Does it take a collapsed superpower to recognize a declining one? In this analysis of the importance of the United States and the consequences of its diminishing influence, Gazeta columnist Semen Novoprudski examines why Russians have been demonizing America since the fall of the Soviet Union, and what earth’s leading nations must do now that the end of the ‘superpower era’ has arrived.
For Russia’s Gazeta, Semen Novoprudski writes in small part:
During the latest economic shock, the syndrome of dependency on America, from which Russia and humanity in general chronically suffer, has become especially apparent. Everyone hates the States, but depends solely on them. Even now, what other nation can deal with the responsibility for maintaining international order and pulling the global economy up by its ears? Alas, the demands on “Captain America” critically exceed the supply. The modern world can no longer afford just one “captain country.”
Russia’s superpower crash was torturous. Even after twenty post-Soviet years, neither the man on the street nor the nation’s heads of state have managed to internalize that we are now inhabitants of a large country that finds itself in a rapid and perhaps irreversible historical decline.
International terrorism, the global economy, information networks, a growing lack of essential natural resources, the creation of history’s first weapons not simply of mass destruction – but of total destruction – have made us, regardless of the size of the countries in which we live – players of relatively equal significance.
And so we play the game of organizing, through joint efforts and even against our will, a world order the likes of which might permit humanity to survive and develop without destroying ourselves and the planet.
Captain America, following Captain Russia, has completed its journey through the realm of imperialism. The world is becoming a global empire, a global colony, a global village. Simply put, we are now traveling in one ship and must fight as hard as we can to make sure that it doesn’t turn out to be another Titanic.
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