America never was the indispensable nation

 America never was the indispensable nation

Richard C. Longworth, in his Chicago Tribune op-ed ‘Is America still the indispensable nation?’ ponders whether America will remain the world’s indispensable nation much longer.

His concern is that for the first time in the half century of polling by the Chicago Council of Global Affairs, a majority of Republicans think the US should stay out of world affairs. Longworth adds it is reinforced by GOP leadership which is jeopardizing continued US funding of Ukraine’s war against Russia.

The resulting US pullback from world dominance, Longworth frets, will produce “global anarchy, a power vacuum drawing in any number of nations, many of them nuclear-armed.”
It somehow escapes Longworth, a former Tribune foreign correspondent and current distinguished fellow at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs, that the world has largely moved on from subservience to US world dominance. Nearly half the world’s population are now in BRICS and SCO, the two non-aligned geo-political blocks that have largely neutralized US unipolar leadership. They include most nations outside of Europe and North America seeking distance from US hegemony.

Rather than threaten “global anarchy”, every American, Longworth included, should welcome a US pullback from endless immoral wars and regime change operations that have destabilized countless countries, killing, maiming and displacing millions of innocents in the process.

Since 1945, America may have been the dominant world superpower, but it has never been indispensable. An America engaging in war and regime change worldwide from over 800 military bases in 70 countries is the least indispensable nation on the planet.