<Ul> <Li> </Li> <Li> </Li> <Li> </Li> </Ul> <P> History of U.S. foreign policy is a brief overview of major trends regarding the foreign policy of the United States from the American Revolution to the present . The major themes are becoming an "Empire of Liberty", promoting democracy, expanding across the continent, supporting liberal internationalism, contesting World Wars and the Cold War, fighting international terrorism, "developing" or exploiting the Third World, and building a strong world economy . </P> <P> From the establishment of the United States after the American Revolution until the Spanish--American War, U.S. foreign policy reflected a regional, not global, focus, but with the long - term ideal of creating an "Empire of Liberty ." </P> <P> The military and financial alliance with France in 1778, which brought in Spain and the Netherlands to fight the British, turned the American Revolutionary War into a world war in which the British naval and military supremacy was neutralized . The diplomats--especially Franklin, Adams and Jefferson--secured recognition of American independence and large loans to the new national government . The Treaty of Paris in 1783 was highly favorable to the United States which now could expand westward to the Mississippi River . </P>

The isolationist current in american foreign policy in the late nineteenth century