Category: Former Soviet Union

Your Regular Georgia Update

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There are rumblings in the Council of Europe about ejecting both Russia and Georgia, which just goes to show what memberships in the Council of Europe are actually worth, seeing as how this was shortly followed by Russia signing treaties with South Ossetia and Abkhazia guaranteeing protection in the event of an attack.

Still Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, the NATO secretary general, has declared that Russia cannot block Georgiaan membership in NATO, which implies that Jaap de Hoop Scheffer has not read the NATO charter, which states that there can be no extant border disputes for a nation to be brought into NATO.

The only way for Georgia to get into NATO at this point would be to recognize the independence of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, and somehow come to a consensus on what the borders were.

Bad Foreign Policy Analysis

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So now Bloomberg is suggesting that western flight from the Russian markets may drive russia to moderate its position on Georgia.

This is bovine scatology….the people who will flee are the foreign investment banks, and the people who will snap up stuff at depressed prices are Putin supporters, and they will make more money when the money reenters the Russian market, and the net result will be a movement of ownership from transnational corporations to Putin and his cronies.

This is a feature, not a bug.

What the War Nerd Said

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Gary Brecher makes a very good point, that the Neocons who are suggesting that Georgia needs to be reorganized along the lines of Hezbollah do not have the best interest of the Georgians at heart.

Rather, as the War Nerd so eloquently puts it, “America’s chickenhawks are ready to turn Georgia into a nation of missing-relative-seeking refugees.”:

I’m pretty sure if you asked any Georgians, they’d screech, “Agh! No! We don’t want to live like Hezbollah, cowering in our huts under constant bombardment, raising kids with no prospects but martyrdom!” But then the neocons haven’t asked anybody in Georgia. Safe in their living rooms, they think it’d be a great idea for Georgia, a very unwarlike little middle-class country, to try to imitate the Lebanese Shia who make up Hezbollah’s suicide squads.

The Palin Interview: Whiskey Tango Foxtrot?

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I didn’t see it live, I saw it in dribs and drabs over Youtube…..That is one scary politician.

If you were to take the hostility of Dick Cheney, and add in the itchy trigger finger of John McCain, the result would still look like Mahatma Gandhi next to Palin.

Going to war with Russia over Georgia? Is she nuts? (OK, she is nuts, we’ve already established that)

Is she confusing the Black Sea nation and the southern state that is the home of the Crimson Tide?

Biden is going to have her for lunch, even if the moderators are in the tank for her, unless he is concerned about making her cry.

Here’s a hint: you won’t make her cry, but she she may try to rip someone’s throat out with her teeth…Or is that a pitbull….the lipstick confuses me.

The Black Sea Follies

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Not surprisingly, we have Cheney visiting the region before slinking off to an undisclosed location, and he is very clear on the fact that he wants a new cold war for political advantage, NATO membership for Georgia and the Ukraine, and pretty much anyone else, if only because it pisses off the Russians. (see here, here, and here)

Of course, the Ukraine’s coalition government appears to be on the verge of collapse, and while Ukrainian President Yushchenko is still going for NATO membership, while PM Yulia Tymoshenko* is more cautious, and less viscerally anti-Russian (and anti-ethnic Russians in the Ukraine) than the president.

It also appears that while the Ukranians are interested in EU membership, support NATO membership is somewhat more tepid.

Even with that, there is no unanimity within the EU over Ukraine’s membership.

I’m not sure if this is because of concerns with Russia, because the Ukraine is really not ready in terms of things like transparency, or because the EU is already suffering from massive growing pains and transfer payments from it’s breakneck expansion of the past few years.

Meanwhile, NATO appears to be taking a leading role in the rebuilding of the Georgian military, with NATO networking with NATO radars and their early warning system.

Meanwhile, we have a pretty good rundown of Georgian misstatements and flat out lies about the war, and that Georgia had been planning its invasion of South Ossetia for many months, as evidenced by this story from April regarding the radars being moved into the conflict areas.

What is clear is that Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili was hoping to draw NATO into his war, which is a pretty good reason not to even begin considering EU or NATO membership for Georgia until it is clear that the firebrand politician has left the stage; he was engaging in nuclear chicken by proxy.

In any case it appears that the Russians are deescalating, with a promise to withdraw all troops from Georgia proper.

