The empire is clearly much weaker today than it was at its zenith in the 90s. While the US is able to continue causing chaos around the world, the the chaos is increasingly backfiring, and the effects reinforce each other. The world is now dedollarizing, BRICS is rising as a direct competitor to G7. The US is starting to lose political control of Africa and Latin America. Meanwhile, western economies are in a crisis, and things in Europe are becoming critical already. These aren’t problems that can be solved using a nuclear arsenal. The reality is that the cost of maintaining the empire now outweighs the plunder. As a result, the core is becoming hollowed out leading to political unrest domestically.
I agree. Of course all of that is true, but it doesn’t mean the empire does not perceive a strategic interest in seeing Isn’treal expand into Syria, nor does it mean the Iraq and Afghanistan weren’t successfully plundered and weakened. You cannot conquer anywhere forever, even if imperialism desires it. Although 40 years is a long time in the modern era. In neither case was the US forced out, it just got what it wanted and turned it’s attention elsewhere.
The problem the US has is that it can’t be everywhere at once. The US had to abandon Afghanistan because they wanted to have a proxy war in Ukraine. Now that it failed, they want to either take on Iran or start something with China. My point isn’t that US is just going to stop, but that they continuously get weaker in every regard as they continue doing this. There is a real material cost to each of these adventures, and these costs continue to add up. My view is that the downfall will be economic as opposed to a military defeat. Trump will likely accelerate this process with his open trade war on the BRICS.
At the same time, the US military is simply not strong enough to take on its main adversaries like Russia and China. All they can do is to continue chaos around the world which ultimately pushes countries towards BRICS.
The empire is clearly much weaker today than it was at its zenith in the 90s. While the US is able to continue causing chaos around the world, the the chaos is increasingly backfiring, and the effects reinforce each other. The world is now dedollarizing, BRICS is rising as a direct competitor to G7. The US is starting to lose political control of Africa and Latin America. Meanwhile, western economies are in a crisis, and things in Europe are becoming critical already. These aren’t problems that can be solved using a nuclear arsenal. The reality is that the cost of maintaining the empire now outweighs the plunder. As a result, the core is becoming hollowed out leading to political unrest domestically.
I agree. Of course all of that is true, but it doesn’t mean the empire does not perceive a strategic interest in seeing Isn’treal expand into Syria, nor does it mean the Iraq and Afghanistan weren’t successfully plundered and weakened. You cannot conquer anywhere forever, even if imperialism desires it. Although 40 years is a long time in the modern era. In neither case was the US forced out, it just got what it wanted and turned it’s attention elsewhere.
The problem the US has is that it can’t be everywhere at once. The US had to abandon Afghanistan because they wanted to have a proxy war in Ukraine. Now that it failed, they want to either take on Iran or start something with China. My point isn’t that US is just going to stop, but that they continuously get weaker in every regard as they continue doing this. There is a real material cost to each of these adventures, and these costs continue to add up. My view is that the downfall will be economic as opposed to a military defeat. Trump will likely accelerate this process with his open trade war on the BRICS.
At the same time, the US military is simply not strong enough to take on its main adversaries like Russia and China. All they can do is to continue chaos around the world which ultimately pushes countries towards BRICS.