.' By 1600, Ottoman power and influence virtually spread from the Atlantic in the west to the Caspian Sea and Persian Gulf in the east and from the Sahara in the south to beyond the Danube and into southern Russia in the north.

My reservation about the Ottomans is their lack of impact culturally and socially. Aside from the final defeat of what was left of the Roman Empire in the east, what effects did they have on the regions they controlled? The Ottoman Empire collapsed less than a century ago and aside from the state of Turkey, I see little evidence of its prior existence.

Most of its territory was culturally Islamic and more advanced than large parts of Europe long before its conquest while the non-Muslim areas of Europe that it conquered on the surface do no seem to have been greatly altered by their 500 years of subjugation - the Greeks are still Greek, the Hungarians are still Magyars and the rest of the Balkans are still Slavic with the vast majority having retained Christianity with a few exceptions such as Albania and Kosovo.

This is of course the opinion of an outsider who has never visited any of the places formerly ruled by the Ottomans so I will readily concede that outward appearance of the Balkan nations may betray a more widespread influence of the Ottomans beneath the surface.

This much is true in that the cultural impact they had may have been of dubious quality. We can obviously associate certain styles of Architecture and things of the sort with a turkish style, but perhaps it would be better to focus on the Islamic side of the Ottoman Empire. Muslims had been around in Europe for a long time before the fall of Constantinople, and I would say that it is Muslims (originally from North Africa, but whatever) that influenced a lot of European Culture, namely in Spain.

Muslims took root in Spain in the 700's and onwards, and actually sparked a mini renaissance of sorts in Toledo, which was THE hub for information, and contained many of the aspects of civilisation, such as Greek philosophy and literature and the like, that wouldn't be seen in Europe for 500 years. The Ottoman Turks, having captured many of remnants of the Western Roman Empire later on, would have no doubt had the means and access to knowledge, be it cannons or otherwise.

Hence, I think what really could judges their status as superpower might be their grasp of knowledge. They held a wealth of information whilst Europe was still coming to terms with events that would lead to the Age Of Reason, and more so than military might, knowledge can demonstrate the true advancement of a superpower.

 

[Барбоса]

Muslims took root in Spain in the 700's and onwards, and actually sparked a mini renaissance of sorts in Toledo, which was THE hub for information, and contained many of the aspects of civilisation, such as Greek philosophy and literature and the like, that wouldn't be seen in Europe for 500 years.

There is no doubt that Islam managed to maintain much of the learning of the Sassanid Persian Empire and more importantly the Eastern Roman (later known as the Byzantine) Empire after its conquests in the mid seventh century, while Europe declined into the Dark Ages. This is why I shortlisted the Arab Caliphate for both 'superpower' and 'cultural superpower,' although perhaps it should be listed as the Umayyad Caliphate.

The Ottoman Turks, having captured many of remnants of the Western Roman Empire later on, would have no doubt had the means and access to knowledge, be it cannons or otherwise.

Hence, I think what really could judges their status as superpower might be their grasp of knowledge. They held a wealth of information whilst Europe was still coming to terms with events that would lead to the Age Of Reason, and more so than military might, knowledge can demonstrate the true advancement of a superpower.

This I am not so sure about. While the Ottomans will likely have enjoyed some superiority over Christian Europe, I do not think that the gap was big enough for knowledge to be the most important reason for their success. By the time of their march to the Danube under Bayezit the Thunderbolt and later Suleimann the Magnificent, the Renaissance was in full flow in western Europe. Also aside from the smaller kingdoms of the Balkans and the occasional western foray, the Ottomans' most consistent foes were the Byzantines who had never forgotten the advances of the Romans.

The Fall of Constantinople perhaps better suggests what really makes the Ottomans worthy of consideration of 'superpower' status. Mehmet II's army was as multi-cultural as they come. He was able to bring not only his fellow Turks, Janissaries and other Muslims from his empire to bear against the walls of Constantinople but also Christian Serbians, Wallachs, Moldavians and Greeks.

Most famously, the huge bombard that would bring down the hitherto impregnable land walls of Constantinople was not built by a Muslim but by a Hungarian, called Orban who had brought his techniques from western Europe.

Although it may just be that Mehmet could afford to pay Orban and the Byzantines could not, this shows that Ottoman influence and power could force co-religionists to fight one another and dissuade the west from sending appropriate aid to the Byzantines.

But again, in my opinion, this just further evidence of Ottoman temporal power, not evidence of an overwhelming superiority of knowledge over their opponents.

