American grand strategy cannot be understood without a historical grounding. Prior to the Revolution, the defense of the colonies as a whole was left to the British crown, and the colonial militia handled local defense. Contention between the great powers (Spain, the Netherlands, France, and Great Britain) on the North American continent bred an enduring distaste among the colonists for international intervention in the Western hemisphere. Prerevolutionary warfare was endemic and nearly constant in North America, fostering on the one hand a familiarity with conflict, but on the other a distrust of standing forces that would condition American strategic thought for several centuries