Has the cold war begun?

“The best news out of this fall-out will be the resurrection of the Non-Aligned movement which has the potential of becoming a very powerful independent body to shape the affairs of the world in a just manner. Here too President Ahamadinejad of the Islamic Republic of Iran is making a steadfast effort to enliven the Non-Aligned movement and lead it so that it could play a dynamic role to alleviate the suffering masses of the developing third world countries.”

by Saybhan Samat

(August 26, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) Historically it is observed that the Europeons have had a propensity to colonise weaker countries, eliminate or marginalize the indigenous population by force and establish their hegemony. Sri-Lanka knows this only too well under the invasion and colonization of the Portuguese, Dutch and the British. When not colonizing weaker countries, they would be fighting each other as in World War I & II.

It appears that it is in the psyche of the Europeons to be always at war and to maime and kill people and exploit their lands.

The present day Americans are in fact former Europeons who invaded the present United States massacred the indigenous Red Indians confiscated their lands and obliterated their civilization and culture. It is these former Europeons now Americans who are once again together with other Europeons in Europe are now provoking Russia. Russia of course is a mixture of Asia and Europe.

The war-like nature of the Europeons some of whom are now Americans and their greed to exploit weaker nations is on-going, unless they are militarily defeated this tendency of theirs cannot be halted. The US and their Europeon allies are trying to encircle Russia by expanding the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO).

The NATO is a relict of the cold war. It was created in April 1949 as a defensive alliance of Western Europeon countries plus Canada and the US to protect the former countries from encroachment by the then Soviet Union. However since 1991 the Soviet empire no longer exists and Russia has been co-operating economically with Western Europeon countries, supplying them with gas and oil, and all types of other commodities. This has increased Europeon interdependence and this greatly reduced the need for such defensive military alliance above and beyond Europeon countries own self-defence military system.

However the US government does not see things that way. It would prefer keeping its role as Europe’s patronizing protector and as the world’s super power. NATO is a convenient tool to that effect. Presently it is a fact that the US government neo-con administration see NATO as an important tool of American foreign policy for intervention around the world. Since US politicians do not anymore support de facto the United Nations as the supreme international organization devoted to maintaining peace in the world, a US controlled NATO would seem to be, in their eyes , a most attractive substitute to the United Nations for providing a legal front for their illegal offensive military undertakings around the world. They prefer to control totally a smaller organization such as NATO, even though it has become a redundant institution, than to have to make compromises at the UN, where their agenda may be vetoed by the Russia or China.

This is the strong rationale to reshape and enlarge NATO, in order to transfer it into a flexible tool of American foreign policy. Regarding NATO, the plan is to turn it into an aggrandized offensive imperial US dominated socio-political and military alliance against the rest of the world. According to plan, NATO would be enlarged in the Central-Eastern Europeon region to include not only most of the former members of the Warsaw Pact-Poland, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Bulgaria, Romania, Albania and Hungary but also the former republics of the then Soviet Union viz. Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia, Georgia and Ukraine. In addition in Asia to include Australia, New Zealand and South Korea, possibly even Israel. Today the initial 12 member NATO has been increased to 26 member organization. In the future if the US has its way it could have 40 members.

All these ambitions of the US and its Europeon allies have caused alarm and anxiety in Russia. Georgia, provided an opportunity for Russia to express its disapproval at the machinations of the US and its allies. Although the statements emanating from Russia and the US and its allies are couched in diplomatic language it seems that the cold war has begun. The Russian president has met Bashir al-Asad the Syrian president to negotiate the installation of a Russian military base in Syria and provide Syria with missiles. Russia is to once again establish military and economic ties with Cuba and may station missiles on Cuban soil. The fall-out of the Georgian crisis will be to the advantage of Iran as Russia will veto any more sanctions sponsored by the US and its European allies and sell arms to Iran.

The best news out of this fall-out will be the resurrection of the Non-Aligned movement which has the potential of becoming a very powerful independent body to shape the affairs of the world in a just manner. Here too President Ahamadinejad of the Islamic Republic of Iran is making a steadfast effort to enliven the Non-Aligned movement and lead it so that it could play a dynamic role to alleviate the suffering masses of the developing third world countries.

While the cold –war may precipitate war in Europe or in the US itself, just like in the last cold war which ended in 1989 it may not lead to world-war. There may be a few small wars like what happened in Georgia and South Ottessia recently. This situation is to the advantage of the third world countries who are in the Non-Aligned movement.
- Sri Lanka Guardian