More on Georgia
James Sherr in The Age:
Western interests…are being tested on three overlapping levels: local, regional and global. Georgia is not just a square on a chessboard, but a country that is extremely important in its own right…
First, despite the uncultivated instincts of its President, Georgia’s political culture is fundamentally democratic, its people (80% of whom support NATO membership) profoundly pro-Western, and its sense of national identity almost indestructible. Georgia can be defeated by Russia, but it can no longer submit to it, and therefore war between Georgia and Russia would be a frightening prospect even if no wider interests existed.
Second, the only energy pipeline in the former USSR independent of Russian control passes through Georgia. There will be no meaningful energy security, let alone diversification of energy supplies, if pipelines become vulnerable to sabotage, like those in Iraq, or to takeover by shadow businesses fronting for Russian interests…
[Third] Georgia is equally important to Russia. Russia has only controlled the nationalities of the north Caucasus when it has dominated the south Caucasus. Despite the so-called “normalisation” in Chechnya, the north Caucasus remains, to Russia’s leaders, the Achilles heel of the Russian Federation. Russia’s regional objectives are straightforward. It aims to show its neighbours, by means of the Georgian example, that Russia is “glavniy“: that its contentment is the key to “stability and security”, and that if Russia expresses its discontent, NATO will be unwilling and unable to help.
One has to question the proposed expansions of NATO to include nations like Georgia, given the reluctance of the EU nations to get involved in anything military and the overstretched armed forces of the United States (eg, the number of lawyers in the United States almost equals the size of the entire active duty military).
August 11th, 2008 at 9:48 pm
As Neville Chamberlain said “it is a small country, far away of which we know little” just before he sacrificed the Czechs to the Nazis. Today we see the same thing. The US has been hoisted on its own petard by supporting Kosovno against Serbia. So are we now to support every state that wishes to break awat? Shades of the American South against Lincoln!
Just goes to show you the era of gunboat diplomacy never went away, nor did those who will sacrifice others willingly for a higher “moral” cause such as profits.