Caucasus Crisis

[ramana]

Need to see if Georgia was used as a gambit by US. In chess one sacrifices a pawn to achieve greater success. Was the greater objective to make Europe realize Russia was still aorund as a bogeyman? Was it to make the former Warsaw pact members rush into US arms? We dont know yet.

In addition to Texmati, Darawaza is also a Soviet expert. And they all didnt see the Russian reaction?

[John Snow]

Please don't forget the recent incursions of Turkey military with tanks and bombing of Iraqi kurdish areas, upon which president Bush said to turkey do what ever you need to but don't stay long as we are here!

[Shivani]

Georgia leader signs truce, but will Russia leave?

By MATTHEW LEE and ANNE GEARAN – 42 minutes ago

TBILISI, Georgia (AP) — Georgia's president grudgingly signed a truce with Russia Friday, even as he denounced the Russians as invading barbarians and accused the West of all but encouraging them to overrun his country. A stone-faced Condoleezza Rice, standing alongside, said Russian troops must withdraw immediately from their smaller neighbor.

President Bush talked tough, too, accusing the Russians of "bullying and intimidation," but neither he nor Rice said what the U.S. might do if Russia ignored them.

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev's press office had no information Friday night on whether he had signed the cease-fire agreement.

Even as Rice stood with Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili in a show of solidarity, he asked, "Who invited the trouble here? Who invited this arrogance here? Who invited these innocent deaths here?" [ ]

Shaky and near tears following a difficult, nearly five-hour meeting with her, Saakashvili answered his own question: "Not only those people who perpetrate them are responsible, but also those people who failed to stop it."

Rice let that pass, focusing instead on the demand that Moscow immediately withdraw its forces.

"With this signature by Georgia, this must take place and take place now," she declared.

There was no immediate clue to the Russians' intentions a week after their tanks and bombers attacked Georgia in retaliation for Georgia's attempt to retake a disputed province by force.

Russian troops allowed some humanitarian supplies into the strategic city of Gori but otherwise continued their blockade.

The cease-fire document sets out no specific penalties or deadlines. It contains concessions to Russia that Saakashvili obviously found hard to swallow. Russia could retain peacekeeping forces in the separatist region of South Ossetia and another breakaway region, Abkhazia, and the forces would have a broader mandate in South Ossetia.

Even if Russia fully complies with the cease-fire, the Bush administration says there will be more consequences to come. Bush's advisers are settling on penalties that would be intentionally modest and subtle, such as continuing to exclude Russia's foreign minister from discussions among his counterparts in elite gatherings of the world's leading economies.

The idea is to give Moscow the diplomatic cold shoulder while offering face-saving leeway for Russia to turn away from a mentality the West sees as throwback to its empire days. Russia would then have motivation, and some wiggle room, to seek inclusion in Western economic, political and security institutions.

In Washington, Bush accused Russia of resorting to thuggery from another era. He insisted the United States will not abandon Georgia, a Western-leaning democracy on Russia's southern flank and once part of the old Soviet Union.

"Bullying and intimidation are not acceptable ways to conduct foreign policy in the 21st century," Bush said. "Only Russia can decide whether it will now put itself back on the path of responsible nations or continue to pursue a policy that promises only confrontation and isolation."

Russian withdrawal from Gori, in the center of Georgia proper, would be a major sign that Russia is not trying to hold permanent sway in Georgia or topple its enthusiastically pro-American government. By holding Gori, Russia holds the small country's only major east-west highway and effectively slices Georgia in half.

The peace pact was worked out earlier in the week by French president Nicolas Sarkozy and both sides had said they agreed to it.

Russian forces remained, however, and U.S. officials said the document would take effect once it was formally signed Friday. It tells both sides to pull their forces back to the positions they held before fighting broke out last week in South Ossetia.

Saakashvili's emotional tirade the forceful words from Bush in Washington suggested that a week into the crisis, both leaders were reassessing how they got here.

