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 The Cost of Saakashvili’s FollyPosted on Aug 26, 2008The overwhelming reaction in American and European comment on the Russian riposte to Georgia’s attack on Russian “peacekeeping” forces in South Ossetia has been that Russia showed too much of its claws. It should now be ostracized or penalized for “overreaction” to an attack on its soldiers. This response evades acknowledgement that the real damage Georgia’s President Mikheil Saakashvili has done has been to the United States and NATO, and to Georgia itself, which for the foreseeable future will now be a nation of limited sovereignty, and an awkward embarrassment to its Western allies. It will have Russian troops indefinitely stationed on its territory to protect South Ossetia and Abkhazia, henceforth self-declared independent entities under Russian protection (or eventually annexed to Russia at their own petition). The Russians, at this point, prefer the first solution because, as they like to emphasize, it follows the precedent of Kosovo’s self-proclamation of independence from Serbia in February of this year, under American sponsorship. The crisis has been a turning point in current international relations because it demonstrated that the United States could not or would not defend Georgia, despite the widespread international impression that Washington, after having trained Georgia’s troops and showily displayed the Saakashvili government as its protege, was in some way implicated in the Georgian attack on South Ossetia, and on the Russian soldiers legally there as “peacekeepers.” Those Russian soldiers had been there for 16 years under an international agreement following a first Georgian attempt to “recover” the linguistically and historically distinct South Ossetia and Abkhazia, both of them autonomous Russian—and subsequently Soviet—protectorates or regions since 1810. Advertisement Another U.S. vessel, an unarmed Coast Guard cutter, is scheduled to make another delivery Wednesday to the port of Poti, patrolled by Russian forces and with nearby Russian checkpoints. The Russians have darkly declared their suspicion that American vessels have been delivering arms to Georgia at other places along the coast. Even though the Russians destroyed all that was left of the new American military equipment and installations recently given to Georgia, even Saakashvili is unlikely to want to start up the war again—at least just now, unless Cheney is going to bring with him the 82nd Airborne Division and the 6th Fleet. That, of course, is what Saakashvili seemed to expect the night when his invasion turned into a debacle. “Where is America?” he said, “Where is the Free World?” He has since received reassurances from presidential candidate John McCain and vice presidential candidate Joe Biden, both fans of the unsuccessful Georgian liberator. This has been an inane and stupid affair, except for the unfortunates who got killed or maimed, or lost their homes, or have been ethnically cleansed by one side or another during the past days and are now grieving refugees. The United States left Saakashvili and the Georgians twisting in the wind, after telling them they were going to belong to NATO and help spread freedom in the Caucasus. Ukraine and the Baltic states have been given the lesson that great powers do not go to war against other heavily armed great powers just to settle ancient sectarian quarrels or linguistic rivalries in client countries, even if those are prospective NATO members. Poland and the Czech Republic had thought it prudent to humor the obsession of Washington and its arms manufacturers with building a missile-defense system against Iran’s committing suicide. Now they find that Russia is furious about something they had taken on faith from the U.S., but turns out to have been, to Washington politicians, a voter-pleasing and money-making boondoggle. Israel now finds Syria talking with Moscow arms suppliers. Russian cooperation with the U.S. on various matters—Iran, Hamas and Hezbollah; counterterrorism, nuclear nonproliferation, and oil and gas supplies to Europe—is now expected to cease. Why? As far as one can make out, because a certain number of policy types in the Clinton and Bush II administrations, and in the Pentagon, decided that it could be a cost-free demonstration of American power of intimidation to build NATO right up to Russia’s front door. Why, they could even take over some of Russia’s historical dependencies and protectorates—just to show who’s No. 1. Visit William Pfaff’s Web site at www.williampfaff.com. © 2008 Tribune Media Services Inc. Elsewhere: . CommentsAre you a Truthdig member yet? Login now, or register with Truthdig. Add Your Comment |
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By Anarcissie, January 28, 2009 at 1:17 pm #
Who—the Ossetians, the Georgians, or the Russians?
Report thisBy Katex, January 28, 2009 at 7:06 am #
There were two options:
1. Surrender and have them to kill you and overthrow the government.
2. Defend the country, people, democracy and freedom.
i would say depend the country…
Report thisBy super lou, August 27, 2008 at 5:55 pm #
(Unregistered commenter)
Georgia got duped just like the Israelis got duped in going full-bore attack against Lebanon. Poor little dictator Saakashvili, whimpering in his Russian vodka.
