Huntington's Conflicts, Fukuyama's World - NYTimes.com

Huntington's Conflicts, Fukuyama's World - NYTimes.com: But at the same time, from the West’s perspective, the stakes in these disputes are relatively low. The struggle for influence is taking place on Russia’s very doorstep, and there’s no real possibility that a Putinist victory in Kiev or the Caucasus would inspire copycat right-wing movements to seize power in, say, Italy or France or Germany, the way Communist movements nearly did in the early 20th century. A true “new Cold War” scenario, in other words, remains entirely fanciful — which means, in turn, that no matter how many hands Putin wins with weak cards we’ll still be playing with house money.