 

[Барбоса]

There is no doubt that the Soviet Union was a military behemoth and able to project its power beyond its own frontiers. Militarily, it is arguable that by 1943 nothing, not even a fully deployed US army, could have stood in the way of the juggernaut that was the Red Army. Churchill's "Iron Curtain" and the Warsaw Pact are perhaps the most obvious examples of a projection of power.

Culturally, you could say that the Soviets managed to spread Communism to the a large part of Europe and heavily influenced the day to day lives of many not only behind the "Iron Curtain" but in the west as well with the fear of a Third World War.

However, in my mind, this cultural impact was all to do with the military power of the Soviet Union. Fear of nuclear war and an ideological dispute was at the centre of the Cold War. Also very few members of the Warsaw Pact willingly accepted a communist government. The uprisings and rush to exploit the gains of the Solidarity movement in Poland demonstrates how unpopular communism was in those countries.

Having said that, it could be said that Soviet communism has had a lasting effect. Many former members of the USSR do not seem to have completely done away with the totalitarian ideas of Lenin and Stalin. Russia itself has a particularly hardline Duma and a former President who has managed to manipulate the system to maintain his own influence over the country. Other former SSRs such as Kazakhstan have had the same president since the Fall of the Soviet Union, a president who appears to rule far more like a dictator rather than an elected official. So perhaps this, along with the Cold War, suggests that the Soviet Union is worthy of being a 'superpower' from a cultural impact aspect.

Longevity is probably the main reason that I neglected to put the Soviet Union straight onto my list of 'superpowers.' Now it is an old mantra that all empires eventually fall. When the British proved unwilling or unable to crush nationalist movements in the years after the Second World War, she gradually granted independence to the vast majority of her subjects. The Soviet Union was always going to go the same way, not only because of its inability to match the capitalism of the west but also because even ruthless totalitarianism could maintain an empire in the post-nationalist world.

However, when the British Empire devolved into the Commonwealth, Britain had had her empire for well over 200 years and while she may not have held 'superpower' status for all of that period, she certainly had a much longer grasp on that title than the Soviets did as the dominance of the Soviet Union perhaps lasted for less than half a century, beginning either just before the Second World War with the third of Stalin's Five-Year Plans, or the full mobilisation of the Red Army against the Nazis in around 1943 and ending before the 1980s had come to a close.

While fifty years in the modern world equates to a lot more in the pre-mechanised age, I find it difficult to attribute longevity to the USSR.

I am still torn regarding the Soviet Union as one of 'History's Superpowers.' I do not think that it had the same cultural impact as its Roman or British predecessors but it certainly had the military might to qualify. Perhaps the case for the Soviet Union suffers not only because it was a secretive, totalitarian state but also because it had to share the spotlight with the USA as for really the first time in history, the world had two mega-powers.

If I was forced to chose, I would say that on this occasion, pure military strength may be enough to grant the USSR the status of a 'superpower'.

 

[Goberz2K8]

The Obvious ones are of course, The Roman, The British Empire, Greek Empire with Alexander the Great, Mongolian and so on, but in a sense you can consider the facist state of Nazi Germany, which at one point conquered most of Europe. Although it conquered it, in a way yhat most empires conquered. Although is probably the most short lived. The largest Empire, is The British Empire, but then the Mogolian Empire near rivalled it, even though the Mogolian Empire, was before the British Empire.
But there are ofcourse all the ones you mentioned.

 

[Барбоса]

Greek Empire with Alexander the Great

As much as I admire Alexander the Great and his accomplishments against the Persian Empire and the tribes of Afghanistan and India, I do not think that his empire qualifies as a 'superpower.' To me, while the military and cultural powers of Alexander's Graeco-Macedonian empire were certainly more than impressive, it relied far too much on the aura and abilities of Alexander himself. Once he died in 323, his empire quickly fragmented.

Nazi Germany

Nazi Germany is in a similar position to the Empire of Alexander - a charismatic leader and a cadre of capable generals. However, while Alexander won his victories against the strongest state in the world at the time, the Persian Empire, Nazi Germany came to dominate Continental Europe only by defeating several second rate powers. The only power of any rank that the Nazis overcame was France and a France that was not the great power it had been under Napoleon Bonaparte or even Napoleon III.

Early German successes in the east had only been possible through sneak attacks on the Russians and continued due to the traditionally slow mobilisation of the Russian army. However, once the Red Army was deployed to its fullest extent, Hitler's armies were out-numbered and out-classed.

Therefore, Hitler's conquests, while impressive, only served to bring him into conflict with states that were either able to withstand his forces (the British) or were vastly superior to his (USA and the Red Army). This alone should suggest that Nazi Germany never attained 'superpower' status.