You didn’t have to face a plethora of terrorist groups and networks, and struggle to discern what type of relationship each had with al-Qaeda. Gone are worries about the high probability of war when an upstart power spooks a reigning rival-the so-called “Thucydides trap.” That was so last year.ĭuring my time in the US intelligence community, I heard many senior intel types talk about how much easier it was during the Cold War. The media is full of talk about the dawn of a “New Cold War.” Many people think we’re already in it. Yet there seems to be a lot of enthusiasm for a rerun, this time with China. I can remember crouching under my desk at Goldwood Elementary School in northern Ohio during duck-and-cover drills. A cold war followed, spreading globally and leading to a nuclear standoff.A regular column on history’s lessons for the world’s future challenges. By 1951, Europe was divided into two power blocs, American-led and Soviet-led, each with atomic weapons. Military alliances were formed as the West grouped together as NATO, and the East banded together as the Warsaw Pact. also offered the Marshall Plan, massive aid package aimed at supporting collapsing economies that were letting communist sympathizers gain power. pledging to prevent the communists from extending their power, a process that led to the West supporting some terrible regimes. countered with the Truman Doctrine, with its policy of containment to stop communism spreading-it also turned the world into a giant map of allies and enemies, with the U.S. The West feared a communist invasion, physical and ideological, that would turn them into communist states with a Stalin-style leader-the worst possible option-and for many, it caused fear over the likelihood of mainstream socialism, too.
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