自满于胜利的美国认为瓦解苏联集团是其卓异论（exceptionalism）的又一明证，并且陷入了一个幻觉：其冷战的成功本身即是一种战略。
The US, inebriated by victory, saw in the triumph over the Soviet bloc another sign of its exceptionalism, and found itself taken in by the mirage that its Cold War success was itself a strategy.