I'm not arguing about the merits of its consensus algorithm or of decentralization. I'm providing context for how the term 'cryptocurrency' originated, and how 'decentralization' was used in this context.

Having a central authority determine who can be a consensus server, and being explicitly designed to put known and trusted third parties in charge to comply with the rules of a central governing authority, is not a decentralized system, especially in the context of cryptocurrency, where the term was used in relation to the absence of trusted third parties.

The economic wars you speak of could put to question whether Bitcoin succeeded in being decentralized, but it doesn't change the fact that NEO and other permissioned blockchains run by pre-approved and known trusted third parties, are definitely not decentralized.

>>A decentralized system takes power from one party and moves it to multiple parties.

But the ultimate power still resides in the hands of one party in NEO, because there is one party acting as a gatekeeper, deciding what can happen on its ledger, and who can run a server.

To call this decentralization, with whaboutisms about problems in the Bitcoin space, that are not even comparable, to justify the characterisation, is disingenuous.