War, and the civilians who pay the cost
Wednesday, 13 August 2008
If there is such a thing as a handbook for aspiring world leaders, it would stand to reason that under the section How to Avoid the Annihilation of Your Nation, rule number one must be this: Do Not Invade Russia. This logic appears, however, to have bypassed President Mikhail Saakashvili of Georgia. A man with too many vowels in his name — who seemingly can’t tell his As from his elbow either when it comes to military strategy.
He attacks the breakaway province of South Ossetia, massacring — at a conservative estimate — hundreds of people. And then, when the Russians hit back, hard, he immediately says he’ll seek a settlement.
As if ?
Sorry Mikhail — but thanks to your stupidity and arrogance — the Russian Bear is now on a roll. A murderous, savage roll.
What did Saakashvili think would happen?
It seems this American-educated, self-aggrandising prat had banked on George Dubya wading in with the US Army.
Bush has visited Georgia in the recent past. But in the grand scheme of things this was always going to be merely a symbolic outing. Not a show of future military commitment.
If Saakashvili was in any doubt of that post-Ossetian invasion, he had only to switch on the TV coverage from Beijing to see the president they call The Most Powerful Man in the World larking around with the girls of the US beach volleyball team like a high school student on spring break. No chance there then of George taking time out to order the Marines on to that midnight train to Georgia.
Meanwhile, Vladimir Putin, who we are told is not The Most Powerful Man in the World —not even The Most Powerful Man in Russia anymore — glowers out of newspaper pictures as his bombers roar over Gori and Tbilisi. Prime Minister Putin may no longer be President. But he's obviously still calling the shots.
Bush managed to drag his eyes away from the bikini babes long enough to condemn disproportionate force (this from old Shock and Awe himself ) but the reality is Dubya is demob happy and his concern for the good citizens of the Caucasus will be limited.
The oil pipeline that runs from Azerbaijan to the West (Turkey) via Georgia ? now that’s a different matter entirely. The people we should have sympathy for in the current Georgian conflict? The civilians on both sides being used as fodder by cynical, self serving leaders.
But this is not a trait, of course, confined to the Caucasus. A youngish, media-friendly leader, a lawyer who toadies to the US and who launches his country’s forces into a war from which he has no apparent exit strategy? Surely another Blair there?
And closer to home, the bloody arrogance of a man who brings misery and suffering to those he purports to defend?
Overtones there of local paramilitary chiefs who similarly profited (in every sense) from the conflict here.
As in Northern Ireland, whatever the outcome in Georgia, the lives lost, the lives destroyed, will never be put back together again. But as we also know from bitter experience, such truths rarely trouble the self-promoting men of violence.
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