The recent Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) summit amounted to a declaration of intent from a new global trio: India, China, and Russia. Their powerful and unified appearance was a clear signal to the world that a coordinated effort to end US hegemony is underway. An American commentator described the event as the dawn of a “new world order.”
This commentator, Van Jones, stressed that this alliance is a “historically big deal” that should not be underestimated. The combined front presented by Narendra Modi, Xi Jinping, and Vladimir Putin is, in his view, a calculated move to challenge and ultimately replace the unipolar international system. The goal is to create a multipolar world where power is more broadly shared.
The foundation of this burgeoning alliance is a deep and widespread dissatisfaction with American foreign and economic policies. The US’s strategy of using tariffs and sanctions as coercive tools has backfired spectacularly, uniting these powerful nations in a common cause. They are driven by a shared desire to create a global system that respects the sovereignty of all major powers.
For the United States, this development is a strategic nightmare. The nation has been effectively cornered by this new geopolitical alignment. Jones’s stark assessment is that the US is “in a box” and on the “bad side of the triangle,” facing a dangerous reality where “it’s everybody against us.” This marks a profound and unsettling shift for a country long accustomed to global preeminence.