Is the war still on?
Uriel Sinai/Getty Images President George W. Bush has announced that the U.S. military will be delivering humanitarian aid to Georgia, a move that his Georgian counterpart Mikheil Saakashvili has described as a “turning point.” The announcement, along with the withdrawal plan that Dmitry Medvedev signed on to this morning, seems like a sign that the ...
Uriel Sinai/Getty Images
President George W. Bush has announced that the U.S. military will be delivering humanitarian aid to Georgia, a move that his Georgian counterpart Mikheil Saakashvili has described as a “turning point.”
The announcement, along with the withdrawal plan that Dmitry Medvedev signed on to this morning, seems like a sign that the war is winding down into the clean-up and recovery phase. Russia’s foreign ministry is not thrilled about U.S military involvement but says they’re open to “consultations” about how best to deliver aid. (Corrected. See comments.)
The only problem is, Russian troops don’t seem in any hurry to leave Georgia. Russian tanks, along with “irregular” volunteers from the North Caucasus, contine to occupy the city of Gori. According to the Russians’ laughable explanation, they’re sticking around to protect the local population from irregulars, who are stealing cars. This menacing quote from a Russian tank commander doesn’t make it sound like he’s getting ready to pack up:
It all depends on what Saakashvili is going to say. If he doesn’t understand the situation, we’ll have to go further. It’s only 60 kilometers to Tbilisi.”
It’s still early to speculate, but it’s possible that Russia, in fact, has no intention of leaving Georgia. The longer Ossetian and Abkhazian forces stay within the country proper, the more likely it is that Georgia will be provoked into firing back, giving the Russians a pretext for further military action. So, despite this morning’s hopeful signs, Georgia is far from out of the woods yet.
One final observation: If the worst-case scenario does come true, serious questions will be raised over whether any statement by Dmitry Medvedev has any basis in the reality of Russian policy.
Joshua Keating was an associate editor at Foreign Policy. Twitter: @joshuakeating
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