I believe the deeper we go, the more we would agree. Our greatest difference in opinion is probably about super powers. I believe they are labels we put onto cultures that end up running most of the world’s trade. The military can be private, as it was in Dutch East India Company, or national as in the U.S., or where-the-f-is-it in India HAHA ;) Somehow the natural behaviors of people end up with some sort of King/Queen after agricultural settlement.

When everyone recognizes two superpowers, as I mentioned, they pick a side and get on with their life. When there are more, each country must build up its military some more, because it can’t trust that who it is aligned with will be there when it needs it — an arms race ensues. I and others have been predicting this for years and look at how EU is clearly moving in that direction today.
In reality, there are only two super powers at the moment, the U.S. and China. Russia has military strength based on equipment from when it was a superpower and China was not. That unconscious understanding is part of why I believe Russia is trying to bluff it’s way back into super power status. It hasn’t, and it won’t work. After the Ukraine war Russia will be picked apart by the EU and China (with the U.S. getting its cut). Russia is a dead super-power walking. We can come back in five years and see if I have egg on my face ;)

Now Russia might come back in the decades ahead if the world needs the oil/gas, farming that Russia has! Climate change may give Russia a huge boost.

Who should India align with? So far, for weapons, it’s mostly been Russia. But Russia may not be able to improve those weapons in the future. India is making them itself, but it would rather outsource the development costs to someone else (Russia). And then the question is, how far apart is Russian equipment from that in the West? What if India is throwing the money out the window?

Then then Indian businesses. Do they want the lower priced materials from China or the safer legal markets of the West? No easy answers! In either case, they must either build a military to protect their interests or stand behind another’s.

The U.S. won’t be the super power forever. It will end, as all things end eventually. The power of Rome went on for centuries. The U.S. and new EU are still relatively new.

Respect still comes from winning wars, or losing the least. It’s the way people are wired. I wish it wasn’t.