John Batchelor, known to RBO/RW readers from both earlier articles and his Sunday night radio show (RBO posts each week’s program schedule), writes:
New Cold War
Speaking Sunday August 10 with Steve Cohen re the hot war in Georgia as the Russian air land forces launch armor columns under air cover into the sovereign state and U.S ally of Georgia. The combat is chaotic and unlikely to cease anytime soon. Georgia President Mikheil Saakashvili at Tbilisi, an American educated and savvy man, immediately read into the news reports that this is a fight between Russian tyranny and American liberty: “It’s not about Georgia anymore,” said Mr. Saakashvili. “It’s about America, its values. We are a freedom-loving nation that is right now under attack.” Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin at Beijing for the Olympics, after speaking with President Bush at a luncheon, said that there must be a response: “There are casualties, including among Russian peacekeepers. This is very sad and this will incur response.”
Total War Before Morning
These two statements together add up to total war for the next twenty-four hours. The photos and video from London shows rocket salvoes (above) going out, tank columns of both Georgians and Russians rolling under cloudy skies, refugee evacuation, downed aircraft, reported of many dead, wounded soldiers, excellent small arms, and what are said to be Ossetian troops at the ready with shoulder-fire anti-air missiles. Yet the most alarming detail of all is the report that the Russians have bombed the Georgian airbase of Viazni, where more than one thousand American Marines and special forces are camped in order to train the Georgia military. At the same time, there is a Georgia combat unit in Iraq as part of the Coalition. In sum, the officers and men now in nighttime operations against an invading Russian task force are trained and equipped and briefed by the Pentagon under direction of both NATO at Brussels and the White House. If Georgia was a member of NATO, instead of just an applicant, the NATO treaty would now have us at war with Russia.
These are the American guns of August
The first report is that the United Nations Security Council met and talked and walked away without action as the decision in New York may be to let Putin and Bush speak in Beijing. Georgia is a proxy battlefield. Over these last years since the Rose Revolution of ‘05-’06, America has encouraged Georgia to apply for NATO membership; America has also encouraged Georgia to think of itself as under U.S. protection. Why? Because President Bush responds to men who aim to be free, who believe in liberty, who look to join the West, not only NATO but all the advantages of market capitalism and Western enterprise. And the single most critical advantage that Georgia enjoys is that it is the only path for a pipeline from the Caspian Sea to the Turkish port of Ceyhan that does not cross Russian territory.
The American guns of August in the hands of our allies are fighting to defend unfettered access to the energy wealth of Central Asia. The Russian claim to be defending its compatriots in the breakaway province of South Ossetia is bunk. Russia under Putin means to exploit its energy supremacy over Europe and over Central Asia. This attack by Russian is naked aggression against a sovereign state in order to expand Russia’s monopoly over the energy routes and fields of Asia.
Not a Pipeline Conspiracy, a Pipeline Coincidence
It is mighty strange that this Russian attack comes within twenty-four hours of a reported Kurdish guerilla attack, by the well-financed PKK, on the Baku-Tblisi-Ceyhan pipeline. This was the first explosion ever reported on the pipeline that carried 1% of the world’s daily need; and the report that the pipeline will be shut for up to two weeks reversed the sell-off in oil and sent it back up through $120. Am I suspicious? Yes. Is it significant that the attack took place outside of the PKK region? Yes. When BP declared force majeure on the pipeline, it freed BP and all members of the consortium from contractual obligations. In other words, your money is no good when there is trouble with that pipeline. And now there are tank battles, air strikes, refugees and anarchy within 40 kilometers of the Tblisi section while the exploded Turkish section near Refahiye must burn itself out for days before it can be replaced.
Churchill on the Tarmac
While we wait for first light in Georgia and the scale of the morning assaults — and Russia cannot be seen to lose this fight — it is worth noting the vast difference between Senator Obama’s response and Senator McCain’s. Mr. Obama is on his way to vacation a week in a private residence in his native Hawaii. Mr. McCain is on the campaign trail.
Mr. Obama remarked, “Now is the time for Georgia and Russia to show restraint, and to avoid an escalation to full-scale war…”
Mr. McCain remarked, “Russian should immediately and unconditionally cease its military operations and withdraw all force from sovereign Georgian territory.”
In sum, Mr. Obama asks the invaded sovereign state of Georgia, our ally, NATO applicant, freedom-loving and critical energy state with a combat brigade of Georgians in Iraq to help America, with over 1000 U.S. military in harm’s way at an airbase that has already been bombed by Russia, this Georgia and its wounded defenders (right), to show restraint when it is attacked by the Russian army and airpower?
On the other hand, Mr. McCain demands that Russia cease fire immediately and get out of Georgia. Webads in train, speaking also on Sunday 10 with my professionals as well as Dick Morris and Larry Kudlow and who is Neville Chamberlain and who is Winston Churchill?
Also see related RBO article (above) Is Obama guilty of dereliction of duty?, a repost about Obama’s Senate Subcommittee on Europe.
Background information on the oil industry, and Pipelinestan and Baku-Tblisi-Ceyhan (BTC) pipeline in particular.
Update: John Batchelor, Aug. 9, 2008, 11:48 Eastern: “The Georgia Airlift 2008: worst case: assume that all systems are prepared to reinforce Georgia: worst worst case: see Berlin Crisis 1948:
August 9, London Times: “Half of Georgia’s 2,000 troops in Iraq plan to leave the country by Monday to join the fight against separatists in the breakaway province of South Ossetia, with the rest following as soon as possible, their commander said. “First of all we need to remove 1,000 guys from here within 96 hours, after that the rest of the guys,” Colonel Bondo Maisuradze told The Times this morning. “The US will provide us with the transportation,” he added. And what is the difference between deploying combat troops in a war zone and attacking in a war zone?
Our citizens may be deceived for awhile, and have been deceived; but as long as the presses can be protected, we may trust to them for light.--Thomas Jefferson.