*Why, oh why can’t news happen in places where the names are easy to spell?

Lynn Westmoreland Someone Who Bigots Can Point At And Say

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See, I’m no bigot, Congressman Lynn Westmorland of Georgia, now there’s a bigot:

“Just from what little I’ve seen of her and Mr. Obama, Sen. Obama, they’re a member of an elitist-class individual that thinks that they’re uppity,” Westmoreland said.

Asked to clarify that he used the word “uppity,” Westmoreland said, “Uppity, yeah.”

Needless to say, if he had said this just two weeks earlier, he’d be the vice presidential nominee right now.

I guess we should be grateful that he didn’t use the term n*gg*r.

As the Caucuses Turns

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Unsurprisingly, we have reports that Cheney to made promises to support Georgia while there.

Once again, Mr. Deferment is letting his mouth cut checks that someone else’s kids will have to cash.

No doubt he promised more welfare for American defense contractors to help rebuild their military, which the Georgians are reportedly very eager to do.

Additionally, it appears that once again, Cheney is determined to make another problem worse, as he is lobbying for the US terminating the civil nuclear cooperation pact with Russia, which is likely to mean more ill-secured nuclear material in that nation.

This isn’t to say that Russian diplomatic efforts are going well. They just got the kiss of death diplomatically, when Hugo Chavez of Venezuela backed the Russian recognition of South Ossetia and Abkhazia.

Also, in the, “I thought that this has already happened,” category, we have Georgia severing diplomatic ties with Russia.

I think that the final word on this conflict comes from William Pfaff:

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.

Meanwhile, Saakashvili is beginning to see domestic push-back from his failed adventure, with the opposition now saying that some of the blame lays in the, “US educated Georgian leader,” for the spanking received from the Russians.

Meanwhile, the EU has been unable to come to a consensus on any diplomatic actions to take, which is an indication that the EU does need a change in governance structure, just not the one that they are trying to ram down the throat of the Irish.

Russia remains completely unapologetic about the whole affair, which is not surprising, as over the top as some of the statements made by Moscow on the conflict are, it’s clear that this is a real statement of how Russia feels about both Georgia and NATO expansion.

While I am not as big a fan of delving into the minutiae of military conflicts analysis as, for example, the War Nerd, Aviation Week does have an interesting report on Russian self-analysis on what happened in Georgia. (paid subscription required)

Not surprisingly, the RuAF comes in for most of the criticism. There was apparently little preparation on their point, and no attempts to use long range PGWs to take out Georgian air defense systems.

Georgia, Russia, and the End of US Hegemony, and Updates

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First, Seumas Milne has a very good article noting that the US is no longer the “hyperpower” it was in the mid 1990s, and Russia just showed it in its recognition of the independence of Abkhazia and South Ossetia.

The US military is too overstretched to do anything meaningful there, even if Russia did not have somewhere around 2000 nuclear warheads, and on the diplomacy side, countries now require an indication that it serves their national interests when they are asked to follow the US on a military adventure.

The US is still the only remaining world power, but Russia is one of a dozen or so regional powers who are now able to challenge the us in their regions.

In a very real way, it is the end of empire.

Russia has rebuilt its military into a credible fighting force over the past decade. 10 Years ago, the Georgian military would have still lost by dint of numbers, but they would have held out for weeks, and not collapsed in a day.

I will also note that I think that Putin believes it when he says that United States encouraged Georgia to attack South Ossetia. I believe it too, and I imagine that in a decade or so, we will have historians confirming the fact.

For what it’s worth, we now have evidence that diplomats don’t have to be Bush political appointees to be complete idiots, case in point, Daniel Fried, who is claiming that Russian military actions are a sign of weakness, “But being angry and seeking revanchist victory is not the sign of a strong nation. It is the sign of a weak one.”

So, that would make invading Iraq….What?

Meanwhile, the US military is looking at ways to rebuild the Georgian military, which strikes me as imprudent, at best.

It was the military aid which convinced the Georgians that they could start this military adventure in the first place.

The EU is warning Moscow to stay out of the Ukraine, but I really don’t think that Russia is looking at rolling up the Ukraine.

