The rest of the world (outside the US) generally refers to the French and Indian War as the Seven Years War. Although Britain and France were already in conflict in North America by 1754, it didn't officially become a global conflict until 1756.

New France, the vast swath of French territory stretching from the mouth of the Mississippi to Quebec and the Maritimes, was almost constantly under attack throughout its 150-year history by both the English and its American colonies and their native allies, the powerful Iroquois Confederacy.

Europe's appetite for furs in the 17th century drove England and France into conflict over territory in America, with the Iroquois and the English skirmishing with the French and their Huron allies. This situation continued until New France made peace with its Iroquois enemies at the Great Peace of Montreal in 1701. Freed from the threat of constant raiding by the Iroquois, France expanded its influence beyond the St. Lawrence Valley and began to establish a chain of forts west of the Appalachians into the Ohio Valley and boosted its military presence in the region.

This incensed the settlers of the Thirteen Colonies, who were primarily interested in virgin soil for agriculture. Crop rotation was not practiced widely, if at all, so they were constantly in need of new land to the west -- land that the French now occupied and garrisoned. The Thirteen Colonies were mostly Protestant, virulently anti-Catholic and viewed the French with hostility as papist enemies. The Thirteen Colonies coveted the lands and were active, not passive, participants in Britain's attempts to dislodge French influence from the region.

Guerrilla-style frontier conflicts soon erupted between the various parties by 1754, with the British, its American colonists and the Iroquois clashing with the French and its Huron allies over control of the waterways leading to the interior. Atrocities were committed by all sides, and not just by the indigenous peoples, but by colonists.

By 1756, Europe was ablaze as Old World dynastic disputes and Austria's desire to recover Silesia from Prussia dragged Britain and France into opposing camps. Europe saw the French and Indian War as only one theatre of war in a global conflict, with Britain and France clashing not only in the Americas but in Africa and Asia too.

The stakes in North America had become much higher as a consequence, with the possession of the entire continent as the real prize. The matter would only be settled in 1759 with Wolfe's capture of Quebec and thus, New France itself. Peace in 1763 did not win the Thirteen Colonies what they had wanted, as Quebec (Canada, or "the Canadas" as it was also called) and its French colonists became British subjects with protected language, religion and property rights. Britain also imposed a Proclamation Line, setting the limits of white settler expansion at the Appalachians, with land westward reserved as Indian Territory.

The American colonists found these accommodations to be intolerable and this would play a role in fomenting rebellion in America within 15 years.