You’re not wrong. The same is true for Russia’s economy, though - they’ve been burning the economic furniture to keep consumer prices in the same place and expand their military. The regime doesn’t look like they’re confident they can survive actual austerity when it hits.

The US is more likely to survive giving up, at least in the short term. As broken and ossified as their system of power is, it’s also well-defined and has over two centuries of ontological momentum behind it. Edit: And they haven’t lost nearly as much as Russia to date.

I guess “terminal forever war” is a bit of an oxymoron, even if people get what I mean.