Thirty years ago, there is one thought that had to be going through the minds of the top leaders in the Soviet Union and the People’s Republic of China. It probably boiled down to the same two words Data uttered in “Star Trek: Generations”: “Oh, sh*t.”

Why? Because during Operation Desert Storm, both countries had seen the United States of America lay a smackdown on Saddam Hussein’s Iraq. The Soviet Union was in terminal decline and would not make it to the end of 1991. China, though, faced some serious problems. The bulk of the ChiComs’ fighters were copies of the MiG-19 and MiG-21. Many of their ships and tanks were also obsolete.

But what happened? China and Russia both got very serious. In fact, in the 1990s, Russian began selling China weapons technology, including the Su-27/Su-30/Su-33/Su-35 Flanker family. While many insiders in Washington obsessed over phony claims of collusion between Donald Trump and Russia, the real threat of Russian collusion with China was largely back-burnered by deep state bureaucrats who became more interested in putting Trump supporters in their place.

Meanwhile, the United States took a very different path. Rather than taking stock of a new post-Cold War world, and taking the Chinese Communist Party’s demonstrated capacity for evil (see Tiananmen Square) seriously, America took a peace dividend. It drastically hampered the Global War on Terror, but it also resulted in an atrophying of the force structure of the Navy and Air Force.

These days, we can look at Biden’s betrayal that led to the dishonorable debacle in Afghanistan. We’ve discussed what needs to be done in the wake of the Taliban takeover, but Biden’s been more interested in attacking domestic political opponents than fighting China. As a result, China gets stronger while America gets weaker on Biden’s watch, as grassroots Patriots rightly conclude that our establishment is not serious about addressing the very real geopolitical threats.

Take Russia’s development of the Armata family of heavy armored fighting vehicles. A new tank, infantry fighting vehicle, and a host of support vehicles was ready for production, and we can probably thank President Trump for Russia’s inability to get it into widespread service (not to mention how he was also putting pressure on China). But Biden is undoing the work Trump did. In addition, the United States has aging M1 Abrams and M2/M3 Bradley infantry/cavalry fighting vehicles, and there seems to be no plan for any replacement.

It isn’t just that America’s material military strength is being sapped. While Biden and our defense establishment are busy trying to make the military safe for the “woke,” Russia and China are telling their troops — and their countries — to get tougher and embracing what the “woke” in America call “stereotypical” traits.

Put it this way: America’s geopolitical foes are serious about taking us down a notch; they’re working to get stronger. If America doesn’t start a major turnaround, both in attitude and in material needs, it could be a very ugly situation.