Russia Warns NATO Against Further Support of Georgia

Dmitry Rogozin, Russia's Special Envoy to NATO, sent official notes to the embassies of all the alliance's member-states in relation to the hostilities between Georgia and South Ossetia, Interfax reported.
According to Mr Rogozin, Russia warns NATO members against their further support of Georgia and its President Mikhail Saakashvili. He pointed out that Tbilisi unleashed real aggression and acts now "thanks to the West's mighty propaganda support."

Dmitry Rogozin linked Georgia's attack against South Ossetia with NATO's recent summit in Romania stressing that they dropped a hint to the Georgian President: Georgia will get NATO admission, and Mikhail Saakashvili understood he could launch the attack.

Mr Rogozin added, "Though NATO doesn't want to show it truly sides with Saakashvili, at the latest summit the President got a permit to start a military operation."

link: http://www.kommersant.com/p-13040/Note_of_Rogozin/

Everybody back away from the brink, slowly... slowly...

:scared:

Fast escalation.

I'm starting to get August 1914 vibes.

:scared:

I suspect that Georgia doing this prior to formal entrance into NATO will negate the possibly commensurate issue of an interlocking system of alliances that existed between the European powers in 1914...if Georgia is not yet a member of NATO, then the signatories are not bound to come to her aid.

The cascade of interlocking alliances isn't here, yet. This may yet pull us away from the abyss.

we're screwn!

Who is no saint, but at least seems able to do the math, isn't going to let him do anything stupid.

Please tell me Congress won't let him do something stupid...

Please tell me he won't try anything...

Please tell me I don't know better...

:scared:

Georgia has asked the US military to provide aircraft to move Georgian troops home from Iraq as fighting rages in Georgia's breakaway South Ossetia region, a US military official said Friday.

"There has been a request for lift support... to take out some of their forces," said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

The official said the request, which was received by the State Department, was being looked at but had not yet been approved.

http://www.africasia.com/services/news/newsitem.php?area=mideast&item=080808190506.hgwhmf0v.php

Which under the circumstances is unlikely.

Shit.

It's the only fair thing to do. Problem is... :nuke:

They are basically saying that they have a right to f*ck with the Caucasus states all they want as if they owned the place and we should be ashamed of interacting with countries Russia thinks are thier vassals.

NATO needs to tell Russia to f*ck off, because Georgia is an independent nation state not Russia's vassal.

Then what? The Russians aren't going to pull out just because NATO says so. Too many NATO member states rely on Russia for oil, no sanctions that way, war unlikely.

Russia has veto power on the security council, no sanctions that way.

Our brilliant leader has not quite endeared himself to the Russian leadership with his rather idiotic sense of diplomacy.

Our military is bogged down in two massive conflicts in the middle east, therefore we have no leverage except nukes, hardly a workable solution.

Georgia is screwed, we gave them the tools, the Russians gave the provocation, but let them strike first, they won't get out of this cheaply and we can stand around with egg on our face, or get left holding the bag for WWIII, given our current state of readiness, I think I'll take the egg.

it has been apparent that we are trying to find a way to justify a strike against Iran. Russia has cooperated to some degree with iran, both militarily and diplomatically. If the US intervenes in Georgia then any strike on iran is sure to be met with increased Russian military support for Iran...possibly including active military engagement.

That would be my guess, anyway. I would think our Joint Chiefs would be seriously dragging their feet on any intervention in Georgia.

and then there's the scarier chance that all of this has already been coordinated with China and Iran.