Tim

If the US taps out now and Israel doesn't finish the job, Iran has straight up won. Perhaps in a substantial way. The senile clerics have been removed, Mossad forces are probably thinned too, and like Ukraine, they've demonstrated viability. They'll rebuild with Chinese help.

How are these two men of the same race?

People really don't seem to understand that Malaysia is basically a first world economies at this point. Salaries are even higher there for most tech roles than in London + most European cities now. Especially around Penang, which is very notable given its not the main economic engine of the country but is a huge semiconductor/engineering hub, and around Johor, which is Southeast Asia's data hub. The world has transformed massively in the past generation. The Malaysian Century.

The people who are running the American empire today have a tremendous amount of hubris but they are just inheriting something that other more competent people in the past built and that they could clearly never recreate nor apparently even maintain.