Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili argues in an op-ed column in Monday's Wall Street Journal that Russia picked the fight with Georgia in South Ossetia to crush Georgia's pro-Western democracy.

"The Kremlin designed this war," Saakashvili writes.

He also argues that the conflict is about "the future of freedom in Europe."

If Russia succeeds, Saakashvili says, it would mark the end of Western influence on any of the former Soviet republics.

"It is clear that Russia's current leadership is bent on restoring a neocolonial form of control over the entire space once governed by Moscow," he writes.

Georgian president: Moscow picked fight - CNN.com

Saakashvili is right!
I always knew it and wrote about it!
But it will be the end of Russia as a Superpower!
New Alberts Einshteins and Alexandrs Kartvelis will go from all over the World to put end to it.

Konstantin.

I wouldn't doubt it.

Russia is threated that Georgia is forging ties with NATO and ending the oil pipeline monopoly that Russia enjoyed.

So from the Russian standpoint it's Georgia which started the fight by attempting to break away from its dependence on Russia.

If Russia picked a fight, why was Georgia making progress at the start of the war?

I mean, if Russia would pick a fight with Finland. The Finns, for all their resilience, would not capture St. Petersburg at day one of hostilities.
The Georgians did in fact, capture the hostile capital of South Ossetia. I would label suprise as the only way they could have achieved this.
If they suprised Russia than it was not Russia picking a fight there.

Sakashvilis gamble did not pay off, and now he is trying to win via the media what he could not win via his military.

Don't know...home team advantage maybe?

I'd need to know exactly how the battle was conducted, a moment to moment history of the fracus to date to answer that question.

It is a good question though.

Err, you do realize that South Ossetia is in Georgia, right? It's not in Russia, and it is not a part of Russia, and it doesn't even want to be a part of Russia. You could say Georgia picked a fight with South Ossetia (and I guess some could argue the other way around, depending on what you believe), but it's definitely Russia that is being the agressor against Georgia, not the other way around.

__________________
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"The ultimate aim of production is not production of goods, but the production of free human beings associated with one another on terms of equality." - John Dewey.

Those pesky facts.

They do have a way of negating good points, don't they?

Fighting between the Georgians and the South Ossetia separatist rebels has been going on for over a decade. In fact, you could say that the situation in Georgia has been one of war interrupted by bouts of peace. All through this, the Georgians have offered South Ossetia a peace deal under which they would be given autonomy within a federal state. But no, the separatist leaders will only accept full independence.

There seems to have been scant media coverage of the fighting that broke out immediately prior to the invasion of S Ossetia. It seems that on 1st August, fighting, in the form of shelling broke out along the border. Perhaps that was the final straw for the Georgians.

This whole situation can be put in better context by reminding ourselves of the key events leading to this situation:

November 1989 - South Ossetia declares autonomy from the Georgian Soviet Socialist Republic, triggering three months of fighting.

December 1990 - Georgia and South Ossetia begin a new armed conflict which lasts until 1992.

June 1992 - Russian, Georgian and South Ossetian leaders meet in Sochi, sign an armistice and agree the creation of a tripartite peacekeeping force of 500 soldiers from each entity.

November 1993 - South Ossetia drafts its own constitution.

November 1996 - South Ossetia elects its first president.

December 2001 - South Ossetia elects Eduard Kokoity as president. In 2002 he asks Moscow to recognise the republic's independence and absorb it into Russia.

January 2005 - Russia gives guarded approval to Georgia's plan to grant broad autonomy to South Ossetia in exchange for dropping its bid for independence.

November 2006 - South Ossetia overwhelmingly endorses its split with Tbilisi in a referendum. Georgia's prime minister says this is part of a Russian campaign to stoke a war.

April 2007 - Georgia's parliament approves a law to create a temporary administration in South Ossetia, raising tension with Russia.

June 2007 - South Ossetian separatists say Georgia attacked Tskhinvali with mortar and sniper fire. Tbilisi denies this.

