Until the attack on Pearl Harbor, isolationism was an important

On the Fall of Isolation and the Awakening of Global Responsibility

When Anne Applebaum wrote, “Until the attack on Pearl Harbor, isolationism was an important, even dominant strand in U.S. politics. After the Second World War, this strand disappeared, smothered by the widespread and bipartisan conviction that the United States needed to stay engaged with the world to prevent future crises,” she was not merely recounting history — she was bearing witness to a great transformation in the consciousness of a nation. Her words carry the weight of an era when the boundaries between safety and indifference, between peace and passivity, were violently torn apart by the fire of war. Through them, we hear a timeless lesson: that isolation, though comforting in calm times, cannot protect a people from the storms of destiny.

Before the attack on Pearl Harbor, America stood apart from the world’s conflicts, a land of oceans and optimism, believing that distance was protection enough. The spirit of isolationism ran deep — born from the exhaustion of the First World War, nourished by the desire to guard domestic peace, and strengthened by a faith that foreign entanglements brought only ruin. Many believed that America, a land blessed with resources and oceans on either side, could remain untouched by the chaos beyond its shores. Yet the dawn of December 7, 1941 shattered that illusion. In one hour of fire and steel, the myth of distance died, and with it the innocence of isolation.

Anne Applebaum’s insight reminds us that history itself is a teacher — that through catastrophe, nations are reborn into responsibility. The Second World War did not merely test armies; it tested the conscience of humanity. The world had witnessed horrors on a scale previously unimaginable — the collapse of democracy in Europe, the rise of tyranny, the Holocaust, and the atomic age. From the ashes of such ruin, America emerged not as a bystander, but as a leader, recognizing that to retreat once more into isolation would be to invite darkness again. The conviction that followed — the belief that the United States must stay engaged with the world — was not born from ambition, but from necessity, and from the understanding that peace demands vigilance.

Consider the lesson of Rome, that ancient empire whose strength once spanned continents. In her final days, when corruption and apathy grew, Rome withdrew from her frontiers, abandoning allies, neglecting defenses, believing herself eternal. But when she turned inward, her enemies grew stronger, and the walls she trusted were breached from within and without. The fall of Rome echoes through Applebaum’s warning — that when a great power withdraws from the world, it leaves a void that chaos and tyranny rush to fill. In this way, isolation is not peace — it is the seed of destruction, sown through neglect.

After 1945, America learned this truth and acted upon it. From the founding of the United Nations, to the Marshall Plan, to the defense of Europe through NATO, the United States sought not conquest, but stability. It recognized that the defense of freedom could not stop at its shores, that prosperity and peace must be shared to be secure. This new engagement — bipartisan and deeply rooted — became the moral spine of the postwar world. It was an era defined not by the desire to dominate, but by the will to prevent the return of the abyss. In this, the people of America fulfilled a role both burdensome and noble — that of guardian of the global order, born from the lessons of fire.

And yet, Applebaum’s words also echo as a warning for our own age. The temptation of isolation has never vanished; it slumbers, waiting for comfort and complacency to call it forth again. In times of fatigue or division, the voice of retreat whispers seductively: “Let the world take care of itself.” But history has shown, again and again, that such withdrawal invites greater suffering. The world is too small, too intertwined, too perilous for any nation to stand alone. Engagement, when guided by wisdom and humility, is not imperialism — it is stewardship, the duty of those who have the power to preserve peace.

The lesson, then, is one of eternal vigilance. Isolation may shield the body, but it starves the spirit. A people must care not only for themselves, but for the world that sustains them. Whether in politics, in community, or in the soul, retreat breeds weakness. Engagement — the courage to act, to connect, to defend what is right — is the path of strength. Each generation must renew this conviction for itself, lest the fire of history grow dim and the mistakes of the past return to haunt the future.

Thus, let the wisdom of Anne Applebaum’s reflection endure as a testament to memory: that from the ashes of Pearl Harbor and the ruins of war arose a new vision of responsibility — one that calls not only to nations, but to every heart. For in this interconnected world, we are all guardians of one another’s fate. The lesson of history is clear: peace is not preserved by walls, but by watchfulness; not by isolation, but by engagement. And those who forget this truth will learn again, through pain, what others already paid so dearly to know.