It’s interesting to read that Russia seem less likely now days to take crap from other ‘nations’ and third parties
So when Georgia invaded South Ossetia (predominately a loyal Russian populace) why were they surprised that Russia hit back. If Sweden invaded Norfolk wouldn’t we hit back ?
The West with the aid given to Chechnya terrorist etc and supporting unpopular governments in the whole region is starting to come home to roost
Russia over the last 20years seems to have been always on the back foot but not any longer it would appear
USA have recently tried to get countries like Poland to install defence installations and of course Russia isn’t happy having this on its own door step
Now Russia are saying we may use Cuba to re-fuel a nuclear missiles carriers (alarm outrage etc) . All USA could do would be trade embargos which wouldnt have the impact of 5/10 yrs ago
If the west stop being 2 face we may have another 50 years of so called peace if they don’t we may live to regret it
Stewart - it's quite complex.........the best analysis for me is on the wonderful web site Global Dashboard - with a set of guys who actually go out and about to these places and know their stuff. And they provide a forward looking and easy to read (and entertaining) analysis of these situations......
See Global Dashboard
Very long winded and washy but i like this bit
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Meanwhile, who’s in charge in Georgia? Mikhail Saakashvili’s chief press spokesman in Tblisi is an American government official. The city is crawling with CIA spooks. You can’t get into a lift in the Radisson without seeing some yank with a crew-cut and shiny black shoes. Did the Georgians tell the Americans what they planned to do? Did the Americans agree? Or are they being pulled into a stand-off with Russia against their will?
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World leaders are condeming Russia for its "dissproportionate response" - what does that mean exactly? If Russia are going to respond to an attack on South Ossetia is a "proportionate response" where they send in just enough troops so that its a fair fight. Isn't that like slapping Bruce Lee in the face and complaining when he attacks you with both arms ?
The Metro seems to have quite an anti-Russian bias, they pay lip service to Georgias attack on people in South Ossetia with "Russia invaded South Ossetia after Mr.Saakashvili moved to quell seperatists". Suggesting Mr.Saakashvili (look he's a nice man we refer to him personally) gave them ice-cream and asked them politely to not be quite so demanding in future
The timeline is here. Start from the bottom.
It's rare that the complexities of global geopolitics can be summed up in a 30 second sound bite. Unfortunately, the public at large tend to make their judgements and decisions based on exactly that sort of simplification. In Democratic countries, this means that the Governments also often end up taking decisions on that basis. In non-democratic countries, Governments end up taking decisions based on their own interests.
There are a few issues here.
Firstly, there is the question of whether Georgia and Russia were justified in their military activities. A group in Georgia's territory effectively declared independence, which was met by an attack by Georgian forces. This is basically the start of a civil war. In the earlier analogy, this step was conveniently skipped out: Norfolk initially declared independence from the UK. Russia certainly backed the separatists; and one strongly suspects they were encouraged by the Russians (Russia has a recent history of messing with the politics of its neighbours).
In response, Russia sent their troops, uninvited, into another sovereign state. The technical term for that is "invasion". It's not that hard to take an educated guess at Russia's motives: they want the region either independent and closely allied to Russia or put back in to Russian territory.
Secondly, there is the nature of their activities. It seems both sides are fighting to win - not fighting clean. The "rules of war" outlined in the Geneva convention are a very European construction, mostly because they horrified themselves in WWII. However, outside of Western Europe, there's limited commitment to those ideals. Russia and Georgia don't seem to be bound by them. However, Russia has a much bigger stick, so they're more capable of doing more damage. But I wouldn't put it past Georgia to use this opportunity to purge the region of indigenous Russians.
Of course, the Bush administration can hardly complain when people chose to define their own rules for a conflict... they've destroyed any moral high ground they might have previously had.
Thirdly, there's the local history. The boundaries of the former Russian Republics are pretty vague. The local populations are of mixed decent and, therefore, of mixed allegiance. Russia has never been happy about letting the former soviet republics go. They've been interferring in their politics over the last 15 years to make sure they stay closely allied to Russia. If they USSR's economy hadn't been a disaster, they would have never let them go. At the time, they couldn't afford to hold on to them. They've been flexing their economic muscle to bring them back into the fold. Now they're flexing their military muscles.
On the other side, there's a lot of resentment against the Russians in the former republics. One suspects that there was an element of military occupation and colonisation to their membership of the USSR. Now they have independence, they remember...
Fourthly, there's the global position. Russia is certainly economically stronger than it was 15 years ago. At the same time, the US's economy is tanking and they're militarily over-stretched in Iraq and Afghanistan. The US cannot confront - or even threaten - Russia militarily. Domestically, they would never be able to defend another war. China won't care - in fact, they would prefer to let Russia do what it wants, so they can do likewise to their own neighbours (Tibet, anyone?) So Russia is free to act without fear of international reprisal.
Economically, Russia and China are probably less dependant on the US than the US is dependant on them right now. It's hard to know who sancitons would hurt more: the US or Russia - particularly if China decides to back Russia.
There's probably a lot more detail, but you get the gist of it. Global politics is driven by economic and military power, harnessed to self-interest (of nations, ruling coalitions and individuals). Rights and laws are only relevant when tied to power. At present, there simply isn't enough power in the world prepared to enforce rights and laws against Russia or Georgia.
A useful start if you want the facts and back ground rather then the Metro take
South Ossetia - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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