Russian Tanks Enter S. Ossetia (Thread Separated)

[ecoli]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7548715.stm

 

This portends to be a large scale conflict in Georgia. The Russian separatists in Ossetia are being supported by Russian military with the Georgian military trying to regain control over the region.

 

The situation is tricky because of accusations of ethnic cleansing in Ossetia (I guess by Georgian government?).

 

According to that BBC link, the US has spoken on the side of a unified Georgia... surprising if the accusations of ethnic cleansing are true. It seems like a similar scenario as the Serbia/Kosovo conflict.

 

Any thoughts from those with more insight than I have?

[ParanoiA]

I certainly do not have more insight.

 

And, I was a bit confused as to who is being accused of the ethnic cleansing. My take was that Georgia was being accused of doing it. Which makes our alliance with them problematic. Incidentally, if that is the case, this is a perfect example of what I've spouted in the past about alliance based on present merit, rather than prenegotiated obligations - we should not play with them. Of course, I don't know much about our agreements with them either.

 

Also, Russia is justifying their involvement as protecting their citizens in South Ossetia. Is that really all there is to it? And how are they considered russian citizens if South Ossetia is independent from Russia?

[CDarwin]

From what I can tell, this is how it breaks down:

 

Georgia's President got elected on a platform promising to reign in the semi-autonomous territories (South Ossetia and Abkhazia). Meanwhile the these territories have been continuing to move toward less semi- and more full- autonomy, and the Russians have been happy to give them cover. Now Georgia was finally stupid enough to let itself get baited into invading South Ossetia, and the Russians are taking the opportunity to punish them and assert their supremacy.

 

Basically, everyone's screwed up here. The Georgians should never have tried to re-assert control over South Ossetia (and cause something like 1,400 mostly civilian casualties in the process, apparently), and the Russians really need to get their head around soft power. You don't have to let the Ukraine stiff you on gas, but you don't shut off half the supply to Europe as a negotiating tactic, either. If Georgia tries to violently re-assert control over a minority, raise a massive stink about it and drive a wedge between Saakashvili and the West. Don't start bombing Georgian cities and making them look like martyrs for the cause of freedom. The references to ethnic cleansing were, I suspect, made specifically to remind the international community of when it recently enthusiastically backed the succession of Kosavo from Serbia. Russia should have just stuck to that chord.

 

Also, Russia is justifying their involvement as protecting their citizens in South Ossetia. Is that really all there is to it? And how are they considered russian citizens if South Ossetia is independent from Russia?

 

There are Russian peacekeepers in South Ossetia and Abkazhia, as part of a CIS mission from earlier in the 90s. That's who Putin and the Russians have been referring to specifically. The Ossetian people themselves are also divided into two territories, South Ossetia (Georgia) and North Ossetia (Russia), and the South Ossetians have repeatedly expressed a desire to join North Ossetia as part of Russia, and generally look to Russia as their protectors. There's nothing official there, though.

Edited August 9, 2008 by CDarwin
multiple post merged

[Sisyphus]

I think it's pretty clear this isn't really about South Ossetia, which is a tiny region with the population of a small town. It's about Russia's relationship with its former empire. Russia just can't let go, and will take any opportunity to openly bully and manipulate the former Soviet Republics. And at the center of it all is Putin, who has cultivated jingoistic sentiment, suppressed dissent to a degree we've never seen in the West, and built a cult of personality around himself, so that even know when he's technically Prime Minister and not President, he's still running the show in the war.

 

Not that Georgia doesn't share any blame for this. They've behaved almost as badly as Russia, and apparently just for the same spiteful, macho posturing that Russia is engaging in.

 

And now thousands of people are dead, and the war is threatening to spread.

 

EDIT: Or maybe it is about South Ossetia? Their "government" claims 99% of residents are in favor of secession from Georgia. Also, how is it that a non-country the size of Rhode Island and with a population of 70,000 has (apparently) 3000 of its own troops, and 90 tanks?

Edited August 10, 2008 by Sisyphus
duplicate

[Sisyphus]

Almost as if to underscore my point, the Georgian President is today begging for US diplomatic intervention. I think I can actually hear European leaders wincing from here in South Florida.

 

Oy. Of course there's not really anything the United States can do that won't make things worse, besides voice disapproval towards all parties, and lend support to the mediators (who probably shouldn't be us). The more I read about it, the more that CSM article you quoted seems right. The best that can be hoped for at this point is a return to the status quo. Well, almost. Georgia is learning the hard way that being friendly with the United States is not enough to make us automatically back them up in any conflict, even if its half their own fault. And Russia, very unfortunately, is learning that it can use military force in neighboring countries without consequence. Unless the rest of the world, led probably by the EU, can make sure there are consequences (without escalating the conflict), then I sure wouldn't want to be Ukraine right now.

