Interesting report from the world of diplomacy and military alliance.
The headline quotation is a direct quotation of a non-American senior official to the Americans at the meeting.
80 years of effort to build up a world of shared values burned in under a year. 80 years of soft power tossed in the compost pile and recycled into fertilizer. 80 years of blood, sweat, and tears as Americans laboured to make the world safe for America.
All gone in the tantrums of a decrepit toddler.
Indeed, USA: We genuinely will never fucking trust you again.
Yes, the US is awful, but it should not be underestimated. The power the US has over traditional allies and others is still massive, and everyone else suffers from the challenge of having to solve the coordination problem if they want to collectively oppose them. The US knows this and constantly works to defeat any attempts to coordinate. Also, the US government primarily represents collections of oligarchic powers and supranational corporate and financial powers that also have huge influence in the countries that could try to coordinate against them. So, their power is not just via the tools of the state itself, but also the supranational powers that control the state. Pretty hard to stop, and the US is still basically getting what it wants, even after all of the insanity and ugly corrupt bs of Trump.
It’s not. It’s allies have started divesting. They continue to cooperate because it’s the path of lest resistance, but every day the move away from the US.
Well, go ahead and underestimate them if you want then.
Or, it did, until Trump gutted the State Department and drove out anyone anywhere near government who cared about good outcomes. There’s surely still some of this going on because of pure inertia, but it will not continue going forward.
Yes, but they can still do that stuff without needing to be tied to the US geographically or governmentally. They’re still tied to the US because it is a stable growth medium right now (stable currency / decent government if you’re rich / etc) and makes an easy home base from which to interact with a lot of different countries, but literally all of that is coming to an end. Once things are more stable and profitable if they uproot and live somewhere else, because the US has terminal rot and has become a liability for them, they’re going to move to Europe like a bunch of Russian oligarchs and do everything you just said on behalf of someone else instead.