Russia and Georgia.

radiowaves · Sat 09/08/2008 20:04:48

Why hasn't anyone started a topic on this yet?

I just saw the clips in the news and it really saddened me to see all those peoples homes destructed. Damn sleazy Russia!

Clearly pre-planned course of events. Now its not only the matter of South-Ossetia, bombs are spreading forward. It is expected that Tibilsi will fall under attack soon. However, I am glad to hear that Georgian Army has started a good strikeback. If it were only in my power to help Georgia..

RussiaToday:
"The fighting in South Osstian capital, Tskhinvali, is continuing with Georgian troops once again entering the city. There are reports that Georgian Special Forces have been throwing grenades into basements where women and children are sheltering." Someting tells me not to absolutely believe this.

InCreator · Sat 09/08/2008 22:04:01

Why oh why did you make this thread?

There is no brave and courageous heritage of ancient teutons or franks left in Europe.
They either emigrated into US during 19th century because that's where action was, or were shot at front lines in WWII.

All that's left are cowardly ostriches, head deep in sand and asses high up to make any aggressors feel comfortable.

pshaw!

Nacho · Sat 09/08/2008 22:15:09

What can we discuss about this? I don' t know the politics involving those events and I don't really care. I only hope it ends ASAP with the fewer casualties as possible.

InCreator · Sat 09/08/2008 22:45:56

What's there to know?

Let's say... a group of chinese emigrate into France, area near German border.

Some of them live in france, some of them in Germany. All near the border. So some of them become french and other become german.
Then, suddenly, ones that live in france become separatists and decide that they want to join their France area with the one over border, become a country. Even worse, they try to claim land to be part of GERMANY, not independent country.

Should government of france like that? Lose land to rebellious immigrants? Of course not. Problems occur. Separatists make mess, rebel against country they're living in (France). Germany likes the separatists, it's giving excuse to fight with neighbor. So...

Then Germany sends its "peacekeepers" over the border, to support separatists. Instead of peacekeeping, wild west goes off.
Thing ends up with Germany invading France.

That's the thing here, Georgia being "France" and Russia is "Germany".
I wouldn't say it's a minor thing. And living in country that was occupied for a century by Russia - for a whole century and exact same "excuse", It's damn horrifying.

"only hope it ends ASAP with the fewer casualties as possible."
It ends when Soviet Union is restored. Mark my words. Casualties are least of concern here.

Then again, this mess has alot of Georgia's guilt in it, too. Sadly, "world policing" USA won't probably squeak much here, because there's still forces in Iraq, not for much better excuse.

Stupot · Sat 09/08/2008 22:51:57

I think both sides are being equally petty, but Georgia blatenly kicked off this particular conflict... and you can just tell that America is itching to get involved in a war with Russia (despite their obligatory "calls for peace"), and as soon as she is we can forget about finishing our WiPs.

Nacho · Sat 09/08/2008 22:54:27

I was quite sure that SOUTH OSETIA wanting to sepparate from GEORGIA to join RUSSIA was going to end into bashing the United States...

InCreator · Sat 09/08/2008 22:58:47

USA has spoken quite alot already about the conflict, more than I imagined they would.
I only hope that there will be actual steps too.
Otherwise, NATO is simply a joke. Georgia was an inch away from joining, as I understand... I think it will make quite clear reason about Russia's itch to "aid the separatists".

But that's how the world powers work, I guess. If Russia would become too friendly with Mexico, and start building rocket bases there, I'm quite sure USA would find some stupid reason to start a war with Mexico right away...

Stupot · Sat 09/08/2008 23:06:01

I'm not bashing anyone, just commenting on the way I see things. If this gets much worse, Georgia will be expecting the US to help out.

radiowaves · Sat 09/08/2008 23:24:35

I believe US does not want to go into this. Its definately not itching to be in war with Russia, otherwise it would be WW III too. The reason behind is that USA is still itching for Iran, and Russia is supposed to support them. USA is playing the double game, most sleaziest of them all. Only thing USA is concerned about is that Georgia was the strongest point of force and democracy in Russian border and a very valuable segment for future western politics with Russia.
Also, as georgia is quite strong, there might be other attacks too, if Russia wins. Then the line of former SU countries have been weakened. Basically it has been stated that every country who has Russians in it, should fear, because basically that was Putins statement.

Vince Twelve · Sun 10/08/2008 00:31:14

This is awful! I have friends in Atlanta. I hope they're ok!

</stereotypical American>

Stupot · Sun 10/08/2008 00:41:09

Baddum Tish

Lionmonkey · Sun 10/08/2008 01:38:38

Oh, damn, I hate wars.

They create some angry little people who say that they are doing the right thing, follow the right ideals and they create some angry little people who say that the first angry little people are bad and evil and should be punished for whatever they've done.
And both camps of these angry little people stay in their comphy llittle homes, showering each other with fecalia and doing nothing about the matter.

That's why I make my schoolfriends learn physics and chemistry at school, so we can make many nukes and explosives and estabish a new world order.

aussie · Sun 10/08/2008 11:03:01

Ok, silly question here. I know little about Russia and Georgia.

Aside from the secessionist issue, is there anything extremely valuable in Ossetia? Industry, natural resources? Or is this more of an identity war?

Nacho · Sun 10/08/2008 11:25:38

Sorry, I understood that you were putting the USA in the discussion because you were paranoid or something.

Now I see the truth! You are not paranoid... It is just that you are confussion, GEORGIA, capital TBLISI with GEORGIA, capital Atlanta!

InCreator · Sun 10/08/2008 12:28:08

Quote from: aussie on Sun 10/08/2008 11:03:01
Ok, silly question here. I know little about Russia and Georgia.

Aside from the secessionist issue, is there anything extremely valuable in Ossetia? Industry, natural resources? Or is this more of an identity war?

