Is US losing new cold war?
By Kristina Wong and Jeremy Herb
If there is a new cold war with Russia, many observers believe the U.S. is losing it.
First under President George W. Bush and now under President Obama, the U.S. and Vladimir Putin’s Russia have engaged in a series of foreign policy battles — and Putin has repeatedly got his way.
The Russian president’s objective is clear. He wants to reassert Russia’s influence in Eastern Europe while preventing NATO’s further expansion toward Russia, said Erik Brattberg, a resident fellow at the Atlantic Council.
https://thehill.com/blogs/defcon-hill/policy-strategy/200237-is-us-losing-new-cold-war
The article is a joke – it reads like smething from the 1970’s or 80’s. Ukraine is a cat and mouse game with Russia being the cat. Both the Russians and the Chinese know that the Euros will not follow the US blindly anymore especially after the debacle in Iraq (a war based on fabrications and lies) and much more recently in Libya and Syria. The Europe needs Russia and China more than it needs the US – energy supplies from Russia are amongst the cheapest in the world and if the Europeans supported US-led sanctions against Russia, it would only hurt the Europeans as all European countries rely on Russia for the supply of natural gas and refined petroleum products. That reliance is between 40% (Germany) and up to 100% for the former Soviet republics.
Russia and China, which holds a huge percentage of US national debt, know that the US is living pay check to pay check and at any minute, either or both of these countries can create an economic nightmare for the US.
Washington needs to back off and stop interfering in situations that it really is financially ill-prepared to deal with. Giving Ukraine $1b in aid, when it owes Russia $1.5b for its supply of natural gas is a bit of a laugh. Ukraine can’t be bought and Crimea is best left in Russia’s control, after all, it was part of Russia until 1954 when it was decided to leave it as part of Ukraine, with the stipulation that Russia’s Black Sea Fleet would remain there.
The funny thing is, Ukraine is one of the poorest countries in Europe, with Crimea, especially the city of Sevastopol being a wealthy part of the country, thanks to Russian money and the fact that close to 90% of the population of Crimea is actually Russian.
So the US needs to back off and take care of its own issues before it considers to wet its feet in another situation that it will not be able to handle.
If there is a new cold war. Without the old cold war some writers cannot make sense of what is going on. Because the nations are the same they put the players into the old roles.
Time to start thinking in the 21st century. There are new motivations and new consequences.
I agree with #1 we have to stop being the worlds policeman and start taking care of ourselves. Our status in the world has slipped considerably, through our own doing and we cannot expect the same results as we have in the past.
It looks like the Russians have killed far less people invading Crimea than the US did invading Iraq and Afghanistan.
Well this thread looks like it’s been hijacked by Occupy Wall Street.
No, we are not.
I don’t think its correct to include Afghanistan, and Iraq in the same context, we had hard evidence that Al Qaeda was housed there and attacked us on our own soil. The invasion of Iraq was a political disaster, based on anecdotal evidence that ultimately blew up in our faces.
#7 just what was the hard evidence?
CIA operatives in Saudi Arabia that had audio and visual recording of plans to hijack air liners, photos from satellites post cole bombing of terrorist training camps in Afghanistan, there was enough tangible evidence to take action. The situation in Iraq was entirely different. Plus the fact that Al Qaeda claimed responsibility for it.