-by building dissonance within. Some like to remember fondly the call by Ronald Reagan for Gorbachev “to tear down this wall”. The United States “Won the Cold War” said George Bush Senior in his State of the Union Address. We need to step back and recognize with some humility that the Soviet Union fell largely of its own weight rather than as a result of external pressure. Again today Russia is economically weak. It has become an exporter of raw materials, its industrial sector is weak, and its revenues are already falling. Conditions now offer the opportunity to aggravate Russia’s economic frailty – let’s focus on that.

Over the last decade, the European land armament industry developed into a thriving market driven by growing demand from the BRICS, a new wave of emerging countries and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The criticism leveled by Americans at Europe’s neglect of its commitment to defense is not new, and is often exaggerated.

The first wave of globalization in the 20^th century triggered deep upheaval of the organization of power and an overall depreciation of European nations.

The increasing militarism prior to the Great War had its roots in national beliefs and ideologies constructed during the 19^th century in European countries.

Germany’s responsibility in the two global conflicts reflects, among other things, the German military’s desire to free itself from political control and the depth to which the Wehrmacht was immersed into Nazi ideology and a Nazi state whose orders it never really contested.

There are some disturbing similarities between present-day Asia and pre-1914 Europe.