For the record, I could give a shit about Georgia, the Ukraine or any other ex-Soviet satellite. I was born in 1957, was 5 during the Cuban Missle Crisis, and lived just fine during the phoney Cold War. And will live just fine if Georgia comes under Russian influence.
I could care less about European conflicts, nobody seems to declare “We are Somalians” or “We are Darfurians,” do they?
Report thisBy Purple Girl, August 27, 2008 at 3:33 pm #
What total dumbass would attack a country far bigger and more powerful than itself Right Next Door?
Report thisYa think they might kick you dusty lil’ ass?
Only reason anyone would do such a stupid thing would be if they thought their ‘Big Brother’ was waiting around the corner,ready to step in.
Did this moron ever check out how this cast of characters treats the ‘expendables’ once they have done their chore. They screw them over and throw them under the bus.
These guys don’t care about devastating your lil’ country..they are working on laying waste to OURS!
Had this idiot had acted like a president of a free country , he would have went to the people of these regions and found out why they wanted to break off, and addressed it. Otherwise he should have just let them go…But of course there are Oil Pipelines to consider right?
If he had any common sense he would be providing evidence against those who instigated this whole staged conflict to the UN and demanding war crime charges be levied for tampering in a soveriegn countries politics and endangering their citizens.What promise did they make…Coercion,breach of contractual agreement?
Saak needs to suck it up and confess to backroom dealing. he’ll save his country and many more around the world-esp OURS!
By Folktruther, August 27, 2008 at 12:41 pm #
Thank you very much,Cyrena, for the links. I hope to get to them in the next few days.
However, I was dismayed by your put down of the American population. Do you think that you are typical of most people in the US? Most people are intensely focused on their personal lives and any political interests they have are at the margins of their attention. They neither have the time, energy, background or interests to understand the details of the million political events that affect them. Especially when they are systematically deluded and distracted by the corporate media.
You are blaming the people for the defects of the power system. You have research skills that almost none of the population has. I don’t have them. Blaming people for not have the skills that you do is does not seem politically productive. Goerthe said that we all see the world in the light of our best qualities. But we can allow for this, and each contribute according to their ability.
People don’t have the conceptual background frames of refeence necessary to organize the details of what they are told in a meaningful pattern. In addition to disinformation in the mainstream truth, the conceptual language that conveys it has undergone DISCONCEPTION. People cannot think or communicate in a simple abstract way about people and power.
This is an historical problem, caused by the deceit of power structures who need to delude the people in order to rule. Blaming the victims of this historical deceit is incompatible with enlighting them about the power process under class based rule.
Report thisBy Anarcissie, August 27, 2008 at 11:10 am #
I think a fairly simple counterargument is that, if the Russians had intended to do that, they would have done it. However, it was not in their interests to do it. For them, it was much more productive to punish and cripple Georgia, take off some territory, and frighten the West. They don’t need another Chechnya.
As for preparation, if what I read in the media is even approximately true—a risky guess—then both Russia and Georgia had been each preparing for a major military operation for at least several weeks, if not several months. That’s how long it takes to set up the kind of operations that have been reported.
I assume that Russian intelligence discovered that something was being prepared by Georgia, and saw in it an opportunity to give the West a bloody nose in exchange for the black eye they got in Kosovo. The Russian leadership must have delighted in the ironies.
On the other hand, while I am not surprised that Georgian intelligence was not up to the Russian level, it is surprising that Georgia’s big imperial brother didn’t inform them that the Russians were waiting for them. With all their spies and satellites they must have known pretty much what the Russians were up to. That is something that might be interesting to look into.
One possible hypothesis is that the U.S. leadership wanted Georgia to be defeated so as to create some kind of Cold-War style crisis which would improve McCain’s chances of election, as Mr. Scheer has suggested. On and off, the U.S. has been trying to provoke the Russians for years; this was the poke of the stick that finally did the job.
Report thisBy cyrena, August 27, 2008 at 9:43 am #
By Folktruther, August 26 at 7:17 pm #
What the American people dont know, because the mainstream media, including the progressive media, dont tell them, is that a week previous to the war the US led a two week military practice operation with Georgia and other European countires called OPERATION IMMEDIATE RESPONSE.
