Saturday, August 9, 2008

RussianTanksRoll

An odd thing happened at the Olympic opening ceremony yesterday.

Don’t worry; this is not going to be a sporting article, that would be at http://tonyklinger.co.uk/

It was the moment when a very worried look crossed the face of President George W. Bush as he sat in the heat of the Bird’s Nest super stadium. Looking like the front-page character of “Mad” comic books, Alfred E. Neumann, the President’s body language was perplexed, unhappy and hot. You could see he had something other than the two thousand and eight drummers working in syncopated harmony on his mind.

Bush stood up and spotted Vladimir Putin, the Russian Prime Minister and former President. A dark frown passed over the American’s face. Words were exchanged. You can imagine the conversation. “Hi Ya Vlad, what are your boys doing in Georgia?” Putin shrugs, “Is in my own back yard, is nothing to do with you, what about this drumming, I’m getting a headache!” Putin then shrugged and left after obtaining a headache pill from Laura Bush who smiled enigmatically and said nothing.

To me it is no coincidence that the Russian leader, because that’s what he still is despite stepping down from the Russian Presidency, is at the Olympics at precisely the moment when the Russian tanks were rolling towards the former Russian province of Georgia.

Formerly Georgia was a part of the Soviet Union, and the Russian leadership seems to have developed a bit of geographic amnesia. They clearly believe these annoying little countries on their borders should still be part of the empire, or at least be in their sphere of influence or control.

Russia doesn’t accept the progressive shift of Georgia and Ukraine towards the West. They are particularly upset and unsettled by both countries wanting to become parts of NATO.

So yesterday Russian tanks rolled into South Ossetia, a rebel province of Georgia.

Russia is becoming progressively more unpredictable as it feels its growing economic muscle. This makes the Western response more difficult.

It isn’t easy to say why this "frozen" conflict escalated now. Perhaps it’s no coincidence that the Russians timed it for the very moment when the world’s eyes were on the Olympics.

The Russians claim that Georgia launched an invasion of South Ossetia, aiming to pacify the breakaway region. Georgia, meanwhile, stated that its troops entered the South Ossetian "capital" in response to escalating South Ossetian attacks, which have been going on for a week—years, really—as well as the Russian aerial bombardment of Georgian territory.

Pots and kettles come to mind. How can Russia accuse Georgia of doing precisely the same thing it does in Chechnya? The truth is we’re all hypocrites when it suits us. Before America gets on its own high horse don’t forget it’s historical attempts at invasion of Cuba, Canada and Mexico!

Previous tensions—both in South Ossetia and Abkhazia, the other piece of Georgia that declared sovereignty—had been resolved without war. Someone wanted this to go further.

Both sides have deeper motives for fighting. The Russians want to prevent a Western oriented Georgia from joining NATO. George Bush called the country a "beacon of liberty"—has long wanted to do. Now the Russians will almost certainly succeed. No Western power has an interest in a military ally that is involved in a major military conflict with Russia.

The Georgian leadership, by contrast, had come to believe that the constant pressure of Russian aggression, coupled with the West's failure to accept Georgia into NATO, compelled them to demonstrate "self-reliance."

Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili purchased a great many weapons in preparation for this. He apparently believed a military conflict was inevitable but could be won if he was clever. As of Friday night, with Russian soldiers fighting in South Ossetia—only a few short miles from Tblisi, the Georgian capital—it appears as if he’s made a potentially huge mistake. Russia didn’t send 150 tanks across that border to lose.

Georgia shouldn’t have played the brinksmanship game with the big bear to its north unless it didn’t mean a big hug. It should have stepped back from the precipice—and should still do so if given a chance—but Russia's deployment of such a large and carefully prepared force, not only in South Ossetia but in the rest of Georgia, is clearly an unacceptable breach of Georgia’s sovereignty and international bodies such as the UN must condemn it and order them out of their neighbor’s soil.

The whole thing reminds me of the historical claim by the German government that they had been attacked over the Polish border which they were resisting. That became the start of the Second World War.

Whoever is to blame for the present escalation, the West has little, if any influence on the outcome. Saakashvili's appeals for help and moral support—"This is not about Georgia," he told CNN, "it is about America, its values"—won’t help his country unless Russia allows them to. Putin didn’t look like he was feeling very well disposed to this idea when he shrugged in response to George Bush’s glad handing.

The truth is that the international community should have dealt with this conflict years ago. There was a dangerous security vacuum in the Caucuses; and that always makes war more likely.

In the most dangerous conflict between ideologies since the Cuba missile crisis there is potential for human suffering on an immense scale.

Georgia is an eager ally of the USA, and a successful Russian invasion of Georgia, a country with U.S. troops on its soil, reflects poorly on the West. Our moral cowardice, economic weakness, over extension and distraction elsewhere, ineptitude, lack of ideas, eliminated any thought of our involvement. Now it’s probably too late.