Yes that’s correct. The empire is not consistent. Its stated principles are empty propaganda intended to build national myths for their populations to believe in support of the actual material goals of that empire. They want you to hate Russia so that when they create policies that marginalize Russia you think, “yeah, serves them right” not, “is that fair? Don’t we do the same things or worse and get away with it?” Same for attempts to marginalize China. They’re coming up with words the public has never even heard of (productive overcapacity) to justify their new tariffs and if the public were told “this just makes your stuff more expensive in an attempt to hurt China” they’d throw a fit if the propaganda apparatus hadn’t already taught the public that China is the enemy always doing evil things.

The real driving force is always a deepee material interest. Who can fund the propaganda narrative, what is the intended national or corporate interest.