What is it that makes a war, a world war?

Oxford English Dictionary traces the term to a Scottish newspaper back in 1848 that cited

A War Among Great Powers.

In our modern age, we used the term twice, and both fit the bill.

But Lord knows, great powers went to war long before the 20th century.

Think of the Napoleonic Wars, the War of Spanish Succession, the Mongol invasions, and Rome's

conquest of the Mediterranean, each a hemispheric struggle with global consequences.

What about smaller wars that spark bigger ones? Our Revolution, for instance, a battle for one tiny nation's independence that created new alliances and tipped the balance of power in Western Europe.

Was ours the World War of the American Revolution?

Or was it the other way around?

History hit listeners, hello again. I'm Don Wildman.

Americans naturally speak of the Revolutionary War in personal terms. It was our fight for independence, our struggle to escape tyranny, our flag of freedom planted in the land of liberty.

And all that is clear and true, in our version of events. But there's another reality to this,

another angle on the revolution that is illuminating,

but usually mentioned as an afterthought, that our noble struggle was fought for our own reasons

and happened against the backdrop of a larger conflict fought for empire, a world war that

unfolded between Great Britain, France, Spain, and the Netherlands.

The American Revolution was, in this regard, a global event.

But just how global? How much can we call the revolution a world war involving nations

far and wide? And did its outcome alter the path of world history as much as it did American.

Let's find out.

Richard Bell is a scholar and teacher at the University of Maryland.

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