Russia Backs Independence of Breakaway Georgian Areas
In South Ossetia and in Abkhazia people are openly celebrating in the streets as Russia announces that it will recognise them as independent states. The west continues, despite Bush's feigned love of democracy, to insist that the people of both of these states must continue to have no say in their own future and must remain part of Georgia, even though the peace deal struck between Russia and South Ossetia insisted that the people would be consulted.
Bush, of course, refused to recognise this vital part of the peace process and insisted that Georgia's territorial integrity was not open to negotiation. So the Russian's, as they have for the past few weeks, have simply gone ahead and dared the west to stop them.
And Medvedev has made it perfectly clear that he feels the United States were behind Georgia's aggression.Acting a day after Russia’s Parliament unanimously supported the enclaves’ request to secede, President Dmitri A. Medvedev announced that he had signed decrees recognizing the two territories’ independence. He blamed the Georgian president, Mikheil Saakashvili, for causing the bloodshed and forcing Moscow’s hand.
He said it was clear that the warring sides could never again live together, and South Ossetia and Abkhazia had to be independent.
“This is not an easy choice, but it is the only way to save the lives of people,” Mr. Medvedev said in a nationally televised address.
“The Georgian leadership was methodically preparing for war, while the political and material support provided by their foreign guardians only served to reinforce the perception of their own impunity,” he said.And Medvedev also made clear that nothing is going to stop them:
"We are not afraid of anything, including the prospect of a new Cold War," said Mr Medvedev, after signing the decree in defiance of the US and Europe.Condoleeza Rice continued with the curious mixture of arrogance and impotence which has defined the US posture since Georgia invaded South Ossetia.
The US secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice, described the decision as "regrettable" and warned that it would be "dead on arrival" at the UN.Condi surely realises that this is never going to arrive at the UN in the exact same way as Kosovo's independence never arrived at the UN because the west feared the Russian veto. This was always the danger of the decision to allow Kosovo to declare independence without consultation with Serbia, other regions were always likely to emulate that stance.
And I find it simply incomprehensible that the Bush administration think they can feasibly make any coherent argument as to why the people of South Ossetia and Abkhazia are unfit to state what they want.
The past few weeks have been notable only for the amount of empty bluster the west has been willing to spout over this and the endless effort they would put into pretending that "little Georgia" had been attacked when all of us knew that the polar opposite had occurred.
It's a sad day when Pat Buchanan is the only one telling the truth, but that's the situation we find ourselves in.
As Buchanan points out, there is simply no consistency in the American position on this matter.
My only worry here is that, in an effort not to look "weak" during an election, Obama is forced to take some reactionary position so as not to seem to be outflanked by McCain, who I note had dispatched his lying wife to the region.
Nothing has changed here. The US and Europe are not prepared to go to war over Georgia. We are going to witness even more hot air and not a lot of action. As Buchanan points out, the American administration have misled Americans over what is taking place here.
McCain is playing on this basic misunderstanding amongst the American populace. I would hope that Obama and Biden would address what actually occurred here, but I seriously doubt that they will do so during an election; which is a pity, as the current utterly wrong narrative plays into McCain's hand much more than it plays into Obama's.
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