It sounds like an obsolete worldview when put like this, but it's worth bearing in mind also that "a comfortable superpower stalemate" is not really what it's e

It sounds like an obsolete worldview when put like this, but it's worth bearing in mind also that "a comfortable superpower stalemate" is not really what it's ever looked like from the other side. For the US, the decades of assorted coups, intrigue, proxy wars, military adventures, tinpot middle eastern dictators, oil crises, war on terror, drone strikes etc mostly happen somewhere off in another comfortably remote hemisphere, with US involvement small and limited to people who signed up for the job. From the other side, all this stuff is happening near your country's borders and potentially affecting your conscripted kids. It's like the Cuban missile crisis ALL THE TIME. It's not "comfortable" at all.