One of the wonders of the internet is the ability and opportunity to gather more than one point of view about current events. If one were to take the time to read accounts of the Russo-Georgian conflict from non-Western news sourses, you get a point of view that is not being reported in the U. S. media.
Pat Buchanan’s version and take on the events appear to be much closer to what really happened in a series of events that began August 7, 2008 – when Georgia foolishly started military actions that were obviously arrogantly oblivious of the possible consequences.
And then when Georgia’s efforts began to go awry, they wanted to cry foul…
See also: 20080812 Stratfor: The Russo Georgian War and the Balance of Power
20080807 Russo-Georgian War, Military Intel Watch - Stratfor, Military National Security Intel Watch, World Middle East Georgia, World Russia
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Patrick J. Buchanan: Blowback From Bear-Baiting
08/15/2008
Mikheil Saakashvili's decision to use the opening of the Olympic Games to cover Georgia's invasion of its breakaway province of South Ossetia must rank in stupidity with Gamal Abdel-Nasser's decision to close the Straits of Tiran to Israeli ships.
Nasser's blunder cost him the Sinai in the Six-Day War. Saakashvili's blunder probably means permanent loss of South Ossetia and Abkhazia.
After shelling and attacking what he claims is his own country, killing scores of his own Ossetian citizens and sending tens of thousands fleeing into Russia, Saakashvili's army was whipped back into Georgia in 48 hours.
Vladimir Putin took the opportunity to kick the Georgian army out of Abkhazia, as well, to bomb Tbilisi and to seize Gori, birthplace of Stalin.
Reveling in his status as an intimate of George Bush, Dick Cheney and John McCain, and America's lone democratic ally in the Caucasus, Saakashvili thought he could get away with a lightning coup and present the world with a fait accompli.
Mikheil did not reckon on the rage or resolve of the Bear.
American charges of Russian aggression ring hollow. Georgia started this fight -- Russia finished it. People who start wars don't get to decide how and when they end.
Russia's response was "disproportionate" and "brutal," wailed Bush.
True. But did we not authorize Israel to bomb Lebanon for 35 days in response to a border skirmish where several Israel soldiers were killed and two captured? Was that not many times more "disproportionate"?
Russia has invaded a sovereign country, railed Bush. But did not the United States bomb Serbia for 78 days and invade to force it to surrender a province, Kosovo, to which Serbia had a far greater historic claim than Georgia had to Abkhazia or South Ossetia, both of which prefer Moscow to Tbilisi?
Is not Western hypocrisy astonishing?
When the Soviet Union broke into 15 nations, we celebrated…
[…]
Read the rest here: Blowback From Bear-Baiting
20080815 Patrick J Buchanan: Blowback From Bear Baiting
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