h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

"So what should the Russians have done? "

Kept to their peace keeping remit and not invaded Georgia proper. They went beyond their remit and at that point lost their moral high ground. Stories of attrocities on both sides are subject to sping of course, but the Russian army is not exempt from them.

And one thing I have noted is the old 'not for us then against us' approach on a lot of media sources. It is possible to criticise both sides and be aware that neither has exactly covered themselves in glory.

>moral high ground.<


The *reality* on the ground shows us that 'Moral high ground' never prevented all kinds of horrible stuff happening in other parts of the world, with very different traditions and values to ours without firm and decisive action. I think its naive not to be anything other than ruthlessly pragmatic in situations like this. History teaches us that.

So called 'democracy' in the region is a very recent western import.

There's so much looking at all this through 'western democratic tradition' glasses going on, on this thread.

Newsnight is about to start.

It seems to me that if the russians withdrew now the militias would run amock . Seeing as the Georgian army appears to have collapsed leaving a power vacuum . It may be better for the russian army to stay put until the Georgians or a peackeeping force can take control of the situation .

Today the the phone box says 'Kung Fu Panda'

[click for pic http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3090/2636074097_0160acdcc2.jpg]

Oh, right, it's cultural , I guess that makes it alright then.

Leaving that aside, the situation is a bit confusing to me, so correct me if I've got this wrong:

South Ossetians voted to break away from Georgia in three referenda.
Georgia attempted to suppress this militarily.
Russia moved in, occupied the area, and bombarded Georgian forces which approached.

Why is Russia being criticised for this?

Well from the stuff I saw on Newsnight, it basically confirmed my view that the bigger picture is that Russia as a former super power is doing payback time on the west, particularly against the US which has gloated over winning the cold war and more or less subjected Russia to humiliation, compounded by intereference in former Soviet states such as Ukraine and Georgia, in its usual attempt to inflict its idea of 'democracy' on the rest of the world. Basically a cover for the US wanting influence, left right and centre. They might have known that pushing this inflicting of 'democracy' in such an arrogant way in that part of the world was going to sting the Russians.

And now some kind of balance is going to be restored as Russia reasserts its influence, in the full knowledge that the US is fairly impotent. Bush sounds such an absolute idiot with his lecturing of the Russians. I don't blame the Russians for a bit of payback of up yours now that they've got stronger again.

The Russian people are incredibly proud and loathed the humiliation heaped upon them by the west, as they perceived it.

Basically I think the west has to face reality that there is a re-balancing of power having to go on, and Russia *will* re-assert its influence strongly now in the former Soviet states. I reckon we have to live with that, and just take the medicine.

All the moralising in the world from us will make damn all difference. That's *reality*. So we just concentrate on looking after our interests as best we can where do have power. The more Bush shoots his mouth off, the stupider he looks.

>Oh, right, it's cultural, I guess that makes it alright then<

My point is that trying to analyse other cultural traditions and reasons for things through our eyes all the time, is not only arrogant but more importantly a complete waste of time.

If you find that fair enough.

Russia's living in denial, on the heady fumes of past "glories". The fact is, the world is changing - Russia and the USA are throwbacks to the 20th century. This century belongs to either China or (hopefully) India.

Russia's birthrate is crashing through the floor. It's hemorrhaging tax & oil revenues through high level criminality. Their military is large but outdated. Putin is trying to re-arm, but they've lost nearly 20 years. The Soviet Union is gone and isn't coming back. The "democracy" Fanny appears to despise has been welcomed with open arms by former Soviet client states who are enjoying prosperity & freedoms unheard of under Communism. Unfortunately, Russians themselves were never allowed to sample democracy.

Either Russia grows up and addresses the realities of the world as it is, or it wastes energy and resources on the dying spasms of empire.

Russia needs to build bridges, not alienate it's neighbours.

Roll on research on renewable resources and speed up nuclear power plant construction. The sooner the West can tell Russia (and the Arabs) to stick their oil up their arses, the better.

So "Russian pride has been hurt". Well boo-hoo. Playground bullies usually have adequacy issues.

"Russia moved in, occupied the area, and bombarded Georgian forces which approached.

Why is Russia being criticised for this?"

because it moved in *too far* and the response was disproportionate. Georgia made a mistake. But then Russia had been egging it on for quite a while - as the newsnight ipanelists said it was going to happen sooner or later as Russia was winding them up. They fell for it and went in. They should not have done. But then Russia should not have wound them up and should not have responded quite as aggresivily as they did. Their is no 'right' or 'wrong' side - both have muffed up badly and the there are no winners, only losers in the shape of ordinary people. Russian military attitude towards those they defeated was very much wrong. Georgian policy during their attack was very much wrong.

Anyone who thinks this is about georgia is sadly mistaken, they are only a pawn in a much bigger game.

Tellingly the newsnight bods picked out what I have thought is the bigger issue - what happens when thesame thing kicks off in the Ukraine? Already we have Lithuainia, Latvia, Estonia coming out in favour of Georgia purely on the basis that they are former soviet states. You can't ignore the history in all this and there is a huge anti Russian feeling amoungst certain parts of the former soviet nations.

