American propaganda is getting out of hand nowadays. They had an image of a confident superpower now it's getting pathetic to outside observers. I understand Democrats were criticizing Trump for making America a laughing stock but Biden isn't any doing better.
In the end what matters is hard power, it underpins eventual soft power and decision makers understand this. We see this manifest in America's extreme irrational fear of China. It's going to be an interesting decade.
Their irrational fear of China is actually just a manifestation of american leaderships fear of their own people
Jan 6 has showed that the polarization in american society has advanced into is terminal stage 4 disease, combined with the inevitable steep decline of their living standards made worse by the coming inflation, their biggest fear is massive internal strife, therefore as any third world countries history has shown us when facing internal conflicts, an external enemy needs to be created to direct that anger
China main challenge is to guide the us into the sunset peacefully, and it goes without saying, is easier said than done