The Georgian Issue: All Sides!

The Georgian Issue: All Sides!

LONDON (Reuters) - Georgia made a strategic miscalculation in trying to rapidly overrun South Ossetia, and as a result has probably lost the region for good, regional analysts say.

While Russian-backed separatists in the breakaway Georgian region helped provoke Georgia into action, it was the belief that its troops could secure a lightning victory that underpinned Georgia's decision to attack.

"The Georgians rolled the dice and they lost," said Michael Denison, an expert in Russian and Eurasian affairs at Chatham House, a London-based security think tank.

"It was not an unreasonable calculation to go for a rapid win, but in the end it was a miscalculation."

Georgia, which has several restless regions within its territory, has managed to quell low-level insurgencies on its turf in recent years -- notably in the Kodori Gorge and the Adjara region -- without provoking Russian reaction.

It calculated that, with the recent change of leadership in Moscow and by timing the attack to coincide with the opening of the Olympics, it could secure a quick and relatively trouble-free victory.

"The capital Tskhinvali is relatively small, no more than around 25,000 people, and they probably thought they could just take it and be done," said Denison.

"They may have calculated that some people would leave the region and flee north to North Ossetia, but the rest would stay and the problem would basically be resolved."

In hindsight, he said, the Georgians should have thought about blocking or blowing up the Roki Tunnel that links South Ossetia to Russia and gave Russian forces access to the region. But the Georgians needed to keep the tunnel open so that South Ossetians could escape north.

Denison and others note that South Ossetia's separatists had been provoking Georgia for some time, probably counting on Russia to come to their aid if needed.

"The Russians have been provoking for a long time and I don't doubt that they stoked up the separatists to start attacking," said Bruce George, a British member of parliament with a long-term association with Georgia.

"At the same time if you embark on a war, as the Georgians did, you have to work out what the consequences will be. It was inevitable that the Russians would react very heavily... and at this stage it seems uncertain that they will stop."

Denison, who was last in South Ossetia a few months ago, said Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin's assertion that it was now very unlikely South Ossetia would ever be integrated into Georgia had all but sealed the region's fate.

"If the Russians hadn't intervened and Georgia had taken over, some South Ossetians would have fled, but most probably would have been okay, and South Ossetia probably would have been better off economically and culturally.

"As it is, now they are looking at being a small outpost on the southern reaches of Russia."

“U.S. suggests Russia wants "regime change" in Georgia; I suggest that in addition to that factor; the Russians are sending a signal that they are prepared to act against “America’s stated interests” as a payback for our role in Kosovo and as a warning regarding Iran.

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - The United States suggested on Sunday that Russia was interested in "regime change" in Georgia after Moscow rejected Tbilisi's offer of a cease-fire in the separatist enclave of South Ossetia.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice that the president of Georgia Mikheil Saakashvili "must go," the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, Zalmay Khalilzad, told the Security Council.

Khalilzad then looked straight at Russian Ambassador Vitaly Churkin and asked if Moscow was looking for "regime change."

"Is the goal of the Russian Federation to change the leadership of Georgia?" he said.

Churkin did not directly address the question but said there are leaders who "become an obstacle."

"Sometimes those leaders need to contemplate how useful they have become to their people," he told reporters later.

"Regime change is purely an American invention," he said. "We're all for democracy in Georgia."

Russian troops took the capital of South Ossetia earlier after a three-day battle as Georgian forces retreated and the Tbilisi government offered a cease-fire and talks. Continued...

Cheney: "Russian aggression must not go unanswered" BEIJING (Reuters) - Vice President Dick Cheney called Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili to express U.S. solidarity in the conflict with Russia and told him "Russian aggression must not go unanswered," the vice president's office said on Monday.

"The vice president expressed the United States' solidarity with the Georgian people and their democratically elected government in the face of this threat to Georgia's sovereignty and territorial integrity," Cheney's office said in a statement.

It said Cheney, in a phone call on Sunday, told Saakashvili that "Russian aggression must not go unanswered, and that its continuation would have serious consequences for its relations with the United States, as well as the broader international community."

Cheney had remained in the United States while U.S. President George W. Bush, who spoke to Saakashvili earlier, was attending the Beijing Olympics.

Cheney's office released the statement as Georgia, a U.S. ally, offered Russia a ceasefire and peace talks after pulling troops back from rebel South Ossetia's capital, and mediators began a mission to end the internationally condemned fighting.

Some fighting still gripped parts of the Caucasus region, however, and Russia demanded an unconditional Georgian withdrawal.

Factbox-What Is Georgia's Rebel South Ossetia Region?

Moscow - Russia launched airstrikes yesterday deep inside Georgia and mobilized columns of tanks after Georgian forces embarked on a major offensive to reassert control over South Ossetia, a separatist province. Political leaders on both sides said that war had begun. The United States, an ally of Georgia, and other governments appealed for a cease-fire.