"We will rebuild. We want them out. I want the world to know, never, ever will Georgia reconcile with occupation of even one square kilometer of its sovereign territory. Never, ever," Saakashvili said.

His leadership is founded on a close alliance with Washington that has always exasperated Moscow.

Bush gave his most sustained explanation of U.S. action during the crisis, saying the conflict is about much more than a small country far away. Bush made clear the real fight is about the power and ambition of nuclear-armed Russia after the collapse of the Soviet Union and Russia's resurgence as an energy dynamo.

"The Cold War is over. The days of satellite states and spheres of influence are behind us," Bush said at the White House, before a vacation delayed by the crisis. "A contentious relationship with Russia is not in America's interest, and a contentious relationship with America is not in Russia's interest."

Rice said the time had come "to begin a discussion of the consequences of what Russia has done. This calls into question what role Russia really plans to play in international politics."

Rice was flying to Texas, where she was to give Bush a firsthand account of her diplomatic mission.

Apparently concerned that her awkward press conference with Saakashvili had set the wrong tone, Rice spoke briefly on her own before leaving Georgia.

"It's obviously a very emotional time here in Georgia," she said after visiting wounded people in a hospital.

"It's clearly a very emotional time, but I think that it should still be seen that this was a productive day. I hope now that peace can return to Georgia and Georgians can return to a normal life."

Associated Press Writer Anne Gearan reported from Washington. AP Writers Terence Hunt and Jennifer Loven contributed to this report from Washington.

[enqyoob]

Naraynan, its still not late to document the media analysis. We need volunteers to fill in the outline you have posted.

I agree. But like I said, it looks like the volunteers who actually deliver have left BRF...

Like the Mullah Vamanullah and Al Haj Abdul Enqyoob Faisalabadi. Where's JEM these days I wonder?

These oh-so-serious-sounding newbies with all their pompous-sounding buzzwords, just ain't got it to do real creative work which takes enormous patience and dedication and the determination to find the truth in the face of overwhelming propaganda, ramanaji.

(OK, THAT'S AS FAR AS I CAN GO IN "BAITING" OR GOADING WRITERS... with the likes of Big-Moush Jagan on the prowl with the Bandook-e-BRFPandoo)

[Shivani]

In chess one sacrifices a pawn to achieve greater success.

Russia Lashes Out on Missile Deal

By THOM SHANKER and NICHOLAS KULISH
Published: August 15, 2008

WASHINGTON — The United States and Poland reached a long-stalled deal on Thursday to place an American missile defense base on Polish territory, in the strongest reaction so far to Russia’s military operation in Georgia.

Russia reacted angrily, saying that the move would worsen relations with the United States that have already been strained severely in the week since Russian troops entered separatist enclaves in Georgia, a close American ally. At a news conference on Friday, a senior Russian defense official, Col. Gen. Anatoly Nogovitsyn, suggested that Poland was making itself a target by agreeing to host the anti-missile system. Such an action “cannot go unpunished,” he said.

The deal reflected growing alarm in a range of countries that had been part of the Soviet sphere about a newly rich and powerful Russia’s intentions in its former cold war sphere of power. In fact, negotiations dragged on for 18 months — but were completed only as old memories and new fears surfaced in recent days.

Those fears were codified to some degree in what Polish and American officials characterized as unusual aspects of the final deal: that at least temporarily American soldiers would staff air defense sites in Poland oriented toward Russia, and that the United States would be obliged to defend Poland in case of an attack with greater speed than required under NATO, of which Poland is a member.

Polish officials said the agreement would strengthen the mutual commitment of the United States to defend Poland, and vice versa. “Poland and the Poles do not want to be in alliances in which assistance comes at some point later — it is no good when assistance comes to dead people,” the Polish prime minister, Donald Tusk, said on Polish television. “Poland wants to be in alliances where assistance comes in the very first hours of — knock on wood — any possible conflict.”

