Both Gorbachev and Reagan were involved in creating "dialogue" between the Soviet Union and the US during the late 1980s. (c) Mark Lennihan / AP / Press Association Images. All rights reserved.Against the background of worsening relations between Moscow and Washington over Russia’s war on Ukraine and its military support for Assad’s regime in Syria, recent reports from Russia give the impression that the country is preparing for a war with the west.
These reports have led some experts and political commentators to claim that Russia and the west are now engaged in a new cold war. The latter concept is not new. In 2003, for example, Michael Klare argued that the world was witnessing the beginning of a new cold war in south-central Eurasia between the US on the one hand and Russia and China on the other. The sheer amount of references to this concept today, as well as mentions of Russian nuclear capabilities, reflects a growing trend to interpret Russia’s actions in the Cold War frame.
Indirectly, Russia threatened the US with nuclear weapons already in March 2014, right after the illegitimate referendum in Russia-occupied Crimea. At that time, Dmitry Kiselyov, head of the Russian Federal State News Agency “Rossiya Segodnya” (“Russia Today”, not to be confused with the RT TV channel), mentioned during one of his shows that Russia was the only country in the world capable of turning the US into radioactive dust. Kiselyov was sanctioned by the EU and Canada a few days after this statement.
