The small countries is where the war will be won and lost
Tue 6:38 am +00:00, 25 Aug 2026The New Atlas
4 hours ago
US secondary sanctions on nations working with Iran will be an indicator of current US power.
Nations like Russia and China will likely not only ignore the threats – the US is unlikely to seriously try to implement sanctions against either.
Doing so – only for Russia and China to continue forward – will make the US look incredibly weak.
The US may – however – stop business taking place between Iran and smaller, more vulnerable countries.
This is the primary problem Russia, China, and multipolarism in general has – creating unassailable fortresses within the borders multipolar leaders like Russia and China – but being unable to prevent the US from encircling them all along their walls.
The ability of the multipolar world to insulate and protect ANY nation targeted by the US to the point of even smaller nations ignoring US threats and weathering US economic or military coercion will be the REAL beginning of a collapse of US power.
The US has in recent years still managed to topple governments in Syria (2024), Nepal (2025), Venezuela (2026) and is currently waging war on Iran, demonstrating the limits of multipolarism at the moment.
Until real and wide-spectrum resilience emerges – the US remains powerful and extremely dangerous, meaning it will take still more time and struggle to change this – whether you want to hear or believe that or not.










