Everything I have heard on the news about this conflict has painted a picture of Russian aggression. They've said Russia is again becoming the empire builder of times past. This FOX News clip tells a different story:
According to CNN :
"Georgia, a former Soviet state, sent troops into South Ossetia on Thursday, aiming to crack down on the separatists, who want independence or unification with North Ossetia, which is in Russia. Russia responded Friday, sending troops into the Georgian province where it had peacekeepers stationed."
This implies that it was actually Georgia who began the conflict, not the supposed Russian aggression. South Ossetia wants to be a part of Russia (and North Ossetia) and Georgia began military action to prevent that. The Russian peace keepers who responded have been stationed there since 1992 under an agreement between Russia, Georgia, and South Ossetia to protect what is described as a fragile peace.
We should be careful about rushing to conclusions here. Unfortunately, if this is accurate, it puts the U.S. on the wrong side of the argument as we are militarily supporting Georgia.
Monday, August 25, 2008
Georgian - Russian conflict
Posted by Andy at 11:12 AM
Labels: International
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
4 comments:
Interesting story. I too have only heard the opposite side of the story until now. I agree that we should not rush to conclusions and if this story is true then we are supporting the Georgians in error but from were I sit it is hard to truly know who is right and who is wrong.
I'm probably not the most informed person on the plant but this is what I heard about this conflict.
Georgia made a bad decision in how they wanted to handle something they didn't like about what Russia was doing as Andy described in his post.
The analyst I was listening to was saying that even though Georgia probably should have handled it differently, Russia was overreacting in a big way. Russia is apparently trying to take over the entire country .... permanently. If that's true then that is going too far. Some think that Putin and Russia have been quite upset ever since the old Soviet Union was broken up and have been laying the groundwork for years to bring it back together at some point. Taking over Georgia is the first step. Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia would be next followed by the Ukraine. Putin has made it no secret that this on his agenda. He is a power hungry leader who is not concerned with the rights of the citizens. After all he is former KGB and basically that's who has been in charge of Russia since the breakup of the USSR - former KGB die hards.
Anyway, that's the angle I heard. I"m sure there's an opposing view on NPR and who knows if that is really accurate or not?
I know a couple who is serving a mission in the Ukraine right now and their emails reflect the view of the Ukrainians which is not sympathetic towards Putin or Russia.
Actually, NPR is had both sides on for interviews and I would recommend their online archive of the conflict. www.npr.org
I have found, as Andrew's post accurately portrays, that US media outlets only exist to contradict each other and they have little meaningful substance on international issues. They only show what will catch the fleeting attention of the US public, which has become accustomed to only desiring the "milk" of the issues, rather than the "meat".
So, allow me to give my discriminatory opinion: when searching for information concerning international issues, I highly recommend the BBC, which is independent of any government, corporation, or other business entity, unlike CNN or Fox (or any other US news outlet for that matter).
The BBC gives detailed information concerning the issue right now in the Caucasus region. You can find it at news.bbc.co.uk
We should have little fear over Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia falling into Russian hands. They are members of the European Union. Once a part of that union, a country becomes somewhat responsible for the security of other members. They are also members of NATO, so pretty much if Russia invades the Baltic states, they invade the EU and NATO. Bad idea. That won't happen.
As long as Ukraine and Georgia have western leaning governments (and our CIA sees fit to keep it that way), they won't be falling into Russian hands either, at least not without a fight. Claims that Russia is trying to take over the world are a bit farfetched. Putin may have is crazy agenda, which doesn't promote human rights or anything lovely or of good report, but I doubt the time has come that we should begin writing essays in school on the possibility of a second Cold War.
As a closing statement, allow me to say this. Russia has been at constant odds with the Caucasus states ever since 1990 and different ethnic groups within the Caucasus states have also been at odds with each other for even longer. This conflict is a result, a climax of old ethnic tensions. Abkhazia and South Ossetia have been shooting bullets into Georgia and vice versa for the past 18 years. It has taken only until now for it to militarily involve Russia.
No one can say Russia or Georgia started it. Abkhazia and South Ossetia have never wanted to belong to Georgia. This is something one should take into consideration when forming a perception about this region.
I'm not saying this is 100% true, but it's always good to investigate both sides of an issue:
From: http://wiredispatch.com/news/?id=319585
"Putin said that Russia had hoped the U.S. would restrain Georgia, which Moscow accuses of starting the war by attacking South Ossetia on Aug. 7. Instead, he suggested the U.S. encouraged the nation's leadership to try to rein in the separatist region by force.
"The American side in fact armed and trained the Georgian army," Putin said. "Why hold years of difficult talks and seek complex compromise solutions in interethnic conflicts? It's easier to arm one side and push it into the murder of the other side, and it's over.
"It seems like an easy solution. In reality it turns out that it's not always so," he said.
The United States has close ties with the Georgian government and has trained Georgian units. The Pentagon has said that the U.S. had about 130 trainers in Georgia when the fighting erupted earlier this month, including a few dozen civilians who were all working to prepare the Georgian forces for deployment to Iraq.
But Russian officials have made statements aimed to convey the idea that Americans may have directly supported Georgia's offensive.
At a briefing Tuesday, the deputy chief of Russian military general staff, Col. Gen. Anatoly Nogovitsyn, showed off a color copy of what he said was a U.S. passport found in a basement in a village in South Ossetia among items that belonged to Georgian forces.
"We found a passport for Michael Lee White," Nogovitsyn said. "He's a Texan."
The U.S. Embassy in Georgia said it had no information on the matter.
In an interview with France 24 to be aired Friday, Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili said there were no American "commanders or even advisers" in the conflict zone. He said the conflict had nothing to do with the U.S., but "the aggression of the Russians."
Putin appeared to link claims of an American presence amid the combat with a potential domestic U.S. political motive.
"If my guesses are confirmed, then that raises the suspicion that somebody in the United States purposefully created this conflict with the aim of aggravating the situation and creating an advantage ... for one of the candidates in the battle for the post of U.S. president."
Putin did not name a party or candidate. Some pro-Kremlin Russian politicians have claimed U.S. Republicans hoped the war would help keep Democrat Barack Obama out of the White House by fomenting concern among voters over security, which some of the Russians consider to be a strong-suit of Republican candidate John McCain, a strong Kremlin critic."
Post a Comment