My point is, there was no better time to beat us into submission. Our own press had turned against us. The same with our allies. Everyone hated the US as the only superpower.

Yes, our military is overstretched, but so what. The world had us beaten on bad politics alone. Now Russia  (and Iran) are letting us back in on the very thing that made us who were once were, the protector of democracy. I personally believe this is a bad move on Russia part. We were quite capable of destroying our reputation and miltary on our own. Russia, Korea, and Iran could have shown a little patience while we self destructed. Instead, they resort back to 1960's shenanigans, and history will continue to repeat itself.

Last edited by Banjo (2008-08-13 23:25:48)

I don't know about all that. Korea and Iran are a different issue altogether and how the world views our actions are easy for Korea (no one defends Korea) and Iran is just, well, complicated. Russia is very different and it's hard to say how it'll play.

The facts:
Russia was in Georgia on a UN sponsored peacekeeping mission.
Georgia (likely provoked) quite stupidly attacked the area under Russian and UN protection.
Russia beats the hell out of the Georgians and the Georgians cry unkle.
Russia gets a couple of cheap shots in and thats the end.
The US, in the meantime, talks alot of shit, but is incabable of doing anything.
Europe tut-tuts and successfully gets everyone to the peace table.

If the thing ends here, it's win-win for the Russians. Europe needs their gas, so there will be no sanctions against them. Everyone in the neighborhood gets the message and I imagine the US will lose those anti-missle radar sites in eastern Europe. It's hard to put the Ruskies in a moral bind over this, if you're America. If the US was on a peace keeping mission to Darfur and the Sudanese killed 10 US soldiers, we would level Khartoum. After what we pulled in Kosovo and Iraq, I can't see how anyone gives the US any room to talk shit on the Ruskies. All-in-all I think it'll have less of an impact on the World than Chechnya had, except to show the world the Russians have power where before they were powerless and the US is incapable/uninterested in doing anything to stop them.

Get a room, you two.

Well, first of all, what exactly did Russia pull? Georgia wasn't exactly a model democracy, didn't have a lot of friends and it had those friends only because it was a stick in the eye (and a way to economically bypass) the Russians. The idea of attacking during the Olympics was freakin dumb. It may have made decision-making a tad more difficult at the very beginning, but Russia has a well equiped military (including veteran combat units in the neighborhood) and excellent communication systems so they bought a day but lost two important things. When the shit turned bad, all eyes were on Beijing and Mike Phelps' abs. There's no one watching to get on the phone to their congresscritters to raise the ruckus, and since it's the olympics, that's true over the entire face of the Earth. It also makes the Georgians look underhanded. It was a sneak attack done when everyone's back is turned. Who comes to the rescue of the guy who got in the way of the TV?

I also think it's all over, and it won't otherwise have an affect. I think too much is made of the McCain lead over Obama on national security. That freaky old man sounds pretty goddamned crazy when he starts talking about bombs falling. He comes off bloodthirsty. I don't think the country is in a bloodthirsty mood. I think a lot of Americans are thirsty for the days when Summer meant shark attacks being the most important thing on TV and we could drive a full day for no good reason and pay the mortgage. I cannot see this as a winner for either of them, Obama would do well to just keep his mouth shut. Motherfucker should have said "This is  a difficult situation and I feel that commenting on it at this time would complicate the delicate task Ms. Rice has ahead of herself." Add tut-tuts over the violence then talk about Iraq and Health Care. Since we can't do anything about it, saying we should makes us look stupid and weak.

Johnny_Rotten wrote:

Some though have a hard time figuring out how to root for their own side.

Making the nasty statements and taking the heat so you can look above the fray is what proxies are for.

JR

My first reaction to the whole thing was "dead russians, dead georgians, what's not to like?" I have to say that I admire the way the Georgians handled the press (excepting the date thing.) They shot first when they had no immediate need to do it, and that's not even in question, yet they've got a large number of people to cry for the brave little victims. It helps when your main lobbyist is the lead foreign policy advisor to the Republican candidate. I also admire the Russians for this, they didn't actually fuck it up militarily. They should be ashamed of the losses they took, but they did it with dispatch and success. Quite a change when disorganized Checknian cavemen beat the fuck out of them for a couple of years. And that, I think is a big lesson to learn here.

I can't believe she mentions Beria, that twisted. It's one thing to talk about Stalin, he's too big to overlook, but Beria? That's fucked up. I was in the same batalion in the army as Jeffery Dhamer had been (not at the same time, of course.) We were sorta proud of that, it's kinda like that.

Last edited by orangeplus (2008-08-14 00:50:57)

orangeplus wrote:

I would actually think the lesson here is that the Russians can stomp on an American ally, and we are powerless to stop them. We're broke, our military is overstretched and the rest of the world is unwilling to follow our lead.

