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None of those had debt denominated in fiat currency they could print at will. So this time it is different.
US can always pay their debts at the price of inflation and whining. And even if they decide not to pay and say - suck it up buttercup - what is the rest of the world going to do? Invade the lower 48 states?
Inflation. Inflation is the consequence, and the US is a hydraulic empire based on the value of the dollar- a hydraulic empire with three imperial cores that can each build their own strong currency if they want to. This makes it uniquely vulnerable to inflation.
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The US imports goods from overseas (often China) and exports little pieces of paper. This is an inherently vulnerable position.
If the little pieces of paper stop being considered valuable or reliable, American living standards will plunge. The US has a huge trade deficit, about $770 billion per year.
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This is one of the reasons why the moves of countries away from US dollar as reserve currency have been watched so closely.
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A substantial amount (majority, IIRC) of US debt is owed to other Americans. Defaulting looks a lot more like "safe" treasury bills not being paid back. Which would probably be disastrous for banks, pension funds, and the lot. But inflation isn't popular either.
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If we stopped paying debts, other countries do have options. They might not lead to a net benefit, but to pretend there are no other options other than war is nonsense. I realize you didn't explicitly say this, but you did suggest it. War or other force is on the table when practical of course (e.g. France occupying the Ruhr).
First, other countries might not even need to do anything at all. The direct self-consequences of telling other countries to suck it is the decline in your own trust, and those other parties can occasionally, roughly, even benefit - it's not a total zero-sum trust system, but other countries will look better in comparison which provides at least some offset to the explicit loss of future repayment. Even though the US is the world default fiat currency this isn't eternally true and doesn't live in a vacuum, other currencies could still take on some of this burden. These benefits are less explicitly tangible but that is not to say they do not exist, including via bond yield returns on secondary markets as well as the jilted country being able to issue their own new bonds at better relative rates. The exact economics are complicated and not guaranteed, I will grant you.
Finally, there IS a long history of alternative methods, the international equivalent of hiring the repo man. US companies own assets worldwide and it's entirely plausible that they could have their assets, IP, and other contract deals repossessed/modified/nullified commensurate with the unpaid amount. Yes, this might result in tit-for-tat so it's not a perfect solution, but to say their only alternative is a literal invasion is incredibly naive.
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