Better red than dead
August 31, 2008 1:01 AM Subscribe
With the potential 'crisis' with Russia, Georgia, Europe et al, the BBC tries to imagine what a new Cold War would be like starting with a tour of the budding Moscow tourist attraction called the Confrontation Cold War Museum. Sold off in an auction last year, the underground bunker now belongs to a private company that plans to turn it into an entertainment complex with a museum about the Cold War, a restaurant and even a spa. But it is already possible to hold fashion shows around the 600-meter-long network of bare, cavernous tunnels.
-Isolated Moscow snubbed by Asian states at summit.
-Putin accuses US of starting Georgia crisis as election ploy.
"The suspicion arises that someone in the United States especially created this conflict to make the situation more tense and create a competitive advantage for one of the candidates fighting for the post of US president," Putin said.
The White House said Putin's allegations were "patently false" and the state department said it was "ludicrous" for the Russians to say they were not responsible for what had happened in Georgia.
posted by ersatz at 6:49 AM on August 31, 2008
-Putin accuses US of starting Georgia crisis as election ploy.
"The suspicion arises that someone in the United States especially created this conflict to make the situation more tense and create a competitive advantage for one of the candidates fighting for the post of US president," Putin said.
The White House said Putin's allegations were "patently false" and the state department said it was "ludicrous" for the Russians to say they were not responsible for what had happened in Georgia.
posted by ersatz at 6:49 AM on August 31, 2008
meanwhile in Europe,
To younger "romantics" such as David Cameron, 41, who wants to "accelerate" Georgia's application to join Nato, that smacks of Cold War thinking. The Tory leader was swiftly invited to Georgia after he described Russia as a "massive bully", and wrote on his return: "We must not return to the days of Yalta, when whole nations were allocated according to spheres of influence. If we go along with that in the case of Georgia, where will it apply next? Ukraine? Estonia?" According to some critics of the Cold War veterans, their vision comes from even further back – from the 19th century, when the Council of Vienna divided up Europe among the Great Powers.
posted by infini at 10:01 PM on August 31, 2008
To younger "romantics" such as David Cameron, 41, who wants to "accelerate" Georgia's application to join Nato, that smacks of Cold War thinking. The Tory leader was swiftly invited to Georgia after he described Russia as a "massive bully", and wrote on his return: "We must not return to the days of Yalta, when whole nations were allocated according to spheres of influence. If we go along with that in the case of Georgia, where will it apply next? Ukraine? Estonia?" According to some critics of the Cold War veterans, their vision comes from even further back – from the 19th century, when the Council of Vienna divided up Europe among the Great Powers.
posted by infini at 10:01 PM on August 31, 2008
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posted by flapjax at midnite at 2:00 AM on August 31, 2008 [1 favorite]