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Could This Be the End of Global Superpowers?
ERAU-News.com ^ | 1/20/2015 | Wesley Stine

Posted on 02/04/2015 1:52:33 PM PST by azcap

Could This Be the End of Global Superpowers?

Recent events indicate that we will likely soon be living in a superpower-free world. The old bipolar order, in which the United States and Soviet Union competed to promote their ideologies, uphold their allies, and subvert their enemies across the globe, is long gone. For the last two decades, the United States acted as the sole global superpower, with Russia and China as possible rivals. But neither of them is really up to that challenge, and in recent years even the United States’ influence is fading.

Russia, China, and the United States are the foremost military, technological, and economic powers of the world, but each of these nations has serious problems that prevent it from exercising the kind of global influence that characterized superpowers during the Cold War. Russia is nostalgic for the glory of bygone days, but despite current imperialist trends, there will be no returning to that past. President Vladimir Putin himself said that, “Anyone who doesn’t regret the passing of the Soviet Union has no heart. But anyone who wants it restored has no brain.”

Russia’s days of waging proxy wars and establishing vassal states in such far-flung places as Vietnam and Cuba are long gone. The recent invasions of nearby countries such as Georgia and the Ukraine, in addition to showing the limited, regional scope of Russia’s military endeavors, also demonstrates its lack of real allies, even among countries that were once part of the Soviet bloc.

While Russia is in a state of decline, China is an ascendant power. From being an isolated and impoverished rogue state in the 1960s and 1970s, China has experienced meteoric technological, commercial and economic growth. With 7.4% annual GDP growth, China will soon become the world’s largest economy.

Nevertheless, China is unlikely to take on the role of a global superpower. China has never attempted to spread its ideology in distant parts of the world, and since 1979 has not fought in a single war. While the United States and Russia have both involved themselves in the recent conflicts sweeping the Middle East, China has not weighed in at all, nor has it taken any position in the Crimean controversy. By avoiding affairs beyond their part of the world, the Chinese are deciding to be a regional, rather than global, power. Like Russia, China has no major allies.

Even the United States is now in an untenable position. At home, the out-of-control national debt threatens our economy. American influence abroad is waning. After several wars in the Middle East, reluctance to intervene to stop the Islamic State in Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS) is undoing our former accomplishments. Although pressure from the United States caused Vladimir Putin to stand down in his 2008 invasion of Georgia, we could not accomplish this again with the Crimea in 2014.

Furthermore, we are losing the confidence of our allies. The United States attracted notoriety for their leaders’ conspicuous absence from the recent anti-terror rally in Paris. Japan’s current expansion of its military likely shows lack of trust in America’s protection. According to Hamza Hendawi of the Associated Press, most Iraqis now see Iran, rather than the United States, as their biggest ally against ISIS.

The absence of strong global powers could mean drastic changes in global politics. Regional conflicts and alliances would come to the fore, and large parts of the world would likely descend into chaos without strong, principled nations like the United States to keep order. But these are only the immediate consequences – in the end, only time can tell what the future will bring. - See more at: http://erau-news.com/final-approach/2015/01/20/the-end-of-global-superpowers/#sthash.K6WR72FI.dpuf


TOPICS: Foreign Affairs; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: china; russia; superpowers
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1 posted on 02/04/2015 1:52:33 PM PST by azcap
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To: azcap

All engineered and administered by Soros and the NWO


2 posted on 02/04/2015 1:54:19 PM PST by jsanders2001
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To: azcap

No, because nature abhors a vacuum.


3 posted on 02/04/2015 1:56:57 PM PST by E. Pluribus Unum (Government is the religion of the fascists.)
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To: azcap

If it is, it’s good news for Islam.

They will become the only Superpower.


4 posted on 02/04/2015 2:00:40 PM PST by 353FMG
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To: azcap

Don’t know about the others, but Jugears is doing a wonderful job of destroying our ‘Superpower’ status...


