The World War Washington Didn't Declare

Russia's blueprint for the post-American order, and why neither Washington nor Beijing fits the role of successor hegemon.

The following article is an analysis adapted from Dmitriy Trenin’s article “Multipolar World: From Ideology to Implementation,” published by the Russian International Affairs Council (RIAC) on April 29, 2026.

Since the second half of the 1990s, the “struggle for a multipolar world” has been a central pillar of Russia’s foreign policy. Yet, in reality, this struggle has already been won. The multipolar world is a fact and has been so for more than a decade.

The era of unipolarity, when U.S. hegemony went largely unchallenged, has ended.

The poles of this new world have taken shape: a China that “has risen,” a Russia that has restored its sovereignty, a rapidly growing India, and, perhaps, a more recently activated Europe. At the regional level, Brazil, Turkey, Iran, Indonesia, and South Africa play analogous roles in their respective regions.

The world is already multipolar.

The key question now concerns the order within this world.

It is precisely over this issue that a fierce struggle is unfolding—effectively a functional equivalent of a world war.

Under Donald Trump, the United States has shifted from the image of a benevolent hegemon and liberal globalist to that of a hardline “master” of the world, acting from a position of brute force.

In an effort not necessarily to restore full hegemony, but at least to salvage its slipping primacy, Washington has launched a broad counteroffensive directed simultaneously at allies, adversaries, and a number of rogue states.

The First and Second World Wars contributed enormously to the growth of America’s economic, political, and military power.

The Cold War established the United States as the dominant power across the capitalist world, while the Soviet collapse paved the way to unchallenged global hegemony. America reached the peak of its power at the turn of the century.

Today, Pax Americana is clearly entering a period of decline, and this decline is far from peaceful.