That’s the most hilarious part of all this. The whole unravelling started when NATO refused to respect Russia’s red lines in Ukraine. Before the war, it was simply taken as a given that NATO was the strongest military force in the world, and that anybody who dared stand against it would be swiftly crushed. Western economic system was considered to be central to the global economy, and any countries that were cut off from it were left in dire straights.

Nobody, including Russia, wanted to challenge either of these assumptions. Yet, once they were put to the test, it became quickly apparent that neither of these notions held much water. At this point there’s no way to put toothpaste back in the tube because the collapse of western led world order is a self-reinforcing phenomenon. No country actually wanted to be subjugated by the west, they just didn’t have a choice before. Now that this choice materialized in from of BRICS, we see countries rushing to join a new economic bloc. Meanwhile, western military presence is being steadily pushed out of Africa and West Asia.