The global security scenario is gradually taking a dangerous turn, with a new phase of the ‘Cold War’ on the cusp of possibly commencing. One might recall that the old phase, which reached its climax during the John F Kennedy era when the Cuban missile crisis had brought the world to the brink of a nuclear holocaust, mercifully ended after Mikhail Gorbachev initiated his policies of Perestroika and Glasnost, and the erstwhile USSR broke up into separate units. In fact, the end of the Cold War had brought about greater bonhomie between Russia and the West, and resulted not only in the introduction of capitalist tendencies in the defunct communist system, but also in the signing of a number of treaties between the one-time adversaries in a bid to end the menacing nuclear race.
One of these was the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) treaty, signed in 1987 by US President Ronald Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, which had put a moratorium on the deployment of short and medium-range missiles between the world’s two leading military powers. Considered to be a significant step towards ending the nuclear race, more than 2,600 missiles from both sides had been destroyed as part of the treaty that covered both nuclear and conventional warheads.
If the global community imagined that the Cold War ended with such positive developments and the world had finally woken up to the pitfalls that rapid proliferation of nuclear weapons created for the planet, it was woefully mistaken. On the contrary, recent happenings indicate that the world is moving in the contrary direction, with renewed friction taking place between the US and Russia. The latter on Monday announced that it will stop abiding by the INF treaty with the US, renewing fears of the return of a Cold War-style arms race.
It may be recalled that during Donald Trump’s first term, the US had withdrawn from this treaty, but Russia tried to act in a rational manner, and keep to the spirit in which the INF treaty had been made. But now, with the return of Donald Trump to the White House, there have been more provocations, the latest of these being his order for the repositioning of two US nuclear submarines in response to alleged “threatening comments” made by former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, currently Deputy Chair of Russia’s Security Council.
However, if another phase of the Cold War does commence, centred around Ukraine, it will be far more insidious than the earlier one. It needs to be kept in mind that the last Cold War had been bilateral, but a new one would surely be a trilateral one, with China too being involved!