Georgian Aggression

By Cernig

Finally, the NYT is helping the American public play catch-up with Europeans on the conflict in the Caucusus. Across the pond, it's been generally accepted for quite some time now that the Georgians were the primary aggressors who turned a fairly low-scale civil war into a full-on military conflict with the local superpower, who then took a mile instead of an inch. Here in the US, it's all been about the Russians invading Georgia, as if that happened first, with both presidential candidates accepting that narrative.

But...

Newly available accounts by independent military observers of the beginning of the war between Georgia and Russia this summer call into question the longstanding Georgian assertion that it was acting defensively against separatist and Russian aggression.

Instead, the accounts suggest that Georgia’s inexperienced military attacked the isolated separatist capital of Tskhinvali on Aug. 7 with indiscriminate artillery and rocket fire, exposing civilians, Russian peacekeepers and unarmed monitors to harm.

The observers in question all being members of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, or O.S.C.E. monitoring team, led by two experienced British military officers.

President Mikheil Saakashvili of Georgia has characterized the attack as a precise and defensive act. But according to observations of the monitors, documented Aug. 7 and Aug. 8, Georgian artillery rounds and rockets were falling throughout the city at intervals of 15 to 20 seconds between explosions, and within the first hour of the bombardment at least 48 rounds landed in a civilian area. The monitors have also said they were unable to verify that ethnic Georgian villages were under heavy bombardment that evening, calling to question one of Mr. Saakashvili’s main justifications for the attack.

All of which had been previously reported from other sources, just not prominently here in the US. Shelling civilian targets in this way is a war crime - something the NYT even now steers clear of but that the BBC has reported on in some depth. The media here isn't reporting on Georgian leader Saakashvili's domestic troubles either. He's had to fire both his Prime Minister and his Army Chief recently, over 10,000 protestors against his continued rule demonstrated Friday and the democratically elected opposition have asked that foreign aid to Georgia be carefully monitored so that Misha and his cronies don't line their own pockets with it. Saakashvili's response has been to accuse all his opponents of being Russian agents, which is historically what he does just before he calls out the police with clubs.

Now that McCain is out of the running, it seems that the US media are rather more inclined to risk "political balance" for accurate reporting on Georgia. Which may well soon have Americans asking why they are supporting the tie-munching, dissent-bashing neocon in charge there and offering him a place at the NATO table and aid to prop up his rule, instead of just supporting Georgia the country. As Will Bunch says "Just in case you needed an after-the-fact reason to be glad we're not talking about President-elect McCain".

Comments

[smintheus]

Cernig, you're right that what's most remarkable is how old this information is. The NYT piece reads like a gloss on the reports that came out in September in the UK and German press...with the most damning details omitted.

Course, within hours of the outbreak of the fighting in early August some of us bloggers were pointing out that a good deal of evidence pointed to Saakashvili's culpability. I was frankly astounded that so many people bought the Georgian propaganda, including too many lefty bloggers, and that so little old/new media attention was given to McCain's compromising ties to Saakashvili.

Excellent roundup of Georgian news, which I haven't been following closely during the last few weeks.

[Тазюк]

As always, so-called liberals aren't liberal but merely "anti-Bush". Russians massed their armed forces on the Russian-side of the Roki tunnel, threatening invasion of Georia, seeded so-called South Ossetian government with ex-KGB people, passed tens of thousands of "instant" Russian passports to so-called South Ossetians...but the focus is not on Russian aggression, but proving the "Finger of Cheney". Disgusting.

[tsotne bakuria]

I thing the more our world knows the real ugly face of the georgian president the better for everybody including the georgian people. this last 5 years have been the most dars and painful era in the history of my country.