Empires rise and fall, pax Americana was not the world's first hegemony. The end of the British Empire is within living memory - while they sowed seeds of instability in a handful of former colonies that still flare up today, the rest of the world is fine. Britain, on the other hand, has had to enter a "managed decline", and is a much smaller player in world politics than it was a century ago.
The US doesn't have the cards to play, because the current US Government doesn't even understand where the wealth has come from. That US Government has risen to power by tricking the public into thinking that the very things that make the US wealthy and powerful are actually a scam making them poorer.
The current US Government has already broken the trust that makes the US strong. The repercussions will take years to become fully visible, and without immediate course correction those future repercussions will get far far worse.
This may be recency bias. The current age just has more immediate, global communications. "The sun never sets on the British empire" had a literal meaning based on how globalized it was then. They even laid intercontinental undersea cables.
If its going to be like this the rest of the world might as well cut its losses
I agree that at some point, governments and people will need to step up and fight back, but the idea that the US will somehow fall in a vacuum and everyone else will live happily ever after is laughable.
the US will somehow fall in a vacuum and everyone else will live happily ever after is laughable.
Not everything is a movie with a final battle. Alternatives are found and adopted all the time without violent strife.
I am not advocating that the status quo should go on, I am just saying that the repercussions will be vast and long lasting, likely resulting in a world war, and whatever follows after that(if anything).