Georgia’s dangerous game
Reading the headlines on the simmering dispute between Russia and Georgia, I was inclined to think it was simply another example of an increasingly reactionary Russia bullying its neighbors. Jon Sawyer, a veteran correspondent who traveled to the region recently, makes a strong case over at ForeignPolicy.com that Georgian recklessness (and American encouragement) share the blame. Flush with cash and ...
Reading the headlines on the simmering dispute between Russia and Georgia, I was inclined to think it was simply another example of an increasingly reactionary Russia bullying its neighbors. Jon Sawyer, a veteran correspondent who traveled to the region recently, makes a strong case over at ForeignPolicy.com that Georgian recklessness (and American encouragement) share the blame.
Flush with cash and the superpower's blessing, the American-educated Saakashvili has become more brash with time, seizing every opportunity to stick it to the colossus to the north...The tough talk plays well at home, as evidenced this month when Saakashvili's United National Movement party swept more than three quarters of the vote in local elections. But it is a triumph of bluster over geographical common sense in a nation that remains very much in Russia's shadow.
Flush with cash and the superpower’s blessing, the American-educated Saakashvili has become more brash with time, seizing every opportunity to stick it to the colossus to the north…The tough talk plays well at home, as evidenced this month when Saakashvili’s United National Movement party swept more than three quarters of the vote in local elections. But it is a triumph of bluster over geographical common sense in a nation that remains very much in Russia’s shadow.
David Bosco is a professor at Indiana University’s Hamilton Lugar School of Global and International Studies. He is the author of The Poseidon Project: The Struggle to Govern the World’s Oceans. Twitter: @multilateralist
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