It was no surprise this week when an independent EU fact-finding commission reported that Georgia started its 5-day war with Russia in August, 2008. But a member of that commission, writing in The New York Times, says their report left out the role George w. Bush played in the outbreak of that conflict and in failing to bring Georgia's Saakashvili to heel:
...the report has a major flaw. It fails to thoroughly analyze the decisive role that the United States played before, during and after the conflict. Only a detailed assessment of President George W. Bush’s Georgia policy and its failures can fully explain the outbreak of the war and help the E.U. and President Obama shape new policies toward Russia and Georgia.
...After 9/11, ...President Bush changed the policy toward Georgia, introducing two elements that developed into serious strategic disadvantages. Mr. Bush not only made Georgia into a partner in the “war on terror,” but he promoted Mr. Saakashvili and Georgia into a centerpiece of his “promotion of democracy.” In Tbilisi in 2005, Mr. Bush proclaimed Mr. Saakashvili’s Georgia “a beacon of liberty.”
Even as President Bush became increasingly aware that he needed the Kremlin’s help in Iran and for other American interests, he was kept a prisoner by this exaggeration of Georgia’s importance for U.S. foreign policy.
Senior officials of the Bush administration claim they warned Mr. Saakashvili against using force against Russia. But having invested so much ideological importance in the Georgian president, Mr. Bush couldn’t warn him publicly — or, as it turned out, stop him. Having become so dependent on Mr. Saakashvili’s success, the United States lost the political influence to stop him.
Once the war broke out on the night of Aug. 7, President Bush decided against any U.S. military action, and instead to encourage President Nicolas Sarkozy of France, then holding the E.U. presidency, to seek a cease-fire. That was also a strategic mistake: Only the United States had the political clout to negotiate and enforce a serious peace agreement with Russia.
A foreign policy failure of the Bush administration? That'd be one for the record books, wouldn't it? Jörg Himmelreich's assessment does make sense. It explains why, when Russia snapped back and counterattacked into Georgia, Saakashvili appeared genuinely surprised that the United States didn't send forces to rally to his support. He really believed that, even if Western Europe didn't go to war with Russia in defence of Georgia, America would.
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