Georgian-Russian War: the Western response

[A1CBOZ]

Oh, I meant the Western response during the Soviet invasion (millions and millions of dollars in munitions from USA, Pakistan, NATO kicked the soviets out, but put the taliban in power)

Ok, I thought you meant we did the right thing invading but then letting it get out of hand lately... either one works I guess

 

[Winner]

This is it, the last remnants of Russian credibility are blown away. It's now crystal clear what they're up to.

Western response: none so far.

This would be the time to move one step up on my "escalation ladder" to the indirect support for Georgian military: ammo, supplies, weapons, AA sets etc.

Russians Push Past Separatist Area to Assault Central Georgia
By ANNE BARNARD

This article was reported by Andrew E. Kramer, Anne Barnard and C. J. Chivers, and written by Ms. Barnard.

​

TBILISI, Georgia — Russia expanded its attacks on Georgia on Sunday, moving tanks and troops through the separatist enclave of South Ossetia and advancing toward the city of Gori in central Georgia, in its first direct assault on a Georgian city with ground forces during three days of heavy fighting, Georgian officials said.

The maneuver — along with bombing of the Georgian capital, Tbilisi — seemed to suggest that Russia’s aims in the conflict had gone beyond securing the pro-Russian enclaves of South Ossetia and Abkhazia to weakening the armed forces of Georgia, a former Soviet republic and an ally of the United States whose Western leanings have long irritated the Kremlin.

Russia’s moves, which came after Georgia offered a cease-fire and said it had pulled its troops out of South Ossetia, caused widespread international alarm and anger and set the stage for an intense diplomatic confrontation with the United States.

Two senior Western officials said that it was unclear whether Russia intended a full invasion of Georgia, but that its aims could go as far as destroying its armed forces or overthrowing Georgia’s pro-Western president, Mikheil Saakashvili.

“They seem to have gone beyond the logical stopping point,” one senior Western diplomat said, speaking anonymously under normal diplomatic protocol.

The escalation of fighting raised tensions between Russia and its former cold war foes to their highest level in decades. President Bush has promoted Georgia as a bastion of democracy, helped strengthen its military and urged that NATO admit the country to membership. Georgia serves as a major conduit for oil flowing from Russia and Central Asia to the West.

But Russia, emboldened by windfall profits from oil exports, is showing a resolve to reassert its dominance in a region it has always considered its “near abroad.”

The military action, which has involved air, naval and missile attacks, is the largest engagement by Russian forces outside its borders since the collapse of the Soviet Union.

Russia escalated its assault on Sunday despite strong diplomatic warnings from Mr. Bush and European leaders, underscoring the limits of Western influence over Russia at a time when the rest of Europe depends heavily on Russia for natural gas and the United States needs Moscow’s cooperation if it hopes to curtail what it believes is a nuclear weapons threat from Iran.

President Bush, in Beijing for the Olympics, strongly criticized the Russian attacks, especially those outside South Ossetia, and urged an immediate cease-fire.

In an interview on NBC on Monday morning, he said he had been “very firm” with both Russia’s prime minister, Vladimir V. Putin, and its president, Dmitri Medvedev.

Earlier, Vice President Dick Cheney expressed a strong warning for Russia. In a telephone conversation with the Georgian president, he said “that Russian aggression must not go unanswered, and that its continuation would have serious consequences for its relations with the United States, as well as the broader international community,” a spokeswoman, Lea Anne McBride, said in a statement released by the White House.

Russian officials say Georgia provoked the assault by attacking South Ossetia last week, causing heavy civilian casualties. But Western diplomats and military officials said they worried that Russia’s decision to extend the fighting and open a second front in Abkhazia indicated that it had sought to use a relatively low-level conflict in a conflict-prone part of the Caucasus region to extend its influence over a much broader area.

On Sunday, Russian artillery shells slammed the city of Gori, a major military installation and transportation hub in Georgia. In the separatist region of Abkhazia, Russian paratroopers and their Abkhaz allies battled Georgian special forces and tried to cross the boundary into undisputed Georgian territory, Georgian officials said.

Russia dropped a bomb on Tbilisi’s international airport shortly before Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner of France, who was sent by the European Union to try to mediate, was due to land, Georgian officials said. It twice bombed an aviation factory on the outskirts of the capital. Russia’s Black Sea Fleet patrolled the coast of Abkhazia, and its Defense Ministry said Russian warships had sunk a Georgian gunboat that fired on them.

The Kremlin declined to say whether its troops had entered Georgia proper but said all its actions were intended to strike at Georgian military forces that had fired on its peacekeeping troops in South Ossetia.