Actually Folktruther, some of us at least, DID know this. Kind of hard to do something like this in a clandestine manner now isnt it? So, it doesnt mean that such events are not reported.
http://jg2090.newsvine.com/_news/2008/07/16/1671102-operation-immediate-response-underway-in-republic-of-georgia
http://www.marforres.usmc.mil/MFRNews/2008/2008.07/IR.asp
http://www.stripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=63921&archive=true
http://www.marines.mil/units/marforres/Pages/OperationImmediateResponsebeginsinCountryofGeorgia.aspx
http://www.militaryphotos.net/forums/showthread.php?t=120648
They just arent reported on the local channel 6 news at 5, or 11, or whatever time. Fox noise didnt mention it either. But then, after 8 or more years, (really far longer, depending on where one might live in the US) this isnt really a surprise, now is it?
No, its only very unfortunate that most Americans wait to have their news spoon fed to them, instead of going in search of it themselves, (which is much easier to do these days).
It would seem that by now, more folks would be aware of the fact that all they get from US MSM is state sponsored propaganda. The crime is that other stuff IS actually available, if we would only look.
An SOMETIMES, (more frequently than we may know) this information IS published in the MSM, and in plain sight. Americans just fail to pay attention, and/or to connect the dots.
The “they didn’t tell us” excuse is costing us all in a very big way. Pretty soon, half of us will be ‘waiting for *them* to tell us’ when we can go to the toilet.
Actually, that’s been happening for a really long time now. For years when I worked at various airports serving the traveling public, my fellow citizens would ask me at least 15 times a day, whether or not they had time to go to the bathroom.
Not wanting to be unhelpful, it still left me in a somewhat difficult position, since I would need a lot more information about them, before I could provide an accurate assessment. Like, what did they plan to DO in the bathroom? #1, #2 or #s 3 and 4? How fast (or slow) could they get to and from the designated area?
Now it would have been, (IMHO) far more effective for them to 1, verify the departure time of their flight, 2) look at their watches or some other instrument to determine the current time, 3) verify where the nearest facility was.
Then, equipped with all of that information, (which I was more than happy to provide) THEY could determine for themselves, whether or not they had time to go to the bathroom, without revealing to me, (or anyone else) what it was they planned to do when they got there, or even how long it might take them. Clearly they would be a better judge of that then I.
So let’s just call this what it is: Far too many Americans are too lazy to use their own minds to figure things out for themselves. Now I’m not sure who or what to ‘blame’ that on, but you’ll probably agree that it is problematic. It makes us far more likely to believe things that are at best, inaccurate, and at worse, blatant lies that can lead to dangerous consequences.
When it involves more than going to the toilet, it can lead to the consequences that we now find ourselves in, at the bottom of the collective shit can.
Report thisBy Ed Harges, August 27, 2008 at 9:18 am #
The word “folly” trivializes what Saakashvili did.
He launched a surprise attack on the civilian population of the capital of South Ossetia and the province generally, with the aim of ethnically cleansing the place through mass terror.
He ordered Georgian “peacekeepers”, stationed there with their Russian counterparts by international agreement, to initiate the operation by turning without warning on the Russian peacekeepers and murdering them before they even knew what was happening.
“Folly” doesn’t begin to describe the depth of malfeasance here.
Report thisBy Alan, August 27, 2008 at 8:05 am #
(Unregistered commenter)
Saakashvilli and his mob are bought and paid for by the US. They’re in turn armed by Israel who have the Georgian defence minister as one of theirs. This is not about Georgia it’s about US encroachment yet again in areas where it should not be. There are much wider issues and there are many dangers ahead. The Crimea will be a powder keg and those who’re stirring up the Ukraine had better think carefully at what they’re doing. Like with Afghanistan it is history repeating and it seems no one has learned from the past.
Report thisBy jackpine savage, August 27, 2008 at 7:57 am #
Regardless of whether or not the Coast Guard cutter is armed or not…what the hell is a Coast Guard ship doing in the Black Sea?
Report thisBy P. T., August 27, 2008 at 2:54 am #
U.S. imperialism seems to want other powerful countries to either have U.S. military bases inside them or to be surrounded by the U.S.
Report thisBy Fahrenheit 451, August 27, 2008 at 2:49 am #
After weeks of propaganda from both sides and because I wasn’t there and all I know is what I’ve read (and that’s considerable); I truly have no idea what is true. What I do know is; Bush is screwing around in the Bears lair and if that Bear acted in kind, there would be hell to pay! 1962 rings a bell!
