Australia.TO, Australia
Aug 25 2008
War à la carte
The US is inventing wars aplenty these days. Will it be Iran or
Ossetia this month? asks Eric Walberg
Last week, Georgia launched a major military offensive against the
rebel province South Ossetia , just hours after President Mikheil
Saakashvili had announced a unilateral ceasefire. Close to 1,500 have
been killed, Russian officials say. Thirty thousand refugees, mostly
women and children, streamed across the border into the North Ossetian
capital Vladikavkaz in Russia .
The timing ‘ and subterfuge ‘ suggest the unscrupulous Saakashvili was
counting on surprise. `Most decision makers have gone for the
holidays,’ he said in an interview with CNN. `Brilliant moment to
attack a small country.’ Apparently he was referring to Russia
invading Georgia , despite the fact that it was Georgia which had just
launched a full-scale invasion of the `small country’ South Ossetia,
while Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin was in Beijing for the
Olympics. Twenty-seven Russian peacekeepers and troops have been
killed and 150 wounded so far, many when their barracks were shelled
by Georgian forces at the start of the invasion. Georgian State
Minister for Reintegration Temur Yakobashvili rushed to announce that
their mini-blitzkreig had destroyed ten Russian combat planes ( Russia
says two) and that Georgian troops were in full control of the capital
Tskhinvali.
Russia’s Defense Ministry denounced the Georgian attack as a `dirty
adventure.’ From Beijing , Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said,
`It is regrettable that on the day before the opening of the Olympic
Games, the Georgian authorities have undertaken aggressive actions in
South Ossetia .’ He later added, `War has started.’ Russian President
Dmitry Medvedev vowed that Moscow will protect Russian citizens ‘ most
South Ossetians hold Russian passports. The offensive prompted Moscow
to send in 150 tanks, to launch air strikes on nearby Gori and
military sites, and to order warships to Georgia ‘s Black Sea coast.
Georgia’s national security council declared a state of war with
Russia and a full military mobilisation. US military planes are
already flying Georgia ‘s 2,000 troops in Iraq ‘ the third-largest
force after the United States and Britain ‘ back to confront the
Russians. By Sunday, despite early claims of victory, Georgian troops
had retreated from South Ossetia , leaving diplomatic rubble behind
which will be very hard to clear. Truth is stranger than fiction in
Georgia .
The writing has been on the wall for months. Georgian President
Saakashvili’s fawning over Western leaders at the `emergency’ NATO
meeting in April and his pre-election anti-Russian bluster in May made
it clear to all that Georgia is the more-than-willing canary in the
Eastern mine shaft. The Georgian attack on South Ossetia’s capital
Tskhinvali ‘ I repeat ‘ just hours after Saakashvili declared a
cease-fire, looks very much like an attempt to reincorporate the rebel
province into Georgia unilaterally. But whoever is advising the brash
young president ignores the postscript ‘ no pasaran! South Ossetia has
been independent for 16 years and is not likely to drape flowers on
invading Georgia tanks. It also just happens to have Russia as patron.
The aftershocks of this wild gamble by Saakashvili are just
beginning. This is Russia ‘s most serious altercation with a foreign
country since the collapse of the Soviet Union and could escalate into
an all-out war engulfing much of the Caucasus region. Russian warships
are not planning to block shipments of oil from Georgia ‘s Black Sea
port of Poti , Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Grigory Karasin said on
Sunday, but reserve the right to search ships coming to and from
it. Another source naval source said, `The crews are assigned the task
to not allow arms and military hardware supplies to reach Georgia by
sea.’ The Russians have already sunk a Georgian missile boat that was
trying to attack Russian ships. Upping the ante, Ukraine said it
reserved the right to bar Russian warships from returning to their
nominally Ukrainian ‘ formerly Russian ‘ base of Sevastopol , on the
Crimean peninsula. On Saturday, Russia accused Ukraine of `arming the
Georgians to the teeth.’
Georgia’s other separatist region, Abkhazia, was mobilising its forces
for a push into the Kodori Gorge, the only part of Abkhazia controlled
by Georgia . `No dialogue is possible with the current Georgian
leadership,’ said Abkhazia’s President Sergei Bagapsh. `They are state
criminals who must be tried for the crimes committed in South Ossetia
, the genocide of the Ossetian people.’ Britain has ordered its
nationals to leave Georgia . British charity worker Sian Davis said,
"It’s really, really quiet, eerily quiet. Everyone was either at home
or had packed up and moved out of the city. People are really, really
scared. People are panicking.’ So far the more than 2,000 US nationals
in this tiny but strategic country are mostly staying put.