[Pangloss]

The Beeb has an interesting piece running with emails and messages from readers who live in the region. Unsurprisingly, they seem to feel caught in the middle.

 

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/7554420.stm

 

Who can I blame for this?

 

I don't know, both sides I think. They could avoid death and disaster if they could manage to settle the problem through negotiations.

 

There are many Ossestians in the capital, for example, and they live peacefully with Georgians.

 

The current war is not a battle between Georgia and Ossetia - it is a battle between Georgia and Russia. We cannot face down a super power, so we need international help.

Edited August 11, 2008 by Pangloss

[john5746]

It's a mess. IMO, the US is doing exactly as it should. The world needs to get used to life without big daddy trying to solve everyone's problems - especially Americans.

[CDarwin]

In... other... news, the Russians are pulling back in Georgia.

 

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7555858.stm There's a lot of other news bits in that worth reading as well. Georgia is pulling out or the CIS, for example. That could have repercussions.

 

This is good news on two levels. One, of course, the fighting has stopped. Yay peace. But more generally it signifies that the Russians do apparently care enough about international opinion to desist in military operations, something a lot of analysts were skeptical about. It was almost as if while the whole world was watching China, some enormous shift had happened in Russia. And of course Russia has been changing. It probably feels more nationalistic and more threatened than any time since the Cold War.

[ParanoiA]

Really? I didn't get the impression they were succombing to international pressure. I figured they did exactly what they wanted to do - stop the invasion, push them back and punish Georgia.

 

Interesting though, nonetheless. I noticed they didn't talk about it during the olympics, or at least during the performances. I was really hoping I didn't have to listen to them go on about it while watching the Russian athletes and so forth, so that was nice.

[iNow]

Interesting point. In my disappointment, it's possible I was missing a greater good.

 

 

I just read about a new development. It's not clear that it came from Russia, but this story illuminates some issues we may see more frequently now as a new age of warfare:

 

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/13/technology/13cyber.html?hp

 

Weeks before bombs started falling on Georgia, a security researcher in suburban Massachusetts was watching an attack against the country in cyberspace.

Other Internet experts in the United States said the attacks against Georgia’s Internet infrastructure began as early as July 20, with coordinated barrages of millions of requests — known as distributed denial of service, or D.D.O.S., attacks — that overloaded and effectively shut down Georgian servers.

 

Researchers at Shadowserver, a volunteer group that tracks malicious network activity, reported that the Web site of the Georgian president, Mikheil Saakashvili, had been rendered inoperable for 24 hours by multiple D.D.O.S. attacks. They said the command and control server that directed the attack was based in the United States and had come online several weeks before it began the assault.

 

As it turns out, the July attack may have been a dress rehearsal for an all-out cyberwar once the shooting started between Georgia and Russia. According to Internet technical experts, it was the first time a known cyberattack had coincided with a shooting war.

In addition to D.D.O.S. attacks that crippled Georgia’s limited Internet infrastructure, researchers said there was evidence of redirection of Internet traffic through Russian telecommunications firms beginning last weekend. The attacks continued on Tuesday, controlled by software programs that were located in hosting centers controlled by a Russian telecommunications firms. A Russian-language Web site, stopgeorgia.ru, also continued to operate and offer software for download used for D.D.O.S. attacks.

 

Over the weekend a number of American computer security researchers tracking malicious programs known as botnets, which were blasting streams of useless data at Georgian computers, said they saw clear evidence of a shadowy St. Petersburg-based criminal gang known as the Russian Business Network, or R.B.N.

[CDarwin]

Hmph, that is really interesting. The same thing happened to Estonia too, as I recall, when they were about to remove a memorial to Soviet soldiers in WWII. In that case, it turned out not to have even been the Russian government, but a private Russian living in Estonia. I wouldn't be surprised if it's the same thing here.

[CDarwin]

Really? I didn't get the impression they were succombing to international pressure. I figured they did exactly what they wanted to do - stop the invasion, push them back and punish Georgia.

 

They could have done a lot more though, like knocking out Saakashvili completely and installing a pro-Russian puppet, like they've got in Belarus. If international pressure hadn't been in the balance, I have no doubt they would have.

 

Interesting though, nonetheless. I noticed they didn't talk about it during the olympics, or at least during the performances. I was really hoping I didn't have to listen to them go on about it while watching the Russian athletes and so forth, so that was nice.