Report thisBy Ed Harges, August 27, 2008 at 2:14 am #
Re:By Ray, August 26 at 8:31 pm #
“Ray” writes:
Georgias invasion was actually a counter-attack to try to stop the Russian invasion at the tunnel.
Oh my frickin’ God, this latest hasbara crap from the Georgian-Israeli Ministry of Truth is the funniest yet!
Report thisBy Ray, August 27, 2008 at 12:31 am #
(Unregistered commenter)
Take a look at the facts at michaeltotten.com
Russia has been planning this invasion for years, tactically, for months. Georgia’s “invasion” was actually a counter-attack to try to stop the Russian invasion at the tunnel.
Report thisBy Folktruther, August 26, 2008 at 11:17 pm #
What the American people don’t know, because the mainstream media, including the progressive media, don’t tell them, is that a week previous to the war the US led a two week military practice operation with Georgia and other European countires called OPERATION IMMEDIATE RESPONSE. It obviously embolden the loony Georgian president and his Israeli minister to attack Russia, assuming that the US and Europe would save his ass.
Loonyaskvili bombed and shelled the Ossentian capital city and sent two brigades of 6000 men into the town to terrorize the Ossetians and drive tens of thousands of them into Russia. The idea was to ethnically clense Ossetia and replace them with Georgians. Since these were co-Russioan citizens, and since the troops killed Russian peacekeepers there legally, Russia had no alternative but to respond. See Chossudosvosky’s article at Global Exchange for details.
The neocons are not only warmongers, they ae loony and incompetant warmongers. And the Dems have chosen one, Biden, to be their vice-president, the counterpart to Cheney.
Report thisBy yellowbird2525, August 26, 2008 at 11:16 pm #
Who is FREE? Woodrow Wilson lamented in WW1 that WE, the USA were no longer a land of the FREE, nor even of majority vote; but rather under the dictates (dictatorship) and rules of a few dominent men; who by the way were bought & paid for by the wealthy long ago; THAT is the reason YOU are paying taxes; when Congress ILLEGALLY started taxing the people; when in reality everything was to have been paid for by profits from Big Business; instead, the wealthy went to the politicians & now WE are paying taxes for the Corps; & this whole entire nation is run for the pocketbooks of the wealthy; we are poisoned at every possible & above & beyond even believable area & avenue of our lives (including babies); to make MORE $ for the Pharma’s; who bill us 600,000 times the amount of meds; who SIT on products that are 10,000 x stronger than chemo; but they can’t duplicate & make big bucks; http://www.naturalnews.com; http://www.drmercola.com; http://www.mizer5.com; (dental folks); lots of info there; the only FREEDOM is we are FREE to every single solitary person or Corp who wants to make money off its citizens; oh, CONGRESS? the LAWLESS & tyranical leaders? ha ha ha; THOSE laws to PROTECT you were just for show; hence the criminal interest rates & added fees; FRAUD folks: all set up & agreed to & permitted by Congress. So; again I say: WHERE Are the FREE?
Report thisBy JimM, August 26, 2008 at 10:38 pm #
These are all infantile assholes armed with nuclear weapons..
Report thisGod help all of us.
By Irakli, August 26, 2008 at 10:23 pm #
(Unregistered commenter)
You have no idea about the nature of this conflict, which did not start this month and which has been going on for many many years.
I understand that you are not dumb enough to realize that going to fight against Russia does not make any sense, but after reading the rest of the comment dumb is a compliment word for you.
If someone comes to your house, rapes your wife and kills your children in front of your eyes, excuse me but would you try to stop him or shot him? This is exactly what is happening right now in Georgia.
This is not only about Georgia, this is about the principals of freedom and democracy. If Russia goes unpunished, they will do the same for Ukraine, Poland, and other countries.
Dont you worry, their bombs can reach east or west coasts very very easily too. So instead of writing some ignorant (pardon me) SHIT, better think about future.
Only cheap gas in gas stations and big economy will not stop those thugs. But your mentality is, only if gas is cheap, if you pay mortgage then everything is just fine.
We will see how fine it will be when bombs start to fall on your head. (hope this want happen, its enough for Georgia)
Now is the time to act.
Now is the time to STOP RUSSIAN AGGRESSION
http://www.sosgeorgia.org
Report thisBy Irakli, August 26, 2008 at 10:07 pm #
(Unregistered commenter)
Interesting article, but the author is missing the point.