5 posted on 02/04/2015 2:03:22 PM PST by DJ Frisat (Proudly providing the NSA with provocative textual content since 1995!)
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To: azcap

Russia has the will but not the strength.
We have the strength but not the will.
China is playing 100 year chess and we better hope that they make a big mistake somewhere along the way.


6 posted on 02/04/2015 2:06:35 PM PST by azcap (Who is John Galt ? www.conservativeshirts.com)
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To: 353FMG

Islam is powered by oil money.

Because of the incredible success of oil production in the USA, over the next decade, the mideast is going to get acquainted with their new “best customer”.

A country with mafia business practices and 1.5 billion expendable people to enforce them.


7 posted on 02/04/2015 2:07:00 PM PST by nascarnation (Impeach, convict, deport)
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To: azcap

Hopefully that will change with a new, conservative administration in the 2016 election.


8 posted on 02/04/2015 2:08:44 PM PST by spel_grammer_an_punct_polise (Why does every totalitarian, political hack think that he knows how to run my life better than I do?)
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To: azcap
in recent years even the United States’ influence is fading.

Ever since the eunich-in-chief got into the whitehut.

9 posted on 02/04/2015 2:11:25 PM PST by pfflier
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To: azcap

Nature abhors a vacuum. Nature also abhors equilibrium. There will be one super power. It will always grow old, die, and be reborn in another place.


10 posted on 02/04/2015 2:12:53 PM PST by Born to Conserve
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To: E. Pluribus Unum

Exactly right! Kudos...

This is the one missing factor in many people’s global outlook.

“If only there were no super-power, this world would be such a better place!” Only idiots adopt this train of thought IMO.

Look at the problems in the first half of the last century without super powers.

Then look at them with only two. And then look at them with only one.

I think there were far fewer global deaths with two super-powers than there was without a super-power at all. I also think there were fewer global deaths with one versus two global super powers.

The reason for that, was that we had a rather sane just and compassionate super power. The United States was reasoned. It didn’t attack lesser nations without a reasoned cause. It didn’t even go after the governments in some instances.

Irrationally (IMO) some folks think the U. S. is a pariah. That’s because they haven’t seen pariahs in a while. If Russia or China or a united Islamic entity were to gain global dominance, we should expect to see tens, perhaps hundreds of millions of deaths through purge and warfare.

There will come a day when the United States of Ronald Reagan will be missed by the world as a whole, not just some Conservative U. S. Citizens.

The world Obama is creating, is one of no hope and extreme exposure to massive death and destruction, certainly destabilization perhaps not seen in hundreds if not a thousand years or more. We know it will be something on the order of at least the late 1800s early 1900s.

With nobody out there to put down the global threat, this is going to be one massive mess.

The void will be filled. If it is filled by evenly matched parties, it would be ugly because nobody could intimidate the others in order to discourage them from engaging.

If one bad entity emerged, a global calamity would take place. It would ride roughshod over the planet.


11 posted on 02/04/2015 2:14:07 PM PST by DoughtyOne (The question is Jeb Bush. The answer is NO!)
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To: azcap
large parts of the world would likely descend into chaos

We're starting to see that already.

12 posted on 02/04/2015 2:16:22 PM PST by Inyo-Mono (Just say to NO Rhinos in 2016.)
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To: azcap
The author is confusing the United States with its current administration. It's a fairly common error. It is not, after all, the U.S. that stands to lose from the U.S. declining to act in an imperial manner, it's everyone who used to be the beneficiary of that and no longer is. Those tend not to broadcast it, in fact, have made a cottage industry out of decrying it over the years, but when you see Europe faced with geopolitical challenges and aspirations it hasn't the military power to address, you get an idea of who really benefits from a return to the Great Powers scenario, and it isn't the people who imagined they would.

That said, Pax Americana always did have a sell-by date attached to it and was pretty illusory to begin with. Most Golden Ages are like that: golden only if you don't look too close and missed bitterly when they're gone. Parade's done, and we're the guys sweeping up the elephant droppings, but the street will still be used.

13 posted on 02/04/2015 2:20:09 PM PST by Billthedrill
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To: nascarnation

Islam is powered by oil money.

