Who Started The War? We Have An Answer

Your article is Featured in the Triple Name Club.

This seems rather straight forward to me too, Sean, upon reading that statement. I suppose the fact that I already pretty much concluded exactly that, could be taken it two ways . . . Either I am seeing confirmation of my general understanding of the relationship between this, and another recent "point of friction", namely the agreement of Poland, to a permanent presence of U.S. forces, and anti-ballistic missiles, and bases for them. Or . . . my comprehension of the English language is very different than Mr. Saakashvilli's.

Here's what I posit is a key PART of what we have been witnessing; The Administration was aware of what to us might look like something which took place AFTER the provocative activity in Georgia, before hand. Such things, strategic military agreements, are of course not immediately announced, though some sort of ceremonial announcement may imply that. If my high level strategic planners, have not managed to figure out that routinely waiting for a "good moment" to make such a thing official to the world is a good idea, they're a whole lot less intelligent than I ever dreamed possible.

If that announcement came "before" the Georgia unpleasantness, The world sees that as a somewhat aggressive thing, on the part of the "west". If the announcement comes after the "invasion" of Georgia, it's seen as defensive behavior. We are being sold a lie, me thinks.

John, very interesting and insightful interpretation I must say. Plausible indeed. Sacrifice Georgia for a Maginot line in the sky, ah, strategery indeed!

Clearly this Administration has endangered us all for quite some time to come.

Yup. Thanks for the info.

Certainly so David, and so, guaranteed huge profits and power for the military/industrial complex, for years on end. Mr. Eisenhower was a prophet indeed;

This conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience. The total influence – economic, political, even spiritual – is felt in every city, every Statehouse, every office of the Federal government. We recognize the imperative need for this development. Yet we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications. Our toil, resources and livelihood are all involved; so is the very structure of our society.

(Final address to the nation, 1961)

Thank you for using Gather Broadcast, where there is an open line of communication for all and you’re more than a connection.

Gather Broadcasting: Have it your way

This takes you in the back door. If you’ve already been, don’t click again.

I have to wonder when our current Pres is out of power how much validity will any or all of his un-Constitutional bargins, SOFAs and treaties done via over reach of executive authority will have any weight. Certainly one of the reasons for Pelosi's visit to Iraq was to tell Malaki in no uncertain terms that any agreement with Bush is not worth the paper it is lied upon. I believe that if McCain is elected he will attempt to continue the TR Roosevelt model of executive imperialism, and this time not against aboriginal Panamanians and Phillipenos, but against the Middle East, China and Russia. But I do not see a more Democratic congress cooperating. We shall have legislative impasse on a historic scale.

I think it more a NATO pay-back if you will for Kosovo...

Thanks Sean, good information.

Does anyone see any difference between Soviet weapons on our doorstep in Cuba or ours on Russia’s doorstep in Poland? Nuclear or not, diplomacy seems to be taking a back seat. We already know how we reacted to a foreign power in our backyard. Does anybody, with any semblance of common sense, think that anything good can come out of this?

Aside from some obviously big differences, if one of our states decided to opt out of our long standing union, I wonder how our national government and neighboring states would react. I am NOT in any way condoning what is happening there, in fact on the contrary. What I am saying, especially in this situation is, to take sides will yield no positive resolution. It, at the very least, gives the impression of a precursor to a larger conflict of dangerous feelings and conflicting ideologies. Diplomacy among friends is the first step to respect, understanding, and solution. We can no longer be the world’s policemen. It doesn’t matter who started the war. The United Nations should be doing their job, assuming responsibility and action before any conflict spirals out of control.

David K., I agree with you!

I'm not familiar with Joshua Trevino or his credentials and credibility, but blog entries are not generally reliable.
I think Russia ought to get its own country in order, before taking on other countries. USSR is over. Historically, Russia has been brutal to its neighbors, as in the Ukraine.
We have a lot of fixing to do in our own country, but I'd be ashamed if we didn't try to prevent another genocide. I guess our best course now, as always, is prayer.

Simon, Amen !

Thanks Sean,

As usual, your lack of insight into world affairs is tainted by your lefto-fascist political viewpoint.

Visited your pals in Iran lately?

Sean Paul: I've read everything I could on the Georgia/Russia situation and to be honest the sequence of events I'm getting from you and most other sources seem to make no sense at all. Georgia tries to present Russia with a fait accompli by attacking a breakaway province which has a thousand or so Russian peacekeepers in it? How on earth could that have worked? They were going to run into and get into a shooting match with Russians. The Russians were going to respond. Why on earth would Georgia try it at any time , and especially at a time when 2000 of their very limited number of good, US-trained troops were in Iraq? Makes no sense whatsoever from Georgia's standpoint.

