IT’S WAR, FORGET THE PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN THIS FALL
No need to bomb Iran, the Neocons got the Georgian conflict to play hard ball. This is George Bush’s Berlin moment, US goods airlifted into Tbilisi with Russians and American troops facing off at 30 miles. The US Mediterranean fleet seeking confrontation by passing the Bosporus into the Black Sea and surrounded by Russia, Turkey and the old Soviet bloc of satellite states. Bush and Cheney are going to protect the Georgian ‘fleet’ and port city of Porti on the Abkhazian coastline.
(AFP photo)
US ally and NATO member Turkey has aligned itself with the opposite power Russia and duo Medvedev/Putin. The US wants to flex its muscles now the internal Georgian conflict got out of hand when Saakashvili managed to destroy S Ossetia over the weekend and murder 2,000 Ossetian civilians. The Russian 58th army on manouvers nearby, stepped in and destroyed the Georgian regular army similar to the Brits in the War of 1812. S Ossetia however is very tough to defend when US would use its superior airpower and start bombing Russian ‘peacekeepers’ on soil of, as Bush announced, sovereign and integral part of the democratic nation of Georgia.
Cont’d …
Bush and Cheney are about to destroy the chance for a ceasefire and truce as brokered by EU president Sarkozy of France. A first indication of a confrontation would be for the US to destroy the Roki tunnel, the sole road connection to North Ossetia and Russian territory. The Russian 58th Army would be cut-off from any escape and easily slaughtered by US marines and Apaches. That’s what the American wants to see, US military forces raising the US (and Georgian) flag inside the capital Tskhinvali of S Ossetia. Nice UPI photo’s of smoldering Russian tanks with dead bodies hanging out.
(AP/Navy Times)
Remember how the first World War started with a ‘single’ shot in Sarajevo. This is what the result will be of great military powers seeking military confrontation and refusing to back down because of the capitalism’s biggest asset … OIL. So political bloggers, chances are this fall your pens will be dry because McShame will win hands down as the greater US hawk in the confrontation with the evil empire: Russia. Forget the economic woes, the scrimmage of Iraq and Afghanistan and who cares about domestic Americans and universal healthcare when US troops are dying on Georgian soil? US media, got your visa’s for Georgia ready? Oh … I forgot, no visa needed for US 51th (vassal) state.
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Is to respect another culture, religion or etnicity. An exceptional piece can only be written from a cultural viewpoint of people involved in a cruel civil strife.
≈ Cross-posted from eeblet’s diary — Georgia on my mind ≈
Civil wars are the most savage as the United States has seen, the USSR-revolution and Lenin/Stalin, China with Mao Tse Tung, Cambodja under Pol Pot, Yugoslavia and Milosevic, Rwanda genocide and mini ‘democracy’ Georgia under Saakashvili. Nationalism breeds fascism and starts with mass gatherings, flag waving, military parades and pledges while singing national anthems. It’s all part of indoctrination as fundamental religion can breed extremists and terrorists.
Taking down the iron curtain or a Berlin wall of misunderstanding and mistrust, can best be done by cultural exchange as JFK proposed to Khrushchev in the Sixties. Boys should not play in real life with toys like marines, stealth bombers and tactical nuclear weapons. Can George pronounce “nuclear” yet or is he a marksman by pushing a red button?
“They’re forcing our hand. We must bomb the children.”
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence.".
GORI, Georgia (Civil.ge) – Georgian official and Russian military commander said that the Georgian police would be able to return back to the town of Gori starting from early August 14. Alexandre Maisuradze, chief of the local police, said people who have fled the town close to the South Ossetian conflict zone, would be able to return as soon as the Georgian police is back.
Meanwhile, deputy commander of the Russia’s airborne troops, Maj. Gen. Alexander Borisov, who was in Gori on August 13 meeting with the Georgian officials there, denied reports about Russian forces ever entering Gori. He said that the Russian forces were stationed in the vicinity of the town recovering and collecting arms, equipment and ammunition, which, as he said, was abandoned by the Georgian army while retreating back towards Tbilisi.
