Culprits of Russia's Invasion of Georgia

In 1992 briefly after the Soviet Union fell apart, the regions Abkhazia and Ossetia wanted independence from Georgia (though both areas had a significant Georgian population). Russia seized this chance to hold on to the strategic area of the Caucasus and Black Sea ports. The disagreements over separation could have been contained or even solved eventually without a third party aggressor, but Russia jumped on the chance to escalate the conflict into an all out war; therein, sequestering these regions from Georgian control. They provided Abkhazia and Ossetia with weapons and aid. The conflict became a war with high casualties and atrocities committed by all sides. Then Russia under the UN banner positioned Russian soldiers as peacekeepers; peacekeepers who were supplying arms to the separatists. Under this guise Russian troops have conveniently been stationed in Georgia for 16 years. Furthermore, Russia gave citizenship to all the separatists as early as the 2000s in case anything happened they could invade Georgia and say "we are protecting our citizens." On the other side of the mountains (literally) the Russians have brutally massacred and suppressed any independence of Chechnya and Ingushetia. Russian government fights for the liberation of Abkhazia and Ossetia abroad but oppresses their own people who try to do the same. Vladimir Putin, former Russian president who is still running the government by proxy, has constantly used "territorial integrity" as justification of brutalities in Chechnya, but sees no inconsistency in invading a sovereign country.

The UN and the international community have let this go on for almost two decades. Now their failure of inaction and sheer incompetence has provoked more death and destruction of Georgians, Ossetians and Abkhazians. Russia is adamant about having a "privileged position" in Georgia even if that means installing a puppet government which is confirmed by recent comments about the Georgian president needing to go and calling Saakashvili a "political corpse." Furthermore one can look at Central Asia where they all have more-or-less Russian "friendly" governments.

The lead up to this recent Russian invasion, the fawning Georgian president, Mikhail Saakashvili was supporting Israel, sending troops to Iraq in support of the US and has been courting Europe while buying weapons from the same countries providing foreign aid. Slowly the façade started fading. First Europe turned down Georgia for NATO, and now that Georgia needs the help of the US and EU they are unable to do anything but issue "strong statements." Israel even stopped selling weapons to Georgia during the Russian invasion for fear of Russia arming Iran. Yet Georgia is in this predicament partly because of all the arms the West provided to Georgia (why were they selling it to them? What was the purpose? Why did a tiny country need to have so many arms?) and partly by approving Kosovo to become independent knowing this would have serious consequences for the rest of the international community. At the decision, Russia alluded to retaliation because they were in strong opposition and militated against an independent Kosovo.

No doubt there are many guilty parties in this war including the impetuous Georgian president who seems now delusional enough that he thought the West was going to militarily take on Russia for a tiny country like Georgia (though the West has done more than Russia would have hoped). The main culprit is Russia because it has consistently exercised its muscle in their near-abroad long before the US was in the picture, but one would be foolish to overlook the blatant armament of Georgia by the US and the hawkish policies of Saakashvili that contributed significantly to this particular conflict.

Bibliography

"A Caucasian journey." The Economist 28 Aug. 2008.

BBC News, ed. "Saakashvili a 'political corpse'" BBC News. 02 Sept. 2008. BBC. 06 Sept. 2008.

Mackinlay, John, and Peter Cross, eds. Regional Peacekeepers : The Paradox of Russian Peacekeeping. Minneapolis: United Nations Publications, 2005.

"South Ossetia is Not Kosovo." The Economist 28 Aug. 2008.

Stourton, Ed. "Georgia fails to escape its past." BBC News. 23 Aug. 2008. BBC. 30 Aug. 2008.