A senior Russian defense official, Anatoly Nogovitsyn, said early Sunday that Russia did not intend to “break into” Georgian territory.

The Bush administration said it would seek a resolution from the United Nations Security Council condemning Russian military actions in Georgia.

In a heated exchange with his Russian counterpart at the United Nations, Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad of the United States accused the Kremlin of seeking to oust President Saakashvili.

He charged that Russia’s foreign minister, Sergey Lavrov, had said as much Sunday morning in a telephone conversation with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, telling her “that the democratically elected president of Georgia ‘must go,’ ” Mr. Khalilzad said. Mr. Khalilzad said the comment was “completely unacceptable.”

In Washington, American officials said that Georgian troops had tried to disengage but that the Russians had not allowed them to.

“The Georgians told them, ‘We’re done. Let us withdraw,’ ” one American military official said. “But the Russians are not letting them withdraw. They are pursuing them, and people are seeing this.”

The official was not authorized to brief the press and spoke on condition of anonymity.

The official added: “This is not about military objectives. This is about a political objective: removing a thorn in their side.”

Tensions with Mr. Saakashvili escalated when he made a centerpiece of his presidency the reunification of Georgia with Abkhazia and South Ossetia, pro-Russian regions that won de facto autonomy in fighting in the early 1990s.

Russia has issued passports to many residents in the territories and has stationed peacekeeping troops in them. Heavy fighting broke out last week in South Ossetia when Georgian troops tried to take its capital in what seems to have been a major miscalculation.

Reports of the death toll varied widely, from the low hundreds to more than 2,000, but none could be independently verified.

Russian officials say more than 30,000 South Ossetians have fled into Russia.

Russia says it is acting to protect residents there and to punish Georgia for the assault, which Georgia says was to protect Georgian enclaves in the territory from attack and to push out illegally deployed Russian troops.

Russian officials told Russian news agencies late Sunday night that Georgian troops were attacking Tskhinvali.

There were no independent observers with either country’s forces, and verifying claims about military activity was not immediately possible.

Georgian officials expressed alarm on Sunday that Russia might be aiming to take Gori, about a 45-minute drive south from Tskhinvali. Gori, a major staging area for the Georgian military, sits in a valley that is the main route connecting the east and west halves of Georgia.

Shota Utiashvili, an official in the Georgian Interior Ministry, said the Russians had moved tanks and troops to within a few kilometers of Gori and were “trying to cut the country in half.”

Mr. Utiashvili said that if they tried to occupy Georgia, “there will probably be guerrilla warfare all over the country.”

He said: “We need large supplies of humanitarian aid, because we have thousands of wounded. And weapons. We need weapons.”

Sunday evening, artillery and tank fire could be heard from the outskirts of Gori. During a pause in the fighting, Georgian military personnel appeared to be flowing into the city. Georgian officials said they would defend it.

Ambulances with flashing red and blue lights roared back and forth on the highway between Gori and Tbilisi, along with troop transports. Families fled Gori in cars and donkey carts.

“The whole family is running away. There is nowhere for us to take shelter,” said Ketevan Sunabali, 40, who had left home in a pair of red Winnie the Pooh slippers. She said she had heard the bombs exploding and seen the smoke and just jumped in the car with her husband, without stopping to take any of their belongings.

“I had a home. I had a father,” said Gogita Kazahashvili, 29. “My father died today from the bombing. I’ve seen with my own eyes. My house was destroyed. I buried my father myself, by where the house was.”

A man who said he was fleeing from Kakhvi, which he described as a Georgian-controlled enclave squeezed between parts of South Ossetia along the winding border, said Russian soldiers had come to his house, and he had run away. Along the road, others who were displaced carried their possessions in wheelbarrows and plastic bags.

A reporter for The New York Times saw artillery being fired from Russian-controlled areas into Georgian territory near the villages of Eredvy and Prisi, about two miles from Tskhinvali. Grassy fields were burning in the villages and clouds of dust rose with the impact of the shells.

Even one close Russian ally, Maksim K. Gvindzhiya, expressed alarm about the possibility of Russian troops moving on Gori and clashing with Georgians on unchallenged Georgian territory.

“If it happened, then it’s a big mess, it’s a big problem, because it is direct confrontation,” said Mr. Gvindzhiya, deputy foreign affairs minister for the de facto government of Abkhazia. “It’s going out of the conflict zone.”

Fighting escalated in Abkhazia as well, Mr. Gvindzhiya and Georgian officials said.