 

Did you see the Russian and Georgian air-pistol shooters hugging? That was pretty neat.

[Pangloss]

New thread opened. No more Bush-bashing, please.

[CDarwin]

Has Russia been ethnically cleansed? Or wait, has the thread been? Ah, I get it. Clever, clever.

[Pangloss]

I changed the title back to the orig.

[iNow]

It's not terribly accurate, though. I hate to play Russian apologist, but the Georgians did 'start this' with their incursion into S. Ossetia, and that's where the majority of casualties have taken place.

 

<...>

 

As I somewhat expected would happen, Russia is getting treated a bit unfairly in Western perceptions over this. Russia's actions were bad because they over-reacted and threatened Georgia's sovereignty (disproportionate response, the term Bush used, is a good phrase), not because they are responsible for the conflict in the first place (or only in a very long-term, indirect sense).

Yes, but none of that negates how Russia has acted since the cease fire. It's what they've been doing since the apparent truce that is causing the negative perception of them.

 

 

 

http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5gDNLWfQWKrQc48pITBUg9KT_6oVwD92HIM080

Russian troops and paramilitaries rolled into the strategic Georgian city of Gori on Wednesday, apparently violating a truce designed to end the conflict that has uprooted tens of thousands and scarred the Georgian landscape.

The developments came less than 12 hours after Georgia's president said he accepted a cease-fire plan brokered by France. Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said Tuesday that Russia was halting military action because Georgia had paid enough for its attack last Thursday on South Ossetia.

 

Bush said he was skeptical that Moscow was honoring the cease-fire.

The EU peace plan calls for both sides to retreat to the positions they held prior to the outbreak of fighting late Thursday. That phrasing apparently would allow Georgian forces to return to the positions they held in South Ossetia and Abkhazia and clearly obliges Russia to leave all parts of Georgia except South Ossetia and Abkhazia.

 

Georgia's President Mikhail Saakashvili criticized Western nations for failing to help Georgia, a U.S. ally that has been seeking NATO membership.

 

"I feel that they are partly to blame," he said Wednesday. "Not only those who commit atrocities are responsible ... but so are those who fail to react. In a way, Russians are fighting a proxy war with the West through us."

 

Russian at first denied that tanks were even in Gori but video footage proved otherwise.

 

About 50 Russian tanks entered Gori in the morning, according to Lomaia. The city of 50,000 lies 15 miles south of South Ossetia, where much of the fighting has taken place.

Leaders of five former Soviet bloc states — Poland, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia and Ukraine — also appeared at the rally and spoke out against Russian domination.

Edited August 13, 2008 by Pangloss

[foodchain]

I just don’t understand how such comes about. This whole situation reeks of some kind of vile stupidity I cant begin to understand.

 

Firstly I don’t see how you can connect America to this, the only way would be via bush who haphazardly handles a situation that really requires a bit more care. The rest starts to get a bit like Tom Clancy really in my opinion, in which what do you say?

[Pangloss]

I just don’t understand how such comes about. This whole situation reeks of some kind of vile stupidity I cant begin to understand.

 

Some (generally pro-Georgia) see it as Russia struggling to maintain (or return to) superpower status trying to assert its authority over the region. Others (generally pro-Russia) see it as an example of protecting its citizens, since apparently most S. Ossetians are Russian passport-holders.

 

The situation is clearly complex, and I completely agree that violence is not the answer. I also don't feel the US should take the forefront, because of its damaged reputation and perception of hypocrisy, but I do think we should do everything we can to bolster the EU and UN, as well as NATO, in resolving the situation peacefully.

 

The humanitarian aid sent by the US today sounds like a step in the right direction.

[iNow]

Firstly I don’t see how you can connect America to this, the only way would be via bush who haphazardly handles a situation that really requires a bit more care.

Careful, foodchain... you might cause Pangloss to close the thread again with bashing like that.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Hmph, that is really interesting. The same thing happened to Estonia too, as I recall, when they were about to remove a memorial to Soviet soldiers in WWII. In that case, it turned out not to have even been the Russian government, but a private Russian living in Estonia. I wouldn't be surprised if it's the same thing here.

 

Looks like Georgians are getting some help.

 

 

http://www.vnunet.com/vnunet/news/2223776/georgia-gets-allies-russian-cyberwar

 

Georgia is gaining allies to resist online attacks, which it says are the work of Russian hackers.

 

Two members of Estonia’s Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT) are heading to Georgia to help deal with the attacks, according to Baltic Business News. The attacks in Georgia are reportedly similar to those that took place against Estonia last year.

"We are witnessing in this crisis the birth of true, operational cyber warfare," said Eli Jellenc, manager of All-Source Intelligence at iDefense.

