Cold war 2.0: how Russia and the west reheated a historic struggle
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2...sia-and-the-west-reheated-a-historic-struggle
...Many acknowledge the west must take its share of the blame for the collapse of relations. The mistakes are real, notably
the scale of Nato expansion to the east and in the Baltics. Russia also feels deeply that it was duped into accepting a UN resolution criticising Muammar Gaddafi in
Libya in 2011, only to find it was used as cover for regime change. Hillary Clinton, then at the State Department, did little to mange the Russians. Russia has not voted for humanitarian action at the UN since.
Britain acknowledges errors over Ukraine and Syria. The former Foreign Office permanent secretary Sir Simon Fraser recently accepted: “With hindsight we might have foreseen in
2013 that the combination of formally signing a deep free trade agreement [with Ukraine], with the internal unrest facing President Putin on his return to office, and the perception that had arisen of greater reticence in western foreign policy, could result in a more aggressive Russian response in Ukraine, and opportunism in Syria.”
Others such as Sir John Sawers, the former head of MI6, warned: “We are moving into an era that is as dangerous, if not more dangerous, as the cold war because
we do not have that focus on a strategic relationship between Moscow and Washington.” But unlike the cold war, there are now “no clear rules of the road” between the two countries.
The German foreign minister, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, an advocate of dialogue, made the same point: “It’s a
fallacy to think that this is like the cold war. The current times are different and more dangerou