Oy!, Magiver I don’t think it’s so much about pissing off Azerbaijan. I think they want those pipelines to be operational so that they can use them. It’s more about logistic mechanism, than feelings.
Oh, goody! We are looking at Neville Chamberlain.
A dictatorship is a dictatorship is a dictatorship. It really doesn’t matter a whole lot what ideology you dress it up in. If you need any proof, just look at the currenly most single-mindedly capitalistic country in the world: China, still devoutly controlled by the Communist Party. (Of course, China’s in a league of its own. I think for a long time, they’ll be satisfied with greed and stability, stability and greed. I guess they have enough people inside that they don’t need to go outside to find enemies or something.)
I’ve read or heard someone mention that the Russians see the pipleline through Georgia as unnecessary. Not sure they’ve thought through the idea that their northern port in the Black Sea is vulnerable to attack.
Ah yes exactly. The Realpolitik.
I doubt that any one here wants to claim that Georgia is pure as the driven snow in this conflict (not unless that’s driven as in driven over by a sputtering oil leaking jalopy). It was stupid for them to allow themselves to be provoked and it was criminal to respond to such provocation in the exact manner in which they did. Heartily agreed that they deserved a slap down.
I also doubt that any one here is so naive as to believe that Russia was responding on the fly to protect the interests of South Ossetians and that their, as of today ongoing, actions within Georgia are motivated by nothing other than preserving the well being of the South Ossetians.
Russia bet on the stupidity of Georgia to rise to the bait. The fact that Georgia did so somewhat thuggishly was ice cream on top.
But the core issue remains: this is about power and Russia preserving its ability to exert power by way of preserving/tightening its grip on the transport of natural gas in particular.
Considering NATO membership for Georgia was not a mistake. Considering it and neither soundly rejecting it nor clearly accepting it was the mistake. The tentative staking out of the fence was a mistake. Russia would not have attacked Georgia proper if Georgia was part of NATO and would not have felt the need if consideration was not in progress. The fact that it remained a decision in limbo invited action to influence the decision the way Russia wanted it to go.
Russia can learn something from this. It can learn that such actions beyond their borders and well in excess of anything justifiable by the goal of protecting South Ossetians will have no consequences - and be emboldened for further adventures near-abroad - or they can learn that such actions incur some price.
What the lesson learned is is up to the EU to decide.
Meanwhile I wouldn’t expect the auto manufacturers to be trying to market NG vehicles to the EU anytime soon.
Amen. It would appear that Russia’s cease fire and withdrawl encompass quite openly includes moving tanks south toward Gori and presumably on to Tblisi. The officers being interviewed in the PBS spot I saw (Transcript here) claimed that they had had absolutely not the slightest order to the contrary. To their credit, they were not doing any shooting or artillery, but I did see footage of shelling or bombing of Gori earlier Wednesday:
Also there appear to be S. Ossetian militia or paramilitary or maybe just opportunists running around the same area:
(both quotes from original link at the top)
So while I can’t say that Georgia is pure as the driven snow, I can definitively say that Russia is not. In the same story, former secretaries of state Madeline Albright and Lawrence Eagleburger call for the NATO alliance to act diplomatically to signal our displeasure with Russia and to admit Georgia to NATO. The big difference between them is as to what this means for the future, and both of them are in agreement that they just don’t know Russia’s intentions at this point (from the same transcript):
WOW. Didn’t expect that from her.
Well, I don’t think PBS was shading the news, and besides which, the interview was on screen. So unless she was under mind control, she said it. I think there’s probably a sound version, maybe even a film clip version (if not tonight, then tomorrow) of this on pbs.org under The News Hour by Jim Lehrer.
So was the footage of the tanks near Gori, and the shelling in Gori. So unless we have a Wag the Dog scenario going on (which I kinda rather doubt), this is really happening. I have yet to hear a single American of any political stripe in public life say that this whole business was primarily Georgia’s fault. Whatever blame that Georgia merited by initiating the entire business has long been surpassed by Russia’s brutal response and utterly dishonest negotiations. However, no one but McCain has suggested that we go in militarily, most likely becase everyone but McCain realizes that we can’t.
I’ve said before that I don’t think McCain ever met a war he didn’t like. Are there any exceptions to that that I’m missing? IME, military people with actual field experience are more reluctant to go to war than their inexperienced counterparts, because they’ve been there, done that, and have a much clearer idea of how little glory and how much pain there is associated with it. It’s got to be darned hard to send out a group knowing that, for example, there’s a good likelihood that only 2/3 of them will return. For example, pre-Iraq, while the Pentagon was doing a lot of the driving for the war, that was realy Cheney/Rumsfeld, who had never served, not the guys who had never been out there who were pushing it. Of course, you sometimes get the abberant, maybe even pathologicals like LeMay or MacArthur, who actually seemed to have enjoyed it. But for the most part, good officers don’t want to go to war. Yet McCain, whom I would not have described as a particularly bloodthirsty man, really seems to get off on the idea of going to war.
