The medieval Christian-Muslim divide parallels modern Cold War ideological divisions.

Evidence

The physical frontier was not very clearly marked and was easily crossed. The frontier that divided the mental attitudes of Christians and Muslims was emphatically defined and crossed only with the greatest difficulty. — Norman Daniel, Islam and the West, 267 (#expands, via linked claim)

During the Cold War the United States was at the center of a large, diverse, multicivilizational grouping of countries who shared the goal of preventing further expansion by the Soviet Union. This grouping, variously known as the “Free World,” the “West,” or the “Allies,” included many but not all Western societies, Turkey, Greece, Japan, Korea, the Philippines, Israel, and, more loosely, other countries such as Taiwan, Thailand, and Pakistan. It was opposed by a grouping of countries only slightly less heterogeneous, which included all the Orthodox countries except Greece, several countries that were historically Western, Vietnam, Cuba, to a lesser degree India, and at times one or more African countries. With the end of the Cold War these multicivilizational, cross-cultural groupings fragmented. The dissolution of the Soviet system, particularly the Warsaw Pact, was dramatic. More slowly but similarly the multicivilizational “Free World” of the Cold War is being reconfigured into a new grouping more or less coextensive with Western civilization. A bounding process is underway involving the definition of the membership of Western international organizations. — Samuel P. Huntington, The Clash of Civilizations and the…, 426 (#responds-to, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Medieval Christian-Muslim division was mental rather than geographical — Norman Daniel, Islam and the West, 267; Post-Cold War Balkan alliances reorganized along Orthodox-versus-Muslim civilizational lines. — Samuel P. Huntington, The Clash of Civilizations and the…, 336; Islam and Christianity have been locked in rivalry far longer than the Cold War (+1 more)

Related

• Cold War alliances crossed civilizations but postwar groupings are realigning around civilizational lines. (similarity 0.88)
• Post-Cold War Balkan alliances reorganized along Orthodox-versus-Muslim civilizational lines. (similarity 0.87)
• Medieval Christian-Muslim division was mental rather than geographical (similarity 0.86)
• Intercivilization conflict divides into micro-level religious fault lines and a macro-level West-versus-rest division (similarity 0.81)
• Post-imperial Islam-West conflicts center on issues beyond territory (similarity 0.81)
• The Cold War’s end left Islam and the West mutually perceived threats (similarity 0.80)
• Europe’s eastern boundary follows the divide between Western and Orthodox Christianity (similarity 0.79)
• Both medieval Christianity and Islam defined each other by disagreement, not overlap (similarity 0.79)
• Civilizational confidence asymmetry drives Muslim-Western conflict (similarity 0.78)
• Civilizational identity is fluid, not fixed or walled off (similarity 0.78)
• Civilizational domino fears drove major states to treat distant border conflicts as their own. (similarity 0.78)
• Most fault line wars occur along the Muslim-non-Muslim boundary (similarity 0.78)
• Post-Cold War conflict was framed by Huntington as civilizational cultural clash (similarity 0.78)
• The clash of civilizations thesis asserts Western values are alien to Islamic societies. (similarity 0.78)

Broader Connections

• Medieval Christian-Muslim division was mental rather than geographical #expands (0.82) — Norman Daniel, Islam and the West, 267
• Islam and Christianity have been locked in rivalry far longer than the Cold War #qualifies (0.80)
• Post-Cold War Balkan alliances reorganized along Orthodox-versus-Muslim civilizational lines. #responds-to (0.78) — Samuel P. Huntington, The Clash of Civilizations and the…, 336
• Cold War alliances crossed civilizations but postwar groupings are realigning around civilizational lines. #responds-to (0.78) — Samuel P. Huntington, The Clash of Civilizations and the…, 426