 

"The use of cyber attack assets in conjunction with kinetic military operations in the current crisis now stands among the most significant developments ever seen in the field of information security or cyber conflict studies."

 

"Moreover, that the attackers are mostly decentralised civilians suggests that the evolution of political and strategic hacking will be messier and more disruptive than even pessimistic strategic theorists have supposed."

Edited August 13, 2008 by iNow
multiple post merged

[ecoli]

This conflict is not going to be limited to Ossetia. Take a look at this, on top of the Serbian/Kosovo conflict.

 

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7561926.stm

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7561586.stm

 

I think we're playing with a Russian time bomb here and it's going to end badly.

[CDarwin]

I would be seriously surprised if Russia did the same thing it's done in Georgia in Eastern Europe, though. The two places are just so different, both in Western perception and in Russian. The European Union would feel threatened if Russia incurred into Eastern Europe, and so would NATO, which no one really does if Georgia gets splatted. And Poland the Ukraine aren't the source of the deep, existential insecurity that the Caucuses hold for Russians. They see that region as loose thread that if pulled will unravel the whole Federation.

 

On a practical side, Eastern Europe is also just a much tougher nut to crack. The Russian military was already heavily deployed in the area of Georgia; it has been since the First Chechen War. That's how they were able to intervene as quickly as they did without needing to go through a lengthy mobilization. The military structures in the Russian West are much less ready for a fast deployment. And the Ukraine and former WP states are just much stronger than Georgia. Belarus is about the only place in Europe that Russia could probably roll into without serious repercussions, and it's ruled by a fawningly pro-Russian (and wildly popular) despot, Alexandr Lukashenko.

Edited August 14, 2008 by CDarwin

[Pangloss]

The question of what really prompted this may be coming into focus. Below is an interesting article in BusinessWeek talking about how international pipeline development efforts in the region have been shattered by the hostilities between Russia and Georgia. Apparently it's not so much that S. Ossetia has any oil or pipelines, but rather the potential threat of invasion in other Russian-bordering countries. A new pipeline in Georgia has been shut down, and apparently Turkmenistan is now considering a pipeline agreement with Russian oil companies instead of western ones.

 

The development is a severe blow to American oil companies, who have been working on these pipelines since the Clinton administration hooked them up in the region back in the 1990s. That may sound like a mixed bag (oh no, those poor oil companies, how sad!), but it's worth keeping in mind that at the time it was considered important by virtually all international observers (except Russian ones, of course) to give the former Soviet states an independent means of bringing their oil to market. It was also considered strategically important because it would reduce European dependence on Russian oil. The issue received a lot of attention in the pre-9/11 world, and was even the subject of a James Bond movie.

 

But Russia, struggling with severe economic issues and desperate to regain its superpower status, never forgot what outside pipelines in the former Soviet states meant to its own oil's value. In short, the war may have actually been over oil, and it almost went unnoticed.

 

http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/08_34/b4097000700662_page_2.htm

 

At the core of the struggle is a vast network of actual and planned pipelines for shipping Caspian Sea oil to the world market from countries that were once part of the Soviet empire. American policymakers working with a BP-led consortium had already helped build oil and natural gas pipelines across Georgia to the Turkish coast. Next on the drawing board: another pipeline through Georgia to carry natural gas from the eastern shore of the Caspian Sea to Austria—offering an alternate supply to Western Europe, which now depends on Russia for a third of its energy.

 

But after the mauling Georgia got, "any chance of a new non-Russian pipeline out of Central Asia and into Europe is pretty much dead," says Chris Ruppel, an energy analyst at Execution, a brokerage in Greenwich, Conn. The risk of building a pipeline through countries vulnerable to the wrath of Russia is just too high.

 

(Great quote at the end of the first paragraph below.)

 

What about the White House's plans for a pipeline to ship natural gas to Europe? The proposed pipeline's success depends on Turkmenistan, which has the fourth-largest natural gas reserves on the planet, an estimated 3 trillion cubic meters. The Turkmen are cautious: Under former President Saparmurat Niyazov, they refused to defy the Russians and support the construction of the Baku-Ceyhan pipeline. "[Niyazov] thought about it and probably decided he didn't want to wake up dead," says former U.S. diplomat Wolf.

 

The assault on Georgia may make the Turkmen even more wary of the new pipeline. Instead, they may end up cutting a deal with the Russians, who are vigorously pursuing new gas pipelines of their own in a bid to dominate energy in the region. "A new Iron Curtain," says analyst Ruppel, "is descending around the periphery of Russia."

