Thursday at the Aspen Institute’s “Washington Ideas Forum,” Secretary of State John Kerry said the Cold War was easy in comparison to the complexity of the world today with more economic power dispersed throughout the world.

“So now, you have more countries with more economic power in a globalized world,” Kerry said. “They’re going to automatically react and say, well, wait a minute, now. Do we really want the behemoth United States, superpower of the world, telling us all the time what we have to do? So you have to approach these things a little differently. It requires more diplomacy. It requires more dialogue. It requires more respect for people, more mutual interests.”

Follow Pam Key on Twitter @pamkeyNEN