The Lost Peace

The end of the Cold War was an opportunity—our inability to seize it has led to today’s renewed era of great power competition “An eloquent and persuasive argument about how the world squandered the promise of the end of the Cold War.”—Maria Lipman, Foreign Affairs The year 1989 heralded a unique prospect for an enduring global peace as harsh ideological divisions and conflicts began to be resolved. Now, three decades on, that peace has been lost. With war in Ukraine and increasing tensions between China, Russia, and the West, great power politics once again dominates the world stage. But could it have been different? Richard Sakwa shows how the years before the first mass invasion of Ukraine represented a hiatus in conflict rather than a lasting accord—and how, since then, we have been in a “Second Cold War.” Tracing the mistakes on both sides that led to the current crisis, Sakwa considers the resurgence of China and Russia and the disruptions and ambitions of the liberal order that opened up catastrophic new lines of conflict. This is a vital, strongly argued account of how the world lost its chance at peace, and instead saw the return of war in Europe, global rivalries, and nuclear brinksmanship.

The end of the Cold War was an opportunity—our inability to seize it has led to today’s renewed era of great power competition “An eloquent and persuasive argument about how the world squandered the promise of the end of the Cold War.”—Maria Lipman, Foreign Affairs The year 1989 heralded a unique prospect for an enduring global peace as harsh ideological divisions and conflicts began to be resolved. Now, three decades on, that peace has been lost. With war in Ukraine and increasing tensions between China, Russia, and the West, great power politics once again dominates the world stage. But could it have been different? Richard Sakwa shows how the years before the first mass invasion of Ukraine represented a hiatus in conflict rather than a lasting accord—and how, since then, we have been in a “Second Cold War.” Tracing the mistakes on both sides that led to the current crisis, Sakwa considers the resurgence of China and Russia and the disruptions and ambitions of the liberal order that opened up catastrophic new lines of conflict. This is a vital, strongly argued account of how the world lost its chance at peace, and instead saw the return of war in Europe, global rivalries, and nuclear brinksmanship.

We won the Cold War. Yet over the past three decades, economic, strategic and political naïvety has cleared the ground for a new and menacing world order—one defined by instability, energy crises, unending conflict in the Middle East, and authoritarian great powers such as Russia and China. In his new book, Henrik Dahl–an acclaimed Danish author and Member of the European Parliament–takes aim at the West’s elites. He identifies four decisive failures: in our dealings with Russia, which we underestimated and misunderstood after the collapse of the Soviet Union; in the naïve belief that economic integration alone would deliver democracy in China; in the Middle East, where Western idealism has collided with the hard realities of political Islam; and in our failure to grasp energy as a geopolitical weapon, particularly in Europe. We won the Cold War—but we lost the peace. HENRIK DAHL (b. 1960) is a Member of the European Parliament and a former member of the Danish Parliament for the Liberal Alliance, a Danish centre-right party (2015–2024). He holds a degree in sociology and has for many years worked as an author, commentator and public intellectual. Henrik Dahl lives in Copenhagen and Brussels.

We won the Cold War. Yet over the past three decades, economic, strategic and political naïvety has cleared the ground for a new and menacing world order—one defined by instability, energy crises, unending conflict in the Middle East, and authoritarian great powers such as Russia and China. In his new book, Henrik Dahl–an acclaimed Danish author and Member of the European Parliament–takes aim at the West’s elites. He identifies four decisive failures: in our dealings with Russia, which we underestimated and misunderstood after the collapse of the Soviet Union; in the naïve belief that economic integration alone would deliver democracy in China; in the Middle East, where Western idealism has collided with the hard realities of political Islam; and in our failure to grasp energy as a geopolitical weapon, particularly in Europe. We won the Cold War—but we lost the peace. HENRIK DAHL (b. 1960) is a Member of the European Parliament and a former member of the Danish Parliament for the Liberal Alliance, a Danish centre-right party (2015–2024). He holds a degree in sociology and has for many years worked as an author, commentator and public intellectual. Henrik Dahl lives in Copenhagen and Brussels.