My political philosophy: a thread for Radar

[Torrere]

The United States became such a powerful country in such a short amount of time because of World War II. Our success had to do mostly with our location (and the fact that neither Canada nor Mexico was fighting against us).

We were the only major fighting country to escape from the war without having been invaded and mostly unharmed. Having successfully slaughtered almost all of the previous occupants, we also occupied new territory and had a huge amount of room to grow.

My question, which I am currently to lazy to answer, is: why didn't Argentina become as powerful as the United States? They were the seventh wealthiest country in 1900 or so.

[Edit: One significant event that may affect why the United States become such a world power was the Civil War, which set our industrial revolution in motion and the 1880s heydays, as well as shifting the social structure of the nation.]