A sense of deepened suspicions — and the more darkly drawn lines between countries in the region — were also apparent in the emotional reaction from Russia.

“It is this kind of agreement, not the split between Russia and United States over the problem of South Ossetia, that may have a greater impact on the growth in tensions in Russian-American relations,” Konstantin Kosachyov, chairman of the foreign affairs committee in the Russian Parliament, told the Interfax news agency on Thursday in Moscow.

South Ossetia is the pro-Russian enclave inside Georgia where Russia sent troops last week, following a military crackdown by the pro-Western government in Georgia.

The missile defense deal was announced by Polish officials and confirmed by the White House. Under it, Poland would host an American base with 10 interceptors designed to shoot down a limited number of ballistic missiles, in theory launched by a future adversary such as Iran.(They forgot India...) A tracking radar system would be based in the Czech Republic. The system is expected to be in place by 2012.

In exchange for providing the base, Poland would get what the two sides called “enhanced security cooperation,” notably a top-of-the-line Patriot air defense system that can shoot down shorter-range missiles or attacking fighters or bombers.

A senior Pentagon official described an unusual part of this quid pro quo: an American Patriot battery would be moved from Germany to Poland, where it would be operated by a crew of about 100 American military personnel members. The expenses would be shared by both nations. American troops would join the Polish military, at least temporarily, at the front lines — facing east toward Russia.

Russia has long opposed the deal, saying the United States was violating post-cold-war agreements not to base its troops in former Soviet bloc states and devising a Trojan Horse system designed to counter Russia’s nuclear arsenal, not an attack by Iran or another adversary.

Stop-and-start negotiations over the arrangement that was sealed Thursday had been under way for almost two years, with the Polish government reluctant to press the deal in the face of strong opposition — and retaliatory threats — from Moscow.

For its part, Washington had balked at some of Poland’s demands, in particular the sale of advanced air defense systems that were unrelated to shooting down ballistic missiles.

But in a sign of the widening repercussions of the conflict in Georgia, those concerns were cast aside, as the offensive by Russia’s military across its borders was viewed around the world as a sign of Moscow’s determination to reimpose its influence across the old Soviet bloc.

Polish officials, in announcing the agreement, said it would be presented to the National Legislature, although it remained unclear whether the American base would require a vote of approval.

The other half of the American missile defense system in Europe would be an advanced radar in the Czech Republic for tracking specific targets and then precisely guiding an interceptor to destroy a warhead. Likewise, that deal has been signed by the country’s leaders, and is awaiting debate in the Czech Parliament.

At the White House, the press secretary, Dana M. Perino, confirmed that senior officials had initialed the agreement. “In no way is the president’s plan for missile defense aimed at Russia,” she said. “In fact, it’s just not even logically possible for it to be aimed at Russia, given how Russia could overwhelm it. The purpose of missile defense is to protect our European allies from any rogue threats, such as a missile from Iran.”

The Bush administration, in an attempt to prove its sincerity and transparency, had invited Moscow to join as a partner in a continentwide missile defense system, sharing information and technology with NATO allies.

While Russian and American experts have discussed cooperation, senior officials in Moscow have kept up a nonstop stream of complaints about the system.

The agreement also poses potential political problems for Democratic critics of missile defense who would be fighting to cut financing for the program in the face of the specific request from Poland and in light of the Russian offensive into Georgia.

There is no such ambivalence on Russia’s periphery, where Moscow’s attack signaled danger, and offered logic for closer ties with Washington and NATO.

In Poland, the war in Georgia has dominated the front pages of newspapers, where it has been starkly characterized as Russian invaders attacking Georgia. For Poles, Russia’s actions also come as a vindication of Poland’s distrust of its former conqueror and was a warning about issues like energy security, one of the primary areas in which a resurgent Russia first began to exert itself.

“We are worried that we are facing, under the strong arm of Russia, a situation where some kind of understanding would be reached that Russia would be given a free hand in the region,” said Eugeniusz Smolar, director of the Center for International Relations, a nonprofit, nonpartisan research group in Warsaw.