Because of the incredible success of oil production in the USA, over the next decade, the mideast is going to get acquainted with their new “best customer”.

A country with mafia business practices and 1.5 billion expendable people to enforce them.


That’s correct, the Chinese will tell ‘Old Goober Habeeb what THEY will pay for a barrel of oil. If you don’t like the price, drink it.

And by the way Sheik we will actively support your overthrow and execution along with your entire blood line to establish a more willing “partner”.


14 posted on 02/04/2015 2:35:25 PM PST by Rumplemeyer (The GOP should stand its ground - and fix Bayonets)
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To: azcap

The 1965 Immigration Act has led to a United States so disjointed and splintered, and diverse, that there is no actual America, that is why none of us even know what our foreign policy, or national identity, or national goals are today, it changes from election to election to election, based entirely on 50%+1 vote.

We don’t even know what side we are on in ongoing wars, until we see who won our latest presidential election.


15 posted on 02/04/2015 2:35:45 PM PST by ansel12 (Civilization, Crusade against the Mohammedan Death Cult.)
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To: E. Pluribus Unum

The players may change, but the game goes on. There shall NEVER a unified world government, because of something called “countervailing force”. Up to now, a relative oligarchy of nations has swapped and shifted that balance back and forth, with varying coalitions forming and dissolving as perceptions and expectations change. In the past century, we have seen Great Britain displaced by the United States, and Germany displaced by the Soviet Union, with most of the others kind of shoved to second-tier status. The emergence of Japan, after their ill-fated alliance with Germany and their crushing military defeat by what was largely the US efforts, as an economic power under the US shield, was supposed to be one of the triumphs of “freedom”, but that has become a most slippery and amorphous term, changing in meaning depending on whom may be uttering it.

Red China rose almost in direct relation to the failure of Japan to maintain its tightrope walk between prosperity and chaos, but unlike Japan, has a military base that is proportionately much larger than Japan’s. China becomes the countervailing force to the United States, with the floundering of the successors to the Soviet Union, the Russian Federation.

The territory once known as “the United States of America” has all but abdicated its leadership position in the world, and right now, there is rising chaos at every turn, with no one power capable of stepping in and substituting for that formerly indomitable nation.

You are right, that vacuum is begging to be filled.


16 posted on 02/04/2015 2:35:54 PM PST by alloysteel (The Internet is like an icy sidewalk. One slip, and BOOM!, down you go)
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To: azcap

Prep for one world Givernment.. -OR- Takerment..

NO givernment has anything that they did not TAKE from others.. i.e. some body ELSE...

Givernment officials are THE FARMERS on the Animal Farm..
Milking a culling “the people”.. for profit by themselves..

Which is what “COMMUNISM”(fascism) (( IS ))..


17 posted on 02/04/2015 2:48:00 PM PST by hosepipe (" This propaganda has been edited (specifically) to include some fully orbed hyperbole.. ")
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To: nascarnation

My understanding is that it costs $5 per barrel crude oil to pull oil from the Saudi Arabia. For the United States fracking, $30. For Russia, ~$30 For Canada oil sands, $60. Since the Middle East (including Iraq) has most of the world’s reserves, I would guess that the center of world power will shift back to the Fertile Crescent and Arabia.


18 posted on 02/04/2015 2:52:28 PM PST by Jan_Sobieski (Sanctification)
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To: ansel12

Great point. Root cause of much of our problems (thank you Teddy Kennedy - the dead lion of the Senate)


19 posted on 02/04/2015 2:54:38 PM PST by Jan_Sobieski (Sanctification)
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To: Jan_Sobieski

It was actually JFK’s lifelong political goal and the left’s, it passed upon his death, as a tribute to him.

People don’t realize that JFK had pushed it for years, wrote a book on immigration, and ran on a democratic platform of chain immigration.


20 posted on 02/04/2015 2:58:25 PM PST by ansel12 (Civilization, Crusade against the Mohammedan Death Cult.)
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