Throughout last year, as Ukraine unexpectedly resisted a major Russian invasion and a war of attrition developed along its eastern and southern borders, the United States saw itself sitting pretty.
Its major antagonist, Russia had gotten stuck in a misadventure that would systematically sap its economic and military power.
And China, by aligning itself so closely to Moscow, had bought into the partnership at the wrong time.
Meanwhile, Europe and NATO which had been disillusioned with US leadership during the Trump years, once again lined up behind Washington and offered full support to Ukraine.
A year later, even as the war in Ukraine grinds on inconclusively, the US finds itself confronted with another war, but this one has brought little comfort to the US and instead, the war pitting US ally Israel against Hamas in Gaza could unlock a chain of events that could not only upend its primacy in the Middle-East, but damage its global standing as well.