Why There Will Be No More Superpowers

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0:00Everyone's talking about who will be the next superpower, but they're all wrong. There won't

0:05be any more superpowers. And this is why. Let's be clear. The conditions that created superpowers,

0:11the unique circumstances of the 19th and 20th centuries don't exist anymore. The game has

0:16fundamentally changed. You can think of superpower status like a scorecard. Because superpower status

0:22isn't one thing. It is six things all at once. military reach, economic scale, energy

0:28independence, strategic geography, technological dominance, alliances. Each is important in its own

0:35right. But the catch is that any country aspiring to global dominance must excel in all categories

0:40simultaneously. And that is far harder than it sounds. And it's why every major contender, China,

0:46India, and even the EU inevitably falls short. And at the end, we'll put every contender back on the

0:51scorecard so you can see exactly where each one falls. Superpower doesn't just mean powerful or

0:57influential. France is influential. Saudi Arabia is powerful. Neither is a superpower. A superpower

1:03embodies dominance across multiple dimensions of influence simultaneously. Military, economic,

1:08technological, geographic, all of it, all at once with global reach. The British Empire came close,

1:14but it lacked certain industrial capacities and faced constant imperial overstretch. The

1:19Soviet Union had massive military might, but its economy was brittle, ultimately shattering under

1:25its own weight. The United States after 1991, well, that that was something different. That

1:31was truly a unipolar moment. A superpower with the world's largest economy, best technology and

1:37reserve currency, most protected geography, and the densest alliance networks. It was everything

1:42everywhere, all working together all at once. You can think of the concept of becoming a global

1:47superpower like a strategy video game where you're designing the perfect empire. You have to have a

1:52high score in all of the following areas. The first is military reach. And no, that doesn't

1:57mean that you just need a strong army with plenty of tanks to overrun your closest enemy. You need

2:03to be able to project your power far beyond the oceanic horizons. That means building a bluewater

2:08navy that can operate anywhere with impunity. So you'll need overseas bases on multiple continents.

2:14and you'll need the ability to not just fight, but win wars thousands of miles from home.

2:19Military reach is the clearest indicator, but it is completely contingent on category number two,

2:24economic scale. GDP matters, sure, but you also need a massive domestic marketplace that other

2:30nations depend on accessing. You need a currency that everyone uses and the economic leverage to

2:36reward friends and punish enemies wherever they might live. Your economy runs on energy, the third

2:42category. If someone can turn off your lights, you are not a superpower. You either need vast

2:47domestic resources or completely secure supply chains that can't be disrupted. And today, that

2:53is becoming harder than ever. It helps if you've got some natural defenses, which fit nicely into

2:58our fourth category, which we'll call strategic geography. Natural defenses make invading you

3:03nearly impossible. Things like oceans, mountains, and friendly neighbors. It helps if you can

3:08lock down on choke points, shipping straits, financial systems, internet infrastructure,

3:12and tech supply chains. Which leads to our fifth category, technological dominance. You need near

3:19monopolistic control over critical technologies that other countries depend on and cannot easily

3:24replicate. Being really good at making slightly better smartphones every year doesn't count.

3:30We're talking about the kind of tech strangle hold where everyone else is basically renting

3:34their future from you. Lastly, you need a network of reliable partners who amplify your power rather

3:40than drain it. This is known as alliance architecture. Prospective partners must be

3:45willing to follow your lead in crisis, host your military bases, and adopt or at least tolerate

3:50your cultural standards. There's other categories to consider. Of course, it's said that population

3:55drives geopolitics. In other words, it helps if you've got a stable birth rate and favorable

4:00demographic trends. Diplomatic influence matters. Your history matters. cultural influence matters.

4:06All these fall under relatively subjective categories of soft power that are difficult

4:10to empirically pin down. But on the whole, if you were building the ideal superpower from scratch,

4:16you would probably create something along these lines. A massive country with protective oceans

4:20on both sides. Hundreds of millions of people, energy resources for centuries, the world's

4:26financial center, technology monopolies others cannot break, military bases on every continent,

4:31and allies who actually show up when you need them. This was achievable in 1945 when the US

4:37emerged from World War II with 50% of global GDP, untouched infrastructure,

4:42and a nuclear monopoly. In 2026, that is a whole different story. The rules that built superpowers

4:49don't work anymore. Three fundamental shifts have made the past century superpower model

4:53obsolete. We'll start with reason number one. War no longer pays. For most of human history,

4:59conquest was profitable. Rome expanded and gained productive provinces. Britain built an empire

5:04that generated enormous resource wealth through trade and extraction. Even America's continental

5:09expansion, added valuable territory and opportunity. Today, the economics have reversed.