Yeah, we definitely would have gone to war with Russia over Georgia back before 9/11.  Until people realized the Georgia they invaded isn't the US state.

Zoo

In 1994 the last Russian troops left Estonia, the last part of the Soviet Union they were willing to pull the trigger to keep. Early 2002 Estonia formerly joins NATO. We moved our military into their backyard. The Russians were powerless to stop us then. We humiliated Serbian, and by extension Russian, by prying Kosovo from them, and the Russians were powerless to stop us. In 2001 we had no serious relations with Georgia, our involvment with Georgia is a direct extension of the war on terror. We went to Georgia to make sure terrorist from Chechnya and the other fuckupistans didn't use Abkhazia as a base. The world has changed quite a bit since then, so the comparison of then and now is baseless.

I think tojo only means the one way, and I think he means the good way.

There were people high in the government ranks who cried when the USSR broke up.  They knew what the defeat of our biggest adversary would mean to their phony-baloney jobs.

Who've they had to scare the populace with since?  A few little tinpot dictators and a bunch of ragged scattered "terrorists" with scrounged castoff weapons.  You know our masters yearn for the good old days of the Cold War.

Yeah, my statement does lack some clarity there. I'm saying is that with regards to Georgia, making a comparison between our commitments to them ("would go to war",) between 2001 and today is not useful since we had no serious ties to them. I was attempting to point out that an analogous situation existed as regards Estonia, where around the same time, we were absorbing into our military alliance what was only a few years before, an integral part of the Soviet Union. An extreme humiliation to the Russians and one they could do absolutely nothing to counter.

What I'm trying to say here is that at one time (late 90's early 00's) we could have protected Georgia with just by looking stern and complicating Russia's debt service, we wouldn't have even had to threaten to go to war to protect her. The situation that has changed, and I feel the lesson that part of the world, and others, will take from these shenanigans is the US is now weaker and Russia is now stronger, and those nations will modify their foreign policies accordingly.

Shot by a sniper during a live broadcast, hot reporter sits up to finish her report.

Last edited by choad (2008-08-14 18:49:41)

That chick is a badass.  I mean, yeah it's a fairly light wound, but still...

I am deeply indebted to the journalists who go into war zones. Who in the process often get shot at and the many who die as a result. I do not intend to question this particular videos validity, but you good not have scripted it better for sympathy to the cause.

Just at the moment when the darling yet vulnerable young girl reporter describes the heroic arrival of Humanitarian aid for the people, she is shot by the evil South Oseetian irregulars who have advanced into the Georgian heartland to shoot and loot the civillian population. thereby demonstrating the barbarity that required the Georgia Military to initially attack South Ossetia kicking this whole crisis off.

She's rather cute and I do not doubt this video, having no info. Still, if it goes on to viral success, I wouldn't be surprised to see more of the same of more dubious origin.

Last edited by Johnny_Rotten (2008-08-14 21:51:04)

Those pics of the burning man I put in the pics thread came from here by the way.

Wanted to reinforce that everything I mentioned before means absolutely dick if it doesn't end here. We are in some danger of things going amiss. John McCain is running a freelance foreign policy and pissing in the Russians corn flakes while the Russians are feeling pretty righteous. The Russians are pretty notorious winners, just ask Berlin. They were once (wrongly) considered our equal and they never quite get the idea that they aren't anymore, they may take McCain's shit talking seriously.

Also want to acknowledge the obvious, I'm talking a lot crap above my paygrade here. I've been really interested in the subject but no one I know has enough of an opinion on it to help me argue it out. Writing it out is a way for me to understand it, I do not necessarily "believe" much of what I've written in this thread.

whiskytangofoxtrot wrote:

Shit, Jesus, that was nasty.  Do you by chance read any Cyrillic?  And what was that other script in the photos?  Does Georgian have its own alphabet?  At first I thought they'd detoured into Ethiopia or something...

Ossetians are descended from Persian and speak Farsi.

O+,

I am sorry I have been too busy to pry apart the points you bring up. But I am sure this passion play will provide us with another act to review.

I for one think it needs more Cheney.

Russians were told over breakfast yesterday what really happened in Georgia: the conflict in South Ossetia was part of a plot by Dick Cheney, the Vice-President, to stop Barak Obama being elected president of the United States.

Johnny_Rotten wrote:

Russians were told over breakfast yesterday what really happened in Georgia: the conflict in South Ossetia was part of a plot by Dick Cheney, the Vice-President, to stop Barak Obama being elected president of the United States.

