The world appears to be heading into a new Cold War, whether we like it or not, with predictions of a conflagration starting in the Asia-Pacific growing more certain by the day. In March, the former US admiral James Stavridis published a novel based on his theory that China and the US could find themselves in a nuclear war by 2034. Mr Stavridis is a former Nato Supreme Allied Commander Europe. His opinion counts, as does that of Admiral Philip Davidson, the outgoing commander of the US Indo-Pacific Command, who warned the same month that China could try to occupy Taiwan within the next six years.