5:14Modern warfare is economically destructive. Look at Russia's invasion of Ukraine. As of late 2024,

5:20estimates suggest Russia has spent well over $200 billion on the war while suffering hundreds of

5:26thousands of casualties to gain what? Devastated territories with destroyed infrastructure,

5:32international sanctions, and pariah status that cost the economy an estimated $1.3 trillion

5:38through 2026. A military that has burned through decades of Soviet era stockpiles. The West hasn't

5:44had it much better. Even supposedly successful modern wars rarely break even. Brown University

5:50researchers estimate that the 20-year global wars on terror cost the US somewhere in the region of

5:56$8 trillion. In Iraq, the supposed prize, Iraqi oil, never materialized as a benefit that came

6:02close to offsetting costs there and elsewhere. Despite tactical and technological superiority,

6:08political decision-making and strategic withdrawal created massive power vacuums,

6:13the broader region is just as unstable as ever. So why doesn't war pay anymore? Modern wealth comes

6:19from complex supply chains, educated workers, and advanced technology. All the things that

6:24bombs destroy rather than capture. You can seize a semiconductor factory, but without engineers,

6:30suppliers, and customers, it is just an incredibly expensive paper weight. And then there's the

6:35nuclear problem. Great power wars between nuclear states risk civilization ending escalation. The

6:42Cuban missile crisis taught us that the closer two superpowers get to direct conflict, the

6:46closer we all get to annihilation, and that puts a hard ceiling on just how much conquest is even

6:52possible. Guerilla warfare and modern insurgencies make occupations nightmarishly expensive. Britain

6:58grappled with this as its empire dissolved. The US learned this the hard way in Vietnam, Iraq,

7:03and Afghanistan. Russia previously learned it in Afghanistan and is relearning its lesson in

7:09Ukraine. You can't just bomb your way to superpower status anymore. In a minute,

7:13we'll see why China understands this lesson better than anyone and why it shapes their entire

7:18strategic outlook. But let's discuss reason number two. Economic dominance creates its own wave of

7:23opposition. It's a paradoxical pattern. The more economically dominant you become, the harder

7:28everyone works to reduce their dependence on you. But historically, that is just the way the cookies

7:33crumbled. When Britain dominated global trade in the 1800s, its rising wealth didn't just buy

7:38influence. It woke up competitors like Germany, Japan, and the US. Each one started building an

7:44industrial base designed to break Britain's grip. British economic hegemony created the very rivals

7:50who would challenge it. That same pattern plays out today, albeit far faster. China's Belt and

7:55Road initiative initially looked brilliant. They were eager to loan money to developing countries

7:59in exchange for infrastructure agreements, influence, and economic dependence. By 2023,

8:04China had invested $1 trillion across more than 150 countries. The result, as we have seen,

8:10has been a form of transparent backlash that wouldn't have been possible a 100 years ago.

8:16Countries from Sri Lanka to Zambia struggling and saddled with debt accuse China of debt trap

8:21diplomacy. Maybe both sides should have seen this coming. But rather than creating loyal partners,

8:26China instead created resentful ones actively looking for alternatives. Sri Lanka's heento port

8:32leased to China for 99 years after the country couldn't repay its loans became a global symbol of

8:37predatory lending. US dollar dominance has spawned its own opposition. The BRICS nations, Brazil,

8:43Russia, India, China, and South Africa have spent years discussing alternatives to dollar-based

8:48trade. After the US froze Russian central bank assets in 2022, even America's allies began to

8:54quietly diversify their reserves, worried they could be next. China accelerated its development

9:00of digital yuan specifically to reduce dollar dependence. Economic coercion teaches countries

9:05to diversify, not submit. Economic power is now self-limiting. You get too dominant and you teach

9:12everyone to start working around you. And now it's time for reason number three. Technology can't be

9:17monopolized anymore. And that is a seismic shift in gaining superpower status. Britain monopolized

9:23industrial revolution technology for decades, helping secure its own dominance. The US dominated

9:29computing, aerospace, and nuclear technology for a generation after World War II. These

9:34monopolies translated directly into superpower status. That is impossible now. Information

9:40moves in an instant. What once took years to learn through espionage now appears in academic papers,

9:45patent filings, and hacked databases within months, if not weeks. Reverse engineering used

9:50to take decades in the 1950s. Today, it can happen in less than a year. Part of the problem is that

9:56talent is globally mobile. Chinese students earn PhDs at MIT and Stanford and Harvard and

10:01Yale. Indian engineers work in Silicon Valley and then they return home taking the knowledge

10:06with them. In 2023, China produced 3.6 million STEM graduates annually compared to America's

10:13820,000. You can't maintain a knowledge monopoly when the people who create that knowledge move

10:19so freely between borders. Cyber espionage and offshore manufacturing have obliterated

10:24technology monopolies. China's alleged theft of the F-35 designs reportedly accelerated their J20

10:29stealth fighter by years. When Apple offshored iPhone production, Foxcon, a multinational

10:35electronics manufacturer based in Taiwan, learned how to master the entire manufacturing process,

10:40not just assembly. The pattern repeats itself everywhere. Smartphones invented in the US in 2007

10:47now see their market share completely dominated by Chinese companies. In the AI realm, China is

10:53leading in research and talent, publishing more papers on the subject than in the US.

