United States of America (Alternity)

The United States of America (also called the United States, the US, the U.S.A., or America) is a federal constitutionalist republic comprising sixty-two states and a federal district. Situated mainly on the North American continent, the fifty-six contiguous states are commonly referred to as the 'lower 56', while the remaining six states are non-contiguous, though two (Columbia and Alaska) are geographically part of North America - the remainder (New England, Hawaii, Puerto Rico, and Guam) are islands. The contiguous US shares its northern border along the 49th parallel (Columbia excepted) with Cascadia and Canada, Quebec mainly along the St. Lawrence River, and its southern border with Mexico, as well as maritime borders with Cuba and the Bahamas.

The state of Alaska is located at the northwestern extreme of the continent and shares its eastern border with Canada and Cascadia, as well a western maritime border with Russia. The states of Hawaii and Guam are located in the Pacific Ocean and share no borders, maritime or otherwise with any other nation (the Western Dividing Line separates the easternmost maritime extent of the Philippine Empire from Guam by nearly a thousand miles). The state of Puerto Rico is located in the Caribbean as the smallest island of the Greater Antilles island chain - Puerto Rico is the third most-recent state to be admitted to the Union (after Guam and Manhattan) and shares maritime borders with Hispaniola to the west and the British Commonwealth of the Antilles to the east-southeast. As well, Puerto Rico is one of only two states where Spanish is the official language (after Baja California). This aided in and led to the adoption of Spanish as the nation's second language in July 1965, making the United States a bilingual nation. Lastly, the state of New England is an extensive archipelago of seven main islands and multiple smaller islands located in the western-mid Atlantic off the Eastern Seaboard of the United States, and due to its location, shares only maritime borders with the US state of Massachusetts to the west-northwest, the British Commonwealth of Bermuda to the south, and Quebec's North Island to the north-northeast. Aside from Hawaii and Alaska, New England is the only non-contiguous state with active volcanoes.

As of 1997, the United States has a population of just under 303 million, ranking third in world population, behind China and India. By area, the United States's territory comprises over a third of continental North America, as well as multiple unincoporated territories in the Caribbean and South Pacific. It has been responsible for the defense of Samoa, the Marianas, the Solomens, Micronesia, the Marshalls, and Palau, under the Compact of Free Association (CoFA) since 1957 - all of whom have no standing militaries, while every one but the Solomens and the Marshalls are US territories. The United States is a member of the G-11, G-30, NATO, and is a permanent member of the United Nations. America possesses the seventh-largest military in the world by number of troops and the largest air force, as well it has been the world's sole superpower since the collapse of the Soviet Union (USSR) in 1991. It is also a nuclear weapons state, and has been so since 1945, when it tested both it and the world's first warhead ('Trinity') and utilized the only atomic weapons of war ever on Japan in 1947, ending the Second World War - and possesses the second largest arsenal of warheads in the world (8,500), behind only Russia (11,000).