“It is dangerous, there were plenty of abandoned firearm; there are some 40 military vehicles over those heights,” Borisov told a group of Georgian journalists in Gori, who were accompanying secretary of the Georgian National Security Council, Alexandre Lomaia, to Gori.
(Sky News) – Russian troops have been seen entering the Georgian port town of Poti and building up their numbers in Gori despite a shaky ceasefire, according to Georgia’s foreign ministry.
MEDVEDEV SIGNS TREATY WITH S OSSETIA AND ABKHAZIA
Russian president Dmitry Medvedev met the leaders of South Ossetia and another rebel province, Abkhazia, to sign a six-point peace plan. He said that Russia would back up the rebel provinces’ future “decisions”, adding “(We) will guarantee them both in the Caucasus and throughout the world.”
Meanwhile, a Russian defence ministry source told Sky News two unmanned Georgian spy planes had been shot down over South Ossetia.
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence.".
(BBC News) – Russian troops have begun handing over control of the area around the town of Gori to Georgian security forces. A Russian general in the area said Moscow’s troops would remain nearby for several days to remove weaponry and help restore law and order in Gori.
I suppose this takes care of Bush’s war rhetoric, or not? Are facts on the ground moving to fast to your liking George?
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence.".
h/t to Frank Schnittger
Is it possible that this time the October surprise was tried in August, and that the garbage issue of brave little Georgia struggling for its survival from the grasp of the Russian bear was stoked to influence the U.S. presidential election?
McCain’s foriegn policy adviser Randy Scheunemann is at the center of the neoconservative cabal that has come to dominate the Republican candidate’s foreign policy stance in a replay of the run-up to the war against Iraq. These folks are always looking for a foreign enemy on which to base a new Cold War.
Scheunemann also played a key role in lining up support for the invasion from the "Vilnius Ten," a group of former Soviet bloc countries seeking to gain entry to NATO, some of whom Scheunemann has worked as a paid lobbyist on behalf of. With his partner Bruce Jackson, a Lockheed Martin executive, Scheunemann reportedly gave assurances to the Ten that backing the Iraq invasion would help their chances for NATO membership.McCain gets to look tough with a new Cold War to fight while Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama, scrambling to make sense of a more measured foreign policy posture, will seem weak in comparison.
Ioseb Jughashvili Stalin was a Georgian, and indeed if Russian troops had occupied the threatened Georgian town of Gori they would have found a museum still honoring the local boy, who made good by seizing control of the Russian revolution.
Stalin museum in GoriPS It’s scary, I paused believed it to be insane to write my diary.
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence.".
GORI, Georgia — Russia’s Foreign Minister Lavrov declared that the world “can forget about” Georgia’s territorial integrity, and American and Georgian officials said Russia appeared to be targeting military infrastructure — including radars and patrol boats at a Black Sea naval base and oil hub.
“I believe, it is impossible to persuade South Ossetia and Abkhazia to agree with the logic that they can be forced back into the Georgian state,” Mr. Lavrov told reporters.
The White House bluntly rejected Mr. Lavrov’s message.
Lavrov attacked the United States in a telephone conversation with Rice, saying Washington had to choose between a “relatively virtual” relationship with Tbilisi and a “partnership (with Russia) on questions that require collective action.”
The Russian foreign ministry said in a statement: “It is a pity, however, that the American side steadfastly refuses to recognise the real reason for what happened.
“That the regime of Mikheil Saakashvili, in violation of all of its international obligations, launched a war against the South Ossetian people.”
Russia Capitalizes on New World Disorder
RICE MEETS SARKOZY
Rice repeated U.S. demands that Russia withdraw its troops from Georgia’s territory.
“The United States of America stands strongly for the territorial integrity of Georgia. It is time for this crisis to end. The Russian president has said that their military operations have halted. We would hope that he is true to his word and that their operations will halt.”
Merkel to Push for Lasting Peace Between Russia, Georgia
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."for not allowing the Khmer Rouge to continue slaughtering its own people a few decades ago. Who said history repeats itself?
and we better not mention whose representative the US backed to remain at the UN or those clandestine arnms supplies to the KR.
amid all the other useful links you provide…
after we’ve sifted the deliberate disinformation in western media and demands of Bush, NYT/IHT catches up with the facts:
Provision of truce demanded by Russians gives rationale to advance
Guess Condi and Bush were in the dark when they issued demands for Russia to pull back eh?