October 2007 - Talks hosted by the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe between Georgia and South Ossetia break down.

March 2008 - South Ossetia asks the world to recognise its independence from Georgia following the West's support for Kosovo's secession from Serbia.

March 2008 - Georgia's bid to join NATO, though unsuccessful, prompts Russia's parliament to urge the Kremlin to recognise the independence of South Ossetia and Abkhazia.

April 2008 - South Ossetia rejects a Georgian power-sharing deal, insists on full independence.


South Ossetia is not an independent state. It is not recognised as such by the UN or any country in the world. This being the case, Russia can only be regarded as the aggressor, since the problem of South Ossetia is an internal one.

There is little doubt that Russia has been itching for this fight. It even managed to manafacture an excuse by dishing out Russian passports to half the population of S. Ossetia (knowing that when the fight came they could claim to be protecting their own citizens).

Ironic isn't it, that Putin accuses Georgia of invading a sovereign state. What bullshit. That's precisely what he has done!

After the 92-94 war, the relations between Ossetia and georgia are about as good as the ones between Bosnia and Serbia, this makes getting someone to agree to "autonomys" quite unlikely.


Considering "picking fights":
85% of South Ossetias population have Russian passports. Russian peace keeping troops (who were there with a completely legal mandate signed by Georgia too) were killed during the initial georgian advance.

If there were "peace keeping troops" than there was a "peace agreement" which likely did not feature an allowance for Georgia to suprise attack the Ossetian Capital.

Although Georgia may have had a fairly legitimate reason of going to war, they cannot really complain about
a) the other side firing back
b) official allies (Abkhazia) of the other side fullfilling their treaty obligations and
c) Russia interfering in a fight where its citizens (the majority of South Ossetias inhabitants sport a Russian Passport) are attacked and where it legally operating peace keeping troops were killed. Apart from its interests and its reputation beeing at stake apart from Russia having officially warned them.



Of course Russia has power reasons, but they have a fairly legitimate cause here I think.

Georgia has withdrawn from SO. Yet Russia has now invaded Georgia proper seizing several towns and a military base. Are you NOW willing to accept that Russia is the aggressor? Or do we need to wait until January so you won't appear to be siding with Bush?

__________________
The fact that an opinion has been widely held is no evidence whatever that it is not utterly absurd. Indeed in view of the silliness of the majority of mankind, a widespread belief is more likely to be foolish than sensible.

-Bertrand Russell

Facts are stubborn things, but statistics are more pliable

-Laurence J. Peters

I never said that you had no right to have an opinion. I just said that it was, in fact, worth nothing.

-Maineman ( on 12 June 2007)

If someone attacked me I'd follow them back to their holes and smash their warmaking capabilities to ensure they got the message. That's just common sense

South Ossestia is part of Georgia. It's been party of Georgia since the state was created. If New Jersey rebels and we move in to put down the rebellion, are we starting a war with Russia if they decide to invade the United States based on what we do in our own territories?

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“The living of one protective principle of the gospel is better than a thousand compensatory government programs—which programs are, so often, like ‘straightening the deck chairs on the Titanic.’ ” Neal A Maxwell

“The Lord works from the inside out. The world works from the outside in. The world would take people out of the slums. Christ takes the slums out of people, and then they take themselves out of the slums. The world would mold men by changing their environment. Christ changes men, who then change their environment. The world would shape human behavior, but Christ can change human nature." -ETB

Would you? so you suppose Georgia smashing Russian warmaking capabilities to ensure they don't come back?

__________________
“The living of one protective principle of the gospel is better than a thousand compensatory government programs—which programs are, so often, like ‘straightening the deck chairs on the Titanic.’ ” Neal A Maxwell

“The Lord works from the inside out. The world works from the outside in. The world would take people out of the slums. Christ takes the slums out of people, and then they take themselves out of the slums. The world would mold men by changing their environment. Christ changes men, who then change their environment. The world would shape human behavior, but Christ can change human nature." -ETB