AFTER WAR, RUSSIA’S INFLUENCE EXPANDS
By Fred Weir

The Christian Science Monitor
October 3, 2008

The war with Georgia has many calling for North and South Ossetia
to unite.

Vladikavkaz, Russia – Boris Samoyev, a driver from war-torn South
Ossetian capital of Tskhinvali, pulls his car over to allow a convoy
of Russian military trucks to roll past. The trucks are heading
south into the Roki Tunnel, which connects the republics of North
and South Ossetia.

"The Russians have helped us so much. They came when the Georgians
were beating our door down, and drove them back," Mr. Samoyev says. "We
Ossetians have always been loyal to Russia, and they have proven that
we made the right choice."

Though Moscow threw relations with the West into crisis by striking
with massive force when Georgia attempted to seize breakaway South
Ossetia in August, the impact in Russia’s turbulent, multiethnic
northern Caucasus appears to be in the Kremlin’s favor – at least
for now.

Many experts in North Ossetia, the most important of the seven ethnic
republics in this troubled region because of its historic and current
loyalty to Moscow, say Russia would have risked disaffection if it
hadn’t acted to protect South Ossetia.

Some add that the Kremlin should now allow North and South Ossetia
to unite, creating a pro-Moscow Ossetian republic that straddles the
Caucasus Mountains, to enhan ce stability in the whole region.

"This war showed that Russia is strong and a force to be reckoned
with. In one stroke, Moscow reassured its friends in the region and
warned its enemies. This will have a calming effect throughout the
Caucasus," says Nodar Taberti, a South Ossetian economist.

During the war, thousands of North Ossetians besieged military
recruitment stations, demanding to be sent to the front lines, experts
here say. "If the Russian Army hadn’t marched, thousands of Ossetian
men would have gone in on their own to fight the Georgians," says
Khasan Dzutsev, director of the official Center for Social Research
in Vladikavkaz. "Especially since [the terrorist school massacre
in] Beslan, people here have wondered whether Moscow would protect
them. This was the moment of truth."

But critics argue that Moscow has set a baneful precedent by
recognizing the independence of South Ossetia, and another breakaway
Georgian region, Abkhazia, and may pay a heavy price for it down
the road.

"All the arguments that [President Dmitry] Medvedev used to justify
Russia’s recognition of South Ossetia can apply in equal measure to
Chechnya, or other republics of the north Caucasus," says Nikolai
Petrov, an expert with the Carnegie Center in Moscow. "Since Moscow
has granted special status to two Caucasian republics – South Ossetia
and Abkhazia – it’s only a matter of time before others start demanding
the same treatment."

The northern Caucasus is often called "Russia’s Balkans," because its
knot of often mutually hostile nationalities. The mainly Orthodox
Christian Ossetians joined the Russian Empire voluntarily two
centuries ago. Others, like the mainly Muslim Chechens, were subdued
in 19th-century wars, and have risen up in rebellion when Moscow’s
grip has faltered.

Soviet social engineers awarded a quasi-statehood to the many smaller
nationalities, grouping them in "autonomous republics," most of which
were placed inside the larger "union republic" of Russia. But Soviet
dictator Joseph Stalin, an ethnic Georgian, folded South Ossetia and
Abkhazia into Georgia. That had unintended consequences when the USSR
collapsed in 1991, triggering separatist rebellions in both republics.

The biggest winners in Russia’s war against Georgia may turn out
to be the Ossetians, who number less than 1 million, in the two
republics. Many here believe it’s a matter of time before their
divided nation is united under a 2001 Russian law that permits outside
territories to join the Russian Federation. Unification would make the
Ossetians Moscow’s bridgehead into the energy-rich and strategically
important south Caucasus, which includes independent Georgia,
Azerbaijan, and Armenia.

"A divided nation has the right to reunite," says Stanislav Kesayev,
deputy speaker of North Ossetia’s parliament. "It may not happen
tomorrow, but after a period of consolidating its i ndependence,
South Ossetia will raise this request. Everyone in both north and
south parts of our nation desires this."

After the war, South Ossetian President Eduard Kokoity suggested
amalgamation was imminent. But now Mr. Kokoity says that "the issue of
joining Russia is not on the agenda today. Russia has put it clearly
that it is not going to annex other countries’ territories." But he
adds, "Our people want to join with North Ossetia, and we already
consider ourselves to be united [in many ways]."

But most analysts don’t think Russia wants North and South Ossetia
unified.

"It would look to the world like Russian annexation. Russia wants South
Ossetia to be independent … because it keeps the instability factor
going in Georgia. Also, the Kremlin worries about the implications
of creating a ‘greater Ossetia’ in the Caucasus, because it might
set up similar pressures among other republics who have territorial
aspirations beyond their current borders," says Alexei Mukhin,
director of the independent Center for Political Information in Moscow.

Despite the pro-Russian feelings here, some remain deeply skeptical
of Moscow’s intentions. In Beslan, where 330 people, mostly children,
were killed in a school siege four years ago, some recall that it
was the 58th Russian Army that shot first.

"It’s hard to welcome the sight of the 58th Army storming into a
neighboring territory and killing people, just as they did he re in
Beslan," says Ella Kesayeva, cochair of Voice of Beslan, a group
representing the victims’ relatives. "We fear that Russia wants
something on this territory and is using the suffering of people as
a means to get what it wants."

â~@¢ Olga Podolskaya contributed from Tskinvali, South
Ossetia. Yesterday: Who started the war in Georgia?

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