The US’s effort to create a New Cold War

When the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, the bipolar world order and the Cold War ended, the United States (US) tried to build the global order as a master of the world. Everything is opposite in nature, the US and NATO, which it led, felt the need to create a new enemy to fight against. Until the early 2000s, US viewed “terrorism” and “anti-democratic regimes” as enemies. Francis Fukuyama’s End of History, Samuel Hungtington’s theories of the Clash of Civilizations, the 2001 Iraq War, the Afghanistan War emerged in this atmosphere. However, NATO continued to act in accordance its character. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, the US did not abandon its strategy of containing Russia, the new heir of its old enemy, and its newly emerging partner, China. In 2004, NATO expanded around the former Soviet Union by including countries such as Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, and continued to design the regimes in these countries with the Colorful Revolutions in Georgia in 2003 and Ukraine in 2004. NATO continued its strategy of enlargement and containment of Russia, including Georgia and Ukraine. The fact that NATO did not give up on this strategy also increased Russia’s concerns. Russia started to show his first response to NATO’s aggressions in Georgia in 2008, which gathered itself with Vladimir Putin’s second term in power.

Russia’s request from the US for guarantees regarding the non-enlargement of NATO in the former Soviet geography shows that the strategy of creating a new Cold War is at the source of the crisis. Ukraine crisis has even no differences with Cuban missile crisis, which threatened to hit each other’s capitals with missiles. It seems quite appropriate to call this process, with the Atlantic drawing its swords against Eurasia, an effort to create a New Cold War.

Turning the wave of Orange Revolutions into a series of US’s defeats

The Orange revolution ended with the loss of Viktor Yushchenko, who followed pro-Western politics, and Viktor Yanukovych’s victory in the 2010 Ukraine elections. After the Yanukovych government’s refusal to sign the EU Association Agreement, on November 22, 2013, the pro-Western opposition and its supporters started protests in the streets and squares. Pro-Western dissidents occupied ministries and took control of the west of the country and the capital, Kiev, and a provisional government was formed in Ukraine. In the elections, Ukrainian businessman Petro Poroshenko, who stated that he wanted to make Ukraine, known for his anti-Russian and pro-EU rhetoric, a member of the EU and NATO, was elected the new president. In the south-east of the country, Russian-speaking Kharkov, Donetsk, Lugansk, Dnepropetrovsk, Zaporozhye, Kherson and Crimea announced that they have joined Russia. Thus, Russia showed that it would not remain indifferent to the developments in the region and continued its second harsh response with the annexation of Crimea in 2014.

The struggle between global alliances has intensified with plans to create chaos in Kazakhstan and the risk of war in Ukraine. After the protests in Kazakhstan turned into chaos, the new Orange Revolution wave was prevented in Central Asia with the intervention of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO). Russian President Putin’s meeting at the CSTO, and Chinese President Xi Jinping’s meeting with the Turkish states in Central Asia emphasized that Orange revolutions will not be allowed. This clearly shows that the Russia and China will not remain unresponsive to US plans to create chaos in the region with Orange revolutions.

The source of tension in the world is the US

On January 21, during the talks in Geneva between US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, Russia stated that they do not want to invade Ukraine and demanded for NATO to stop its continuous expansion around Russia. However, on the same day, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki told reporters that US have committed $2.7 billion in military aid to Ukraine since 2014, with military equipment worth nearly $650 million being sent in 2021 at its peak.[1] The fact that NATO countries Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania sell Stinger anti-aircraft missiles to Ukraine is increasing the tension day by day. The increase of tension in the region by the US makes it inevitable for Russia to take precautions. The US is trying to expand the Ukraine crisis by taking anti-Russian stances of NATO members Germany and France. However, the German Defense Minister’s statement that he does not want his own-made weapons to be exported to Ukraine, and France and Germany’s stance in favor of solving the problem at the table due to their energy dependence on Russia, isolating the US in the Ukraine crisis.

The trade wars of the US against China, the siege of China from the Pacific with the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (Quad), the fact that Russia, China, Turkey and Iran were not invited to the Democracy Summit held in December, forming a front, and accusing China of spreading the Covid19 virus, the propaganda that ‘Uighur human rights’ were violated and massacred form another part of the strategic plan against the Russia-China alliance. Even the US’s effort to compare the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics with the 1936 Munich Olympics shows that the effort to create a new cold war has taken place in all areas.

