Credibility of US' global power being challenged

DURING the Cold War between the United States and the former Soviet Union, strategic thinkers sketched out the frightening dilemma facing policy-makers in Washington.

According to the commitments made by the US as the leader of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (Nato), and later in similar defence treaties with Japan and South Korea, the Americans were expected to rush to the defence of their security allies if and when they were attacked by a foreign aggressor.

Both the US and the Soviet Union were nuclear military powers and it was assumed that if the Soviets would strike the US by dropping nuclear weapons on New York, the Americans would then retaliate by nuking Moscow, and vice-versa.