In any case, Albright seemed hopeful that economic sanctions would be effective, while Eagleburger was less so. He felt tht if Russia was determined to suck up the satellite republics around us, there’s pretty much nothing we could do about it. Since we don’t know what Russia’s aims are yet, we can’t really gauge what our reaction should be.
mswas: This is difficult to express. Your rhetoric is, I’m sorry to say, a little masturbatory. The tricky part for me is that you make a lot of good (and helpful and interesting) points along the way, but IMnotsoHO your assessment is off.
To make it easy for myself, I’ll shoot down a straw man. Russia isn’t going to take over Georgia, then Lithuania, then Poland, the Netherlands and France. Now I know you’re not saying that this is Munich, 1938. But methinks the aggression of the 19th century won’t occur either.
And calling a proposed currency union evidence of an expansionary Russia is a bit of a joke.
Why the heck would Russia turn fascist now? They’re rolling in oil and natural gas wealth. Plausibly things could get unpleasant in say 10 years, after the resource curse leads to internal rot and the benefits of conservation and alternative fuel research push the oil price downwards. Then Russia might turn paranoid, blaming foreigners for their own errors. But that’s down the road.
Put it another way. India has been a local hegemon for years vis a vis Sri Lanka, Nepal, etc. But this power simply doesn’t amount to much. *
As I see it, Putin and the other guy have accomplished their missions: they’ve blocked Nato encirclement, sent the message that Kosovo succession and American unilateralism have a cost, and thumbed their noses at W besides. I doubt whether a military campaign is in the cards though: holding down hostile populations is just too costly. And absent that, why is this event of overwhelming significance?
(Hm. Thinking it over, it does seem noteworthy that Russia has ended its period of relative decline. But I have serious doubts about their current capacity for resurgence: it’s politically very hard to manage a resource windfall well even in the best of circumstances, and Russian institutions are corrupt and weak.)
Oy!
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PBS’s Newshour isn’t exactly liberal. They regularly have debates between Brookings and Heritage: i.e. they set centrists off against wingers. This gives Newshour a center-right feel. Then again, by US media standards this isn’t unusual. But let’s not pretend that they will pay much attention to the Economic Policy Institute or the Juan Coles of the world.
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“…former secretaries of state Madeline Albright and Lawrence Eagleburger call for the NATO alliance to act diplomatically to signal our displeasure with Russia and to admit Georgia to NATO.”
Frankly, this is pretty good evidence that my perceptions are skewed in some way (mswas take note!). It seems to me that a lot of these diplomats are suffering from Cold War Fixation Syndrome, but they certainly have a deeper understanding of these matters than I do.
I hope that talk of admitting Georgia into NATO at this juncture is simply that: talk. There’s no reason why we shouldn’t maintain that bargaining chip. But if it’s serious, either I’m misunderstanding something pretty fundamental or it’s a really really bad idea.
- That is, it doesn’t amount to much in Beijing, Washington or even Malaysia. It amounts to something in Nepal, etc.
Looking at the Russian oil terminal at Novorossijsk (on Google Earth) it is appears to be a major port. Not just for oil but other material via rail head. Looks like a sizeable grain setup. From Wiki I see that Putin earmarked 1/2 trillion US equivalent dollars into a naval base for the Black Sea Fleet in 2003. He’s put some serious money into fortifying the region.
Here’s a timeline: The Times & The Sunday Times: breaking news & today's latest headlines
Early in the year talks regarding Georgia’s NATO membership intensified. Russia didn’t like that and started engaging in “Provocations”. That’s a popular word in those parts , apparently.
First Russia intensified their links with S. Ossetia and Abkhazia, whatever that means. Then, atrocity: Russia shoots down a Georgian spy drone over Abkhazia. On the pretense that Georgia is planning an attack (now how likely is that?), Russia then builds up troop levels in Abkhazia.
In July, more outrage: Russian jets enter South Ossetia’s airspace, a clear violation of sovereignty. Georgia calmly withdraws its ambassador from Russia.
Now things get a little murky. A Georgian Nationalist website says, “Ossetian border has never been peaceful and shootings occurred often there. In the night between 1 and 2 August 2008, after opening fire on border Georgian villages, Georgian forces changed their policy of not responding to Ossetian provocations and responded with fire. Shootings lasted until the night between 7 and 8 August, when Georgian troops and tanks entered South Ossetia and rushed on its capital, Tskhinvali.”
They skip over part of the sequence noted by the UK Times:
I dunno, some of these provocations that the Georgians suffered just don’t seem very provocative. And responding to a border skirmish (if that’s what really happened) with an invasion of the province’s capital seems sorta, kinda aggressive.
Nothing ‘provokes’ shelling civilians. This is meant to be a democracy suitable for NATO membership not a nine year old wailing ‘well he started it’.
No, not be committing war crimes and breaking treaties its signed up for. And not over territories that have never been under its control since the breakup of the USSR.
