How America Could Fall

Our final debate focused much on internal issues. Maybe this is due to the way the presidential primaries are turning out now. With Trump advocating policies that are war crimes and military leader publicly stating such orders would be ignored, with Cruz advocating carpet bombing ISIS (news flash, carpet bombing is not a good tactic against insurgents. More importantly, it's a tactic not a strategy), and with Clinton claiming foreign policy mastery after she voted for the Iraq invasion and advocated for the Libyan intervention, which didn't turn out all that good for anyone, no wonder we are concerned with internal issues.

However, I don't feel that such issues raised, such as education, infrastructure investment, healthcare, etc. will have the impact people seemed to think it will. These are all connected with economic development, true, however the US has been surprisingly able to adapt to economic shocks before. Lets not forget that unemployment is around 5.5%, which is not great but also not such a concerning average. Our educational institutions still attract the highly capable students from overseas. Our internal issues can be overcome.

A quick glance at the classic hard power issues like military capabilities and economic strength shows there are no short term realistic challengers. Russia, while it has been flexing its strength recently, is much more of a regional bully than an international threat. And with oil prices as low as they are Russia is limited in it's economic ability to continue expeditionary deployments. China, while more of a rising concern, is so economically tied to the US that a military conflict in the short term is almost unthinkable. Their economy is slowing down, they have a lot of overcapacity, and it is still an open question as to if China can maintain enough economic growth to keep the population satisfied. 

Climate change was offered as a threat, but I don't believe it ranks that highly. Rising sea levels coupled with dramatic shifts in rain patterns will have huge effects for sure. However, given the technological sophistication of our agriculture as well as the wealth in the economy, I believe we would be able to adapt. Not to mention Russia and China will be experiencing the same issues.

More importantly, we never defined what the basis of American power in the world is. I would argue that it's not just our ability to expeditionarily employ an advanced conventional military, nor is it just our advanced economy, even with all of its internal flaws. I would argue that historically it has been the soft power we can wield that is the true source of strength. How to make friends and influence people should be a guiding philosophy for our international relations. There are no existential threats to our security, but not playing by the rules we demand of others in fear of overblown threats will further damage our reputation and therefore our power. That is our most likely path to downfall.