A new cold war between Russia and the West?

Moscow announces reprisals against the expulsion of Russian diplomats from the West. Ministry of Foreign Affairs: behind the European Union is NATO, which has the task of demonizing Russia. Fears of  boycott of the football world championships. The situation seems to have escaped both Putin and the May.

Moscow (AsiaNews) - Russia has promised to respond with similar measures to the decision of several Western countries to expel a hundred diplomats from Moscow, following Great Britain decision in the wake of the nerve gas attack on former agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov called the move "wrong"  and said that Russia's response "will be guided by the principle of reciprocity". On the other hand, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs accuses the United Kingdom's allies of "blindly following the principle of Euro-Atlantic unity". Russian Foreign Ministry spokesman Maria Zakharova similarly told Tass news agency: "We know all too well who is behind the European Union: NATO has the task of demonizing Russia". "What we are witnessing now - she said - is part of a long-term program of unbridled Russophobia: it is not only against Russia as a country, it is a matter of Russians and the Russian people".

The escalation of tension between the Western countries and Russia in recent days, with the mass expulsions of diplomats and the reciprocal threat of new sanctions and counter-sanctions, seems to lead to the reckoning of this new phase of international politics, which began with the Russian-Ukrainian conflict at the end of 2013, and still far from its conclusion. In this five-year period of "hybrid war" Russia has become increasingly isolated from those who, at least in theory, are its allies in the international fight against terrorism.

The "Skrypal case" has detonated a truly explosive development of relations between the conflicting parties. The ex-Russian spy and his daughter lie in a coma for over two weeks, poisoned by the deadly "Novichok", the substance created by the Russian secret services several years ago for this type of settling of scores, betrayed by its own name ( which means "the newbie") and spread the stale smell of the "cold war" of the twentieth century. The reason for the poisoning is far from understandable, since Skrypal has long since retired, so much so that it has inspired imaginative hypotheses on both sides; whether the double agent is back in action, in a new phase of mutual aggression for military and technological secrets (even if there is scant evidence of anything technological), or whether the poisoning is a provocation organized by the Westerners themselves, to discredit and attack Russia.

What is clear is that Vladimir Putin, accused by British Prime Minister Theresa May of having ordered a revenge attack on Skrypal, who is now struggling to justify himself, is also committed to responding to widespread public anger over the dramatic Kemerovo fire and the responsibilities of local administrators, who are very close to him. The immediate Russian reaction was rather scornful. Rejecting the accusations in the middle of the elections that confirmed popular consensus for the president, it seemed that Putin was attempting to exploit this circumstance to show his electors and "subjects" Russian superiority over weak Western governments.

Now the Russian Foreign Ministry is adding fuel to the controversy, accusing May of exploiting the issue to strengthen her weak hold on power, while also generically accusing the West of using Russia to recompose itself politically and militarily, in a phase of uncertainties related to the populist insurgents in various countries, and its inability to give credible answers in the war against terrorism. In essence, the thesis suggested by the Russian statements would be this: after the war in Syria with the Russian victory and control of the Middle East territory, the West wants to make the Russians pay for the advantage it has obtained, preventing  it from further extending its influence.

This thesis is supported by the excessive hurry of the British and their allies in issuing punitive measures over the Skrypal poisoning, without even waiting for the fateful conclusions of the coroner in the "closing of investigations". The comparison with the Litvinenko case, another ex-Russian dissident spy poisoned in 2006, actually raises many doubts; then everything was practically covered up without consequences, despite the much greater evidence pointing to the responsibilities of the Russians and of Putin himself, who had been accused by Litvinenko of being the instigator of the murder of the journalist Anna Politkovskaya.

Some Russian observers believe that the purpose of the British "provocation" was not to sabotage the March elections, but rather to create problems for the football world championships, which will be held in June in Russia, and which Putin intends to exploit to revive his image as a world leader. A consequence of the recent diplomatic war, in fact, could be the boycotting of the championships by some countries, beginning with England and Ireland (for sure the political leaders will be absent), reminiscent of the famous boycott of the 1980 Moscow Olympics. The recent controversies over the Winter Olympics in South Korea, where Russia was banned from competing over scandals linked to doping, really suggest the renewal of the "sporting cold war". The victory of the Russian ice hockey team, without a flag but with the "forbidden" song of the national anthem, was celebrated by Putin on the return of the "heroes", with a demonstration at the Olympic Stadium "Luzhniki" in Moscow in an atmosphere of patriotic enthusiasm pushed almost to paroxysm.

The world's political equilibrium for the coming decades is therefore at stake, where Russia is convinced that it has to go it alone, at most partially relying on its Asian partners, in whom it holds little trust anyway. America is siding with England, forcing the European Union to align, which could lead to strong divisions among the European countries in the near future, something on which Putin's Russia is clearly hedging its bets.