Govorit Mikhael Sergeyevich; maybe a good candidate for mediator?

Roman iz revoliutsionnoi’ zhizni Kavkaza
Doesn’t sound like Serbo-Croatian to me!
Hvala lijepo!

* RUSSIA

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“First of all we need to remove 1,000 guys from here within 96 hours, after that the rest of the guys,” Colonel Bondo Maisuradze told The Times this morning.

“The US will provide us with the transportation,” he added.
Webmaster’s Commentary:

Which means the United State is now openly engaged in military operations against Russia, making those transport planes legitimate targets of war.

All anyone who wants to really turn this into a Russo-American war needs to do is shoot one of those down.

We have been witnessing tremendous historical fact. Wednesday 7th of August 2008 is the day of the beginning of Russian-Georgian war. The propagandistic machine of Russia, which produced two conflicts of Abkhazia and South Ossetia are about to collapse. We have to bring it down finally through our intellectual efforts by overweighing the lies and targeted disinformation which is produced by the Russian media.

We have to admit the fact that Georgia missed the opportunity to tell the world its part of the truth in the beginning of 90s. We neither had the media infrastructure nor proper understanding of the chaos that Russian secret services made with the hands of ethnic Georgians, Abkhazs and Ossetians from the end of 80s, when Georgia begun its active liberation movement and following the independence in 1991. Russia was always distancing itself hiding behind the false treaties and memorandums imposed through chantage, ultimatums and using over-powerful and unfair leverages to force Georgia to concede.

In fact Georgia has been in a silent war with Russia since the early 90s. It has made its experiments on building another, updated, brand new iron curtain successful, which was mainly based on censored media controlled by the Russian authorities. It now attempts to begin a massive expansion of this iron curtain and present its atrocities against the nations that strive for freedom from Russia through professionally wrapped media streaming according to which everything that Russia does is right and legitimate.
While writing this letter the towns and villages are under heavy bombardment by Russian planes. Russian fleet rearranges and concentrates to prepare to attack Georgia from the Black Sea. Russian regular army in the amount 10 000 soldiers and 300 heavily armored tanks have entered through Roki tunnel. Same scenario is applied that Bolshevik Russia did in 1921 when independent Georgia was annexed.

I am very much hopeful that the world will wake up and stop Russia killing peaceful civilians. Putin and Medvev have to be brought to war crimes tribunal in The Hague for ethnic cleansing and massive murders.

We all stand united.

The Times isn’t wringing its hands at all, but pointing out the realities that constrain us. I thought it was a realistic appraisal.

If Saakashvili thought he could take back Ossetia without a Russian reaction, he’s more naive than I thought. What’s really troubling is that this brings out the worst instincts in people.

If the New York Times is wringing hands about “US” not bold enough to use force, well, we’ve seen that before as a prelude to absolute recklessness. The most encouraging thing you point out is that oil politics will be more of a detriment than enticement to geopolitical enthusiasts looking to earn a move in the history books.

Now I’m thinking this is an olympic theater of death which the Russians have already won. And, again, if I read the news correctly, it appears that the Georgian Army is digging in close to the ethnic Georgian villages. So the partition idea that Robert likes is nearly accomplished?

Would it be too much to ask for, if peace voices insisted on an immediate cease fire, followed by resumption of freedom of travel for all South Osstians as soon as the shooting stops. I know it’s too much to ask for at the border of Texas, but peace hopes should persist, nevertheless. Local peoples still need each other in practical ways that tend to refute their professed chauvenisms.

And thanks for the translation correction. I’m very curious to know more about Tsalykkaty.

Also, please note that Brat na brata is in Russian, not Serbian.

Supposing that minding one’s business is closely related to having opinions about what one’s elected powers are doing with one’s military tax dollars, I have to reject the argument that any attempt to think clearly about South Ossetia is by definition Cold War thinking. According to what I read, the Georgian Army is American trained and equipped to such a degree that the battle in South Ossetia is already a kind of American war by proxy. If I have any opinions about this use of my tax dollars, it may be delusional to think that they will count for anything in Congress, but I do not think it is irresponsible to think out loud and seek dialogue.

