"Checkmate", say's Vlad

Beautifully written, balanced argument via www.timesonline.co.uk. The most balanced and realistic version of what's actually going on in Georgia and South Ossetia anywhere on the internet.

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Russia has been biding its time, but its victory in Georgia has been brutal - and brilliant

Michael Binyon

The cartoon images have shown Russia as an angry bear, stretching out a claw to maul Georgia. Russia is certainly angry, and, like a beast provoked, has bared its teeth. But it is the wrong stereotype. What the world has seen last week is a brilliant and brutal display of Russia's national game, chess. And Moscow has just declared checkmate.

Chess is a slow game. One has to be ready to ignore provocations, lose a few pawns and turn the hubris of others into their own entrapment. For years there has been rising resentment within Russia. Some of this is inevitable: the loss of empire, a burning sense of grievance and the fear that in the 1990s, amid domestic chaos and economic collapse, Russia's views no longer mattered.

A generalised resentment, similar to the sour undercurrents of Weimar Germany, began to focus on specific issues: the nonchalance of the Clinton Administration about Russian sensitivities, especially over the Balkans and in opening Nato's door to former Warsaw Pact members; the neo-conservative agenda of the early Bush years that saw no role for Russia in its global agenda; and Washington's ingratitude after 9/11 for vital Kremlin support over terrorism, Afghanistan and intelligence on extremism.

More infuriating was Western encouragement of “freedom” in the former Soviet satellite states that gave carte blanche to forces long hostile to Russia. In the Baltic states, Soviet occupation could be portrayed as worse than the Nazis. EU commissioners from new member states could target Russian policies. Populists in Eastern Europe could ride to power on anti-Russian rhetoric emboldened by Western applause for their fluency in English.

Nowhere was such taunting more wounding than in Ukraine and Georgia, two countries long part of the Russian Empire, whose history, religion and culture were so intertwined with Russia's. Moscow tried, disastrously, to check Western, and particularly American, influence in Ukraine. The clumsy meddling led to the Orange Revolution.

Georgia was a different matter. Relations were always mercurial, but Eduard Shevardnadze, the wily former Soviet Foreign Minister, knew how to keep atavistic animosities in check. Not so his brash successor, Mikheil Saakashvili. From then on, hubris was Tbilisi's undoing.

It was not simply the dismissive rhetoric, the open door to US advisers or the economic illiteracy in forgetting dependence on Russian energy and remittance from across the border; it was the determined attempt to make Georgia a US regional ally and outpost of US influence.

Big powers do not like other big powers poaching. This may not be moral or fair but it is reality, and one that underpins the Security Council veto. The Monroe Doctrine - “hands off the Americas” - has been policy in Washington for 200 years. The US is ready to risk war to keep out not only other powers but hostile ideologies - in Cuba and Nicaragua.

Vladimir Putin lost several pawns on the chessboard - Kosovo, Iraq, Nato membership for the Baltic states, US renunciation of the ABM treaty, US missiles in Poland and the Czech Republic. But he waited.

The trap was set in Georgia. When President Saakashvili blundered into South Ossetia, sending in an army to shell, kill and maim on a vicious scale (against US advice and his promised word), Russia was waiting.

It was not only Mr Saakashvili who thought that he had the distraction of the Olympics to cover him; the Kremlin also knew that Mr Bush was watching basketball, and, in the longer term, that the US army was fully engaged in Iraq and Afghanistan. From the day that the Russian tank brigade raced through the tunnel into South Ossetia, Russia has not made one wrong move. Mr Bush's remarks yesterday notwithstanding, In five days it turned an overreaching blunder by a Western-backed opponent into a devastating exposure of Western impotence, dithering and double standards on respecting national sovereignty (viz Iraq).

The attack was short, sharp and deadly - enough to send the Georgians fleeing in humiliating panic, their rout captured by global television. The destruction was enough to hurt, but not so much that the world would be roused in fury. The timing of the ceasefire was precise: just hours before President Sarkozy could voice Western anger. Moscow made clear that it retained the initiative. And despite sporadic breaches - on both sides - Russia has blunted Georgian charges that this is a war of annihilation.

Moscow can also counter Georgian PR, the last weapon left to Tbilisi. Human rights? Look at what Georgia has done in South Ossetia (and also in Abkhazia). National sovereignty? Look at the detachment of Kosovo from Serbia. False pretexts? Look at Ronald Reagan's invasion of Grenada to “rescue” US medical students. Western outrage? Look at the confused cacophony.

There are lessons everywhere. To the former Soviet republics - remember your geography. To Nato - do you still want to incorporate Caucasian vendettas into your alliance? To Tbilisi - do you want to keep a President who brought this on you? To Washington - does Russia's voice still count for nothing? Like it or not, it counts for a lot.

You Go, Russia!

As the only American who truly believes the Russian Federation has been wholly justified in its intervention in Georgia over the course of the past few days, it appears I am also the only one who has not taken the reporting of the media hook, line and sinker. I do this thing, usually on the internet - I read. To those who think that the big bad Soviet Empire is once again rearing its evil head to challenge the benevolent world hegemony of the United States, this post is for you.

Russia is completely justified in their actions in Georgia because they were attacked. It is as simple as that. Here's a brief, layman's history of the conflict in Georgia

Following the fall of the Soviet Union in the beginning of the 1990s, Georgia became its own independent nation. The Russian Federation, in an explicit deal with the United States, agreed to respect the national sovereignty of the states formerly within its sphere of influence, as long as the U.S. and NATO did not attempt to influence these states.

In 1992, the predominantly-Russian regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia (who's North Ossetia counterpart is part of greater Russia) passed referendum to secede from Georgia and rejoin their Russian bretheren. This referendum was wholly unrecognized by the international community, and South Ossetia and Abkhazia became autonomous regions of Georgia, though technically still within its borders.

With tensions flaring throughout the '90s, a joint peacekeeping effort was set up between South Ossetia, Georgia, and Russia, where all three stationed peacekeeping troops in an attempt to maintain a balance that would enable the stability of the entire region.

Flash foward to the 21st century - NATO membership has been all but promised to Georgia, millions of dollars worth of aid has been siphoned its way, and Georgia has become an active member of the "Coalition of the Willing" by stationing a few thousand troops in Iraq. The United States' promise to Russia, to keep its fingers out of its former sphere of influence, had been broken.

Last week, in response to South Ossetian separatist actions, the Georgian military, using rockets provided to it by the United States, launched indiscriminate missile attacks upon the capital of South Ossetia, killing, amongst many others, ten Russian peacekeepers.

Let us now discuss a hypothetical. A resurgence, against promised actions, of Russian training and arming of the Cuban military, followed by the Cuban army, using rocket launchers provided by Russian, killing ten American peacekeepers stationed...somewhere. Ten dead Americans at the hands of Russian rockets launched by the Cuban military. Our tanks would have rolled into Havana within 48 hours.

Yet the United States has reacted with moral indignation to the actions of Russia, hypocritically claiming that it had violated the national sovereignty of its tiny neighbor. While it is true that without a doubt Russia is pursuing other interests, namely energy interests, in its conflict with Georgia, the base issue here is that the Georgians started a war, hoping for U.S. intervention on their side, and the Russians ended it. The Georgian President, Mikheil Saakashvili, should be thankful that Putin and Medvedev let him remain in office and didn't wipe Tbilisi off the face of the Earth.