I could see that situation developing if a Ukrainian nationalist comes to power and starts trying to ethnically cleanse the region, but I don’t see anyone being stupid enough to do this…..At least no one on the scene right now is stupid enough.

That being said, the reaction of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) regarding the recognition of those provinces, where Russia is a member, was decidedly tepid, and the Asian former Soviet Republics who are its members (with China) are among those most likely to be supportive.

And in the comedy as foreign policy department, Georgia is calling for the UN Security Council to take action against Russia…..Ummmm….What part of “veto” don’t you understand?

For what it’s worth, we now have a report, albeit a self serving one from South Ossetia’s prosecutor general on the numbers of casualties from the initial Georgian assault, 1,692 killed.

I would take that with a serious grain of salt. It probably is more than the 130 stated by other sources though.

Georgia: Dueling Presidents

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Kind of like “Dueling Banjos”, only it’s both Medvedev and Saakashvili, both writing an OP/ED for the Financial Times.

I think that they are both very sparing with the truth, but one sounds like a mealy mouthed politician, and the other sounds like a complete tie chewing nutjob.

Medvedev’s bullet points:

  • The Ossetians and the Abkhazians wanted independence.
  • Upon independence, Georgia stripped Abkhazia and South Ossetia of Autonomy, and engaged in brutal military operations against ethnic minorities.
  • That the West encouraged Saakasvili to make broad claims against the region.
  • That the recognition of an independent Kosovo encouraged secessionist movements in Georgia.
  • Following the recent conflict, he felt compelled to recognize Abkhazia and South Ossetia’s independence.

Saakashvili’s bullet points:

  • Russia intends to redraw the map of all of Europe.
  • Russia was issuing passports to Abkhazians and South Ossetians to get a claim on these regions.
  • That the Russians were actively ethnically cleansing Georgians using, “using arson, rape and execution.”
  • That the Russians were already invading when the Georgians attacked South Ossetia.
  • That the Russians have designs on Ukraine, Muldova.
  • That Moscow is determined to wipe out democratically elected governments in its “near abroad”.

These are both self serving statements from men, they are both less than completely frank.

One of them, however, sounds nuts.

Georgia: Can We Just Say that Russia Won, and Be Done with It?

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We have NATO demanding that Russia rescind its recognition of Abkhazia and South Ossetia without explaining why Kosovo is legal, and Abkhazia and South Ossetia are not.

Because I said so is not a good argument in foreign policy.

Meanwhile, Medvedev is talking to the China, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan about their recognizing the break away provinces.

I think that China will wait, but that one or two of the FSU central Asian naations will go along.

Kosovo is refusing to back sovereignty, which is not surprising.

In terms of the purely legal aspects of the situation, they are very similarly, but the Kosovars were targeted with an organized campaign of Genocide, while the Georgians went with a brutal program of imperialism, and there is a difference morally.

In any case, the independence of Kosovo, South Ossetia, and Abkhazia are really more about the “great game” between the US and Nato and Russia than they are about concern for the people in those regions….on both sides.

Meanwhile, Serbia said, I told you so,” which is not unexpected.

As if Things Didn’t Already Suck for Georgia

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Dick Cheney will be visiting Tbilisi next week, which should be unpleasant for everyone involved.

Cindy McCain is going there too, doubtless to provide tips on make-up, face lifts, and shoe purchases, in addition to her obvious expertise in drug abuse.

Unsurprisingly, the Russian Duma voted to recognize South Ossetia and Abkhazia as independent, but there has not yet been a definitive statement by Medvedev, as the formal recognition of a state is the president’s and not the Duma’s prerogative, though I expect one shortly, because of the Kosovo precedent.

The US is warning that this is “unacceptable”, and I expect that the Russians will consider this with just as much seriousness as the US considered similar Russian warnings on Kosovo.

I supported, and continue to support, the independence of Kosovo, but one of the negative consequences was that it provided a precedent of secession of regions in Europe, and it’s entirely possible that we may see a similar movement in the Crimea in the next few years as a result.

Meanwhile, the U.S. and France are saying that Russia remaining in the so-called buffer zones is a violation of the cease fire, and Russia is maintaining that these are called for under agreements negotiated in the 1990s, and are thus covered by the cease fire.

