by YVES SMITH
John Ruehl’s generally informative piece on how the US and China are seeking to secure their technology spheres of influence is marred by at least one historical inaccuracy. Ruehl asserts that the former Soviet Union relied on a “militarized approach” to extend its reach. In fact, the USSR in Africa and I assume other parts of the world cultivated friends and allies by providing economic assistance with no military strings attached. That was a big reason most African states were willing to defy the US and EU during their shock and awe sanctions against at the start of the Ukraine conflict, that the USSR’s residual good will extended to modern Russia.
Ruehl in passing makes a point that came up in our recent discussion of the near-impossibility for the US of restoring domestic manufacturing at meaningful scale: that power projection via diffusion of operations (as in having allies run technologically important activities) also diffuses expertise.
By John P. Ruehl, an Australian-American journalist living in Washington, D.C., and a world affairs correspondent for the Independent Media Institute. He is a contributor to several foreign affairs publications, and his book, Budget Superpower: How Russia Challenges the West With an Economy Smaller Than Texas’, was published in December 2022. Produced by Economy for All, a project of the Independent Media Institute
The U.S.-UK technology deal announced in September 2025 promises to accelerate Britain’s AI sector, but critics warn it will happen at the expense of national tech sovereignty. It reflects the steady trend of U.S. government and private interests extending a technologically driven form of hegemony, employing communications, data, and AI systems to deepen dependence on American networks and weaponize against rivals.
China has built a parallel structure of influence through its own technology exports, manufacturing base, and integrated supply chains, challenging the American model without the costly global military footprint. And unlike earlier empires, Washington’s and Beijing’s systems increasingly overlap: Spain, long considered a reliable partner for American tech firms and data security, has faced U.S. pressureafter contracting with Chinese company Huawei in July to store judicial wiretap data.
Yet both tech-driven networks face a growing diffusion of capability. Advances in manufacturing, resource mapping, and digital development are making it easier for smaller states to build industries that have until now been dominated by major powers—“Small countries like Taiwan and the Netherlands have curated specialized offerings in niche parts of the global AI supply chain,” stated an article in the digital law and policy journal Just Security. A more balanced and competitive order could emerge, though the U.S. and China still retain major leverage.
The U.S. has maintained a strong foreign presence for more than a century. When Elihu Root became Secretary of War in 1899, he had already spent decades cultivating the nation’s elites as a lawyer and once in office, he modernized the army for sustained overseas operations. Subsequent American expansion in Cuba, Puerto Rico, and the Philippines was framed as paternal administration—to spread the “civilizing mission” to those less fortunate in need of a long period of paternal tuition—rather than colonial conquest. Yet military power remained central to advancing government and private American interests.
After World War II, the collapse of European empires left the U.S. and the Soviet Union with competing spheres of influence. Unlike Moscow’s more militarized approach, “Washington’s forms of control were more in accordance with the will of the local populations,” creating what scholars called an “empire by invitation,” according to Norwegian historian Geir Lundestad. Military and subversive power were often used to promote U.S. interests, but many states partnered voluntarily to receive financial and technical assistance.
With the Soviet collapse in 1991, the U.S. entered a new phase of expansion. Technologies like GPS, which reached full global coverage in 1993, expanded American power as a “silent utility” providing an increasingly essential service. The rapid spread of the internet under U.S. oversight further extended American standards and control across global communications, while the rise of tech giants like Microsoft, Intel, and Google embedded U.S. software and hardware at the center of globalized technology systems.
Even as global military demobilization followed the Cold War, Washington demonstrated its continued combat and technological dominance through limited conflicts in the Persian Gulf and precision strikes in the Balkans. Dominating global arms exports, it deepened leverage by integrating more countries into U.S. weapons systems and defense supply chains.
Yet within years, the failures in Afghanistan and Iraq exposed the limits of invasions and occupation, which no longer guaranteed control over resources or populations. As of March 2025, America had 1.3 million personnel stationed abroad, reflecting an outdated emphasis on physical presence. With nearly 90 percent of corporate assets in advanced economies now intangible, such as software, patents, and intellectual property, the same logic applies to power projection. Digital networks and remote capabilities have replaced much of what permanent garrisons once represented.
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