Its claim comes from the fact that it was an autonomous unit with the Georgian Socialist Republic - e.g it was an autonomous bit of Georgia when Georgia was part of the USSR.
When Georgia declared independence it revoked the autonomy and fought a civil war to retain it against its populances wishes. And it lost. south Ossetia remained independent in fact and protected by the treaty Georgia broke.
Claiming a province as yours because Uncle Joe Stalin et al found it administratively convenient to lump it with you is a pretty thin moral claim against the wish of that people not to be ruled by you. Especially as that people have never been ruled by you.
Does it need to be said that people in other countries don’t necessarily have the rosy-tinted view of Bush that Americans do? Sakashvillii’s “close ties with the Bush Administration” doesn’t help his credibility with me one bit.
The province has been part of a Georgian state since at least 1000. The Ossetians are themselves migrants into the region fleeing the Mongols. I don’t see any reason Georgia should give the region independence just because they want it.
Captain Amazing, you may be right de jure. But the fact is, S. Ossetia has enjoyed de facto independence from Georgia for sixteen years. For Georgia to enter S. Ossetia militarily, and especially for them to then take on S. Ossetian civilians and Russian troops was not a smart idea. It gave Russia the excuse to do precisely what they did, because about a third of the population of S. Ossetia are Russian citizens - see? it says so right there on the passports Russia foisted on them!
I can guarantee that if the U.S had peacekeeping forces somewhere in a breakaway province, and the official owner of that province came in and attacked our troops, we would be strongly inclined to open a can of whoop-ass on them. I’m not sure we would, because we’re rather otherwise occupied. But we’d sure as hell want to, and we’d feel entirely justified in doing so.
Well, I’m not arguing that what the Georgians did was smart. I’m just tired of everybody in this thread slamming Georgia and praising Russia as the good guys here.
On Tuesday. The leaders of Poland, Ukraine,Lithuania, Estonia and Latvia flew to the Georgian capital of Tbilisi for a nighttime rally. The Ukrainian President (Victor Yushchenko) talked about revoking an agreement with Russia to continue using Sevastopol as a port. He has also imposed restrictions on vessels blockading Georgia to ask permission to return to the port.
**In a decree published on his Web site, Yushchenko said Russia’s navy, which leased the port near the Crimean city of Sevastopol after the Soviet Union collapsed, must coordinate all future movement of ships with Ukrainian officials, including the Defense Ministry. The country used to allow Russian vessels to cross Ukrainian waters without any control,'' Yushchenko said. Such a situation threatens Ukrainian national security, especially when the Russian fleet is used against third countries.‘’ **
**
“We came to fight since our old neighbour thinks that it can fight us,” Polish President Lech Kaczynski said in Tbilisi. “This country thinks that old times will come back, but that time is over. Everyone knows that the next one could be Ukraine, then Poland.” **
Given that Russia has used oil exports as a financial weapon it is disturbing that they are attacking a country with the only other pipline in the region. It looks like they might try to remove Georgia’s President.
**The prospects for a negotiated ceasefire were dealt a blow when Russia’s ambassador to Nato declared that Mr Saakashvili “is no longer a man that we can deal with”. Dmitri Rogozin said: “He must be punished for breaching international law. He is responsible for many war crimes.” **
from the same article
**Vladimir Putin, the Russian Prime Minister, said that Russia would continue its military operation until “its logical end”. **
The former Soviet states are taking this very seriously. Talks with NATO about additional security in the area have increased in light of the current situation. And I would add that the word “cease-fire” apparently doesn’t translate properly from Russian. They are still fighting in Georgia.
You sure as hell haven’t seen me praising Russia as the good guys, and I think if you go back and read the thread from its start, you’ll find that the general consensus has been that Georgia has been stupid, while Russia has been over the top brutal. I travelled more or less the same journey you have, where I started out entirely on Georgia’s side, and came to the realization that there was plenty of blame to go around, including for the US, which appears to have encouraged Georgia in its belief that we (the US specifically and NATO in general) would be there with support if Russia did happen to notice that Georgia had acted in S. Ossetia.
This is a frightening situation. We don’t know Russia’s intentions here. As Magiver has now quoted,
and we have no idea yet what that means.
The former Russian satellites are apparently taking this very seriously. Europe has a hell of an exposure here, both economically and militarily. And the United States is, of course, militarily tied up in Iraq. W is behaving better than one might have expected from his early years, but he’s not the best person to settle this down. I suppose we should be grateful he sent someone like Condi Rice rather than, say, Dick Cheney to Tblisis to deal with this.
But I’d be more grateful still if Obama were in the White House. There’s a man who doesn’t panic, doesn’t get overly excited, and doesn’t view every international issue as a nail to be hammered on by his military hammer.
Isn’t that a misrepresentation of Georgian history? It’s not like Georgia has been a well-defined, independent state with South Ossetia within its borders for all those centuries.