Abrams has nothing to do with this. It's a series which reflects on current events in the real world through a Trek lens, bringing in elements from various eras and putting them in a new direction in an era we haven't seen before. This is classic Trek with a modern update. Starffleet and the Federation aren't perfect, they've constantly had to fight to uphold their ideals within (Section 31, for instance and the resident evil admiral of the week). The Cold war had a massive impact on TOS, the 90's with TNG/Voyager/Deep Space Nine and 9/11 on Enterprise.