Makes no sense from the US standpoint either. The US did not heavily arm Georgia or do a massive training program for its army. Georgia apparently was armed mainly with second-hand Czech heavy equipment and some Israeli stuff. Other than some Hummers and a few thousand M16 rifles (which are available from a variety of sources) Russia hasn't even claimed to have captured US weapons as far as I've seen. The Israeli's did sell the Georgians some weapons and did some training, but apparently stopped the weapons sales quite some time ago because they didn't want to hack the Russians off. The Russians have leverage over Israel because if Israel hacks them off too much the Russians can supply Syria and Iran with even nastier stuff than they are already selling them. The US trained Georgians for the sorts of situations they would find in Iraq, not for fighting Russian armor, and supplied them with penny-packets of light weapons.

Most of the Georgian army is still not trained. The reserves that they were trying to build up are still in their infancy. They couldn't take South Ossettia without fighting the Russians. Apparently the bulk of their troops were facing Abkasia when the fighting broke out. Them attacking first makes no sense at all. Granted, governments do stupid things, but generally not as stupid as that would have been.

Alternate explanation which makes far more sense to me: The Russians planned to do a regime change while the media was focused on the Olympics. Ratchet up tensions enough to cloud the question of "who started it", then come through South Ossetia, cut Georgia essentially in half, roll up the bulk of the Georgian army on the frontiers, then be rolling through the streets of the capital with a new regime in charge in less than a week.

If that was the plan, a lot of things suddenly make sense. A spike in Russian hacker attacks on Georgian sites in late July, the quick and overwhelming Russian response, and the sudden pullback of the Georgian army to the vicinity of the capital after a few days of fighting. Here is an alternate explanation of events that I've seen a few places and which makes perfect sense to me:

The Russians ratcheted up violence in S. Ossetia in late July/early August. On the 6th, heavily armed Russians began moving through the tunnel chokepoints between Russia and South Ossetia in violation of the peacekeeping agreement. The Georgians moved to take key ground that dominated those chokepoints, but had to go through Tskhinvali to get there. Once the Russians broke out of the chokepoints, the Georgian army pulled back to a kind of "fortress Georgia", which included the capital and a mountainous region in the eastern part of Georgia. The Russians decided that the cost of street-by-street fighting, followed by a campaign in the western mountains would be too high for what they would get out of it. They decided to cause the undefended part of Georgia as much pain as possible in hopes of luring the bulk of the Georgian army out so it could be destroyed on armor and aircraft-friendly grounds. The Georgians haven't taken the bait so far and the Russians appear to have decided to hang on to as much Georgian territory as they can get away with without paying too high a price, and bide their time on the regime change.

Like I say, that makes far more sense. Does that mean it's true? No. We probably won't know what really went on in the leadup to this conflict for decades. Both sides are quite willing to lie in order to impact world opinion. Both sides have lied and gotten caught at it. Both countries have a history of being manipulative and ruthless.

Who won in this conflict? Both sides. Georgia obviously lost, though not as much as the Russians wanted them to. Russia also lost in the longer run. Reminding their neighbors that the bear could come back was a very bad move. Russia has both a strong and a very weak strategic position. Much of their border is surrounded by small, weak countries that could provide a buffer against any foreign threats, and allies against those threats. The likes of Georgia, Armenia, Latvia and the Ukraine are in themselves not threats to Russia. They only become threats to Russia when they seek alliances with outside powers. Why do they do that? Because they perceive Russia as a threat to them. A more threatening Russian equals more chance that a foreign enemy of Russia will be welcomed into those countries as a counterbalance.

In the long term Russia can't afford to tie down military power in intimidating the likes of Georgia. There are !40 million Russians--dwindling toward 100 million--inhabiting a resource-rich area several times the size of China (which has close to 10 times the population and an economy several times the size of Russia's). Over the next several decades, China and probably Iran will be far greater threats to Russia than the US ever was. The Russians need to figure out a foreign policy that doesn't require them to tie down military power keeping countries like Georgia that should be strategically irrelevant or assets from becoming a drain on their resources and potential lodging points for real enemies.

Oops. That's supposed to read "Both sides lost".

Both John-Mark and Dale present some sound political insight into the Russian standoff with the west over Georgia.

As retired NATO supreme commander, US general Joulwan stated a few days ago: “We have not treated Russia with respect for the past several years... I advised years ago that we need to seek common ground with Russia.. work together...”

thanks

Great writing. Sounds like an intelligent view.