Georgian Syndrome ("Foreign Policy", USA)
- gold is not a word then dollar. The article is a funny feuilleton, very funny. Respect the author! (IN)
Two years after the catastrophic war, Tbilisi is flourishing, but the Georgians are still nervous - mainly because they are not completely sure of Barack Obama’s love for Georgia.
In these weeks, Russia celebrated the second anniversary of the war with Georgia in a typical manner: President Dmitry Medvedev paid a visit to Abkhazia - a rebellious province that Russia recognizes as an independent state - and one of the Russian generals announced that Russia had deployed modern anti-aircraft missiles in Abkhazia. C-300 missile systems to counter some threat from Georgia. If Georgians, inclined to regard every Russian provocation as the beginning of an apocalypse, rushed to sound the alarm, the State Department representative dismissed the general’s statements as obsolete news. The administration of President Barack Obama is trying - so far quite successfully - to find a balance between defending Georgia and maintaining a “reset with Russia.” But what will it do if Russia simply refuses to leave the territories seized during the illegal and unjust war?
Strongly inferior to Russia in all aspects of hard power, Georgia has a crushing advantage in soft power. Russian is, for sure, surprised and infuriates. Like Israel, Georgia is one of the countries that Americans are not able to think rationally about. The guests of Tbilisi, the charming ancient capital of the country, quickly fall under the rule of the “Georgian syndrome”, and are readily amenable to charm of picture sentimentality, abundant feasts, Central European boulevards, and passionate loyalty to Western values in the face of threats — real and imagined. It all worked pretty hard for me — the article about the events that preceded the war, which I wrote for the New York Times, surely should have pleased President Mikhail Saakashvili. Now I am in Tbilisi again - I am giving lectures at the invitation of the government, although mainly I wanted to see my son, who is currently practicing in the Ministry of Finance.
I was not the only one who succumbed to this spell. George Bush, who visited Georgia in 2005, was so moved that he even began to dance, and this instantly turned him into a local hero - they even called the street in Tbilisi after him. Georgia quickly became the unofficial symbol of the presidential crusade for democracy; Bush supported (however unsuccessfully) the idea of accepting Georgia into NATO, despite the vehement opposition of Russia. Senator John McCain nominated Saakashvili for the Nobel Peace Prize for the central role he played in the Georgian Rose Revolution 2003 of the year, which led Georgia to democracy (supported by Hillary Clinton, who was also a senator at the time). McCain still remains a loyal supporter of Georgia. His recent column in the Washington Post, in which he stated that the Obama administration, "seems to want to pacify authoritarian Russia more than support friendly Georgian democracy," completely reprinted the extremely pro-government Georgian English-language newspaper Messenger.
Georgian leaders look at what is happening with a little more optimism - or at least they say so. The Georgian reintegration minister Temuri Yakobashvili, a close friend of Saakashvili, who shares many of the characteristics of his boss - absolute self-confidence, reckless directness, spontaneous wit, told me: "We believe that the Obama administration does not betray Georgia." During the election campaign, Obama sharply, albeit with some delay, condemned the invasion, and in the presidency he unequivocally blamed Russia for the actual annexation of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, the rebellious province in which the war began in 2008. Yakobashvili and his colleagues were very pleased when Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, visiting Tbilisi last month, directly called the Russian presence in two areas “occupation”.
Nevertheless, so far Georgia has not had the opportunity to test its magic on Obama, and the Georgians fear that this impassive and incomprehensible type will not succumb to the “syndrome”. Informed people say with concern that, although Michael McFaul, who is officially in charge of the National Security Council (NSS) for Russia and Eurasia, is pro-Georgian and even worked in Georgia, representing the National Democratic Institute, Denis McDonough ), Obama's longtime adviser and chief of McFaul in the National Security Service is a cold-blooded realist. The rest ask if Obama has not abandoned the principle of “Eurocentrism” - that is, “Western values” - and does he intend to sacrifice Georgia for the sake of a “reset” with Russia.