10:57More than 80% of all solar panels shipped around the globe themselves invented in the US-based Bell

11:03Labs in 1954 are now made by China. The knowledge diffusion rate has accelerated catastrophically

11:09for wouldbe monopolists. Technologies that used to take 50 years to spread globally in 1950 now

11:15spread in less than five. You can't stay ahead enough to leverage temporary advantages into

11:20permanent dominance. This is the new reality. War doesn't pay. Economic dominance creates opposition

11:26and technology can't be monopolized. These three shifts have fundamentally changed what's

11:31possible. Now, let's see what that means for the countries that everyone thinks will be superpowers

11:36one day. And we can test the scorecard on the obvious candidate. If anyone looks like the next

11:41superpower, it's China. Second largest economy at roughly 18 trillion GDP. A modernizing military

11:48that's added aircraft carriers, stealth fighters, and hypersonic missiles. Leading in 5G technology,

11:53electric vehicles, and solar manufacturing, a population of 1.4 billion. That should work,

11:59right? And it would until you see what China depends on to keep the lights on. China imports

12:05approximately 70% of its oil and 45% of its natural gas. The killer headache is that most of

12:11that energy arrives via ship through the straits of Malaa, a narrow waterway between Malaysia and

12:16Indonesia. It is a crucial choke point and it is controlled by US aligned powers. That means

12:22China's entire economy, all of that manufacturing, all those mega cities, all that military runs on

12:28energy that passes through a straight the US Navy could slam shut in an afternoon.

12:34During a Taiwan crisis scenario, this becomes America's ace in the hole. China knows this,

12:38which is why they're actively exploring building overland pipelines from Russia and Kazakhstan.

12:44But even those can't replace seaborn oil. Not even close. Geography compounds the problem. China is

12:50surrounded by rivals and potential rivals. India, Japan, South Korea, Vietnam all are either allied

12:56with the US or balancing against Chinese power. Russia is a partner of convenience, not a reliable

13:02ally in any sense. They all compete in Central Asia and Russia fears long-term Chinese expansion

13:07into Siberia. And like we said before, China's Belt and Road initiative created resentment,

13:13not loyal allies. Then there is the demographics. China's population peaked and is now in decline.

13:19The UN projects their population will now plummet from 1.4 billion to half of its current

13:24number at less than 800 million by 2100. Their workforce is shrinking right now. Fewer workers,

13:31more retirees, rising costs. It is the opposite of a superpower trajectory. Looking at the six

13:37superpower qualifiers, here is China's verdict. a formidable regional power, just not a global

13:43superpower. And if China can't clear that bar, the next candidate is even tougher. India has in

13:49spades what China is rapidly losing young people. And in a second, we'll show you why the advantage

13:54is real, but also why it still doesn't add up to superpower status. With around 1.5 billion

14:00people and a median age of almost 29, they have got the workforce China desperately needs. They

14:06are pretty democratic, making Western alliances easier to build. Their geography is defensible

14:10enough with mountains to the north and oceans to the south. India's problems rest with well

14:16everything else. Its economy, India's GDP is approximately $4.1 trillion, about a fifth of

14:22China's and a seventh of America's. Per capita income remains around $2,600, meaning limited

14:28domestic consumption power. Infrastructure lags decades behind. Power outages are common, roads

14:34are inadequate, and ports are run inefficiently. The middle income trap looms large. Militarily,

14:39it's actually pretty strong regionally at least, but it has absolutely zero global reach. India's

14:45navy is coastal defense embodied, not bluewater power projection. They can't sustain expeditionary

14:51operations beyond South Asia. And they haven't since they were part of the British Empire during

14:55World War II. And when was the last time you heard about an Indian military base in Africa,

15:01Europe, or Latin America? Never. They don't exist. Technology. India excels at IT services,

15:07call centers, software development and back office operations. Yes, your computer has supposedly been

15:12compromised and you need to buy gift cards immediately. But cuttingedge innovation,

15:16manufacturing dominance, far from it, at least not yet. They still import most military hardware

15:22being problematically dependent on Russia while also broadly aligned with the West. As for energy,

15:28it's a similar situation to China. India imports about 85% of its oil, most of that from Russia.

