“Brink” of a New Cold War? Another Cold War Already Started? Is McCain Brain Dead?

Former Soviet Union leader Mikhail Gorbachev warned on Saturday that the Ukraine crisis had brought the world to the “Brink of a New Cold War“.
‘The world is on the brink of a new cold war. Some say it has already begun,’ said [Mikhail Gorbachev] the 83-year-old former Kremlin chief in a sombre speech delivered in Berlin at an event to mark the 25th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall this weekend.
Mr Gorbachev accused the west, led by the US, of ‘triumphalism’ after the fall of the Berlin Wall ended Soviet dominance in eastern Europe.
Trust between Russia and the west had ‘collapsed’ in the last few months, he said, highlighting the damage done by the Ukraine crisis. He called for new initiatives to restore trust, including a lifting of personal sanctions imposed by the US and the EU on top Russian officials in response to Moscow’s actions in Ukraine.
Mr Gorbachev clearly sees the west as the culprit in the crisis, having given his unequivocal backing to Mr Putin last week. He said, before arriving in Germany, that he was ‘absolutely convinced that Putin protects Russia’s interests better than anyone else’.

This post was published at Global Economic Analysis on Monday, November 10, 2014.