I guess I didn't have a better country than the guy with 3m jets and 40k turrets who topfed me in Express a couple sets ago either...

He's probably spent like $1.5b building up that 20,000 land advantage he has on you. Probably lost another half billion dollars in jets from making all the grabs to get that land. Probably spent a billion or so more than you on tech. $3b can buy him about 24,000,000 turrets at these prices, could you break him if he bought those? Doubtful. But he didn't buy those, instead he gained 20,000 more land than you, which will lead to vastly MORE turrets and military as the game goes on. He'll finish 50m net above you in the final scores. If he went to war with you, provided he put up some defenses to prevent getting pancaked off the bat, his 40,000 land * 5.3 * 2.2 * $66/bushel will be earning him $30m/turn, while you'll be earning half that at best, with worse purchasing power and lower max techs. So yes, I'd say his country is better than yours, despite the fact that you were able to turn your weak land investment into a temporary ability to jet through his defenses for a topfeed.