Let’s just say that this isn’t exactly the rebirth of the Cold War:
Washington – Following a series of provocative attacks in its secessionist region of South Ossetia late last week, Georgia launched an all-out attempt to reestablish control in the tiny enclave. Russia then intervened by dropping bombs on Georgia to protect the South Ossetians, halt the growing tide of refugees flooding into southern Russia, and aid its own peacekeepers there.
Now, the story goes, Russia has at last found a way of undermining Georgia’s Western aspirations, nipping the country’s budding democracy, and countering American influence across Eurasia. But this view of events is simplistic.
American and European diplomats, who have rushed to the region to try to stop the conflict, would do well to consider the broader effects of this latest round of Caucasus bloodletting – and to seek perspectives on the conflict beyond the story of embattled democracy and cynical comparisons with the Prague Spring of 1968.
Russia illegally attacked Georgia and imperiled a small and feeble neighbor. But by dispatching his own ill-prepared military to resolve a secessionist dispute by force, Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili has managed to lead his country down the path of a disastrous and ultimately self-defeating war.
(…)
Russia must be condemned for its unsanctioned intervention. But the war began as an ill-considered move by Georgia to retake South Ossetia by force. Saakashvili’s larger goal was to lead his country into war as a form of calculated self-sacrifice, hoping that Russia’s predictable overreaction would convince the West of exactly the narrative that many commentators have now taken up.
The United States doesn’t need to fall into the trap that the Georgians have set. The Russian invasion should be rightly condemned, but so should the actions of the Republic of Georgia which has acted to deny self-determination to people in South Ossetia and Azkhabia who never wanted to be part of Georgia to begin with, and have thereby brought on a war that never needed to be fought.
We agree again. This isn’t the Cold War part deux. It is Russia being Russia. And a very small neighbor swatting at a big bear.
While I largely agree, it’s important to note that the international community recognizes Georgia’s sovereignty over those territories.
The U.S. signed a treaty that held Serbian sovereignty over Kosovo – in no uncertain terms. Legally, Serbia owns Kosovo much as Georgia owns the territories it doesn’t control either.
James & James,
Isn’t think a problem that goes back to World War One, if not further ?
When you’ve got national borders that don’t correspond to ethnic divisions that go back centuries, conflict of some kind seems rather inevitable.
The other thing to note is that this certainly doesn’t feel like the “end of history” to me…..
Yup, same territory was fought over in the First World War, although I believe it was Russia vs Turkey then. Then, also during that war, Russia fell and shortly thereafter became the USSR. I don’t remember if it swallowed Georgia immediately or not. It’s interesting how many of these fights occur again and again.