My prediction: I expect formal recognition of the two breakaway regions as sovereign nations by Russia in the near future, and significant distancing from Georgia, or at least from Saakashvili by the West. It’s already happening in “Old Europe”, and I would expect it to occur in the US in January.

Georgia Again

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Obviously, what makes the news in the US is that the USS McFaul delivered aid to Georgia, but in the grand scheme of things, that means very little.

I think of more import is that fact that Saakashvili is a nut-job relegated to chewing his own tie…Really…see the vid at end.

First, he is promissing to rebuild his army and retake South Ossetia and Abkhazia. That’s clearly not going to happen. Both areas will be declaring independence, and will be recognized by Russia, in the next 18 months, and probably before January 21.

We also have him flat out lying about the original Georgian offensive into South Ossetia, claiming that the Russians had already moved tanks in, and I honestly think that he believes that.

Certainly there are issues of provocations on both sides, but the idea that somehow Georgia was forced to invade South Ossetia and launch an artillery barrage on its capital has no relationship to reality.

Of course, it doesn’t help that the Georgian parliament has extended martial law, which I think at this point will be used against political opponents, and not either the Russian military or Ossetian or Abkhazian militias.

Interestingly enough this article in Newsweek provides some insight into the dynamics between Georgia and the West:

It would have been hard not to be charmed by Mikheil Saakashvili. Young, dynamic, Western-educated and -oriented, he was among the most intriguing characters to move onto the global stage after the collapse of the Soviet Union.

….

….Soon after, I met the president again at his newly built residence in Tbilisi. He had dark rings around his eyes and he alternated between enormous, if not misplaced confidence that his Western allies would help him, and rather childish despair about Russia’s view of him personally. He said he had heard that Russian officials play billiards with the word MISHA written on the black ball, and asked the reporters assembled at his home, “What is going on in Russia? Am I hated there?” That evening he seemed traumatized by this. With his head in his hands, and pear juice and brandy running down his chin, he pleaded: “Does anybody know what Russia is up to?”

This is Western Tribalism at it’s finest: He spoke good English. He went to an elite technical school, Columbia University, so despite the fact that he unleashed riot police on protesters, and seized opposition media outlets, he has to be a good guy.

We see the same thing in Iraq: The representatives of ISCI, a proxy for Iran, speak fluent English, and affect American manners, so they must be the representatives of western style democracy.

The West in general, and America in particular, must get over this little bit of chauvanism.

Perhaps the most extreme example of just how far this short-sightedness takes us is this piece of doggerel from Richard Holbrooke, who claims that somehow the Russians have lost because Saakashvili is still nominally in power, when it is clear that he is a dead man walking.

He is an indicator of just how morally and intellectually bankrupt the foreign policy establishment is in Washington, DC.

Georgian Fallout on Israel-Russian Relations

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Well, it looks like Israel-Russia relations are a little bit cool now, because of Israel’s arms sales to Georgia, though, as I mentioned earlier, the Israelis shut that down when they thought war was likely.

On the bright side, it appears that they will be holding talks on the middle east, which implies a continued relationship.

On the not so bright side, we have rumors of increased Russian arms sales to Syria, including the advanced long range S-300 system, though Syria has denied this.

We also have a report (Ynetnews, not sure of the quality of the source) that the US is pressuring Turkey to shut down the Israel Syria talks that it is hosting, because Syria took Russia’s side in the Russo-Georgian war.

It’s petty and stupid if true, and considering that we still have Condi Rice running state, I am therefore inclined to believe it.

Georgia Update

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It appears that the Russian pullout is in fact happening, though they are taking up stations in their buffer zones, and they blew up military installations on the way out.

The UN Security council is currently deadlocked, with the Russians demanding that force to reunify the provinces be specifically forbidden, and the US demanding that it not be, and that “Georgian territorial integrity” be specifically affirmed in the document.

I also heard (no link, radio report) rumors that both South Ossetia and Abkhazia will be declaring independence at some point in the near future.

Georgia News

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It appears that by late last yearIsrael scaled back arms sales to Georgia last year, because they saw a war between Georgia and Russia brewing.

Based on what I’ve read at this point, it appears that, with the South Ossetians, there was no one within 1500 km who did not know that the Georgians were preparing for an invasion of the breakaway province.

Meanwhile, Georgia is suffering economically, both as a result of transportation disruptions and a flight of foreign capital.

