By Manila Ryce
Published Thursday, August 14th, 2008, 4:24 am
Filed under: World: Asia, World: Europe, Videos: News, Videos: Political, Economic, Videos, World Issues, US Politics

9 Responses to “What’s Really Going on with the Russian/Georgian Conflict?”

1. Following up on this…
   http://edition.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/europe/08/14/poland.us.missile.shield/

   We may not be the spitting image of Germany moving into Poland, but it probably looks worse than that to Russia.

   CurMei
   08/14/08 at 12:34 pm
   
2. 

   Good stuff. I hate the bias in the corporate Western media so much, they make it so hard to understand the socio-economic reasons for conflicts, even when it’s quite simple, as if conflicts just arise because people get bored of not fighting. But let’s not start waving Russian flags here, this isn’t some soccer game.

   Bernie
   08/14/08 at 12:46 pm
   

3. So, this has nothing to do what so ever with Russia wanting to exert control back over the countries it abused to no end for decades that are breaking away and creating economic ties with the West?

   This also forced the Russians to use their words, “punish”, Georgia by invading their country?

   I mean yeah, certainly US/EU would like control of that energy, so would Russia, but it is dumb to excuse their actions.

   nittany
   08/14/08 at 1:53 pm
   
4. 

   @ nittany,

   You are correct. That’s why I said this is not a soccer game - these are systems of power vying for control, they are not operating from principles.

   Bernie
   08/14/08 at 2:16 pm
   
5. 

   First, lets understand that US-backed Georgia invaded South Ossetia. This was a provoked attack. Secondly, who’s excusing anyone’s actions nittany? What phrase would you prefer I preface every sentence with so readers don’t come to your conclusion?

   Manila Ryce
   08/14/08 at 2:19 pm
   

6. I don’t think that anyone made the argument that we should excuse any actions of Russia - just that there is more than one or two sides to this story and US expansion is a big part of what’s at play.

   This analyst is probably pretty dead on with what went down - two days before it happened:
   http://www.reuters.com/article/asiaCrisis/idUSLE696364

   CurMei
   08/14/08 at 2:21 pm
   

7. From what I read, it came off to me as if Russia was only reacting to Western aggression.

   nittany
   08/14/08 at 4:14 pm
   

8. That’s still different than someone excusing the actions… did you read that someone made excuses for Russia, or that Russia was reacting to “Western aggression”?

   Technically, Georgia is kind of southwest of Russia and they moved their troops in, and that was what Russia reacted to, so it was “western” aggression.

   However, I know what you mean.

   I think that Russia is reacting to Western aggression, it is just indirect at this point, and the Georgians are getting caught in the middle.

   One person’s view, though.

   I don’t excuse Russia anymore than I excuse the US… for what that’s worth. More just describing what’s happening at this point.

   CurMei
   08/14/08 at 4:26 pm
   
9. 

   Just to make a case-study in hypocrisy, we can compare this to Israel’s 2006 invasion of Lebanon. The justification for this was that it was a response to Hizbullah’s capture of Israeli soldiers, and the “punishment” for this was tremendous and devastating. Granted, Hizbullah is not the government, and the motivations for the kidnapping were completely different than the motivations for the invasion of S. Ossetia, but we understand from principle that a massive “punishment” is not something to be excused.

   Bernie
   08/14/08 at 4:45 pm
   

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