Strategic Council Online – Opinion: A proxy war is when two countries fight each other indirectly by supporting the warring parties. Classic examples from the Cold War era include the Congo crisis in the 1960s and the Angola crisis in the 1970s when the Soviet Union and the United States supported each of the warring sides in a civil war with money, weapons, and sometimes soldiers, but never directly engaged in the war themselves. Accordingly, the approach of the United States and Europe, in the form of NATO and their all-out support for Ukraine, has all the hallmarks of a proxy war against Russia.