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WARSAW, Poland (AFP) — The Polish prime minister says that Poland and America have reached an agreement that will see a battery of American missiles established inside Poland, a plan that has infuriated Russia and raised the specter of an escalation of tension with the country.
Donald Tusk, speaking in a televised interview from the capital, said today that America agreed to Polish proposals that it help augment its defenses in exchange for placing 10 missile defense interceptors.
Warsaw has been lobbying Washington to provide a THAAD or Patriot-type air defense system in exchange for a Polish green light to hosting the silos.
Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said the talks seemed “on the right track.”
“Our arguments about the need for a permanent presence of US troops and missiles on Polish soil have been taken seriously by the American side. The events in the Caucasus show clearly that such security guarantees are indispensable,” he added.
Washington aims to base 10 interceptor missiles in Poland plus a radar facility in the neighbouring Czech Republic by 2011-2013 to complete a system already in place in the United States, Greenland and Britain.
The system, which has cost more than €63 billion ($100 billion) to develop and costs €7 billion a year to maintain – the single biggest line item in the Pentagon’s budget – is unpopular in the US Congress too, where congress members argue the technology remains unproven.
Most Poles and Czechs also oppose the plan, according to polls.”
-excerpt from the EU Observer
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."Poland just guaranteed it will be targetted by multiple nuclear warheads. I hope the Polish supreme leader will make this clear to his peopel who oppose the missiles.
It looks like they haven’t worked out the details, but the Polish Prime Minister is promising to sign a suicide pact–for Poland!
We’ll see if the Parliament thinks this is a good idea.
Not since the Poles based their national security on defense treaty with Nazi Germany has there been anything this stupid.
Now if they can talk the Russians into giving the missile coordinates ahead of time (like in the very few successful tests)the Poles have the ability to shoot down one possibly two missiles. Not really worth all the uproar is it. Why host it and why flip out about it. The real losers here are US taxpayers who are paying to deploy this shit.
after all the moving of lips by Rice and Bush that Russia needs to exit Georgian soil NOW:
The Guardian, UK-AP
Russia wins concesssions in Georgia truce.
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Bush made empty promise to Saakashvili of sending naval support to Poti. He forgot he needed permission from NATO partner Turkey. Here are some thoughts from president Abdullah Gül of Turkey and his vision of a new multipolar world emerging from the wreckage of war.
Saakashvili is silenced by visit of Rice and signs EU ceasefire deal with Medvedev of Russia.
UN vote needed formalizing the ceasefire
WASHINGTON — President Bush declared Friday that the United States and its allies “stand with the people” of war-torn Georgia against Russian “bullying and intimidation.” He then left Washington for a 10-day vacation at his Texas ranch.
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence.".
Just minutes ago in another televised interview, Holbrooke lays out the claim that Russian backed Ossetian militias had provoked Georgia, Saakashvili had no other option than protect the Georgian villages from etnic cleansing. [By mortar and artillery bombardement of capital Tskhinvali.] Conveniently Holbrooke explains the scenario followed by Russia’s Putin as he had written in his book and interviews more than a year ago. Putin hates Saakashvili, the West’s great democratic leader, and wants to overthrow his government. Sounds quite similar to discussions about one great democracy (Israel) in the Middle East on whose behalve the US invaded and occupied Iraq. I wonder what happened to the Russian peacekeepers stationed in South Ossetia when Georgia started the attack.
Sorry BooMan, Holbrooke has no credibilty and is just another war hawk with different feathers.
Washington Post by Richard Holbrooke, Nov. 27, 2006
“Much is at stake: Putin’s long-term strategic goal is to create a sphere of Russian dominance and hegemony in the vast area the Soviet Union and the czars once ruled. If he succeeds in bringing down the most independent and pro-Western leader in the former Soviet space outside the Baltics, he will have gone a long way toward his goal. Also at stake: President Bush’s “freedom agenda,” stability in the Caucasus and the European Union’s attitude toward a small European country on the edge of the world’s most volatile region.”
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."