 

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So apparently a deal has been brokered in which the fighting stops and Georgia agrees to let Russia stay and occupy their country. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the EU-proposed and -supported deal was brokered by French President Sarkozy. Perhaps he offered Paris as collateral.

 

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/europe/article4543728.ece

 

The Bush administration seems to have abandoned it's 8/6 requirement and gone along with the EU.

 

Mr Saakashvili was humiliated further when the final text of the agreement, delivered personally by Condoleezza Rice, the US Secretary of State, removed a reference to Russian recognition of Georgia’s territorial integrity. It referred only to independence and sovereignty, a day after Ser-gei Lavrov, the Russian Foreign Minister, said that the world could forget about Georgia’s territorial integrity.

 

Ouch. Humiliation is definitely the right word.

 

I guess that's the difference between Putin and Saddam Hussein. Putin has the muscle to back it up.

 

But apparently this is better than fighting in the eyes of Europe. Perhaps that has something to do with the fact that a third of their oil comes from Russia, and none of it comes from Georgia. Oh wait, that's impossible, only Americans trade blood (or in this case independence) for oil. Silly me, I forgot.

Edited August 16, 2008 by Pangloss
multiple post merged

[bombus]

This is the most recommended message on the 'Have Your Say' bit on the BBC news website. I agree with it:

 

Kosovo tries to secede from Serbia - Serbia tries to stop it - NATO rolls in with blazing tomahawks and planes to stop it.

 

South Ossetia tries to secede from Georgia - Georgia tries to stop it - Russia rolls in with tanks to stop it.

 

What is the problem here other than double standards?

 

Marko, Belgrade

 

The truth is the US has been meddling in Georgia since the collapse of the Soviet Union, and has been busy seeing how far it can push its sphere of influence. Basically this is Russia saying 'that's as far as you go!'. Let's pray that everyone (US, Russia, EU) sobers up and stops playing this dangerous game.

 

It's not so much 'The Cold War' lives again as 'The Great Game' lives again. Forward (as ever) to the 1800's!

Edited August 16, 2008 by bombus

[Pangloss]

Thus reminding us that news site comments are about as insightful as callers on Rush Limbaugh or Air America.

 

That first argument might actually work if (a) Russia had only entered S. Ossetia, instead of invading all over Georgia, and/or (b) there wasn't this larger geopolitical, realpolitik struggle taking place for control over the resources of the region.

 

As for your follow-up, I've already quoted sources that this dispute is not US-derived. The EU is taking the diplomatic point on this (Georgia wants to join the EU, not the US), and the truce came from French president Sarkozy, not the US. The "meddling" began at Georgia's invitation and was a joint venture between European and American companies.

 

You know, it's bad enough when the ABB arguments are so shallow they won't get the tops of your shoes wet, but when they're debunked before they're even posted it becomes pretty obvious that the only reason it IS being posted is to perpetuate the message. I guess no matter how poorly reasoned an argument is, if you say it enough times, sooner or later people will repeat it.

Edited August 17, 2008 by Pangloss

[CDarwin]

I think it is worth pointing out here that in the rush to declare a new cold war, Georgia has basically got away completely internationally with trying to violently bring a region that had declared it's wish for independence (ah, self-determination, the most unevenly applied Western ideal in history) under central control. The only country that's called them on it is, of course, Russia.

 

*shrugs* It doesn't excuse Russia's excessive, and transparently Machiavellian, response, but the (especially American) media's coverage of this thing has been horrid. For example: Russia did not invade S. Ossetia. I've heard that way too much. Russia was already in S. Ossetia on a peacekeeping mission, Georgia invaded it. The Russians reinforced their troops there and then invaded Georgia. And Russia did not invade Czechoslovakia. The Soviet Union (and Warsaw Pact) did, which Georgia was a part of. The leader of the Soviet Union at that time? A Ukrainian. Yet Neil Cavuto gets on the video with Sakashvili and lets him cite that as a famous example of Russian aggression. It seems like a nit-picky point, but the Soviet Union really was something different that simply "Russia." In fact, organizationally, the Russian Soviet Federal Socialist Republic was intentionally kept the weakest of the Soviet Socialist Republics, because the Communist Party feared that if anyone would challenge its authority, it would be a Russian political leader (and look who it ended up being, President of the RSFSR Boris Yeltsin). What the Communist Party did, it did for its own reasons, not Russia's, and there were always Georgians right at the highest levels of power in that Party, just as there were citizens of almost every SSR. (No one would care to recall Josef Dzhugashvili, would they? Or you might know him as Joseph Stalin.)

Edited August 17, 2008 by CDarwin