[NRao]

Some in the US want to return of the Cold War. Whether it is for a true Cold War or because they see a chance to put the Russians away once and for all - near term at least - one cannot say at this time. But, it is clear that their logic has changed from the Georgians starting a regional conflict to the Russian disproportionate response to now all out a Russian preplanned invasion. In Staring Down the Russians ZBIGNIEW BRZEZINSKI has this to start his essay:

The end of the Cold War was supposed to usher in a new age in which the major powers would no longer dictate to their neighbors how to run their affairs. That is why Russia's invasion of Georgia is so tragic and so potentially ominous. Russia is now on watch: Will it continue to rely on coercion to achieve its imperial aims or is it willing to work within the emerging international system that values cooperation and consensus?

Between that and, the now famous Ms Rice statement:

This is not 1968 and the invasion of Czechoslovakia where Russia can threaten a neighbour, occupy a capital, overthrow a government and get away with it. Things have changed.

One can see that the US in particular is trying its best to turn the table, snatch this opportunity to corner the Russians.

I can bet if the Russians do not cooperate on Iran the focus will be on Russia and not on Iran.

[jash_p]

Some in the US want to return of the Cold War. Whether it is for a true Cold War or because they see a chance to put the Russians away once and for all - near term at least - one cannot say at this time. But, it is clear that their logic has changed from the Georgians starting a regional conflict to the Russian disproportionate response to now all out a Russian preplanned invasion. In Staring Down the Russians ZBIGNIEW BRZEZINSKI has this to start his essay:

Pakis are salivating at the word of new cold war. They are singing Zia's days are here again, jehad up ! jehad up !!

[montybal]

maybe i'm a bit too conspiratorial, but... i think the americans are clever... talk georgia into picking a fight with russia, knowing fully well what type of response russia would give... giving more reason for poland and the other nato countries on the russian border to sign up with their missile defense shield, and get even closer to the US, scare the western euros with the re-emergent russian threat... give a defined enemy for all those who weren't too sure about this undefinable terror threat... the US never had any real hopes that georgia would be allowed to have a close relation with them, or join nato... the neocons worked this out pretty well...

[SwamyG]

Color me skeptical, but along with media all the stars are lining up for McCain's coronation in Jan'09.
Georgia, Turkey, Poland...... oh man.

[ramana]

If anyone is to be blamed blame it on the Romans. When the Western wing whithered away they nurtured the Eastern wing at Constantinopole. And when that fell to the Ottomons, Muscovy became the new Byzantium. And nurtured the idea to create the third Roman Empire. Even the Soviets were pursuing that goal under the Communist rhetoric. Mao saw through that and went his own way leading to the great split. After FSU collapsed and Putin came to power the same goal is being pursued.

But the other side is not pure either. They see themselves as the Western inheritors of the Roman Empire via the Anglo-Saxons. During the Renaissance to Modernism period they secularized and internalised the religion, so it is appeals to more people. We see the two branches of Roman Empire duking it out.

However was the idea of a universal empire a Roman one? No its was from the Greeks who realized it under Alexander. But then the Greeks got it from the Persians of the 5th century BC who terrorized the Greeks and called Sparta and Athens rogue states.

So blame it on the Persians!

Where did the Persians get their ideology? Zarthurashtar and his ideas of Ahura Mazda.

[Paul]

and Ahura Mazda is Varuna - so blame the Yindoos!!!!

[SwamyG]

After the Olympics and with the lack luster US & European economies, China will be forced to act.

[NRao]

After the Olympics and with the lack luster US & European economies, China will be forced to act.

Interesting.

And, what would they do. Go East I hope.

[enqyoob]

It does look like the Georgian Musharraf was expended by the US to get Poland to join NMD, and maybe even Ukraine.