Russia doubled the number of its troops in Abkhazia to about 6,000 early Sunday, landing paratroopers at an airport near the Black Sea. There was heavy fighting in the Kodori Gorge, the only area in Abkhazia that Georgia controls, with Russian paratroopers ferried in by helicopter.

In Washington, Secretary Rice worked through the night Saturday with other Bush administration officials on a Security Council resolution. American diplomats said that they did not want an actual Security Council vote on the resolution until Tuesday or so, the better to draw out the debate and publicly shame the Russian government. While the resolution will carry no punitive weight, and is almost sure to be vetoed by Russia, a permanent Council member, the hope is that it could create more pressure for a cease-fire, officials said.

Meanwhile, Georgian and Western diplomatic officials said Georgia had offered a cease-fire proposal to Russia, though Russian officials did not acknowledge receiving such an offer.

Andrew E. Kramer reported from Tbilisi, and Anne Barnard from Moscow. Reporting was contributed by Michael Schwirtz and Nicholas Kulish from Tbilisi, Helene Cooper from Washington, and Joseph Sywenkiy from Gori, Georgia.

New York Times

 

[woody60707]

Oh, I meant the Western response during the Soviet invasion (millions and millions of dollars in munitions from USA, Pakistan, NATO kicked the soviets out, but put the taliban in power)

WHoa! the US never put in, nor funded the taliban.

 

[Desmond Hawkins]

WHoa! the US never put in, nor funded the taliban.

Sowed the seeds of their ilk though.

 

[jeps]

WHoa! the US never put in, nor funded the taliban.

How Jimmy Carter and I Started the Mujahideen

Q: And neither do you regret having supported the Islamic [integrisme], having given arms and advice to future terrorists?

Brzezinski: What is most important to the history of the world? The Taliban or the collapse of the Soviet empire? Some stirred-up Moslems or the liberation of Central Europe and the end of the cold war?

NOTE: INTERVIEW DONE BEFORE 9/11

the US DID provide funding for ALL Mujahideen groups. This included the Taliban. They did not put them in power, but set up the situation in afghanistan that led to them taking power.

Ron Paul, in 2001 after september 11

We should recognize that American tax dollars helped to create the very Taliban government that now wants to destroy us. In the late 1970s and early 80s, the CIA was very involved in the training and funding of various fundamentalist Islamic groups in Afghanistan, some of which later became today's brutal Taliban government. In fact, the U.S. government admits to giving the groups at least 6 billion dollars in military aid and weaponry, a staggering sum that would be even larger in today's dollars.

Bin Laden himself received training and weapons from the CIA, and that agency's military and financial assistance helped the Afghan rebels build a set of encampments around the city of Khost. Tragically, those same camps became terrorist training facilities for Bin Laden, who uses some of the same soldiers our military once trained as lieutenants in his sickening terrorist network. Our heroic pilots are now busy bombing the same camps we paid to build, all the while threatened by the same Stinger missiles originally supplied by our CIA. Once again, the stark result of our foreign aid, however well-intentioned, was the arming and training of forces that later become our enemy.

 

[aronnax]

Good luck when the Chinese come knocking

We will just send tribute every year and rule as a vassal

We are after all Chinese Dominated

 

[woody60707]

How Jimmy Carter and I Started the Mujahideen



NOTE: INTERVIEW DONE BEFORE 9/11

the US DID provide funding for ALL Mujahideen groups. This included the Taliban. They did not put them in power, but set up the situation in afghanistan that led to them taking power.

Ron Paul, in 2001 after september 11

Dude, mujahideen does not = Tailban (look up what mujahideen means). Dude, really, the Taliban came in to power in the mid 90's the US (CIA) was done with the Afghanistan in the late 80's. Now I agree that with the US leaving a power vacuum in Afghanistan, it gave a opening for the Taliban to take power.

But dude, there is a big difference between funding and trying to install the Taliban, and the US GTFO of Afghanistan, and leaving the place wide open for a power like the taliban to take power.

 

[BEHIND_THE_MASK]

Dude, mujahideen does not = Tailban (look up what mujahideen means). Dude, really, the Taliban came in to power in the mid 90's the US (CIA) was done with the Afghanistan in the late 80's. Now I agree that with the US leaving a power vacuum in Afghanistan, it gave a opening for the Taliban to take power.

But dude, there is a big difference between funding and trying to install the Taliban, and the US GTFO of Afghanistan, and leaving the place wide open for a power like the taliban to take power.

The funding given created the Taliban... the man responsible for 9/11 and, if my memory serves me right, another bombing on the trade centers, was trained by the CIA.

They were supplied by the US. Funded by the US.

