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What Russia Gained and Lost in Georgia

[Jerusalem Post] Yitzhak M. Brudny - This is the beginning of a larger international effort to find a permanent resolution to the South Ossetian and Abkhazian problem. The self-proclaimed republics of South Ossetia and Abkhazia seceded from Georgia in the early 1990s, with the Russian military providing crucial help. In practice, Russian policies amounted to de facto annexation: most residents of Abkhazia and South Ossetia were granted Russian citizenship, and both republics were given various forms of economic aid. Moreover, Russian military contingents in both regions - officially the OSCE-sponsored peacekeeping force - provided shields against potential Georgian efforts to bring the seceding regions back under effective Georgian sovereignty. By inflicting a military knock-out punch on Georgian President Saakashvili, perceived by Russia as a mere puppet of the U.S., Russia sent the message that it would neither tolerate hostile regimes in bordering states nor permit its economic hegemony in the region to be challenged. Russia's use of force could in the long run completely undermine Russian credibility when it speaks against the use of force in Iran or condemns potential future confrontation between Israel and Hizbullah (in 2006, Russia condemned in the harshest terms Israel's "excessive use of force"). Finally, as Israelis know well, bombing and invading small countries never looks good on TV in the West, however justified it might be. In the court of public opinion, Russia has already lost. The author is the Jay and Leonie Darwin Chair in Russian Studies at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
2008-08-13 08:00:00
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