Of course this is all just a huge scam to sell overpriced junk from US companies to these suckers. As I have explained b4, ballistic missiles are passe for all except short-range love exchanges. None of these radar or interceptor stations can do diddly about hypersonic cruise missiles.

So the net result is an all-out arms race to develop hypersonic cruise missiles and counters to that. Yippee! Unfortunately I have no money to buy defense stocks.

[svinayak]

Green Berets now in Georgia: U.S. Special Forces are training Georgian soldiers to fight radical Muslims. The mission could benefit other U.S. interests as well

US military advisers arrive in Georgia

Russia Begins Troop Deployment in Georgian Border Region

By VOA News
01 May 2008
Russia says it has begun deploying new military units in the Georgian breakaway region of Abkhazia, despite strong Georgian objections and NATO concerns

Georgia resumes shelling the South Ossetian capital

The fighting in South Osstian capital, Tskhinvali, is continuing with Georgian troops once again entering the city. There are reports that Georgian Special Forces have been throwing grenades into basements where women and children are sheltering.

Russia orders halt to war, U.S. cancels exercise

The conflict over the separatist province of South Ossetia, which seeks independence and threw off Georgian rule in the 1990s, has spooked markets and rattled the West.

[JaiS]

BBC Video: Georgia president chews over his next move

[Gerard]

Pity there aren't more caps. He was stuffing more and more of the tie in his mouth and you could see teeth.

Ah.. its on YouTube
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GqSIXIwGLhI

[Muppalla]

In this particular situation, Saakashvili's plight is almost like Nehru's plight when India was attacked by China. India's case was far worse at that time. These are the examples of leadership with extreme bad calculations which is not based on reality but based on ego and self professed theories.

[John Snow]

From a military perspective I think Hezbollah vs Isreal, Hezbollah did better than Ivans vs Gerogians.

Russian equipment is no where near western equipment. The loss of aircraft like Su 24 and the Russian armed forces using T-72 while pushing T-90 to India is an indication of cutomer cash driven arms development strategy!
Igor posts all kind uber modern small arms, tanks ect but the Russian armed forces are using 1970s vintage equipment. In EW they are I think 1960s. No wonder rambha we followed the right strategy of our own mix of electronics.
Even in Kargil we lost Russian made planes (mig 23/27 Nachiketa, Mil Sqdr Ldr Ahuja) but no Mirages or others.

In a all out war between US and Russian forces I think Russian equipment will be routed with in first 48 hrs period.

Long ways to go for Ivan. India better diversify and customize buying only shells ( I mean the frame and build our own integrated machines)

[Gerard]

Now where and when did we hear this before?

Russian headache looms for next US President

"The Russian government desperately wants the West to treat it as an important and respected great power," James Rubin, ex-spokesman for Democratic secretary of state Madeleine Albright, wrote on the Huffington Post website. "We can and should withhold that treatment. No diplomatic business as usual."

[Rahul M]

Pity there aren't more caps. He was stuffing more and more of the tie in his mouth and you could see teeth.

Ah.. its on YouTube
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GqSIXIwGLhI

can we nominate him for a joint "ditched by bushy" prize along with mush ?

[SwamyG]

Fox News cuts people off when describing the aggressors. Fox News did not expect these. Heeee heeeeeee. Notice how the aunt pats/touches the 12-year old girls hand after returning from the break. Hmmmmmm, what must the Fox News guys told them during the commercial break?

One more case where the media does not give the full picture to the American citizens.

[Gerard]

Georgia forced to accept a Russian occupation

Russia to pull troops from conflict zone

[Victor]

Fox News cuts people off when describing the aggressors. Fox News did not expect these. Heeee heeeeeee.

I would'nt be surprised if the two ladies said one thing before the telecast and another during. Well planned Russki danda!

[Johann]

It does look like the Georgian Musharraf was expended by the US to get Poland to join NMD, and maybe even Ukraine.

That is to give the Bush administration far too much credit for foresight, when the truth is that the Georgian adventure has come as an embarassing surprise to them.

