Quote:
Originally posted by Ironhorse
That's not entirely fair to say. There are plenty competitors, some even serious contenders to the Imperator crown they're all after. I think it's more realistic to say US is trying very hard to stay a huge step ahead of the competition. This of course angers a few folks.
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It?s not just that there is the US is trying to stay ahead of it?s competitors. It?s that there is currently a wide gulf between the US and it?s closest competitors in combined economic, military, and political power. From the end of WW II until 1991, the USSR was the only true competitor because it had vast military and political power.
Political power, because of the great influence in the world of the Soviet system and because it was the world center of Communism. It?s not just that the USSR fell but Communism, with a capital C, fell and with it the seat of Russian political power. Military power, because it was willing to spend a higher percentage of it?s GDP on military than any other large nation at the time.
Today, the largest economies are the US, Japan, and Germany. The number one economy is 10 times larger than the number 7. Japan?s economy is only 40% of size of the US economy and they don?t have the population to support moving relatively higher. Militarily, those two closest economic competitors, Japan and Germany still have US troops on their soil and politically, neither of them has a veto in the UN. Japan is one of the closest allies of the US and it is necessarily so because of historic threats of China and North Korea.
This assumes a look at the nation level. The EU has about the same economic clout as the United States.
Militarily, the gulf is even wider than that. Just look at military spending. Though the US military budget as a percentage of its GDP is considerably smaller than it was at the height of the Cold War, it is still heads and tails above all other nations, more than the next 20 nations combined. It does this while spending less than 4% of it?s total GDP on military.
Politically, the US is part of NAFTA, NATO, has a veto in the UN, has a veto in the IMF and remains a pivotal card to play among regional competitors in all the important regions of the world. Even China played "the America card" courting the US in the early 1970s as tensions rose between it and the USSR.
France has much political power with a veto in the UN and membership in the EU. So too does the UK with a UN veto, EU membership and a special historical relationship with the US. The UK, it seems to me has played the political cards it holds better than anyone.
I?m not so naive as to suggest there is a permanent imbalance of power. It is rather imbalanced right now, especially when one looks at the combined Holy Trinity of power; economics, military, and politics. It became immediately imbalanced when the USSR disintegrated and with it the political influence of the Communist Party. We didn?t witness this degree of imbalance in the past century.
On a national level, any future potential global competitors have at least as many potential difficulties in becoming a superpower as the US has in maintaining superpower status. Many people think of the US as a young nation but in reality it one of the oldest with a consistent form of governance since the late 18th century. Nearly every one of the ?old? countries have all written or re-written constitutions and even changed their entire system of government.