This is yet another made-in-the-USA war. US President George W Bush
loudly supported Georgia ‘s request to join NATO in April, much to the
consternation of European leaders. NATO promised to send advisers in
December. Not losing any time, the US sent more than 1,000 US Marines
and soldiers to the Vaziani military base on the South Ossetian border
in July `to teach combat skills to Georgian troops.’ The UN Security
Council failed to reach an agreement on the current crisis after three
emergency meetings. A Russian-drafted statement that called on Georgia
and the separatists to `renounce the use of force’ was vetoed by the
US , UK and France . To dispel any conceivable doubt, Secretary of
State Condoleezza Rice said Friday: `We call on Russia to cease
attacks on Georgia by aircraft and missiles, respect Georgia ‘s
territorial integrity, and withdraw its ground combat forces from
Georgian soil.’
But it’s also yet another made-in-Israel war. A thousand military
advisers from Israeli security firms have been training the country’s
armed forces and were deeply involved in the Georgian army’s
preparations to attack and capture the capital of South Ossetia ,
according to the Israeli web site Debkafiles which has close links
with the regime’s intelligence and military sources. Haaretz reported
that Yakobashvili told Army Radio ‘ in Hebrew, ` Israel should be
proud of its military which trained Georgian soldiers.’ `We killed 60
Russian soldiers just yesterday,’ he boasted on Monday. `The Russians
have lost more than 50 tanks, and we have shot down 11 of their
planes. They have enormous damage in terms of manpower.’ He warned
that the Russians would try and open another battlefront in Abkhazia
and denied reports that the Georgian army was retreating. `The
Georgian forces are not retreating. We move our military according to
security needs.’
Israelis are active in real estate, tourism, gaming, military
manufacturing and security consulting in Georgia, including former Tel
Aviv mayor Roni Milo and Likudite and gambling operator Reuven
Gavrieli. `The Russians don’t look kindly on the military cooperation
of Israeli firms with the Georgian army, and as far as I know,
Israelis doing security consulting left Georgia in the past few days
because of the events there,’ the former Israeli ambassador to Georgia
and Armenia , Baruch Ben Neria, said yesterday. Since his posting, Ben
Neria has represented Rafael Advanced Defense Systems in Georgia .
By Sunday, Putin was in Vladikavkaz and said it is unlikely South
Ossetia will ever be reintegrated into Georgia . There are really only
two possible scenarios to end the conflict: a long-term stalemate or
Russian annexation of South Ossetia . The former is beginning to look
pretty good, and Saakashvili is probably already ruing his rash
move. The Georgian president is clearly hoping he can suck the US into
the conflict. Alexander Lomaya, secretary of Georgia ‘s National
Security Council, said only Western intervention could prevent all-out
war. But it is very unlikely Bush will risk WWIII over this scrap of
craggy mountain.
When US puppets get out of line, like a certain Saddam Hussein, they
are easily abandoned. Saakashvili would be wise to recall the fate of
the first post-Soviet Georgian president, Zviad Gamsakhurdia, also a
darling of the US (in 1978 US Congress nominated him for the Nobel
Peace Prize). He rode to victory on a wave of nationalism in 1990,
declaring independence for Georgia and officially recognising the
`Chechen Republic of Ichkeria’. But South Ossetia wanted no part of
the fiery Gamsakhurdia’s chauvinistic vision and declared its own
`independence’. Engulfed by a wave of disgust a short two years later,
abandoned by his US friends, he fled to his beloved Ichkeria. He snuck
back into western Georgia , looking for support in restive Abkhazia,
but his uprising collapsed, prompting Abkhazia to secede.
Gamsakhurdia died in 1993, leaving the two secessionist provinces as a
legacy, and was buried in Chechnya . Saakashvili rehabilitated him in
2004 and had his remains interred in Mtatsminda Pantheon with other
Georgian `heroes’. Truth really is stranger than fiction in Georgia
. Now the burning question is: will history repeat itself?
*** Eric Walberg writes for Al-Ahram Weekly. You can reach him at
tent&view=article&id=183:eric-walberg& catid=13:north-america&Itemid=36