Anyone who has been following the news lately cannot be unaware of the ridiculous calamity currently unfolding in Georgia. Oddly, no one has been asking the obvious question; why did the Georgians march into South Ossetia knowing that it was under tacit Russian protection? Having suffered centuries of Russian domination and brutality, didn't the Georgians know better than to antagonize their much more powerful neighbour?
The Georgian president is not actually the fool that current events make him appear. With a large US military base in their country and Washington pushing hard for Georgian membership in NATO, the government in Tiblisi must have felt confident of American backing in a confrontation with Moscow. Certainly, the White House was consulted long in advance of Georgia's action and gave their approval. But why would they assume that Moscow would not react?
For years, the Russian government has been warning the west that extending NATO into eastern Europe and the former Soviet republics was unacceptable and would have consequences. No one listened. After all, post-Soviet Russia was an impoverished and weakened state that needed western good will too much to rock the boat. So went the conventional wisdom among western nations, less so in Europe after Moscow turned off the energy tap a few years ago, but it still has currency in Washington.
This past week, Condoleezza Rice signed an agreement that will see US missles based in Poland, a stone's throw from the Russian border. Moscow has had enough. The Russian actions actually have very little to do with Georgia and everything to do with Russian-American relations. What we actually saw happening in Georgia was Vladimir Putin giving George Bush a hard slap in the face and telling him to back the hell off. It's a shame that the hapless Georgians had to suffer for the message to be delivered.
No comments:
Post a Comment