Georgia Again

Obviously, what makes the news in the US is that the USS McFaul delivered aid to Georgia, but in the grand scheme of things, that means very little.

I think of more import is that fact that Saakashvili is a nut-job relegated to chewing his own tie...Really...see the vid at end.

First, he is promissing to rebuild his army and retake South Ossetia and Abkhazia. That's clearly not going to happen. Both areas will be declaring independence, and will be recognized by Russia, in the next 18 months, and probably before January 21.

We also have him flat out lying about the original Georgian offensive into South Ossetia, claiming that the Russians had already moved tanks in, and I honestly think that he believes that.

Certainly there are issues of provocations on both sides, but the idea that somehow Georgia was forced to invade South Ossetia and launch an artillery barrage on its capital has no relationship to reality.

Of course, it doesn't help that the Georgian parliament has extended martial law, which I think at this point will be used against political opponents, and not either the Russian military or Ossetian or Abkhazian militias.

Interestingly enough this article in Newsweek provides some insight into the dynamics between Georgia and the West:

It would have been hard not to be charmed by Mikheil Saakashvili. Young, dynamic, Western-educated and -oriented, he was among the most intriguing characters to move onto the global stage after the collapse of the Soviet Union.

....

....Soon after, I met the president again at his newly built residence in Tbilisi. He had dark rings around his eyes and he alternated between enormous, if not misplaced confidence that his Western allies would help him, and rather childish despair about Russia's view of him personally. He said he had heard that Russian officials play billiards with the word MISHA written on the black ball, and asked the reporters assembled at his home, "What is going on in Russia? Am I hated there?" That evening he seemed traumatized by this. With his head in his hands, and pear juice and brandy running down his chin, he pleaded: "Does anybody know what Russia is up to?"

This is Western Tribalism at it's finest: He spoke good English. He went to an elite technical school, Columbia University, so despite the fact that he unleashed riot police on protesters, and seized opposition media outlets, he has to be a good guy.

We see the same thing in Iraq: The representatives of ISCI, a proxy for Iran, speak fluent English, and affect American manners, so they must be the representatives of western style democracy.

The West in general, and America in particular, must get over this little bit of chauvanism.

Perhaps the most extreme example of just how far this short-sightedness takes us is this piece of doggerel from Richard Holbrooke, who claims that somehow the Russians have lost because Saakashvili is still nominally in power, when it is clear that he is a dead man walking.

He is an indicator of just how morally and intellectually bankrupt the foreign policy establishment is in Washington, DC.