No, the Polish government couldnt think of a better way to send a signal to the Russians.

The Russians have allowed their irrational fears of losing nuclear superpower status to actually push the Poles and Czechs in to American (and French) arms.

There is absolutely no way that these facilities could threaten Russian ability to deliver assured destruction to any NATO state.

On the other hand the Poles and Czechs had a very limited direct threat perception from Iran or Syria or Libya, and hence very little stake in them - until Russia started upping the threats to pointing nuclear missiles at them. Now they are absolutely to American deterrence. The Eastern Europeans are now even going to help pay for a system that will protect Paris, London, and perhaps DC and NYC from Iranian and other mid east missiles.

Very, very stupid on the Russians part to distribute threats so uniformly across its Western periphery. But a lot of people at the top of Russia's foreign and defence policy were part of the machine when they could as in the early 1980s threaten their clients with invasion if they didnt toe the line, eg Poland 1980-81 was told very clearly that they would face an intervention if they didnt put their house in order.

All of Putin's nostalgic acts in the last 8 years - restoring the Red Army's star, the Soviet anthem, putting up busts of Andropov etc is no incentive to become a Russian ally - after all the USSR only invaded its allies - Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Afghanistan.

p.s. The Georgians of course cant pay for much in the way of weapons. Its going to be US taxpayer funded Foreign Military Sales credits for them.

[ramana]

In this particular situation, Saakashvili's plight is almost like Nehru's plight when India was attacked by China. India's case was far worse at that time. These are the examples of leadership with extreme bad calculations which is not based on reality but based on ego and self professed theories.

This is incorrect. Nehru did not attack any part of China or Tibet unlike Saakashvili. Please dont Compare Nehru who had his faults with short sighted puppets.

[SwamyG]

[Shivani]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GqSIXIwGLhI

These antics are rehearsed stunts being played out in front of media to garner sympathy and portray himself as a victim.

Earlier he 'escaped' with his bodyguards on sighting some Russian aircraft in the sky....while everyone else on the street including the media walked calmly and observed the streetside drama.

He shouldn't bother. The western media has already condemned the Russians to be worse than Nazis and are 'examining' the way of punishing / eliminating them.

[Gerard]

Six days that broke one country - and reshaped the world order

[shyamd]

The Georgian president says Washington backed his invasion of Tskhinvali and left him in the lurch. Moscow believes in a CIA conspiracy. No one confirms either claim, and some say Saakashvili is passing the buck for his army’s rout by Russian forces.

[NRao]

It does look like the Georgian Musharraf was expended by the US to get Poland to join NMD, and maybe even Ukraine.

That is to give the Bush administration far too much credit for foresight, when the truth is that the Georgian adventure has come as an embarassing surprise to them.

This from WSJ (login required):

U.S. Diplomat, Close to Saakashvili, Plays Key Role in Conflict

U.S. Diplomat, Close to Saakashvili,
Plays Key Role in Conflict
By JAY SOLOMON in Washington and MARC CHAMPION in Tbilisi, Georgia
August 16, 2008; Page A5

When Russian tanks rolled out of South Ossetia and into Georgia proper Monday, triggering fears of a full-scale invasion, a man began furiously shoving U.S. diplomat Matthew J. Bryza around the lobby of the Marriott Tbilisi, the capital's fanciest hotel.

"It's your fault too," shouted Georgy Khaindrava, a former Georgian minister for conflict resolution. "If you hadn't propped up Misha Magariya [Misha the strong], we wouldn't have tanks here now," he said, referring to Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili.

Mr. Bryza, who is in his mid-40s, is a household name in Georgia, closely identified with U.S. support for Georgia and for its pro-Western president, Mr. Saakashvili. When he goes out in the street, people sometimes ask to take their picture with him. They ask for his autograph. And, like Mr. Khandraiva, a fierce critic of Mr. Saakashvili since being fired, some of them get mad.

