Britain’s reign as a world superpower is over – and it’s all thanks to Brexit

Future historians may well pick 2019 as a decisive year in the decline of the US and UK as world powers. Of course, the UK started at a much lower level in the international pecking order than the US, but the direction of travel in both cases is the same. This geopolitical shift comes exactly a century after the Treaty of Versailles, in 1919, when the US and UK were at the peak of their power in determining the fate of nations after the First World War. They self-confidently redrew the map of eastern Europe, the Middle East and Africa according to their own interests and with minimal concern about the effect on others. 

Like most political retreats, the present one by the US and UK is masked by patriotic bombast about “Making America Great Again” or launching a post-Brexit “Global Britain”. In the case of the US, the retreat from hegemony was made manifest this year when Iran carried out a devastating drone and missile attack on Saudi oil facilities in September. Though a blatant act of war against an important US ally, Donald Trump, the US president, swiftly decided that it was not in America’s interests to retaliate. He may be putting maximum economic pressure on Iran, but he made clear he is not going to fight a war against them....
https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/brexit-uk-britain-boris-johnson-us-saudi-syria-nato-a9236286.html

see also

India is on a path to decline and that is why China is challenging it. By Sushil Aaron


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