Meanwhile, in response to NATO’s downgrade of relations, the Russians have frozen cooperation with NATO, which includes things like anti-drug operations and supply routes to Afghanistan.

On the military side, while the Russian counter-offensive was clearly successful, there are accusations that the Russian Air Force was unprepared, with little or no effort made in the initial stages of the war to take out surface to air missile and radar sites.

Mikhail Gorbachev has written a blistering editorial excoriating the west and the western media, that he feels was in the pocket of Georgia.

It looks like the promised Russian pullout is procedeeding, albeit slowly, though Georgian president Mikheil Saakashvili is claiming that the pullout is widening the occupation of Georgia.

I think that it’s clear at this point, despite Saakashvili’s fluent English and his Columbia University degree, which counts for way more than it should in US diplomacy, he’s just a bit…..well….nuts.

The Georgia Pullout

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I stand by my earlier assessment, that the Russians are pulling out, but doing so with all deliberate slowness.

In any case, it does appear that the Russians are determined to humiliate the Georgians, and their state security apparatus, as much as possible on the way out.

They still seem to be messing around in the main Georgian port of Poti, and they are maintaining that, “A 1999 document written up by the Joint Control Commission, an international body that monitored tensions in South Ossetia, gives peacekeepers access to a long piece of land that extends about nine miles into Georgian territory.”

This is about showing who is boss, which is immature, but at least no shots are being fired right now.

That being said, the Russians are suffering some diplomatic blow-back, with Ukraine offering NATO access to a former Soviet missile early warning station, and Poland signing a deal on installing the US ABM system.

Certainly these will be more noticed by the Russians than what will be a temporary downgrade of NATO-Russian relations, which is not going to last long, if just because cooperation with them on Iran is essential.

We have an interesting quote in this article about the US capitulating on NATO membership for Georgia:

“Russia has successfully burned Georgia’s NATO card,” said Sarah E. Mendelson, a senior fellow for Russia and Eurasia at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington. “Whatever the outcome, Russia has all but obliterated Georgia’s possibility of joining NATO, as it cannot belong to this alliance if it has unresolved border disputes.”

Let’s be clear. The Russians won.

Georgia Update

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Russia says that it is pulling troops out of Georgia, though Pentagon sources are disputing this.

My guess is that there is a withdrawal going on, the Russians don’t want to deal with an insurgency, but that it is proceeding with all deliberate slowness.

Aviation Week has analysis of the relative success of Georgian air defense systems (Paid Subscription Required), specifically of the SU Tu-22M3, and suggest that it was shot down because of Israeli aid in upgrading the Soviet era air defense systems.

Additionally, they note that the Georgian air defense system was less sophisticated, less networked, and less automated than the Syrian one, and as such, it may have been less vulnerable to the cyber attacks that were allegedly used by the Israelis when they struck the Syrian reactor complex.

Shades of Battlestar Galactica, the new one, not the old one.

As to the Su-25 losses, they suggest that these were shoulder launched SAMs, and I agree, as the Su-25 is really a close air support aircraft, which puts them in the sweet spot of such weapons.

Georgia

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Well, Georgia and Russia have now signed a cease fire agreement, and Russia will begin to withdraw troops on Monday.

What the Russians have always wanted is to be able to kick Georgia in the teeth regarding the independence of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, and they did, and under the terms of the cease fire, they get to keep troops there, and in a “buffer zone”.

What’s more, they are installing SS-21 missiles in South Ossetia, and possibly Abkhazia, which can cover most of Georgia.

Truth be told, nothing shows Georgia’s defeat more clearly than the words of Georgian president Mikheil Saakashvili, who is now pleading to mend fences.

Saakashvili’s political platform has been almost exclusively about putting the boot back on the neck of the Ossetians and the Abkhazians (once again proving that there are no good guys in the Caucasus), and now he is trying to make nice with the Russkys.

Interestingly enough, if you believe in signs of the apocalypse, a Washington Post OP/ED is suggesting that the knee jerk anti-Georgian reaction is unwise.

Of interest to the war buffs, this article, if I read the numbers right, suggests that the number of Russian troops sent into the region were not hugely larger than the numbers for the Georgians, even though the Georgian military ceased to function as a fighting force within about two days of their intervention.