Sailboats

Humans have had sailboats for at least 10,000 years. Those sailboats could only sail in the same direction the wind was blowing, so if the winds were west winds, the boats could sail east (or they could lower their sails and travel in whatever direction they wanted to row, but galleys require lots of oarsmen, and oarsmen require lots of food and water, so not much space for cargo or paying passengers).

For fishermen if there was no storm, the winds are seaward at dawn and landward at dusk, so they can use the sails going out to catch fish and coming back home, maybe catching a few more fish as they sail homeward.

But the Vikings wanted to travel west when the North Atlantic winds were mostly west winds, so they lowered their sails and rowed. We know they made it to Canada, started a small colony, and then all died out. Likewise in Greenland. Iceland was close enough they could carry enough stuff (including women, of course) to set up a colony that remains to this day in Iceland, but Iceland was about as far west as those old ships, mostly moved by oarsmen, could travel and set up permanent colonies.

Until the 15th century, when some Italian came up with a ship that could sail into the wind: with a west wind, the ship could sail south-southwest by south or north-northwest by north, and, by sailing between south-southwest by south and north-northwest by north, the ship could tack her way westward into a west wind.

However, no rich and powerful people in Italy had any desire to sail west, they wanted to sail east to fight the Ottomans (and claim all the Ottoman treasures for Christians who G_d wanted to have all those treasures)), and when an Italian begged for a ship to sail west, he was refused.

And then the Spanish royalty threw a huge party in 1492 to celebrate the total defeat of Islam in Spain, and when that Italian asked for money to buy one ship, they gave him enough for three ships, and the Europeans began colonising the rest of the world (and figured G_d must have wanted them to do so).

Those sailing ships allowed Europeans to colonise just about the entire world, and also allowed Europeans to have huge naval wars over which European power would have which colony. And, of course, the colonists in the Americans mostly declared independence from their European Imperial masters, and, logistics being what they are, mostly succeeded, with a few minor exceptions.

The US of A started as a British colony, declared independence, won, and then, in 1823, condemned colonialism for 75 years, until someone said no nation can be a Great Nation without colonies, so, in 1898, the US declared war on Spain based on the lie that Spain had attacked the US, and took over just about all of the Spanish colonies. Many in the US decided they hated being Imperialists and demanded that the US 'free' the colonies and make them into neo-colonies, with a faux 'Independent Government' that is entirely run from the US. Of course, a few of those neo-colonies refused 'independence' and remain colonies, and, after most of Cuba was made into a neo-colony, a small part remains a US colony/military base and prison, and the rest, with Soviet support, moved from an American neo-colony to a Soviet neo-colony to a state forced into poverty by harsh US sanctions (and, the US hope, will return to the kind of US neo-colony it was in 1955, with lots of resorts for US tourists, and lots of sugar and tobacco farms owned by US companies).

But the US have returned from a significant Imperial Power into an insignificant Imperial Power, with most of the US vassal states nominally 'Independent States' (with governments who always do what the US leadership order them to do, or else, are maybe killed, or maybe sentenced, like Noriega, to Life in the lowest basement of a US Federal Prison).

So now we're all hoping that All will soon for the Best, in this, the Best of All Possible Worlds (thanks to the brilliant American leadership of just about all the nominally independent governments of the entire world).