Georgia Clash Provides a Lesson on the United States Need for Russia
WASHINGTON
The image of President Bush smiling and chatting with Prime Minister Vladimir V. Putin of Russia from the stands of the Beijing Olympics even as Russian aircraft were shelling Georgia outlines the reality of Americas Russia policy. While America considers Georgia its strongest ally in the bloc of former Soviet countries, Washington needs Russia too much on big issues like Iran to risk it all to defend Georgia.
And State Department officials made it clear on Saturday that there was no chance the United States would intervene militarily.
Mr. Bush did use tough language, demanding that Russia stop bombing. And Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice demanded that Russia respect Georgias territorial integrity.
What did Mr. Putin do? First, he repudiated President Nicolas Sarkozy of France in Beijing, refusing to budge when Mr. Sarkozy tried to dissuade Russia from its military operation. It was a very, very tough meeting, a senior Western official said afterward. Putin was saying, We are going to make them pay. We are going to make justice.
Then, Mr. Putin flew from Beijing to a region that borders South Ossetia, arriving after an announcement that Georgia was pulling its troops out of the capital of the breakaway region. He appeared ostensibly to coordinate assistance to refugees who had fled South Ossetia into neighboring Russia, but the Russian message was clear: This is our sphere of influence; others stay out.
What the Russians just did is, for the first time since the fall of the Soviet Union, they have taken a decisive military action and imposed a military reality, said George Friedman, chief executive of Stratfor, a geopolitical analysis and intelligence company. Theyve done it unilaterally, and all of the countries that have been looking to the West to intimidate the Russians are now forced into a position to consider what just happened.
And Bush administration officials acknowledged that the outside world, and the United States in particular, had little leverage over Russian actions.
There is no possibility of drawing NATO or the international community into this, said a senior State Department official in a conference call with reporters. There is none. There is not a danger of a regional conflict in our mind.
The unfolding conflict in Georgia set off a flurry of diplomacy. Ms. Rice and other officials at the State Department and the Pentagon have been on the telephone with Russias foreign minister, Sergey V. Lavrov, and other Russian counterparts, as well as with officials in Georgia, urging both sides to return to peace talks.
The European Union and Germany, in particular, with its strong ties to Russia called on both sides to stand down and scheduled meetings to press their concerns. At the United Nations, members of the Security Council met informally to discuss a possible response, but one Security Council diplomat said it remained uncertain whether, with Russia and China both holding veto power on the Council, much could be done.
Strategically, the Russians have been sending signals that they really wanted to flex their muscles, and theyre upset about Kosovo, the diplomat said. He was alluding to Russias anger at the West for recognizing Kosovos independence from Serbia earlier this year.
Indeed, the decision by the United States and Europe to recognize Kosovo may well have paved the way for Russias lightning-fast decision to send troops to back the separatists in South Ossetia.
During one meeting on Kosovo in Brussels this year, Mr. Lavrov, the foreign minister, warned Ms. Rice and European diplomats that if they recognized Kosovo, they would be setting a precedent for South Ossetia and other breakaway provinces. As easily as the West could encourage a former Russian satellite toward independence and away from Russias sphere of influence, the Russians warned, so too, could Moscow encourage pro-Russian breakaway regions like South Ossetia to follow suit.
For the Bush administration, the choice now becomes whether backing Georgia which, more than any other former Soviet republic has allied with the United States on the South Ossetia issue is worth alienating Russia at a time when getting Russias help to rein in Irans nuclear ambitions is at the top of the United States foreign policy agenda.
One United Nations diplomat joked on Saturday that if someone went to the Russians and said, OK, Kosovo for Iran, wed have a deal.
That might be hyperbole, but there is a growing feeling among some officials in the Bush administration that perhaps the United States cannot have it all, and may have to choose its priorities, particularly when it comes to Russia.
The Bush administrations strong support for Georgia including the training of Georgias military and arms support came, in part, as a reward for its support of the United States in Iraq. The United States has held Georgia up as a beacon of democracy in the former Soviet Union; it was supposed to be an example to other former Soviet republics of the benefits of tilting to the West.
But that, along with America and Europes actions on Kosovo, left Russia feeling threatened, encircled and more convinced that it had to take aggressive measures to restore its power, dignity and influence in a region it considers its strategic back yard, foreign policy experts said.
Russias emerging aggressiveness is now also timed with Americas preoccupation with Iraq and Afghanistan, and the looming confrontation with Iran. These counterbalancing considerations mean that Moscow is in the drivers seat, administration officials acknowledged.
Weve placed ourselves in a position that globally we dont have the wherewithal to do anything, Mr. Friedman of Stratfor said. One would think under those circumstances, wed shut up.
One senior administration official, when told of that quote, laughed. Well, maybe were learning to shut up now, he said. He asked that his name not be used because he was not authorized to speak publicly on the issue.
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