The United States War of Independece, also called American Revolution, or American

Revolutionary War(177517!"# The 1" $reat %ritain & s 'orth American colonies (on
political independence and (ent on to form The United States of America#
After the successful conclusion of the )rench and Indian War in17*", the %ritish
+overment decided to ma,e its 'orth American colonies pay more of the costs of
+overnin+ and defendin+ them#-ver the ne.t 1/ years %ritain imposed a series of ne(
ta.es#
The American colonist resended the trade re+ulations 0y (hich%ritain utili1ed American
economic resources to its o(n advante+e, and also resented the lac, of representation
in %ritish 2arliament #
In 1775 open fi+htin+ 0ro,e out 0et(een the %ritish and Americans, and the ne.t year
the A3erican colonies declared their independence from %ritain#
The conflict 0e+an as a civil (ar , (ith American 0ein+ 4oined 0y )rance(177!5,
Spain(17765, and 'etherlands(17!75, it 0ecome an international (ar#
in e.planin+ the outcome of the (ar, scholars point out that %ritain, seemed never to
have an overall strate+y for (innin+ and often displayed a lac, of understandin+ and co
operation amon+ their armies#
The Americans on the other hand performed admira0ly# )rench supplies and funds from
177* to 177!, and direct miliatry and naval support after 177!, ena0led the american
forces to ta,e advanta+e od %ritish disor+anisation, to defeat entire %ritish armies at
Sarato+a and 8or,to(n, and to secure the independece of the 1" American states#
)-U'9ATI-' -) T:; A3;RI<A' R;2U%=I<#
3ost of the pro0lems lasted 0eyound the achivement of independence and continued to
ve. American politics for many years, even for +enerations#
3ean(hile the colonies had valua0le, thou+h less visi0le, sources of
stren+th#2racctically all farmers had their o(n arms and could form into militia
companies overni+ht#
3ore fundamentally, Amrican had for many years 0een receivin+ 0asically the same
information, mainly from the ;n+lish press, reprinted in identical form in colonial
ne(spapers# The effect of this (as to form a sin+ularly(ide 0ody of afreed opinion a0out
ma4or pu0lic issues#
Another force of 0i+ importance (as the fact that for several +enerations Americans had
0een +overnin+ themselves#<olonial self+overment seemed, from a colonial point of
vie(, to 0e continuous and cosistent (ith the priciples of ;n+lish +overmentprinciples #
It (as e>ually important that e.perince of self+overment had tau+ht colonial leaders
ho( to +et thin+s done#