Like the Israelis, it is not pleasant for Georgians to realize that their demands on the United States are based more on morality than on strategy. Yakobashvili makes wild claims that Russia's presence in Transcaucasia threatens NATO’s fight against terrorism, organized crime and the proliferation of nuclear weapons. weapons. In particular, he says that Russian passports issued to Ossetians were found in Chechen separatists. However, in reality, the current stalemate is hardly the source of instability. When I asked the deputy secretary of the Georgian National Security Council, Irakli Porchhidze, why the West should seek the withdrawal of Russia from Abkhazia and South Ossetia, he replied: “Russia has violated the principle of inviolability of borders; She is involved in ethnic cleansing. Are these not human rights issues? ”
This is true - more or less. The notorious ethnic cleansing is associated mainly with the brutal civil war of the early nineties, in which both sides committed atrocities. However, although there is still controversy over whose shot was the first in 2008, during the war, Russia violated Georgia’s territorial integrity as roughly and unequivocally as Iraq violated Kuwaiti’s territorial integrity in 1990. Despite the fact that the cease-fire agreement requires both sides to withdraw from the disputed region, Russia continues to keep thousands of soldiers in it, retains control over the territories, and demonstrates disregard for the agreements, announcing plans for C-300 - deprived of any or a distinct defense sense. “We have three and a half aircraft,” says Yakobashvili. “What are they going to shoot down - flying saucers?”
Georgia, in essence, is a problem for its friends. Most of its neighbors in the post-Soviet space bowed to Russian claims to regional hegemony - but not stubborn Georgia. Many of those who did not definitively succumb to the “Georgian syndrome” persuaded Saakashvili not to tease Russia and her hot-tempered Prime Minister Vladimir Putin to give up hopes of joining NATO and muffle his ardent nationalism. In his last column in the Financial Times, regional expert Thomas de Waal (Thomas de Waal) suggested that Russia also seeks to “reset” relations with the West, which could include reconciliation with Georgia, but added that such changes are impossible for now. Saakashvili, “Moscow’s sworn enemy,” as de Waal put it, retains his post. (His presidential term expires in 2013 year.)
Saakashvili, in fact, a man is hot and reckless, but the Georgians, apparently, like it in him. He partially - though not completely - regained the popularity lost after the war in which Georgia suffered a quick and convincing defeat, and the Georgian opposition is hopelessly fragmented. The country is booming, Saakashvili is building a lot to emphasize his image of the second David the Builder - the great Georgian ruler, whom he swore to imitate. When his presidential term ends, he can become prime minister, as Putin did (however, Saakashvili himself would hardly like such a comparison). In short, in Georgia he is by no means a stranger. In addition, there are no signs that Russia is really softening its position towards its neighbors unnoticed. Putin’s Russia — or Medvedev — seems to need submission, not reconciliation. If Russia's goal would be simply to liberate the Ossetian and Abkhaz peoples from the Georgian yoke, one could find some solution that implies considerable autonomy. However, if its goal is to bring Georgia to its knees, then it will not withdraw its troops from the region, without concerted pressure from the West.
This is where the problem lies. If Russia again tries to crush Georgia, the West can respond. But what if Moscow just keeps on holding on to what has already been captured? European leaders, many of whom depend on Russian oil and gas, are unlikely to find it worth risking relations with Russia for the sake of getting out of this impasse. The McCain administration could still sacrifice arms control or Iranian politics for the great cause of Georgian territorial integrity, but neither Obama nor any other president who is not under the authority of the “Georgian syndrome” will act like that. Russian occupation of Georgian territory is one of those abuses that are insisted on inadmissibility, but in practice they are usually put up with them and wait until a compromise solution is possible.
It would be better if to the attention of the Georgian leadership, who does not want to abandon the maximalist claims, this will be brought by friends, not opponents. At the end of our conversation in the bar of the Georgian hotel Marriott, Yakobashvili conveyed to me one of the ambassadors recently told him: "We love Georgia, but we will not love you unconditionally."
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