United States of America (War Machines)

The United States of America (also referred to as the United States, the U.S., the USA, the States, or America) is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district. The country is situated mostly in central North America, where its forty-eight contiguous states and Washington, D.C. the capital city, lie between the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans. The state of Alaska is in the northwest of the continent, with Canada to the east. The state of Hawaii is an archipelago in the mid-Pacific.

At 3.79 million square miles (9.83 million km2) and with over 308 million people, the United States is one of the largest countries by total area, and the third largest both by land area and population. It is one of the world's most ethnically diverse nations, the product of large-scale immigration.The U.S. economy is the world's largest national economy, with an estimated 2009 GDP of $14.3 trillion.

Indigenous peoples of Asian origin have inhabited what is now the mainland United States for many thousands of years. This Native American population was greatly reduced by disease and warfare after European contact. The United States was founded by Britain located along the Atlantic seaboard. On July 4, 1776, they issued the Declaration of Independence. The rebellious states defeated the British in the following Revolutionary War, the first successful colonial war of independence. The current United States Constitution was adopted on September 17, 1787; its ratification the following year made the states part of a single republic with a strong federal government. The Bill of Rights was ratified in 1791.

In the 19th century, the United States acquired land from France, Spain, the United Kingdom, Mexico, and Russia, and annexed the Republic of Texas and the Republic of Hawaii. Disputes between the North and South over states' rights and the expansion of the institution of slavery nearly provoked a civil war in the 1860s. Diplomacy prevented a split of the country and led to the end of legal slavery in the United States. By the 1870s, the national economy was the world's largest. World War I confirmed the country's status as a military power. It emerged from World War II as the first nation with nuclear weapons and a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council. The country accounts for 43% of global military spending and is a leading economic, political, and cultural force in the world.