Is a New Cold War Inevitable? Central European Views on Rebuilding Trust in the Euro-Atlantic Region
Is a New Cold War Inevitable? Central European Views on Rebuilding Trust in the Euro-Atlantic Region

Author(s): Martina Heranová, Zdzisław Lachowski, Raimonds Rublovskis
Contributor(s): Łukasz Kulesa (Editor), Brien Barnett (Editor), Dorota Dołęgowska (Editor)
Subject(s): Politics / Political Sciences, Politics, Governance, International relations/trade, Security and defense, Military policy, Geopolitics, Peace and Conflict Studies
Published by: PISM Polski Instytut Spraw Międzynarodowych
Keywords: International relations; West and Russia; lack of trust among states; Euro-Atlantic region; annexation of Crimea; security policy; NATO, OSCE;
Summary/Abstract: When the idea to invite Central European experts to share their views on overcoming the acute deficit of trust in the relationship between the West and Russia first originated in early 2014, there was still some hope that the Ukraine crisis would not mark the beginning of a new period of confrontation in Europe. With that in mind, PISM asked the authors not only to comment on the state of the relationship with Russia but also to assess to what extent various proposals (including Carnegie’s Euro-Atlantic Security Initiative papers and the 2013 report by U.S., Russian and European experts, “Building Mutual Security in the Euro-Atlantic Region”) regarding military confidence building and arms control dialogue with Russia would advance the security of Central European countries. However, as the situation deteriorated with Russia’s annexation of Crimea and its support for eastern Ukraine separatists, the focus inevitably had to turn from dealing with the symptoms (mutual mistrust) to addressing the root causes of the spat between Russia and the West, which now threatens the very foundations of the European security system. Previous approaches to mending the relationship, such as those focused on finding areas of cooperation based on common interests (e.g., dealing with terrorism or the Iranian nuclear programme), were unlikely to be sufficient.

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