15:34Like China, they're vulnerable to the same Indian Ocean choke points, block the straight of Hormuz,

15:39where much of the Middle East's crude has to pass through, and India's economy grinds to a halt.

15:44It might sound like a billion people should equal automatic power, except population size

15:49alone hasn't mattered since industrialization made productivity more important than raw numbers. So,

15:55what's India's verdict? Important regional player, but far too many missing pieces for superpower

16:00status. Now, let's look at one contender that doesn't fail on money. On paper, the European

16:06Union or EU looks like an incredible candidate for the next global superpower, assuming you believe a

16:12block of like-minded states can function like one. It's got a combined GDP of almost 20 trillion,

16:17rivaling the US. It's got a respectable population of $450 million. It is strong in aerospace,

16:23automotive, and luxury goods. And the main point is that it's got integrated alliance architecture.

16:29It is literally a union of states. And here's why the EU looks like a superpower on paper

16:34but still fails the test in real life. The moment you need them to act like one country,

16:39they can't. It's the committee problem embodied. Militarily, the EU has no unified command. France

16:46has nuclear weapons and wants strategic autonomy. Germany spent decades underfunding its military.

16:51Its defense budget sat around 1 and a half% of GDP until Russia invaded Ukraine and shocked them into

16:56action. Western European members want trade with Russia. These aren't complimentary positions. The

17:02EU depends almost entirely on the US for power projection and the nuclear umbrella. When crisis

17:08emerge, Libya, Syria, and Ukraine, just to name a few, Europe tends to wait for America to lead.

17:1427 different militaries don't equal one strong one. They equal a committee that can't agree on

17:20deployment priorities. The Russia Ukraine war also has exposed catastrophic vulnerabilities in energy

17:25independence. Germany had made itself dependent on Russian gas. Nordstream pipelines pushed roughly

17:3155% of German gas imports before the war. When the supply was cut off, energy prices spiked

17:37across Europe, forcing countries into emergency measures. The renewable transition is incomplete

17:43and uncoordinated across member states. But the fatal flaw is political unity. Hungary blocks

17:49consensus to maintain ties to Russia. France and Germany disagree on fiscal policy, nuclear power,

17:55and defense spending. Italy's government changes constantly. You just can't be a superpower if you

18:00can't agree on foreign policy. And worse still, Brexit proved the whole edifice is reversible.

18:05If Britain could just leave, the Union isn't permanent. Europe's verdict, economic block

18:10and regulatory power in spades, but far from a unified superpower. Let's take a second to dismiss

18:16some other candidates. First, the uh bear in the room. Russia's economy is smaller than Italy's,

18:22$2.2 trillion in GDP. Its demographics are in a freefall. Its population is declining. Life

18:28expectancy for men is around 68 years, actually lower than standouts like Syria, Palestine,

18:34Venezuela, and North Korea. The Ukraine war revealed military weaknesses, rampant corruption,

18:39poor logistics, and outdated equipment. They are a regional power with nukes. Nothing more,

18:44nothing less. Brazil, Indonesia, and Nigeria might be emerging powers,

18:48but each is missing multiple critical elements. Brazil has resources but lacks infrastructure,

18:54technology, and military reach. Indonesia has population numbers, but minimal global economic or

19:00military presence. Nigeria has demographics, but unstable governance and infrastructure deficits.

19:06Demographics alone don't make you a superpower. If they did, we'd probably be worried about

19:10Bangladesh taking over the world. Let's look at our scorecard one last time. China fails energy

19:16independence, strategic geography and alliances. India fails on economic scale, military reach,

19:22technology, and energy independence. The EU fails on military reach, energy independence, geography,

19:28and most critically, political unity. Russia isn't even a real consideration. But even if it was,

19:33it still fails in economy, demographics, and technology. Every single contender fails in

19:38multiple categories. Notice a pattern. So, what replaces superpowers in the new world order?

19:44regional powers with China in East Asia, India and South Asia and the US in the Americas. Domain

19:50specific dominance with the US leading in tech and finance, China in manufacturing in the EU setting

19:55regulatory standards that everyone follows. In the past, superpowers controlled everything. It

20:00looks increasingly likely that future powers will merely control something. The world looks like it

20:06will indeed eventually become multipolar, becoming somewhat more stable through mutual dependence.

20:11But who organizes collective action during the inevitable crisis? Globalization has made

20:15us too interconnected for dominance, and you can't control a system you depend on. The 20th

20:21century created the conditions for superpowers with world wars, technological monopolies,

20:26and colonial legacies. The 21st century has different rules. Superpowers are really of

20:32the last century, and ultimately the US might be the last one we ever see. Now go check out

20:37the end of the United States superpower empire starts here or click on this video instead.

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Why There Will Be No More Superpowers

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