“In the old days under Soviet rule we didn't believe a word of our own propaganda but we thought that information was free in the West and we longed for it,” said Katya, a middle-aged Muscovite. “But we have learnt since that the West has its own propaganda and in some ways it is more powerful because people believe it.”
...
The coverage goes down well in developing countries that want an alternative to CNN and BBC World Service, a Russian official said. “We have learnt from Western TV how to simplify the narrative.”

Niiiiice.

jesusluvspegging wrote:

whiskytangofoxtrot wrote:

Shit, Jesus, that was nasty.  Do you by chance read any Cyrillic?  And what was that other script in the photos?

Nope, and no idea.

http://translate.google.com/translate?u … l=en&tl=en

orangeplus wrote:

I don't know about all that. Korea and Iran are a different issue altogether and how the world views our actions are easy for Korea (no one defends Korea) and Iran is just, well, complicated. Russia is very different and it's hard to say how it'll play.

The facts:
Russia was in Georgia on a UN sponsored peacekeeping mission.
Georgia (likely provoked) quite stupidly attacked the area under Russian and UN protection.
Russia beats the hell out of the Georgians and the Georgians cry unkle.
Russia gets a couple of cheap shots in and thats the end.
The US, in the meantime, talks alot of shit, but is incabable of doing anything.
Europe tut-tuts and successfully gets everyone to the peace table.

If the thing ends here, it's win-win for the Russians. Europe needs their gas, so there will be no sanctions against them. Everyone in the neighborhood gets the message and I imagine the US will lose those anti-missle radar sites in eastern Europe. It's hard to put the Ruskies in a moral bind over this, if you're America. If the US was on a peace keeping mission to Darfur and the Sudanese killed 10 US soldiers, we would level Khartoum. After what we pulled in Kosovo and Iraq, I can't see how anyone gives the US any room to talk shit on the Ruskies. All-in-all I think it'll have less of an impact on the World than Chechnya had, except to show the world the Russians have power where before they were powerless and the US is incapable/uninterested in doing anything to stop them.

Umm? What?

What about the part where Russia now claims 2 providences of Georgia and are not giving them back?

Better yet, your analogy on "if we were on a peace keeping mission in Darfur"???? Ever hear of Mogadishu circa 1993? That's where Somali's dragged our dead troops through the street (in front of 100's of their cheering countrymen) on international tv and Clinton gave us the old "aww shucks" and we did nothing....

What about your "Europe gets everyone to the peace table".  You forget to mention the Russia cease-fire violations subsequent to that.

Read some news and come back...

orangeplus wrote:

Also want to acknowledge the obvious, I'm talking a lot crap above my paygrade here. I've been really interested in the subject but no one I know has enough of an opinion on it to help me argue it out. Writing it out is a way for me to understand it, I do not necessarily "believe" much of what I've written in this thread.

God I like this guy...

If I had a nickel for every time I said the same thing.. I'd have a whole mess of nickels right now, that is for sure.

You'll have to excuse me. I had a rather unpleasant run-in with an asshole law enforcement officer/former high school bully this evening...

I'm sure all of this will work itself out after Obama takes office. He will simply reason with the Ruskies, Ahmadinejad, Kim Jong-il and Bin Laden and we will all live together in a new era of peace... and hope!

ptah13 wrote:

You'll have to excuse me. I had a rather unpleasant run-in with an asshole law enforcement officer/former high school bully this evening...

Ew.  I demand storytime!

ptah13 wrote:

What about the part where Russia now claims 2 providences of Georgia and are not giving them back?

Better yet, your analogy on "if we were on a peace keeping mission in Darfur"???? Ever hear of Mogadishu circa 1993? That's where Somali's dragged our dead troops through the street (in front of 100's of their cheering countrymen) on international tv and Clinton gave us the old "aww shucks" and we did nothing....

What about your "Europe gets everyone to the peace table".  You forget to mention the Russia cease-fire violations subsequent to that.

Read some news and come back...

Check the date on my post, Russia hadn't violated the cease fire when I had posted nor made statements that Georgia should forget about taking her shit back.

As to Somalia, oh summer days of youth, it doesn't hold for the example. There was no government to blame and no capitol to destroy. That of course didn't stop us; for a couple of weeks after "black hawk down" Cobras from the Kearsarge regularly flew in and fucked up Bakara. When I got there ~6 months later, driving trucks for the 10th, they told us we killed around 1000 people a day for a week after the rangers got hit. Just killing black people rarely makes the news, but those little fuckers had learned their lesson. I had the occasion to fire a couple of hundred rounds of 50 cal over the heads of a group of people protesting at the Mog airport road. They didn't throw anything, didn't shoot back (and they were all armed), just looked at us sullenly for a minute or so, turned around slowly and walked back home.