I think that&#x27;s less about perception of time as it is cultural expectations. Plenty of people in Europe would consider a train that&#x27;s 15 minutes late &quot;late,&quot; it just happens often enough that society has to take the slop of inefficiency into account.<p>But, my point is that even conceding such a long view of history, the US probably didn&#x27;t look more menacing than Europe. The US was a minor political and economic power, whereas Europe was much more powerful and had its own much longer history of imperialism and territorial expansion by divine right.<p>The implication seems like a bit of historical revisionism in hindsight, based on how threatening the US seems to a lot of people now.