> The obvious non-US potential hegemon was China, yet we normalized trade with them, which greatly helped their economy grow.

Of course you present it as a one way street. Nah, you normalized with China to counter balance the Soviets and after that fell your companies benefited, since it is much cheaper to produce in China.

China just wasn't standing by and it also got something out of that relationship (know how) - the US only wanted it as a cheap sweatshop factory, so as soon as they became a real competitor to the US, the US started with sanctions, tariffs etc.

Having failed in China, the US now wants Latin America to stay behind in development terms, just useful enough to outsource to, but not enough to compete.