The other day, it looked like there was a cease-fire agreement in place between Russia and Georgia. But remember what we said here--they key for determining whether this agreement was any good was simple: would the Russians actually withdraw.
Today there's evidence there's in fact no withdrawal.
My suspicion is that the Russians are trying to intimidate not only the Georgians, but other eastern European states as well, trying to keep them from drawing closer to the West.
President Bush will have to continue to take a tough line.
Showing posts with label Russia; invasion of Georgia; NATO. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Russia; invasion of Georgia; NATO. Show all posts
Monday, August 18, 2008
Thursday, August 14, 2008
What's really going on regarding Russia's invasion of Georgia?
I think Victor Davis Hanson on NRO the other day got at it quite well:
"The long-suffering Russian people resent the loss of global influence and empire, but not necessarily the Soviet Union and its gulags that once ensured such stature. The invasion restores a sense of Russian nationalism and power to its populace without the stink of Stalinism, and is indeed cloaked as a sort of humanitarian intervention on behalf of beleaguered Ossetians. There will be no Russian demonstrations about an “illegal war,” much less nonsense about “blood for oil,” but instead rejoicing at the payback of an uppity former province that felt its Western credentials somehow trumped Russian tanks. How ironic that the Western heartthrob, the old Marxist Mikhail Gorbachev, is now both lamenting Western encouragement of Georgian “aggression,” while simultaneously gloating over the return of Russian military daring."
Yep. Read the whole thing. Hanson points out that this crisis advertises, again, the weakness of NATO. True--and I think there's a simple reason for that (still): the end of the Cold War. NATO was a (necessary) invention of western anti-communism. It was very simple: an alliance designed to help keep in check Soviet expansionism. And it worked very well for over 40 years. But what function does it have if there ain't no USSR anymore? Russia today isn't communist; there's no agreement in the West on its aims, or on what threat it poses. Indeed, there's no agreement in the West, really, on just what NATO is supposed to do these days. And so, when crises erupt, NATO and its members tend to flail around a bit and accomplish little.
I am glad to see the Bush administration taking a stern line vs Mr. Putin and the Russians--let's hope it's effective.
"The long-suffering Russian people resent the loss of global influence and empire, but not necessarily the Soviet Union and its gulags that once ensured such stature. The invasion restores a sense of Russian nationalism and power to its populace without the stink of Stalinism, and is indeed cloaked as a sort of humanitarian intervention on behalf of beleaguered Ossetians. There will be no Russian demonstrations about an “illegal war,” much less nonsense about “blood for oil,” but instead rejoicing at the payback of an uppity former province that felt its Western credentials somehow trumped Russian tanks. How ironic that the Western heartthrob, the old Marxist Mikhail Gorbachev, is now both lamenting Western encouragement of Georgian “aggression,” while simultaneously gloating over the return of Russian military daring."
Yep. Read the whole thing. Hanson points out that this crisis advertises, again, the weakness of NATO. True--and I think there's a simple reason for that (still): the end of the Cold War. NATO was a (necessary) invention of western anti-communism. It was very simple: an alliance designed to help keep in check Soviet expansionism. And it worked very well for over 40 years. But what function does it have if there ain't no USSR anymore? Russia today isn't communist; there's no agreement in the West on its aims, or on what threat it poses. Indeed, there's no agreement in the West, really, on just what NATO is supposed to do these days. And so, when crises erupt, NATO and its members tend to flail around a bit and accomplish little.
I am glad to see the Bush administration taking a stern line vs Mr. Putin and the Russians--let's hope it's effective.
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