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March 16 (UPI) -- Wednesday, of course, is St. Patrick's Day. But in addition to such annual recurrences, 2021 marks the deci-anniversaries of many tectonic events that have reshaped and altered history. One hundred sixty years ago on April 12th, 1861, Confederates opened fire on Fort Sumter igniting the bloodiest war in American history in which nearly 700,000 lives were lost.
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One hundred years ago in 1921, the dreaded Spanish Flu pandemic passed and America entered into the most explosive period of economic growth in its history. But the "Roaring Twenties" did not turn out well. The crash of 1929 began a Great Depression that would not end until World War II fired the arsenal of democracy and the defeat of Nazi Germany and fascist Japan.
Eighty years ago, two monumental events would ultimately turn the tide of battle and victory in that war. On June 22nd, 1941, Hitler launched Operation Barbarossa and the invasion of the Soviet Union. Six months later, Imperial Japan struck without warning at Pearl Harbor eviscerating Battleship Row. While both attacks achieved tactical surprise, sleeping bears and giants were awakened. Just over three and a half years later, World War II was won.
Sixty years ago in 1961, the Berlin Crisis and the building of the Wall brought one of the most critical crises of the Cold War that could have ended in conflict and set the stage for the Cuban Missile Crisis that followed in the Fall of 1962.
Forty years ago, the Nixon administration was on the verge of achieving rapprochement with the People's Republic of China.
Thirty years ago, President George H. W. Bush ordered Operation Desert Storm in 1991 that liberated Kuwait from Iraqi occupation and turned much of Saddam Hussein's military into scrap metal restoring American military dominance and prestige. And, more significantly, the Soviet Union collapsed and became the much smaller Russian Federation.
Twenty years ago, September 11th, 2001, forever changed the course of American history. With the Cold War long gone and a seemingly benign China emerging, a new enemy arose called violent and radical religious extremism. The response was the unending global war on terror with U.S. and NATO troops still deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan.
A decade later in May 2011, SEAL Team Six undertook a daring raid to capture and it turned out to kill Osama bin Laden in Abbottabad, Pakistan after one of the most intensive manhunts in history.
But what do each of these anniversaries tell us beyond the coincidence of occurring decades ago divisible by 10 from 2021? The answer is a very great deal.
In 160 years, the United States has experienced a civil war; two world wars; a Cold War; the Korean War; the failed Vietnam War; the debacles of the global war on terror and the second Iraqi intervention and Afghanistan; one massive depression; two pandemics; the rise and fall of powerful adversaries and enemies; four presidential impeachments of three presidents; three presidential assassinations and one death in office; and of course the industrial, information and now biogenetic revolutions. That does not discount the advances in civil rights from the ending of slavery to giving women the vote.
In 160 years, one can only wonder what history will have wrought. One obvious observation is that the human race has survived and for much of it standards of living have soared asymptotically. Another world war has been avoided. But regional conflicts have not abated. And perhaps the potentially most dangerous and even existential threat of climate change will very much determine the state of the future.
At the moment, the United States may be facing a constitutional crisis second only to 1861. Without civility and compromise, checks and balance cannot work unless one party absolutely controls both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue. That will never happen in a nation divided 51/49 on virtually every issue.
While the advent of at least three vaccines to contain COVID-19 augurs well, that significant numbers of Americans refuse vaccination and reject precautions such as wearing masks and social distancing could too easily lead to a fourth wave of the pandemic especially as more pernicious and contagious strains of the virus increase infections.
One can argue that any or every year is an "inflection point." 1914, 1939, 1947 marked the start of two world wars and a cold one. 1918, 1945 and 1991 marked the end of those wars. 2021 may be the precursor of even greater inflection points to come especially if disruptive acts of nature replace those of man as the most threatening and the most difficult to contain.
Harlan Ullman is UPI's Arnaud deBorchgrave Distinguished Columnist and author of the upcoming book "The Fifth Horseman and the New MAD: The Tragic History of How Massive Attacks of Disruption Endangered, Infected, Engulfed and Disunited a 51% Nation and the Rest of the World."
