American hegemony is the basic fact of global politics, recognized by all other powers. This has been the state of world affairs at least since the Bretton Woods conference of 1944 established the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund -- and put them in Washington, DC. The U.S. will to dominate its perceived enemies and intimidate its allies was confirmed by the two American nuclear bombing attacks on the civilian populations of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945.