Large oil and gas pipelines for first... Being control maniacs, easiest way to upset them is to leave them out of business.

But I don't think russia cares about resources that much. It's more of wiping off the "shame" of losing heavy amounts land when Soviet Union broke... Ukraine, Baltics (**shudder**), far east...
It's about imperialism. To this very day, even a decade later, Russia acts like they own us, and our independece is simply a joke. Europe makes a nice face in this rotten game, because cheap gas and oil are more important than any principles of democracy. Or Union.

I've been watching Russian news for awhile, and it's absolutely incredible. Incredible how 3 major TV channels show theatre instead of news. There's word 'genocide' in every sentence, endless "proof" that Georgians are bad, heroic glow all over russian paratroopers... Their media has always been a joke, but I never thought propaganda machine has THOSE limits in russia. If I was a Russian and living in this media space, I would conscript right away... Because that is played to be so believable.

If Americans knew how to make such a farce and did it, there wouldn't be a single protest against Iraq war.

I'm quite sure it will fool the news of West too. Though, I liked it when reporter at CNN said "thanks for YOUR version" after russian emissary spoke.

As for me, I believe in order. If I start misbehaving in my country, police will lock me up. If I do so with a gun, trying to make my own country, military will shoot me. This is how it is and should be.
That's why I heavily dislike all sides in this conflict.

Tuomas · Sun 10/08/2008 17:10:06

I guess no-one brought this up before because no-one really knew what was happening, and a thread with answers like here would have resulted. As it did.

I think it's a bit biased to go bash Russia before you get into the matter a bit more. So South Ossetia is an area with an ethnic minority and separatist agenda. Has been since '90 when the Soviet Union came down. And at the same time it was granted de facto independence. Now that Saakashvili was voted president of Georgia, he their relationship has gone a lot worse. He clearly stated, that one of his major agendas was to unite the whole Georgia, that also including the area of Abkhazia. It was his move to bring in the troops to South Ossetia to calm down the restlessness in the area, to which the Russian reacted. A lot of South Ossetians have changed to Russian citizenship lately, and there's almost more of them than Georgians there nowadays. Realise, that the rest of this ethnic group live in North Ossetia, which is a part of Russia, and they wish to join these.

Well NATO won't help them (who?). Georgia was not a NATO member, though Sakaashvili wanted to bring the country closer to the west and join it too. Lately, NATO has been building bases to old Soviet countries near Russia, and we all know how they reacted. Russia doesn't want to be surrounded by NATO countries. And Georgia can't be a member before they're united, be it through a treaty or a war. NATO doesn't allow in countries with separate, independent areas like these two. That's why Saakashvili had to go there. There's a similar reason to Russia's moves. If nothing else, they want to keep Georgia out of NATO. The west won't come in. The US won't risk a war with Russia just to defend a country that's pretty much useless for them. There is oil in S-O, sure, but that's not the whole reason.

We allowed Kosovo to separate from Serbia already. It's no wonder there's more active and intensive separatist actions and movements everywhere. It's a small scale Yugoslavia there too. The problem is, that the whole area (Eastern Europe) is filled with people with different religions and backgrounds. And states like that can't really work as long as the minorities are not treated equally. There's always a reason why they'd want to leave, they wouldn't do it for nothing. Perhaps we'll have Ossetia, perhaps not. Most probably Russia won't let North Ossetia take their leave, as was done with Chechenya. It's not really all that different.

Nacho · Sun 10/08/2008 17:25:45

That post is flawless, Toumas... except if you honestly think that we made a mistake with Kossovo... (Which is something I consider... Just to make it clear: It was ok to go there and make the humanitarian effort, but I am not so sure about if the political stuff was so good)

Tuomas · Sun 10/08/2008 17:45:05

Not flawless, I realised I misspelled Saakashvili

Honestly? I don't think it was a mistake, letting Kosovo separate, but it was a bit hasty, seeing as there was no visible intention in even trying to get Serbia agree with everyone. They still haven't accepted the thing, and then, one begins to wonder, is it really our business to decide about some other countrys internal matters. There was a lot of discussion around it. I followed our former president, Ahtisaari working on it for years, but in the end, the way they finally decided, it seemed a bit hasty. As if they had ignored every suggestion made earlier. Perhaps Montenegro separating first had something to do with that.

InCreator · Sun 10/08/2008 17:48:13

I'm worried (and angry at Russia!) because...

Have you watched Saakashvili's speech on CNN or BBC?
He's saying just what I think.

Whole last century, Russia used EXACT same excuse to invade different countries.
"Ours live there, they're being killed, all hair savior, the great motherland".
It never was about saving anyone. All those countries were simply occupied. Joined to Soviet Union.

It's history repeating itself god-knows-which-time...

During communist era, in many countries Soviet Union sent forward a rebel force or set up an agenda, so-called "fighting worker class" who's main objective was to create provocations, create unrest, take a beating from policing power of that country and take over when Red Army came over borders to "help" them.

If everyone will sit on their asses and Russia would really conquer Georgia under this totally fake "reason", it would create another precedent... We don't know if it would really happen though. Yet.

If it will, however, Ukraine's most likely "next stop".

In which case, no country neighboring this imperial beast would be safe.
And yes, it WILL have impact on rest of the world. Nobody's realizing that yet.

Tuomas · Sun 10/08/2008 18:06:06

Still, it makes me wonder, what would a country as large as Russia do with a place half the size of Luxembourg... Russia states at the moment, that they support South Ossetia's independence. I guess that wouldn't 'officially' mean invading it or adding it to Russia. I don't see Russia conquering the whole Georgia either. They really don't need it, or the issues it would bring, with all the unsatisfied Georgians. At least it's not about spreading communism anymore.