The US sided with what they believed was the lesser of two evils and somewhere along the line this evil hit the top all with training and funds originating from the good USA.

Its sorta undeniable.

 

[jeps]

Dude, mujahideen does not = Tailban (look up what mujahideen means). Dude, really, the Taliban came in to power in the mid 90's the US (CIA) was done with the Afghanistan in the late 80's. Now I agree that with the US leaving a power vacuum in Afghanistan, it gave a opening for the Taliban to take power.

But dude, there is a big difference between funding and trying to install the Taliban, and the US GTFO of Afghanistan, and leaving the place wide open for a power like the taliban to take power.

mujahideen does not mean taliban, however this SPECIFICALLY shows YOU that TALIBAN was ONE of the MANY mujahideen groups supported. I even bolded parts I thought would be important, of the 2nd one. If needed, here we go with a final one:

some of which later became today's brutal Taliban government

.
there we go. SOME of the MANY groups that the US supported became the TALIBAN. This was DURING the time the US was STILL supporting them. so the US DID support the Taliban, back in the day.

and to stay On topic, the Olympic Truce has been shot to hell and gone, but I have a lot of respect for the Georgian team.

Georgia's Nino Salukvadze, bronze medallist in the women's 10m air pistol event, hugged the Russian silver medallist Natalia Paderina during the medal ceremony and insisted that the enmity between their two nations did not exist in Beijing. "We live in the 21st century after all and we shouldn't stoop so low as to wage war," said Salukvadze. "There should be no hatred between athletes and people in general. We'll leave this to the politicians to figure out."

I am awaiting the

further test of sportsmanship on Wednesday when the two countries are due to meet each other in the beach volleyball competition

, and hopefully it will be better than Hungary-USSR water polo in '56

 

[GrandAdmiral]

This is it, the last remnants of Russian credibility are blown away. It's now crystal clear what they're up to.

Western response: none so far.

This would be the time to move one step up on my "escalation ladder" to the indirect support for Georgian military: ammo, supplies, weapons, AA sets etc.

That's probably why Russia is moving so fast and ignoring the ceasefire request. They want to do as much damage as possible before any political or military support affects the situation. They know that because of the US situation, there is going to be a slower diplomatic strategy. In my opinion the Russians are going for a regime change ASAP.

 

[Winner]

That's probably why Russia is moving so fast and ignoring the ceasefire request. They want to do as much damage as possible before any political or military support affects the situation. They know that because of the US situation, there is going to be a slower diplomatic strategy. In my opinion the Russians are going for a regime change ASAP.

What's happening now is an embarrassment for the West, but if the Russians really achieved "regime change" in Georgia and the West was unable/unwilling to do anything about that, it would be a geopolitical disaster comparable with the Iranian islamic revolution.

It's necessary to help the Georgians by more than words. Useless talking is just giving the Russians more time, like you said.

 

[leksaaa]

Russian journalist about western response:

Mikhail Budaragin: When all are allowed...
The world unexpectedly approached to terrible border, for which opens such chasm, against a background of which all present events grow gim. They without it were horrifying, 2000 lost peaceful inhabitants in Ckhinvali is an entirely mad crime and fitting to no frameworks.
But the position of Western mass media presenting Russia by “aggressor” bombing “peaceful Georgia” and not wanting to notice transformations of town Ckhinvali to ruins, - much more terrible than any bombardments.
In fact true sooner or later all the same triumphs, and Saakashvili all the same will appear before military court. For crimes it is necessary to answer, such firm rule of international policy from the times of tribunal in Nuremberg.
Misfortune is only that if UN refuses to judge the president of Georgia, it will have to be done of Russia. Not from revenge , not so that “to show, who is owner”. Only so that true triumphed.
If in representation of the West Russia is already “aggressor”, it means only that henceforth for Russia all are allowed: we heard enough of lie and incomplete truth to don’t believe to any “international community” and don’t admit any “civilised world”.
Civilisation is ability to feel pity and to empathize, instead of weaving loud words on international tribunes. If “civilised world” is not ready to feel pity two thousand killed peaceful inhabitants, on which fire to destruction was led, on what ground we should consider it to be “civilised”? If “civilised world” is ready to support a lunatic Georgian leader only because lunatic Georgian leader learned to utter word “democracy” in English, what he stands , this civilised world?
The target image of Western mass media of the last days (convincingly than any artillery shots) showed that henceforth - it is worth only to pronounce magic word “Western values” - and then it is possible to raze to the ground city, it is possible to arrange a humanitarian accident, it is possible meanly to shot on peacemakers, whose presence, by the way, - it is UN mandate. Mandate of UN is not interference, if someone wants very much to play to war.
Russia cannot behave worse today than Georgia on the war, and worse than the West in the peace, because it is simply nowhere “to behave worse”, further - there is nothing, void, chasm. On the edge of this chasm today it is turned out that Western civilisation (which finally was entangled in her(its) own duplicity and double standards) first mourning insurgents-Muslims who protected so-called “Ichkeria”, then destroying the same very insurgents in Afghanistan, then thinking pretext for attack to Iraq, then granting to Iraq democracy under accompaniment of tortures in Abu-Grabe, then bombing Belgrade, then announcing that Karadzic is military criminal.
Destruction of Ckhinvali is the last drop. They were played up, now it is time to stop.
From this moment not only for Russia everything is allowed: henceforth everything is allowed for everybody. If you do not like the population of your own region – well, burn out region by the fire. If you want that genocide to be in the eyes of “civilised community” legitimate, invite NATO's military and tell about it on perfect English in the broadcast CNN.
There are enough idiots in the world who able to hammer together a small army and to begin to shoot for nothing peaceful inhabitants: they can understand now that UN nowadays can make only a helpless gesture in respond.

