Day 18 of Community Notes posting

People forget that the US, after WWII, had conquered and occupied many of its enemies. But, once the economies were stable and there was a political system in place to replace the dictatorship, the US *left*. No other countries ever did that. Look at the difficulty in Soviet satellites breaking free once communism was weakened. History is replete with countries fighting for independence, but there aren’t many examples of a conqueror saying “You’re ready for independence. Bye.”