I mean we had a lot of unforced errors. Specifically Afghanistan and Iraq empowered the petrodollar and led to more influence for countries like Russia, the housing market collapse gave A lot of countries a chance to catch up. Plus Trump showing how we were unreliable global overseers. America leaving the TPP was a big plus for China too…. Don’t even get me started on how far behind America is on green energy and health tech due to the avoidance off facing the realities of global warming and stem cell tech.
America did it to themselves, and a lot of it can be traced to Bush 2. With that said Putin another president from that era that is doing his impression of Bush 2 right now. The damage he has done is going to be felt by Russia long after he is dead, and the funny part is none of this serves a purpose. Crimea was the best part of Ukraine economically and he already had it. That’s the funny part, he got what he needed and his reputation was unscathed in 2014. He even got Trump elected in 2016. This unforced error international L was him ego tripping. He was already seen as a scary entity internationally.