In this conflict, which threatens to rewrite U.S.-Russian relations, the Stanford and Tufts University-educated Mr. Bryza has taken a central role, despite his title. A deputy assistant secretary of state for European and Eurasian affairs, he has been Washington's point man on territorial disputes in the Caucasus since the beginning of President George W. Bush's first term.

He also oversaw U.S. efforts to break Moscow's stranglehold over Central Asia's oil and gas supplies to Europe, a project for which Georgia is essential. That project suffered a setback after Russia apparently tried to bomb oil pipelines in Georgia.

The affable Mr. Bryza has developed a reputation as a hard-liner on Russia's actions towards the former states of the Soviet Union and a staunch defender of both Georgia and the 40-year-old Mr. Saakashvili, with whom he has a close personal relationship.

Critics say that has complicated the U.S.-Georgian relationship, possibly diluting State Department warnings to Tbilisi against engaging in a military confrontation with Russia. Some say there were signs for months that Russia was laying a trap for Mr. Saakashvili.

Lt. Col. Robert Hamilton, who headed the Office of Defense Cooperation in the U.S. Embassy in Tbilisi until last month, said Russia took a number of steps that appeared designed either to spark a war or force a "creeping annexation" of the two disputed provinces at the center of the conflict.

Col. Hamilton said he was particularly concerned about Russia's deployment in April of hundreds of "railroad workers" to reconnect transportation links between Russia and Abkhazia, which U.S. officials now believe was preparation for the conflict.

"In every case, Georgia appealed for international assistance," he said.

Mr. Bryza said Washington has been firm with Tbilisi. He said that for at least four months, he and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice as well as other U.S. diplomats had repeatedly delivered the same message to Mr. Saakashvili: that the Georgian leader should "avoid an unwinnable confrontation with Russia."

Though he acknowledges a close and long relationship with Mr. Saakasvili, Mr. Bryza says his diplomatic role is not about friendship. "This is not about any one leader, it's about democracy," he says.

He noted that in November, when Mr. Saakashvili cracked down on opposition protesters using tear gas and rubber bullets, shutting down an opposition television station, he was the one who took a "very tough" message to the Georgian president.

"We'll support you as long as you are a democrat," Mr. Bryza says he told Mr. Saakashvili.

This time around, he has expressed firm public support for the Georgians. Arriving in Tbilisi Monday to try to negotiate a cease-fire, Mr. Bryza blasted Russian forces for what he said were their premeditated military actions in South Ossetia and Georgia. He also challenged Russian claims that Moscow's offensive inside Georgia was akin to Washington's 2003 invasion of Iraq, essentially an act of self-defense.

"Saddam Hussein was not a leader who transformed his country into the world's leading economic reformer," Mr. Bryza told reporters at Tblisi's international airport. "President Saakashvili and his government are democratically elected."

Mr. Bryza, who speaks fluent Russian and Polish, was based in Poland from 1989 to 1991. From 1995 to 1997, he served in the U.S. Embassy in Moscow and monitored the Russian legislature and the Communist Party as a political officer.

The U.S. diplomat must manage a widening crisis with a Georgian leadership remarkably short of international experience. Defense Minister David Kezerashvili is just 30 years old, and many of Mr. Saakashvili's other top aides have yet to hit 40. Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin is 55.

"You had this massive generational change in Georgia's leadership in recent years that gave young officials enormous responsibilities," says Cory Welt, who directs Georgetown University's Eurasian Strategy Project. "This can lead to mistakes."

In recent days, Mr. Bryza and Ms. Rice, who visited Tbilisi Friday, have worked to safeguard Georgia's democratic transition by trying to hammer out a cease-fire agreement between Russia and Georgia and a plan for the deployment of international peacekeepers into disputed regions. The U.S. has also worked to ferry humanitarian supplies into Georgia as international relief agencies say there are now more then 100,000 displaced peoples in the country.

