The US is going through the most awkward phase in the life cycle of an empire. Its relative power in the world is down from its peak, but its burdens aren’t.
At the time of writing, the US has no ambassador in Egypt. A charge d’affaires is doing the job while the nominee for the permanent role enters her seventh month in the surrealist theatre production that it pleases Washingtonians to call the Senate confirmation process.
Perhaps the nation is distracted with the politics of its own hemisphere, what with the frequent arrival of migrants from Latin America at the southern border.Advertisement This monomania is untenable, as events in the Middle East are proving. Having taken China too lightly for decades, America’s elites have overcorrected lately. There has been a mental “pivot to Asia”.
Without question, this is the most important bilateral relationship in the world, but it is not the world. It was just possible to believe so at the turn of this decade, when non-Chinese claims on US intellectual and military bandwidth receded. The US is going through the most awkward phase in the life cycle of an empire. Its relative power in the world is somewhat down from its all-time peak, but its burdens aren’t.It must prioritise, and at the same time daren’t. Had the US not sent aircraft carriers to the eastern Mediterranean after the Hamas attack on Israel, or armed Ukraine, there would now be talk of “isolationism” or a “reluctant superpower”. Enemies might be tempted to test its will elsewhere.
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