 

[sgrig]

No

You in particular are a perfect example. You ignore all the years and years of Russian pressure against Georgia, you ignore that the Russians have violated all the agreements they now claim to be enforcing by sending heavy military equipment to the area prior to any major escalation, you ignore the fact that Russia reacted within about 12 hours, which means their troops had to be mobilized and given the order prior to the Georgian actions in South Ossetia.

There were some comments in the Russian press (although you may dismiss them as false propaganda) that the reason why Russian forces were able to act so quickly in response to "Georgian aggression" is because very recently Russia held military exercises in the region, so troops were ready and assembled. This can probably be verified, but I can't be bothered right now.

Of course, in military-speak, "exercises" can sometimes be preparations for war. However also don't forget that Georgia's attack on South Ossetia was also definitely pre-planned. They also had to mobilise and to gather forces, and this is hard to conceal, so Russia most likely knew in advance about Georgia's plans.

 

[Desert-Fox]

Russian journalist about western response:

Don't forget that Russian journalists are allowed to write only what Putin likes. If you criticize him or his party then you will get attacked by polonium or you just die by "random car accident". There comes difference between western democracy and Russia that in West you may criticize President and nothing happens. If USA is like Russia then nobody dares to call Bush idiot. I remember a joke from WW2 :

Stalin and Truman met together and argued where is more freedom of speech, in Soviet Union or USA. Truman said that everyone can go in front of White House and yell that Truman is an idiot ... and nothing happens, nobody will arrest him. Stalin only smiled and told that everyone may go into red square and yell that Truman is an idiot and also nothing happens.

 

[Princeps]

Dude, mujahideen does not = Tailban

That's right, but the people US funded were worse than the Taliban.

Don't forget that Russian journalists are allowed to write only what Putin likes.

Nonsense.

Not only do Russians have an access to foreign media, but Russian media has also been critical of Kremlin.

 

[Aleksey_aka_al]

http://georgia-vs-russia.com/

 

[Desert-Fox]

That's right, but the people US funded were worse than the Taliban.



Nonsense.

Not only do Russians have an access to foreign media, but Russian media has also been critical of Kremlin.

Nope, Russians believe only what is written in Russian media, even these Russians who live outside Russia, and this info is far different than it is reality. And Russian media doesn't criticize Kremlin, they won't dare.

 

[sgrig]

Don't forget that Russian journalists are allowed to write only what Putin likes. If you criticize him or his party then you will get attacked by polonium or you just die by "random car accident". There comes difference between western democracy and Russia that in West you may criticize President and nothing happens.

Have you actually every read any Russian press? There are usually plenty of articles that are critical of the government. It is a far cry from Soviet press. TV is different though - as far as I know, it never critizes the government (although people who actually live in Russia may correct me on this).

The situation is probably worse at regional level, but there it's mostly linked to corruption. For example journalists can get killed when they try to expose a corrupt mayor.

 

[Loki130]

Nope, Russians believe only what is written in Russian media, even these Russians who live outside Russia, and this info is far different than it is reality. And Russian media doesn't criticize Kremlin, they won't dare.

Any Russians want to weigh in on this, or would that be unfair?

 

[Princeps]

Nope, Russians believe only what is written in Russian media,

Only about 20% of Russians get their news from the state media, from what I've read. The rest read private Russian media or foreign media.

And yes, Russian media has been critical of Kremlin.