But what if it's not a conscious forfeit of power. The power is taken out from underneath them and by the time they realize it, they have no recourse. Other than threatening all countries that use the currency, which I don't see happening.

How could a militarized country have no recourse?

You’re saying all militarized countries on Earth will come to a point where Bitcoin is prominent and they will forfeit their power over their citizens without any fight?

You’re proposing Bitcoin will bring world peace without conflict?

They have no recourse because the box has opened, and the new economy is up and running. Barring your citizens from participating would put your whole country at a disadvantage.

Also, I don't think I agree with the notion that adopting crypto would result in a country forfeiting their power over the citizens. There are plenty of ways to integrate crypto into existing governments while still maintaining control.

I'm not claiming this will happen, more of contemplating on how a global decentralized currency can take over.

As far as bringing world peace, I don't think a decentralized currency would do any such thing. It's probably one of the required steps towards it, but one of many.

For example, if the rest of the world adopts BTC as the world's reserve currency, the USA would HAVE TO purchase crazy amounts of BTC, and defend against a 51% attack by investing into mining.

Meanwhile, the USA could try to preempt this future, but only the USA is incentivized to have USD be the world's reserve currency. As such the USA would need to threaten every other country in the world to stop using BTC, but its not clear if that causes BTC adoption to drop, or the Streisand Effect to kick in.

And ofcourse, "mutually assured destruction" stops any large country from employing too large a threat against any other large country.

Would any nation allow itself to be in a position where a coalition of the willing could perform a 51% attack on their currency? Because if not, only one country could use BTC or anything with the same mining algorithm.

If we are talking about a coordinated aggressive action to cripple the economy of a non-superpower nation, like today it requires a superpower to protect it.

If we are talking about a coordinated aggressive action to cripple the economy of a superpower nation, you're basically triggering "mutually assured destruction". As such its most productive to assume that doesn't occur.

The first nation to adopt it would be vulnerable immediately, without any real risk to other nations performing a 51% attack.

Why anyone out themselves in harm’s way like that?

Yeah, that is an interesting question. Probably best to ask Coinbase, Tesla and Square. I don't have a good answer for you. The bad answer is this:

Risk isn't inherently a deterrent. If the reward is perceived to be high enough, there will be a first adopter.

Now it is too late to edit, I see an annoying spelling mistake. Should be “put themselves”, not “out themselves”.