"I've been arguing since the 1990s that the road to American national security still runs through Moscow. But instead we have waged a Cold War against Russia," he noted.
Since the 9/11 attacks, terrorist organizations have increased their capacity to carry out assaults in major cities throughout the world, including New York, London, Moscow, Paris, Madrid, Istanbul, etc., killing scores if not hundreds, Cohen observed. The post-Cold War world order "is breaking down," while the birth of the new one has been "very painful and dangerous."
However, "the Western leaders are doing nothing about this except making it worse," Cohen asserted, referring primarily to Washington and to a lesser extent NATO. "Our notion of a solution since 9/11 has been to invade countries, attack them with planes or drones and carry out regime change."
In late 2015, French President Francois Hollande "startled the world" following the attacks in Paris on November 13 when he urged to create a grand anti-Daesh coalition that would include both the US and Russia, Cohen recalled. "Some countries agreed, but Washington did not," he added.
Many European countries understand the benefits of working with Russia.
"Europe needs Moscow terribly – economically, politically, socially in terms of the migration problem and militarily in the fight against terrorism. Russia, I guess you could debate this, might be the best fighter of international terrorism because it has had so much experience," Cohen explained. "Russia is needed."
The professor added that there was only one reason why Europe did not remove sanctions imposed on Moscow following the outbreak of the civil war in Ukraine. The United States does not want this to happen. Washington says "Don't do it and if you do it we will punish Europe," the analyst observed.
