The Future Simple indicates that an action is in the future relative to the speaker or writer. The future is also formed with the use of a form of "go" plus the infinitive of the verb. English can even use the present to suggest the future tense.
She will leave soon. He is going to faint. I am leaving later today.
The Past Simple indicates that an action is in the past relative to the speaker or writer. It is used when the time period has finished, when the time period is definite and with “for”, when the action is finished.
I worked with the FBI for two months. We went to Chicago last Christmas. We visited Mom last week.
The' is used with specific nouns representing something one of a kind, abstract or named earlier in the text. We also use ‘the’ with certain kinds of proper nouns and nouns followed by a prepositional phrase beginning with "of".
The United States has encouraged the use of the private automobile as opposed to the use of public transit.