And as for the hypocrisy and 'the west has no right to comment because of ...' name your country - Russia is not exactly innocent onthat front either - propping up former states with extremely dubious records purely because the dictators in question are pro Russia. Neither side is clean. The least that can be said is that Russia is one country with one foreign policy. The West is not, despite what russophiles might say.

>>South Ossetians voted to break away from Georgia in three referenda.
Georgia attempted to suppress this militarily.
Russia moved in, occupied the area, and bombarded Georgian forces which approached.

Why is Russia being criticised for this?<<

The Russians are meddling very heavily in Georgian affairs, hoping to provoke the sort of mistake Saaskhavili made. Giving passports to the citizens of (technically) another state and then putting peacekeepers in there to protect your new-found citizens is pretty dodgy behaviour.

Look at all the anti-Russian former Soviet states and see how they're faring: the Baltics all got themselves into NATO and the EU, in spite of some very serious threats, and yet still face attacks on their sovereignity, as witnessed by Estonia coming under cyber-attack in 2006. The Ukraine is too powerful for the Russians attack in the convention sense, but have seen their fuel turned off. Azerbaijan has seen Russia supporting Armenia in Nagorno Karabakh, but now has more vocal support form the US, despite a decidedly dodgy government (the wonders of oil, I guess).

Georgia is the weakest and most isolated of the bunch. It was the best one for Russia to use to teach a lesson to the others.

"Ukraine is too powerful for the Russians attack in the convention sense"

Very true - and why this http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/7566070.stm could be somewhat worrying. If the Ukraine internal divisions surface again there's a lot of people to get involved.

and it is still rumbling on.
'Were leaving' from the russians
'no you ain't' from the georgians
'no orders to pullout' from the russian commanders
'Oh but we are *now*' from russia
'Georgians not standing down/observing ceasefire'

US urging sanctions against Russia (that'll work....)
NATO having a go and speaking of non-cooperation and suspension of business as usual
NATO saying Georgia should join
France and Germany call for immediate retreats, with ultimatums.

Really doesn't matter about right and wrong (not that life was ever that simple) now does it?

Anyone else worried or are we all being distracted by the smiling happy people on the olympics reports?

Personally every time I see a Georgian athlete I'm reminded of it.

I didn't know what their flag looked like 2 weeks ago.

Wasn't Russia's action disproportionate precisely because the eyes of the world (they thought ) were on Bejing?

BTW Having visited Estonia and having a priveliged diplomatic view of Estonia's feelings towards the Russian people shipped into it by Moscow during it's occupation of Estonia, I can see why the Russians are sensitive over the treatment of these people. It is their own historic fault of course, and in no way excuses them.

We in the West have to remember that Russians as a race have NEVER known democracy (in our terms), moving from Czar's to Revolution through Stalin, loosing 20 million in WW2, only to be controlled by the NKVD and KGB. They have therefore little or no comrehension of what we think of as 'democracy' (a discredited idea in the UK under the present government), and don't forget Putin was the head of the KGB, which says much about his ideas of civil liberties.

Novo

Here's what Gorbachev has to say: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/08/11/AR2008081101372.html?nav=hcmodule

"What happened on the night of Aug. 7 is beyond comprehension. The Georgian military attacked the South Ossetian capital of Tskhinvali with multiple rocket launchers designed to devastate large areas. Russia had to respond. To accuse it of aggression against "small, defenseless Georgia" is not just hypocritical but shows a lack of humanity."

Russia has recognised South Ossetian and Abkhazian independence:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/7582181.stm

I'm expecting a few of the Russian satellites and possibly Serbia, depending on how bitter they feel, to follow suit.

The question is, what happens when South Ossetia uses its new 'independence' to join North Ossetia and accede to the Russian Federation, as it has always said it wants to?

Also good to see that Medvedev has no compunction whatsoever about claiming the moral high ground using blatant lies - the boy will go far, though not as far as to actually be in charge.

I am interested to know what exactly is the qualatitive difference between the recognition of Kosovo and South Ossetia?

Georgia has never tried to commit genocide in South Ossetia and South Ossetians aren't in a 90% majority in South Ossetia.

Fair one....

Ethnic cleansing is allegedly all the rage. By Georgians in S Ossetia according to Russia - http://www.reuters.com/article/GCA-Russia/idUSL872256820080808 and by separatists in Abkhazia according to the UN http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethnic_cleansing_of_Georgians_in_Abkhazia

and Milliband is telling the Russians off for recognising them because it is "unjustifiable and unacceptable". Similar to the Russian reasoning behind Kosovo so I can't see that helping. Not that I necessarily think he is wrong - but it is hardly something they will listen to.

The politics seem more and more purely about positioning and not arbitration or reconciliation (I realise they always were, just more overt now).

So hands up who thinks the Russians are thinking about grabbing half of the Ukraine in a similar manner? Certainly the Ukraine seems to think so.