Georgian Army units quickly seized Tskhinvali, capital of the mountainous province, Georgian officials said.

But large numbers of Russian tanks appeared to be moving against them there. Russian television showed what was described as a Georgian armored vehicle burning on the city's streets. Local officials reported large numbers of civilians killed. Russian officials said that more than 10 of their troops had died.

Georgia, a former Soviet republic, became independent after the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. South Ossetia then fought a war to break away from Georgia and has had de facto independence since 1992.

The province is dominated by an ethnic Ossetian population, many of whom have taken Russian citizenship. South Ossetia has received support from Russia, which is suspicious of Georgia's close links with the United States and its bid to join NATO.

Georgia's American-educated president, Mikhail Saakashvili, has made recovery of South Ossetia and another breakaway region, Abkhazia, a top priority.

"A full-scale aggression has been launched against Georgia," Saakashvili declared in a televised statement. He announced a full military mobilization, with reservists being called into action.

Georgian officials also said they would recall troops in Iraq to bolster forces against the Russians.

In an interview with CNN, Saakashvili called for unspecified US support for Georgia, comparing the situation to Soviet crackdowns in places such as Czechoslovakia and Afghanistan.

"This is not about a tiny separatist area inside Georgia," he said. ". . . This is not about Georgia anymore. It is about America, its values."

President Bush discussed the crisis with Prime Minister Vladimir Putin of Russia in Beijing, where both were attending the opening ceremonies of the Summer Olympics, US officials said. Putin told Bush that "war has started today in South Ossetia," according to Putin's spokesman Dmitry Peskov.

The Bush administration offered strongly worded backing for Georgia but avoided any mention of possible military assistance. In Beijing, White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said "the United States supports Georgia's territorial integrity and we call for an immediate cease-fire."

The administration was urging "all parties - Georgians, South Ossetians and Russians - to deescalate the tension and avoid conflict," Perino said.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice - who spoke several times by telephone with her Russian counterpart, Sergei Lavrov - was more specific.

"We call on Russia to cease attacks on Georgia by aircraft and missiles, respect Georgia's territorial integrity, and withdraw its ground combat forces from Georgian soil," her statement said.

The two major party presidential candidates - Senator Barack Obama, Democrat of Illinois, and Senator John McCain, Republican of Arizona - called separately for the United Nations Security Council to help end the violence.

The administration and the European Union agreed to send mediators, an effort in which France appeared to take the lead. France, which currently holds the rotating residency of the European Union, issued a communiqué saying that envoys would be sent to Georgia from the EU, the United States, and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe.

About 130 US military and civilian personnel are currently in Georgia, where they are training Georgian troops for deployment to Iraq as part of the multinational force there. US military officials in Baghdad said they had received no official word that half of Georgia's 2,000-troop contingent was being called home from Iraq, despite statements from Tblisi.

In New York, Georgia requested an emergency session of the UN Security Council to try to secure a cessation of hostilities and to press Russia to withdraw its military forces. The 15-nation council struggled unsuccessfully in a closed-door session to fashion a statement calling for an end to the fighting in South Ossetia, but the United States and Russian remained deadlocked over wording.

Russia's UN ambassador, Vitaly Churkin, said that Russia was compelled to intervene to protect Russian citizens from attacks by Georgian forces and that those responsible for violence would be held accountable. He said that Georgia's actions "calls into question the viability of Georgia as a state, their viability as a responsible member of the world community."

The two sides have long skirmished along the unofficial border between Georgia and the province of South Ossetia, where Russia has maintained a force of soldiers who are officially peacekeepers, but who Georgians see as allies of the separatists.

Georgian officials said their offensive was triggered early Friday after separatists continued to shell Georgian villages following the announcement of a unilateral cease-fire by Saakashvili on Thursday.

Television images showed Georgian rockets firing into the night sky. Reporters in Tskhinvali said many houses were engulfed in flames, a hospital was destroyed, and a university was on fire. One Russian peacekeeper told Interfax, the Russian news agency, that the city was "practically destroyed."

More than 10 Russian peacekeepers have been killed, and about 30 have been wounded in fighting in Tskhinvali, Colonel Igor Konashenkov, aide to the commander in chief of the Russian Ground Forces, told the Russian news agency Interfax.

Estimates of civilian casualties from the separatist government ran as high as 1,400. Civilians from South Ossetia were flooding to the border with Russia, according to news reports. Russian media said that paramilitary fighters were also streaming across the border from Russia, including from North Ossetia, a Russian republic that shares ethnic ties with the South Ossetians.

President Dmitry Medvedev of Russia, facing his first major crisis since coming to office in May, called an emergency meeting of Russia's national security council.

"We will not tolerate the death of our citizens," Medvedev said at the meeting. "Those guilty will receive due punishment."

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