Ok, so the Olympics may still be on (really only begun), but I’m not noticing that as news. What is news, and it’s hard to overstate the disaster potential which remains in it, is Russia’s serious smackdown of Georgia.
As of today, the Russians have claimed to have stopped pursuit operations into Georgia, but they’re not in a hurry to pull back out. I suspect they are looking for any excuse (and they don’t need much of one) to pound the Georgians, specifically the army.
This is a message to the Georgians, all former ‘Soviet Republics’ and to the West as well that Russia is back and it makes the rules in its’ back yard. For a long time the Russians only had economic means to bend satellite countries to its will; those (read: natural gas and oil) remain, but the Red army is back, baby.
This is no surprise to any who have been following things in that part of the world, but a lot of people have these fuzzy memories of the Russians getting shot to hell in Grozny the first time around. The second time (1999-2000) was a far different story, and marked the return of the Russian Army as a serious force.
Georgia has been angling for NATO membership, and we can all be thankful that they weren’t let in. This is nothing against Georgia, but they are in Russia’s sphere, and major wars have started over a lot less than the current goings-on. If they were full members of NATO, we would be obliged to HELP THEM FIGHT THE RUSSIANS. I emphasized that to ensure you were as alarmed by that prospect as you should be...
Culturally and politically we have a lot more in common with Georgia than with Russia, but we can’t help them. If NATO decided to start WWIII over this (II started over Poland, and WWI over Serbia, of all places) Georgia would be flattened before the first NATO troops rolled onto Russian soil, and eastern Europe (e.g. Ukraine, Byelorussia) would revert to the Soviet/Russian glacis that it used to be as the Russians pushed into it to pre-empt them joining us or being used against them.
It gets better. I personally have no use for Kosovo (I think we backed the wrong side), but the Serbs like the Russians and vice-versa. All it would take is for some ‘ultranationalists’ to take over in Belgrade while NATO`s hands are tied with the full might of the Russian armed forces (they have a navy and an air force too!), and Kosovo would be southern Serbia again.
Are our sailors still trained to a high pitch to find and destroy Russian subs? I doubt it. I’m not even seriously considering a nuclear exchange, but let’s remember who we’re talking about here.
Sure, the combined forces of Europe and the US could beat the Russians, but at what cost, and really, to what purpose? If (imperfect example) Mexico decided to take Arizona back, what would the US do? The Yanks would probably stop at the Rio Grande, but they aren’t the Russians. Militarily the Russians did this right, putting the hurt on the opposition and leaving them no sanctuary. It looks ugly on TV but war is hell, even the small, local ones.
It also has to be said that Georgia, allowing for the fact that it was provoked (repeatedly), did start this by attacking in South Ossetia. That was a big mistake, but I imagine this will be the last time Georgia assumes that the Bear is still hibernating.
2 comments:
But, if Georgia started it, why is Russia the bad guy?
Georgia started it, but Russia FINISHED it, with more finishing to come. Russia is the bad guy because: a) they used direct, old-school military action to solve a geopolitical problem, which the soft-power mamby-pambys never countenance, and
b) Georgia is a "democracy" which Russia, it is increasingly clear, is not (again). Optics, in this case.
The Americans will almost always back the underdog in any situation, especially situations that the Americans have no business getting invloved with. Russia smacked down a small country that wants to be more like us, and that automatically looks bad. Hell, even I think they're pushing it too far, but I said the Russians were smart, not necessarily brillant, and definitely not subtle.
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