Opinion: America is great again

Editor’s Word: Peter Bergen is CNN’s nationwide safety analyst, a vp at New America, and a professor of observe at Arizona State College. Bergen is the creator of “The Cost of Chaos: The Trump Administration and the World.” The views expressed on this commentary are his personal. View extra opinion on CNN.

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The US is riven by polarization, its democracy is threatened, inflation is raging, and the Dow is down sharply this 12 months. But, regardless of all these issues, in the event you zoom out and take a look at the world total, the US continues to be doing fairly nicely in comparison with its key enemies and closest allies.

Russia and China – the 2 nations with which the US strives most commonly for world affect – have suffered current dramatic declines of their standing.

By invading Ukraine and failing to attain its conflict goals, Russia is demonstrating that it’s now not a terrific energy. After Russian President Vladimir Putin introduced a “partial mobilization” for the conflict in Ukraine final month, around 200,000 Russians voted with their ft and fled their nation – together with two who sailed to Alaska.

Within the early days of the conflict, Russia didn’t take Kyiv, and in current weeks it has misplaced some 3,000 square miles of territory, in keeping with Ukrainian officers. Even typically dependable cheerleaders for Putin, such because the Chinese language, have distanced themselves from Putin’s failures in Ukraine.

Led by the US, NATO is now stronger than ever, supplying Ukraine with important quantities of weaponry and bulking up its collective protection spending. NATO can also be including the previously non-aligned nations of Finland and Sweden to the alliance. Whereas former President Donald Trump stored threatening to pull the US out of NATO, in the present day the alliance has new relevance.

Russia additionally didn’t cease European nations from filling their fuel shares to more than 90% for the approaching winter, which reduces President Vladimir Putin’s leverage to weaken NATO’s assist for the Ukrainians.

In the meantime, American weaponry, corresponding to anti-tank Javelin missiles and Excessive Mobility Artillery Rocket Programs (HIMARS) which are GPS-guided precision rockets, and US applied sciences, such because the Starlink satellite-based broadband Web communication system provided by Elon Musk, have helped to show the tide of the conflict in Ukraine.

Against this, Soviet-style, Russian “dumb” artillery rounds proceed to land in Ukrainian cities, killing civilians, however to no strategic end as a result of these assaults have scant army utility. Iran has additionally provided drones for Russia’s use in Ukraine, however such developments have solely hardened the resolve of Ukrainians to expel the Russians, in keeping with Gallup polling final month that discovered 70% of Ukrainians wish to proceed preventing till they win in opposition to Russia.

In the meantime, President Xi Jinping could also be taking a victory lap as he’s anticipated to be anointed the chief of the Chinese language Communist Social gathering for the third time on the ruling occasion’s nationwide congress this week, guaranteeing that he’ll develop into the nation’s strongest chief since Mao.

But, Xi’s zero-Covid policy has spurred repeated large lockdowns of China’s cities, which have broken the nation’s economic system and have gotten more and more unpopular.

The zero-Covid coverage, mixed with what the Wall Avenue Journal phrases a “full-blown property downturn,” are dramatically slowing the Chinese language economic system. As of June, youth unemployment was almost 20%.

On the similar time, China’s imprisonment of as much as two million Uyghurs and different ethnic minorities, in keeping with US State Division estimates, and its costly loans for its “Belt and Street” insurance policies haven’t endeared it to a lot of the planet. Earlier this 12 months, Pew polling discovered “unfavourable views of China stay at or close to historic highs in lots of the 19 nations” the place the group polled.

Regardless of Xi’s bellicose rhetoric about China’s proper to make use of pressure to reclaim Taiwan through the Communist Social gathering Congress this week, China should absolutely have taken notes watching Russia’s failures in Ukraine, which included the sinking of the flagship of the Russian Black Sea fleet, the Moskva in April. Any Chinese language invasion of Taiwan would contain crossing a maritime border and launching a naval armada throughout some 100 miles of water to achieve the island.

One other American rival, Iran, is riven by countrywide avenue protests which are threatening the regime arguably as a lot as any protests have executed since 1979.

Within the western hemisphere, Venezuela can also be in free fall below its socialist authorities; virtually seven million people have left the nation since 2014, 1 / 4 of the inhabitants.

China, Iran, Russia, and Venezuela share a standard function; they’re autocracies – not precisely a type of authorities recognized for serving the pursuits of the folks.

Even America’s closest democratic allies are additionally going through profound issues. The UK is popping itself right into a third-rank energy following its disastrous determination in 2016 to vote for Brexit and pull out of the free commerce zone of the European Union, which shortly lopped greater than 16% of the pound’s value in opposition to the greenback that 12 months.

Former Prime Minister Boris Johnson ran a marketing campaign in 2019 to “Get Brexit Done,” finishing the withdrawal from the EU in January 2020. This was supposed to unleash the British from all the onerous obligations of the European Union.

As a substitute, it has confirmed to be an financial debacle. Many roles within the UK that will have been stuffed by Europeans who have been previously free to maneuver to Britain for work are going unfilled in sectors corresponding to development, farming, nursing houses, and eating places. Because the Brexit vote six years in the past, the UK’s per capita revenue has grown by solely 3.8% in real terms, whereas the EU’s has grown by 8.5%, in keeping with the Group for Financial Cooperation and Improvement.

Then got here UK Prime Minister Liz Truss who compounded the hurt of Brexit by proposing unfunded tax cuts for the wealthy in September. After heightened political outcry and monetary turmoil, Truss reversed the tax cut decision, however the harm was executed, and the pound fell to historic lows. She introduced her resignation below stress Thursday, on observe to changing into Britain’s shortest-serving prime minister.

And what about that bilateral US-UK commerce deal that Conservative leaders stated would supposedly wave a magic wand over the UK’s financial mess? Truss told reporters in September, “There (aren’t) presently any negotiations going down with the US, and I don’t have an expectation that these are going to start out within the quick to medium time period.” That is government-speak acknowledging that the Individuals have advised the British: “How about by no means– isn’t good for you?” to quote the great New Yorker cartoon.

European nations are typically faring higher than the UK however nonetheless face their very own issues. The greenback, which is at a two-decade high against the Euro, remains strong because the Fed raises rates of interest and the American economic system continues to be probably the most dynamic on the planet. Certainly, the US has the lowest unemployment rate in 5 a long time. And the US is now the world’s largest producer of both gas and oil.

American vaccine technology utilized by Pfizer and Moderna helped to show the tide in opposition to Covid-19 in the US and different nations that used these vaccines. Against this, the Chinese and Russian vaccines have been far much less efficient in opposition to Covid-19.

To make certain, the US has issues aplenty, together with deep political polarization, raging inflation, excessive inequality, a horrific Covid-19 demise toll, shrinking life expectancy, frequent mass shootings, unaffordable housing in lots of locations, and intense battles over abortion. The widespread denial of President Joe Biden’s 2020 election victory amongst Republicans raises severe questions in regards to the well being of the nation’s democracy. Nonetheless, in lots of respects, the US appears to be like a lot better than a lot of the remainder of the world.

Immigration, which is usually handled as an issue by Individuals, underlines the continuing attraction of the US. In the meantime, a whole lot of 1000’s of Russians have fled their homeland since Putin introduced a partial mobilization within the conflict in opposition to Ukraine, and tens of 1000’s have left Hong Kong after the Chinese language takeover of the previously autonomous metropolis.

To paraphrase Warren Buffett, betting in opposition to America has by no means been a wise transfer.