The destroyers-for-bases deal marked the start of US global basing empire

Evidence

The base nation as we know it was born on September 2, 1940. It is a vastly underappreciated moment, generally treated as a small detail in World War II history books. But it was then, with the flash of a pen, that President Franklin Delano Roosevelt began the transformation of the United States from one of the world’s major powers into a global superpower of unparalleled military might. — David Vine, Base Nation_ How U.S. Military Bases…, 50

Categorization

• corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim — David Vine, Base Nation_ How U.S. Military Bases…, 50