I do not think anyone can argue that this was very well preplanned military operation orchestrated by Kremlin for annihilation of Georgia as sovereign democratic state.
Even Russian troop say that they started to move towards S. Ossetia on August 6th when there was no military operation going at that time from Georgian side. Of course on the background Georgian villages were under intensive shelling since July 29 form Ossetian positions.
What is really happening in Georgia is a genocide of ethnic Georgians. Removing Georgian’s from their land and killing them based on their ethnic origin and this is happening in Europe.
I would like to ask the author who is probably sitting inside warm room and drinking decaf coffee with little sugar: Do not you realize Russia’s intentions?! Is not it still clear where Russia is going to?!
No matter what Georgian government had done, this was not avoidable.
There were two options:
1. Surrender and have them to kill you and overthrow the government.
2. Defend the country, people, democracy and freedom.
You probably do not, but every Georgian remembers being a slave under Russian boots for 200 years.
This is not the first attack on Georgia from Russia. In 1921 Russia attacked sovereign and independent Georgia, occupied and expelled its government and annexed it as part of Soviet Union. We do not want the history to be repeated.
We do not want to go through that again and if Saakashvili had not ordered Georgian troops to defend the country, every Georgian would demand his resignation. This is what Georgian’s dream about, to be free, united and they will defend itself from the aggressor no matter what.
I usually get from my co-workers “is your family ok, are they fine?” but they are missing the point. It is not about one family or two, this is an existential threat of the whole country, nation and democracy.
Now, this is a lesson for EU and US to consider its views towards Russia and this lesson cost Georgian people many lives and high risk of existence as a free state.
If Russia is not stopped now, be prepared to write the same type of article about Ukraine and other states in EU.
Report thisBy George Zaqa, August 26, 2008 at 10:06 pm #
(Unregistered commenter)
Many commentators, including this one, seem to base their assessment of this situation on the premise that it was Saakashvili who started this messy affair. They (sometimes even sincerely) try to imply that had Saakashvili not attacked Tskhinvali none of this would’ve happened. Nothing can be further from the truth! Anybody who closely followed the developments in Georgia knew that Russia had been preparing for this invasion for years and especially these last months. There is absolutely nothing that Saakashvili could’ve done to prevent it.
To see why this is true, one simply has to imagine the situation when the Georgian army stays in the barracks, not answering any provocations from Ossetian/Russian side, but the Russian tanks still roll in Georgia. Under some other silly pretext, say, claiming that Georgian terrorists blew up their peacekeepers, or some innocent women and children, or whatever. Or even without any pretext. Do you think the West would’ve reacted differently? No! It would’ve shied away from the confrontation just as they did now. And some conceited commentators would’ve proclaimed that the whole thing is Georgia’s fault anyways.
Another wrong premise is to insist that there was nothing the West could’ve done to stop Russia “in their own backyard”. Wrong! The West had the ability to prevent it. They knew this is coming. All the signs were there. They could have stopped Russia, and easily so. But they didn’t. The West preferred to cowardly betray Georgia. There is no other name for it. Of course, one can say that the West decided to look after their own interests, but then which traitor doesn’t.
Report thisBy Big B, August 26, 2008 at 9:57 pm #
You’ve got to hand it to president Saakashit, He thought that with the taccid aproval of the US(as well as some of our weapons and advisers) he could go all in, and Russia would be too frightened to respond. And now, like all broke gamblers, Saakashit is begging his friends for some cash. But like most compulsive gamblers, this dumb SOB will drag us all down with him.(that is if we’re dumb enough to let him)
Do you suppose the rest of NATO will see us walking down the sidewalk, and cross the street so they don’t have to talk to us?
Our foreign policy has turned into that crazy ex-girlfriend. Despite the fact that she has made our life a living hell, we keep taking her calls, and going back for that one last bang.
(I just realized I mixed about 4 metaphors, sorry)
Report thisBy John, August 26, 2008 at 9:25 pm #
(Unregistered commenter)
An Unarmed Coast Guard Vessel? Not sure where you get your information for but the Coast Guard Cutter Dallas is a well armed warship. It may not have Tomahawk missiles like the US Navy ships involved but I assure you the Dallas can put out a lot of firepower in a very short time.
Report thisBy Ed Harges, August 26, 2008 at 8:44 pm #
Hah, hah, hah!
Report this