... grave of the Russian superpower. They have since sobered up a bit, but equal status between Moscow and Washington is out of the question for them.
This is the main difference between the current state of relations and the ‘golden’ period of the Cold War - the 1960s and early 1980s. And Russia has yet to prove the Americans wrong.
As they say, it is always difficult to predict anything, especially the future. But today we have to assume that a long period of confrontation with the West, led by the US, lies ahead of us for about a generation....
... capacities to protect our interests” [
15
]. Russia’s foreign policy center of gravity is moving towards the East and to the South, while the West is rapidly losing its position as the top Moscow’s foreign policy priority.
Getting back to the Cold War order
Ivan Timofeev:
Russia-West: Rising Stakes
Many influential Russian analysts argue that under the current challenging circumstances the best possible scenario for the European security would be to move back to the old Cold War system, even though many practical arrangements ...
... building a balanced relationship with Russia. It is also possible that the Americans could decide to leave Russia alone.
It could well be that the calculation just described would ultimately be correct. But it is unlikely.
Yes, a US nuclear strike on Russia would probably not follow immediately. It is unlikely that the Americans would sacrifice Boston for Poznan, just as they were not going to sacrifice Chicago for Hamburg during the Cold War. But there will probably be some sort of response from Washington. Perhaps of the non-atomic type, which, without speculating too wildly, could be sensitive and painful for us. It is likely that with it, Washington would try to pursue a goal ...
... powerful and intensifying global earthquake. This is uncomfortable, but after an earthquake, there appear new continents, countries, phenomena, mountains, and gorges. This is how a new world is created.
— In 2021, you wrote in your article that a new Cold War was unfolding, from which Russia had a chance to emerge victorious. “For this, Russia must choose the correct domestic and foreign policy orientation and, most importantly, stay away from a big war that may develop into a global thermonuclear and cyberspace Armageddon,” you ...
... American politicians, if we speak metaphorically by the worlds of the Senator John McCain, Russia is “a gas station pretending to be a state”, and not “the only country capable of completely destroying the United States”, as they said during the Cold War and for some time after its end. Thus, Russia’s nuclear potential is bracketed out based on the assumption that it cannot and will not be used in modern conditions. Thirdly, the global (especially Western) agenda in the context of globalization has moved far away from the problems of war ...
... considered in the context of the conflict between Russia and the West. The military-political confrontation with the United States and its allies is central to ensuring national security. However, the specific causes of the conflict are the result of how Russian-Western relations developed after the Cold War and are very indirectly related to the fate, interests and aspirations of the rest of the world. The way most states behaved towards Russia is a consequence of their own development and interests. These two factors are much more stable and long-term ...
... where our memories come into play. I remember the euphoria accompanying the fall of the Berlin Wall and the alleged end of the Cold War, which led to a unipolar world. But how many of us do properly recall the major events that have occurred in recent years?... ... the obliteration of most of humanity. Those of us who remember have only to recall how NATO, instead of disbanding, ignored Russia’s concerns and attempts at serious dialogue, expanded, and then illegally bombed Belgrade, ignoring the UN. That was ...
... there is practically no prospect of a compromise, primarily between the United States and Russia, based on a balance of interests. The new dynamic of Russian-Western relations involves a dramatic severance of all ties, and increased Western pressure on Russia (the state, society, economy, science and technology, culture, and so on) on all fronts. This is no longer a source of discord between the opponents of the Cold War period, who then became (unequal) partners. It looks more like the drawing of a clearer piding line between them, with the West refusing to accept even the perfunctory neutrality of inpidual countries.
Moreover, the shared anti-Russian agenda ...
... format; in the wake of the Russian military action in Ukraine last February, Russian-Western confrontation degenerated into a full-blown “h
ybrid war,”
complete with an actual confrontation – if so far a proxy one.
Having tried, after the end of the Cold War, to become part of the new West, and having failed at that endeavor, Russia is now focusing on developing its ties with Asia, the Middle East, Africa, and Latin America.
This is both a difficult and a necessary task, for a number of reasons. First, there is a powerful inertia from the past. At least since the days of Peter ...
... the international order established after the Great War was inherently unfair to them.
A distinctive feature of the modern revolutionary situation is that all significant global players except the United States are dissatisfied with their position. Russia considers the international order established after the Cold War blatantly despotic, and its actions appear to be most revolutionary. China is following the same path, getting less and less reserved in expressing its discontent. China’s actions are induced by its internal development, not by external pressure,...
