>>520395865
>no one wants total war
Agreed. That's why (big) countries maneuver themselves into positions where total war against them would be suicide, or impossible.
>with America
Because we have the biggest, baddest military in the world, right? Do you know how we built it and maintain it? We first established dominion over the non-soviet world (relatively easy in the aftermath of WW2), as the soviets began to decline, and established our currency as The global standard. Countries with this global currency used to be able to redeem it for gold, IIRC De Gaulle did this quite a bit, knowing what was coming. We then ran out of gold paying for korea+vietnam, and noticed that nothing changed. Since we still had dominion over the world, the world continued to use our, IOU's. The important detail is that these IOU's could not be turned-in for hard currency anymore. Instead, they bought our bonds and pumped our stock market, creating the greatest infinite money glitch in human history (including the future, probably). We adjusted our economy to take advantage (gutted our base industry) and became a "nation of doctors and scientists" ('think that was a nixon quote), which, while admirable, had a GLARING FUCKING WEAKNESS, in that we placed our armory and IV drip in the hands of our slaves. They realized that the emperor had no clothes, and so, BRICS now encompasses most of the planet. And though China has provided much of the momentum, it's a decentralized movement, and no single war can prevent those countries from wanting to turn off the infinite money glitch. And if they do engage militarily against China, you'd better believe that the world would yank our life support.
>>520395865
>Industry can and will return to America faster than you think. It’s already underway
Atlas lifted less weight.
Do you know why the AI bubble, makes up half of our economy? They don't believe they can match 1/4 of China's output, and so, they're gunning for a wunderwaffe