The US weighs the strength of its enemy to stay strong at the table

The US seems to have calculated Russia’s strengths and weaknesses. “We discovered how economically weak and politically fragile Russia was during the Cold War, and we learned that Russia cannot handle a prolonged conflict with the EU and the US,” Fukuyama says.[2] Even, Fukuyama has some foresight to the war in Ukraine. He thinks that drones are not very suitable for attack, but cheap drones for defense can cause serious damage to armies with more modern and powerful weapons than themselves.[3] The UK’s Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) is that sending short-range weapons such as anti-tank weapons to Ukraine will not significantly alter the military balance or Russia’s behavior. It is thought that in case of war, Russia will neutralize Ukraine with artillery fire or long-range missiles to avoid hot conflicts.[4] It is thought that Russia’s Black Sea Submarines could play a key role in Ukraine’s war by launching missiles hundreds of miles away. Likewise, according to an expert of the RAND Corporation, the US should supply Ukraine with Patriot and Israel’s Iron Dome air defense systems and the US should prepare for war against Russia via Ukraine![5] he states.

In a period when the risks of hot conflict are not like the days of the Cold War, the main expectation of the US from its European allies is to impose unilateral economic sanctions against Russia. There is talk of imposing serious economic and financial sanctions against Russia, including cutting off Russian banks from the global electronic payment messaging system known as SWIFT. It is discussed that economic support, including energy, should be provided to Ukraine and its NATO allies due to the expected interruption of Russian natural gas flows to Europe.[6] However, the inability of Europe to meet its energy needs in the short term shows that this is just a show of strength in table diplomacy.

Can the US win Turkey back in the Ukraine crisis?

Turkey has not recognized Crimea as Russian territory since 2014. In addition, Turkey seems to have taken part in a very NATO-side strategy by selling Bayraktar drones to Ukraine. However, Turkey is seen as a problem against the alliance rather than being a NATO member country. For this reason, the US’s massing in Greece, Romania and Bulgaria instead of Turkey against a possible war in Ukraine shows its distrust. With the inauguration of the US President Joe Biden, some circles were very hopeful, but there was not even a positive development in the US-Turkey relations in 2021. US President Biden showed Turkey the stick of genocide as the first action, there was no change in the F35 issue, he established a base in Alexandroupoli, 50 km from Turkey, and conducted exercises, they campaigned on the lack of human rights and democracy in Turkey, US embassy interfered in Turkey’s internal affairs under the pretext of the detention of the Osman Kavala… Diplomacy is mutually beneficial. Turkey’s willingness to act as a mediator between Ukraine and Russia and the fact that Russian President Putin will visit Turkey indicates that an anti-Russian stance will not be taken.

Conclusion

The concrete situation that emerged, rather than whether the war in Ukraine could start or not. It seems that the Atlantic’s effort to create a new cold war is behind the Ukraine crisis. The diplomatic boycott decision of the US even to Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics is another dimension of the effort to create a new cold war in every field. The aggressive attitude of the US and NATO, which increased the tension in Ukraine, tested Russia’s patience. This causes Russia to increase its military measures in the region to ensure its security. But the world is in the phase of a global depression. Considering the start of a war in Ukraine, the global epidemic in the world, the rising inflation in Europe and the US, and economic difficulties, the chaos in the world seems to increase even more. It seems that it is not possible for the world to remove these problems. In addition, the failure of the US’s attempts to create Colorful revolutions reinforced the power of Eurasia in the region. For this reason, the probability of the crisis being resolved at the desk seems high.

During the Cold War, the diplomatic table was a period when diplomacy and show of power were experienced rather than hot conflicts between the parties. The negotiations between Russia and the US constitute this bargaining phase. The US is aware of the economic weaknesses of Russia on the table, and Russia knows that it still does not have a strong economy. For this reason, the expectation of the US is that this weakness of Russia is supported by its European allies, unfortunately, Germany or France will not be on the side of serious sanctions against Russia due to their energy dependence. At the same time, it does not seem possible for Turkey to take an anti-Russian side in the Ukraine crisis, or to play a positive role in NATO relations, if there is no change in the West’s attitude towards Turkey.