Mr. Bryza says there may be a silver lining to the conflict. "This need not be the defeat that many people in Georgia perceive it to be," he said. "The situation is serious, make no mistake," he added, but with Russia's international reputation "back on its heels, Georgia has an opportunity to reshape the international mechanisms around the frozen conflict zones."

Write to Jay Solomon at [email protected] and Marc Champion at [email protected]

[svinayak]

Soros Agent Spilled the Beans:Lord Malloch Brown is Conduit to Obama" -LPAC

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

August 15, 2008 (LPAC)--In a London Times interview dated February 24, 2008, the Barack Obama campaign's senior foreign policy adviser Samantha Power revealed that "the principal conduit between Britain and the candidate [Obama] has been Lord [Mark] Malloch-Brown, the junior foreign minister, whom Obama came to admire when he was deputy secretary-general of the United Nations. `He was really taken with him. It's a relationship that has persisted and they have talked a number of times since.'"

Two weeks after the articles publication, Samantha Power was forced out of the Obama staff. The public reason for her departure was her remark March 6 that Hillary Clinton is "a monster."
The significance of the Malloch-Brown/Obama connection may not have been widely noticed at the time Ms. Power boasted of it; Lord Malloch Brown was being played as a liberal critic of George W. Bush. But the fact that Malloch Brown on behalf of Britain, and George Soros -- later Malloch Brown's own investment partner -- had created the present government of Georgia and have just organized the recent war provocation against Russia, has put the matter into a lurid new light.

Samantha Power is herself a "human rights mafia" operative of George Soros and his British sponsors. In a 2004 forum, she stated, "My book [A Problem from Hell: America and the Age of Genocide, 2003] and my research was utterly unsustainable on the free market. If I hadn't been able to get a grant from George Soros and the Open Society Institute, there is no way that I could have done the kind of investigative reporting that I needed to do...

link

[John Snow]

Acharya garu>> If you keep spilling the truth, you will be touted as a conspiracy capatain.
If people come to know what you are saying is true after the event or 10 yrs fromnow, then they will say its history!

Just my caution
"Even in BRF some can't see tomorrow, today and along with others await it to dawn"

[svinayak]

Acharya garu>> If you keep spilling the truth, you will be touted as a conspiracy capatain.

I have figured out that it comes with the territory. Truth is more important

[Karan Dixit]

http://www.calcuttanews.net/story/395013

A bit off topic. So please accept my apology in advance admins.

Here is a scenario:

One day Russia by mistake of course ends up hitting Poland with tactical nukes. There was some kind of mix up in Russian missile forces. Russia immediately calls U.S., apologizes and asks for forgiveness. Russia assures U.S. that it has no intention of starting the ultimate nuclear war.

What will be U.S. response?

a) Will U.S. accept Russian apology and for the greater good of America and humanity not start the ultimate nuclear war with Russia?

b) Will U.S. start an all out war with Russia resulting in total destruction of Russia, U.S., U.K., China and pretty much rest of the technological world?

[John Snow]

Karan Dixit ask a tougher question, the one asked is very elementary my dear whatson! (wit all due respect )

"US will not be peturbed by loss of Poland, but how can it profit from Russia is the one they will tackle"
Spinster

[Karan Dixit]

John,

OK. United States will not be perturbed by loss of Poland.

What will they do to Russia? What will be U.S. reaction?

I did not say that U.S. would be perturbed by loss of Poland.

[John Snow]

US will sell more of its anti missile shield to any one who can buy or donate such systems to all nations along the borders of Russian and PRC, may also toss one free to Mushy's next door for them to stop whining Munna .

And thats how profits are made, charge a premium of 1000% to UAE, KSA, IRAQ to ward off Iran and sell defective or bugs laden system to prevent detection of Jericho class

[ramana]

I finally got to see those pics. What kind of waepons caused that charring? And what kind of weapons caused those injuries to those killed?

[John Snow]

I think they are Napalm and fuel air explosives ramana garu.

Perhaps Igor can pitch in