I especially want to thank heike and Michael for responding to the focus on what would be preferable and just from the point of view of the people of South Ossetia. This is what I would like to keep foremost in mind.

Heike says: “The real and just solution for South Ossetia as well as Abkhazia is autonomy while maintaining Georgia’s territorial integrity, but that doesn’t suit Russian purposes.”

Michael says: “what the South Ossetians are willing to settle for is to be joined to North Ossetia within the Russian Federation and Russia has conferred Russian citizenship on the South Ossetians with that in mind.”

At first glance the positions would appear to diverge from each other, heike preferring the status quo; Michael moving more in the direction of the position that I have explored above. Yet, on further consideration, they may converge upon a practical conclusion, that the status quo is going to continue to produce conflict, and that South Ossetians would be willing to settle for life under the Russian Federation since it would mean closer contact with their North Ossetian kin.

As I read the practical convergence, I think it is quite like the option that I have explored above, namely, not to favor prolonging the conflict on the basis of some commitment to the “integrity” of Georgia’s border.

This also sounds like what Mark Almond argues at CounterPunch, that “If westerners readily conceded non-Russian republics’ right to secede from the USSR in 1991, what is the logic of insisting that non-Georgians must remain inside a microempire which happens to be pro-western?”

I think this is a worthwhile start for progressive thinking about this conflict, since it contradicts the kind of “domino” thinking that is very likely to surface in American public opinion.

thanks again,
Greg

In 1939 they said that no one will go to war over Poland.

Never Never try to guess what people will or will not go to war over.

The Ossetians are a small people who live astride the Caucasus Mountains. They are Orthodox Christians and ethnically related to the Iranians. Thus the idea that they are somehow “kin” to the Slavic Russians is absurd. As far as can be seen, what they have in common with both Russians and Georgians, though, is that they all regard themselves as Europeans. Under the Soviet dictatorship the “autonomous “ republics of North Ossetia (Russia) and South Ossetia (Georgia) were set up, although nothing is in fact autonomous under a dictatorship. The collapse of the Soviet Union has left the Ossetians with an international frontier running through the middle of their homeland and it is to that that they object. Like the peoples of ex-Yugoslavia, therefore, all sides here are victims of communist fascism.

What the Ossetians want is to come together. Thus, South Ossetia does not want the independence which Mr Moses would force upon them! It wants to be joined to North Ossetia. The Ossetians would probably like that unified country to become independent, but getting independence from Russia would be a tall order at the moment, so, logically, they go for the easier target: Georgia. Indeed, I doubt if Russia would tolerate South Ossetian independence, since the North Ossetians would then inevitably want to join the new state. So what the South Ossetians are willing to settle for is to be joined to North Ossetia within the Russian Federation and Russia has conferred Russian citizenship on the South Ossetians with that in mind.

That any of this might lead to “World War III” is an idea that can exist only in the fairytale world of Americans! Nobody, but nobody is going to go to war for South Ossetia! Least of all the Russians! I would guess that the Russian aim is to disrupt NATO. Ex-Yugoslavia and Afghanistan has discredited NATO in Europe and, moreover, nobody in Europe, including Russia, likes the new cold war that US neocons are trying to manufacture. Russia is thus addressing itself to Europe and pointing out the dangers of NATO expansion and anti-Russian belligerence. Europeans will get the message loud and clear! Basically, it’s heads, Russia wins, tails, the US loses! That may well explain US reluctance to get involved.

I would once again make the point that Americans should cease to meddle in other countries’ affairs. The “people-centred” solution, Mr Moses, is thus to mind your own business!

Here is an interesting analysis. Note that while Hitler claimed that after the Sudetenland, he had no further territorial claims in Europe, that’s not the way the Russians are playing it:

http://www.stratfor.com/analysis/intelligence_guidance_conflict_south_ossetia

Let’s remember Churchill’s admonition: “each one feeds the crocodile and hopes the crocodile will eat him last. Each one hopes that the storm will pass before their turn comes to be devoured.”