US warning to Russia over Georgia
Bush is said to have spoken "very firmly" with Putin at the Olympics and has told Russia that their reaction to Georgian violence towards the South Ossetian's is "disproportionate".
What Russian aggression? My understanding is that Georgia started this and that Russia is refusing to stop it until Georgia removes all her troops from South Ossetia.Speaking in Beijing, Mr Bush told NBC TV that he had spoken frankly to Vladimir Putin when the pair met at the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games late last week.
"I said this violence is unacceptable," Mr Bush said, adding: "I was very firm with Vladimir Putin. Hopefully this will get resolved peacefully."However, in a telephone call to Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili, the US Vice-President, Dick Cheney, said Russian aggression "must not go unanswered".
Mr Cheney said the continuation of violence against Georgia would have serious consequences for Russia's relations with the US, as well as the international community.
The Georgians are calling for a ceasefire but Russia is refusing until that basic condition is met.
And it's a bit rich to listen to Bush and Cheney lecturing people on the need to accept ceasefires when most of us remember their utter refusal to even call for a ceasefire when Israel were battering the people of Lebanon for a crime that they did not commit.
And that's before we get to the irony of the US objecting to Russia attempting to obtain "regime change" in Georgia.
Regime change is illegal under international law, but I hardly think the Bush administration are the best suited persons to point that out. After all they made a great deal of noise about seeking "regime change" in Iraq, despite it's illegality.Russia and the US clashed at the UN security council - meeting for the fourth time in four days to discuss the crisis - over charges that Moscow wanted "regime change" in Georgia.
Zalid Khalilzad, the US ambassador to the UN, asked his Russian counterpart Vitali Churkin: "Is the goal of the Russian Federation to change the leadership of Georgia?" Churkin replied: "There are leaders who become an obstacle. Sometimes those leaders need to contemplate how useful they have become to their people."
So the people who actively worked against a ceasefire in Lebanon - and the people who sought regime change in Iraq - are now telling us that Russia must embrace the Georgian ceasefire and that regime change in Georgia is a bad thing for Russia to attempt to impose.
I happen to agree, but what strange bloody bed fellows I suddenly find myself in the company of.
The very people who have argued that regime change is legal and that ceasefires in Lebanon were "giving in to terrorists" suddenly find themselves arguing for ceasefire and against regime change.
If there was only some consistency to their arguments then they might carry an ounce of credibility.
Unfortunately, they lost all their credibility a long time ago.
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2 comments:
The audacity of Zalid Khalilzad to actually look Mr. Vitali Churkin in the eye and ask the question of "Is the goal of the Russian Federation to change the leadership of Georgia?" The US openly and verbally "decided" the regime of Iraq "needed to be changed", and did so, and how have they been punished, moreover, who questioned them on that matter? George Bush and Dick Cheney lied to the american people telling them that there were WMD's in Iraq all for approval to invade and still nothing. Why hasn't Bush or Cheney been indicted by the Hague? Because even though the U.S. urges every other country to send their indictees there, surprisingly enough, the US does not recognize the Hague! The US cannot even get those two idiots impeached!
Only an idiot wouldn't see that the US has systematically disintegrated all the larger/stronger european, baltic and former soviet countries in order to take the power away from a once large and strong, powerhouse soviet union. Had the former U.S.S.R. stayed together and became democratic, the US and the EU wouldn't stand a chance. That USSR and China could dominate the world and that's what the US and the EU did not want. The US and the EU think they are the world police and should decide what should happen in the world, excuse me but 1/5 of the world population is The Peoples Republic of China.
In summary, I am sick and tired of the double standard that the US and the EU has for themselves and for everyone else. The US has the nerve to accuse Russia of invading an independent and sovereign nation when they themselves invaded Serbia in 3/1999, also an independent and sovereign nation. But they have some excuse for that, of course. Russia even warned them during the Kosovo "independence" that the same could occur with South Ossetia. What did they think, they were just bluffing? That's probably when they sent over the $1BLN.
In summary, I am sick and tired of the double standard that the US and the EU has for themselves and for everyone else.
I couldn't agree with you more. When we find Bush saying that regime change isn't acceptable in the 21st Century one has to wonder if the 21st century started after 2003.
Russia even warned them during the Kosovo "independence" that the same could occur with South Ossetia. What did they think, they were just bluffing?
The Bushites are some of the dumbest buggers who have ever held power in the US and they always seem astonished - and appalled - when other powerful nations show that they can flex their muscles too.
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