The missing piece of the "multipolar" assumption is whether there's any real trajectory for deglobalisation. I think that remains to be seen and the question is being tested now.

The utility of military power will mostly be at flashpoints in the imperial peripheries like Palestine or Ukraine (not at all discounting the people who live in these "peripheries", but it's their geography that allows empires to view them as expendable) while China and the US remain interdependent.

The self-preservation trick for imperial satellites like Australia is not to think like an imperial periphery. It's when your country ends up as little more than a subsidised missile and submarine base that you're in real trouble.

JazzG didn't finish the clip but this guy starts by saying we're "leaving" the rules-based order and that's because of strong men like Xi Jinping Putin and Trump, and Europeans didn't share this mindset.

He mentions the Yalta conference but did Europe have this mindset in the thirty years after when it beat down liberation movements in Africa and Asia and millions died in liberation wars? Or did that rules based mindset raise its head when they joined American wars and invaded Iraq twice Afghanistan Libya and Syria?

This whole vague bollocks of "rules-based order" is the most transparent attempt to deflect and distract from an actual order that exists called international law. Not like they're without issues of their own but the United Nations and international courts and conventions have clear concise rules to govern everyone like the absence of which this MI6 prick claims to lament, just funnily enough Europe and especially the US (under Dem or Rep presidents) simply don't observe or adhere to any of it when it's not convenient. Just astonishing to me that people actually still fall for it in 2025.

      Even one of the most annoying men in the world has lost patience with the most annoying man in the world.

      jones I think most Western Europeans like each other these days and they share a culture to an extent. What you are referring to is probably the xenophobia from some people against foreigners but this exists within countries too.

          awooga83

          Russians are laughing after completely depleting their military equipment, almost a million men dead, and a front that is barely moving? Worst win of all time.

              jones I think it's more a reflection on the geo political situation saying you need military power to be respected in the current climate. There are plenty of criticisms of Western hypocrisy but the US wouldn't have gone making these kinds of moves over the last 30 years where they blatantly sell out clear allies to countries that are committed to their defeat ideologically so things have definitely changed in the past 5 or so years. The idea that a country like Russia would launch a direct war (recognising the crimea event) would not have been imaginable and that there's looking to be no team long term consequences either.

              We have swung back into a similar landscape of the 20th century time frame he's referencing. You mention the United nations but it's always been weak as body now almost all big countries don't even bother to pay it lip service. You can see another equivalent in the league of nations the delusion was believing we had actually effectively replaced the former with an effective version, we never did.

                  Kel Varnsen the Russian state will, Putin doesn't care about his people, they have all the weaknesses you claim today but also sanctions and no long term out. Trump and the US should be in a very good position to push a negotiation that costs the Russians. Instead giving them more then they would have dreamed forcing Ukraine to give territory, no security guarantees, proposing removal of NATO troops from all Eastern NATO countries with no reparations for destroying an independent country. Giving that as you say Russia is on its needs that's a massive win for them. They launched an aggressive war of they come out with normalised relations, US openly abandoning Europe, gaining territory. It's been clear Putin's gamble these last 18 months was I hope trump gets in I think we can get a positive outcome and he was absolutely right.

                    Gurgen nah what I'm referring to is there are no 'friends' in geopolitics, everyone looks out for themselves. Germany for example is supposed to be even more grateful than other European countries for the Union yet they've had zero scruples to abuse the Euro and Maastricht rules to run an internal devaluation policy for two decades and export mass unemployment to its neighbours.

                      awooga83 sorry but I don't buy it, the US has been doing the exact same shit since forever it's just gone unreported (or at least with less coverage) because they bothered to put more varnish on their policies, what's new is that Trump is just showing the bare face of power. There's countless examples but not sure it gets more obvious than when the US signed The Hague Act into law 20+ years ago allowing them to invade the Netherlands if ever an American soldier was put on trial there ffs.

                      Russia invading Ukraine is novel because for once it's not a country that's part of the West that's committed the crime of aggression. Everybody outside the West knew that the global order is only orderly for them as long as the US decide it is.

                          "For once"? Non-western countries invade other countries all the time. The very same Russia took 20% off one of its tiny neighbours only this century.

                            Gurgen yes, for once. If you talk about the Georgian war regardless of how one feels about the South Ossetian conflict it was Saakashvili's troops who crossed the border first, hence the term "crime of aggression"

                            Compare the number of dead in these conflicts with the victims of Western wars, it's not exactly comparable is it.

                                I see what @jones is saying. There are acceptable invasions and unacceptable invasions. In South Africa, we are now dealing with the threat of sanctions and lies pfficially tabled by US congressmen about our government's relationships with Hamas and the Chinese Communist Party simply because South Africa dared to take an opposing view on Israel's misdeeds in Palestine. It's been very damaging economically to South Africa. But I am still happy the SA government stood on business here.

                                Gurgen compare the dead of America's wars with those of Russia's?

                                  jones I mean Russia has been involved in plenty of conflicts of such nature Afghanistan, Syria and numerous African conflicts all which were linked to Russia. It's not like Russia just started to do this either it's been that way since the post WW2 order as an the big powers have been. The difference for me is there were unwritten limits to what the big countries would do in some theatres which no longer appear to be in play which to me is a change in the reality of things.

                                      awooga83 Afghanistan is the only war that fits the description and that wasn't Russia, it was the Soviet Union - the conversation was regarding post Cold War. Syria the Russians were actually there with a mandate under international law and "numerous African conflicts" I'm not sure if you appreciate the reason why Russia or Russian mercenaries were ever called in there.

                                      I've no relation to Russia, they as any other country with the means to do so will abuse it and commit horrendous atrocities - we were friends with a Chechen family back in the day and I vividly remember the images coming from there in my childhood. That doesn't mean that what Russia under Putin have done is even remotely comparable to the pain and strife the US have rained on the planet in the last four decades.

                                          Coombs this shit drives me insane. I'm happy to take in Ukrainian refugees but in Ireland we've given them way more rights than all other refugees and its fucking nuts.

                                            awooga83 What is surprising to me is Russia are in a very weak position, if Trump just turned around and said he is gonna support Ukraine they'd probably come to the table themselves. They can't sustain this much longer but despite that Trump seems more desperate than the Russians to end it.