Hegemony is sustainable—flexibility and adaptability make the US resilient
Lieber 12 [Robert J. Lieber, 2012, PhD from Harvard, Professor of Government and International Affairs at Georgetown, former consultant to the State Department and for National Intelligence Estimates , “Power and Willpower In the American Future”, pg. 4-5, Google Books, DMintz]
For the United States, as I argue here, the maintenance of its leading role matters greatly. The alternative would not only be a more disorderly and dangerous world in which its own economic and national security would be adversely affected, hut also regional conflicts and the spread of nuclear weapons would be more likely. In addition, allies and those sharing common values, especially liberal democracy and the market economy, would increasingly be at risk. Ultimately, America’s ability to avoid serious decline and the significant international retrenchment that would be a result of severely reduced resources becomes a matter of policy and political will. There is nothing inevitable about decline, and both past experience and national attributes matter greatly. Flexibility, adaptability, and the capacity for course correction provide the United States with a resilience that has proved invaluable in the past and is likely to do so in the future.