“No surprise, folks. When you ask old men old questions, you get old answers.”

KNOXNEWS Opinion Columnist Thomas P.M. Barnett has a great piece up regarding the Bush administration’s recent attempt to bring back the cold war. A very good read!

What reviving Cold War will end up costing us

The West’s re-demonization of Russia is in full swing, with aging advocates barely able to conceal their glee in resurrecting the “good old days.” It’s a sad commentary on our grand strategic thinking that we so blithely add back the Cold War to our already full plate of global security interests. [...]

Osama bin Laden must be laughing all the way to his cave tonight. Nothing suits his long-term interests better than renewed East-West tension. When the next 9/11 happens, and the inevitable questions arise, it won’t be enough to say, “But we were busy making the Caucasus safe from Russian imperialism.”

In our supreme lack of strategic imagination, we’ve said no, choosing instead to expand NATO right up to Russia’s doorstep and - just now - to get Poland’s agreement to install missile defense. NATO, we tell ourselves, began as an anti-Russia military alliance, and so it must stay. Instead of building something new that could include Russia, we’ve hung onto our Cold War safety blanket, inserting thumb in mouth.

Republicans happily (but falsely) claim that Ronald Reagan ended the cold war. If that were the case, then why try to revive it?