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Originally Posted by Edward64
Assuming you are in a position to influence US policy and your goal is for the best interest of the US, how would you REALISTICALLY proceed with correcting this problem?
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We ignore creeping multipolarity at our peril. The US is of course currently the world's dominant power but will face challengers in the coming century. Those challengers are unlikely to come from the Middle East. Already in this past year China and Russia have signed a strategic cooperation pact whose aim is to place a check on American strategic interests. The Euro has emerged as a legitimate competitor to the US Dollar as a preferred global currency.
I'm not saying that the US policies toward Middle East are a sideshow, but the expense in political, economic, and military capital they require are giving potential competitors such as Russia and China an opportunity to play catchup in terms of their own power capacity building. Relations are not entirely competitive now, but how we choose to deal with these countries now will determine whether our relations will be cooperative or competitive. To the short-sighted this may not matter much now, but this may turn out to be very expensive indeed, especially if and when the Treaty of Moscow expires in 2012.