I've been delving into some cold war history and have been trying to think of good ways on how the Cold War could start again. I know there's that whole thing were the cold war never really ended, but it at least came to low. One idea I had was if Russia decided to help North Korea update its weapons arsenal. I've seen things about Putin wanting the return of imperial Russia, not sure how accurate that is, but I wouldn't be surprised. Also some history resources would be great. Most of my understanding about the cold war and the Soviet Union is pretty superficial. I figure there is no shortage of stuff that can be found, as well as common misinformation.
pretty much America is so far ahead in defense spending that the Russians can't catch up without a step change .. a more likely scenario would be a new cold war with china or india
Russia is a paper tiger. The Cold War ended, if not officially at least in every other way when the world saw Desert Storm play out on CNN. We were, and still are so far ahead of Russia that short of nuclear war they are no threat to us. At the heart of it, Russians are a peasant class of people, always have been and probably will always be. That our President fawns over the little tyrant is more worrisome to me than Russia's third rate military.
Economics and political bipolarity would be the big factors in another Cold War-ish scenario. The original was only possible because the world was capable of splitting into ideological camps, which modern globalism would make problematic now. The US and China are linked at the hip economically, and Russia is desperate for any kind of international participation/acknowledgement to keep themselves relevant. It would depend on what you mean by a cold war. Arms races are still possible, I guess, but the classic ideological conditions don't really exist anymore for a bipolar standoff. Everyone is economically interdependent with the exception of North Korea and the underdeveloped world. Might be able to work something in there. And there's always terrorism, but that tends not to be officially sanctioned, and any nation that attempted to do so would cease to be a nation fairly quickly.
As of now I don't see Russia having enough organization to pull off the stuff they did during the cold war. Their main deal seems to be surveillance... and invading their neighbors. I'de agree that Russia generally seems out of the picture. I was hoping to come up with something that is probably unlikely, but somewhat likely. Russia has more tanks, artillery, and warheads than the US, but that majority it outdated Soviet stuff. I can only foresee them mucking around with developing countries, or in North Korea's case not developing... Unfortunately, I just can't think of something that doesn't drift into the realm of conspiracy theory, not that that's bad. I was just hoping for something a little bit more logical. Russia is pretty good at stealing stuff. Heard about soviet Buran program where they finally decided that it would be easier to steal from the US rather then develop their own stuff. Although, it was supper easy to get the shuttle plans. They weren't classified so spies could just request them. China's best bet seems to be cyber war and economics. I think more than half their military can't even meet physical requirement and most of it is devoted to hacking.
The tensions between America and the Soviet Union were fueled by our different ideologies, as well as the arms race masquerading as a space race. The USSR and USA had significant nuclear arsenals in short order after the war, and next to nobody trusted America after Hiroshima and Nagasaki. If we were willing to drop the bomb twice, what would we be willing to do to other nations? Soviet ideology taught that America was imperialist. In the Soviet mindset, America would invade the world if given half a chance. We thought the same of the Soviets. Consequently, the two powers became like gunslingers in a standoff on a street, twirling our pistols to show each other we were every bit as dangerous as the other, and then some. We also engaged in the arms race through putting people in space, as a way of researching weapon technology and saying, "We dominate this untapped frontier." No one wanted to risk firing the first shot, for fear the ensuing war would go nuclear, which it damn well would have. If the Soviets and Americans had gone to war, it may have well dragged our allies into it as well, and we could've ended up with a nuclear wasteland and a pyrrhic victory for whoever lived through it. Slowly but surely, tensions eased through treaties, agreements, and uneasy cooperation. Even today, with the USSR no longer in existence, tensions with the nations of the former Soviet Union aren't relaxed. And the Cold War may have ended with Russia in some ways, but in other ways it's moved to Iran and North Korea, where there's varying concern their leaders would get itchy trigger fingers around the nuclear missiles aimed at the United States and her allies.
Come on, people, let's not dismiss an entire nation as "a peasant class of people." That's the kind of casual racism we don't need on this forum.
clearly its typo - he meant that russians are a pleasant class of people , to say otherwise would be nekulturny
I was thinking something like that too, then I was also thinking about the issues the government has. Russia has sorta moved out of imperialism, and sorta hasn't. Crimea and the Ukraine are pretty good example of this, also the protest during the olympics when it was held in Russia. My long time childhood best friend is Russian, come from a big Russian family. She use to tell me about what it was like growing up there. Her family were basically poor farmers. Her parents where also persecuted by soviets for being Christian (yes, the soviets exploited religion at first, but generally wanted to get rid of it). That's partly why they moved to the US, It also had to do with health issues from the fallout of chernobyl. I wouldn't consider the Russian people to be "peasant", but I can also see the government leaning that way when it comes to the treatment of their people, probably more so during the soviet era. Right now, their government is set up to be some sort of representative parliament, but a lot of the actions by the government are looking pretty fascist. Hopefully things have gotten better there since my friend left. There is another story I have about encounters with the police, but some other time... (and before anyone thinks it, I'm not equating corruption with the feudal system, or that it implies it)
There's nothing casual about it. Ask the good folks of Eastern Europe what they think of the Russians.
By that logic you could also reference the Germans or the French ... hell ask the Boers what they think of the English , or the Japanese what they think of the Americans....
So, this is deliberate, premeditated racism? Look, it's okay to opine about Russian politics or the state of their military, or to say whatever you want about Vladimir Putin. But to disparage an entire people, their entire past and their entire future, is racist and definitely not cool. BTW, my paternal grandparents were from Ukraine, too.
I appreciate everyones input, but lets please stick to the topic. There is a debate forum on here for this sort of thing.
There is, but if you expect any of us to sit idly by or "go over to the debate thread" after someone makes disparaging comments about an entire group of people, it ain't gonna happen. ETA: But to answer the original question, militarily, I think the Cold War is over for the time being, but Russia aligning with China or others is a whole other thing. Frankly, though, I think cyber attacks on things like the electrical grid would be a much more real threat.
