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athair ambrois
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 Posted: Sun Aug 17, 2008 12:51 pm Post subject: A Two-Sided Descent Into Full-Scale War |
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A Two-Sided Descent Into Full-Scale War
By Peter Finn
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/08/16/AR2008081600502_pf.html
Washington Post Foreign Service
Sunday, August 17, 2008; A01
TSKHINVALI, Georgia, Aug. 16 -- Nine days ago, late in the afternoon
of Aug. 7, Georgian tanks, artillery and infantry began moving out of
bases in Georgia and toward South Ossetia, a zone long held by
separatists who are backed by Moscow.
About 800 troops from Georgia's 4th Battalion left a base in Tbilisi,
the Georgian capital, that Thursday afternoon, according to Georgian
Defense Minister Davit Kezerashvili. Later that day, units armed with
the BM-21 Grad, a multiple rocket system whose World War II version
was known as Stalin's Rain, moved out of their base in Gori, about 40
miles away.
As the Georgian units approached the contested zone from the south,
Russian army forces were massed just to its north, separated from it
only by the 4,000-yard-long Roki Tunnel through the Caucasus
Mountains. The Russian units were receiving intelligence reports about
the Georgian movement. About 8 p.m., Russian military aircraft took
off and skirted Georgian airspace, staying just outside it, according
to Kezerashvili.
For days, separatists and Georgian troops had skirmished along the
border, but this movement of armor was a major new development.
Georgia and Russia were on a collision course. In three hours, full-
scale war would begin.
With a huge air, land and sea campaign, Russian forces routed the
Georgians in the following days and advanced far into Georgian
territory, overrunning major cities and military bases. An ensuing
uproar in the West, accusing Russia of using excessive force, has
clouded details of how the war began.
Interviews with Georgian leaders, Russian officials, Western diplomats
and Bush administration officials, together with briefings by the
Russian military in Moscow, show that a series of escalating military
moves by each side convinced the other that war was imminent.
The Georgian leadership took steps, sometimes against the advice of
its allies, sometimes without telling them, that accelerated the
advance to a war in which Georgia could never prevail, according to a
U.S. account. But the key question -- who finally triggered full
conflict? -- remains in dispute. The Georgians said they staged their
offensive only after Russian troops began streaming into South Ossetia
and the Russians saying they advanced only after the Georgians began
attacking South Ossetia's capital, Tskhinvali.
The Kremlin, long angry over Georgia's close ties with the United
States and Western Europe, may have been itching for a fight, as
Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili has long insisted. If so,
Saakashvili facilitated the lopsided matchup. Some Western officials
say that although he faced clear provocations, he was reckless. "If it
was a trap, and there's good reason to think it was, he walked right
into it," one Western diplomat said, speaking on the condition of
anonymity.
In Georgia, popular anger against Russia remains high, and Saakashvili
has yet to be called to account for the decision to assault
Tskhinvali, a small city in which thousands of civilians were forced
into their cellars by shelling.
Russian officials say 2,000 people died in Tskhinvali. That figure has
been described as inflated by human rights groups. But there
unquestionably was a large toll of civilian deaths and injuries, which
has outraged Russia and shocked Georgia's Western allies.
"It's deplorable, simply deplorable, to fire on civilians like that,
and illegal," said Matthew Bryza, the U.S. special envoy to the
region, in an interview. "It's horrible." |
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athair ambrois
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| Posted: Sun Aug 17, 2008 12:53 pm Post subject: Re: A Two-Sided Descent Into Full-Scale War |
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........ continued
A Long Preamble
South Ossetia, an area the size of Rhode Island, is dominated by
Ossetians, an ethnic group distinct from the country's majority
Georgians. The province secured de facto independence from Georgia
after a short, vicious war in the early 1990s. The two sides signed a
cease-fire, but true peace never set in. The world denied formal
recognition to the separatist mini-state, but Russia forged close
links with it, providing aid, passports for South Ossetians and a
peacekeeping force.
Earlier this year, two distant developments angered Russia. Western
countries overrode Russian objections and endorsed independence for
Kosovo, the separatist province of Serbia, and the NATO alliance,
meeting in Bucharest, the Romanian capital, announced that Georgia
might one day become a member, although it put off formal steps toward
that goal. In April, Vladimir Putin, then the Russian president,
upgraded ties with the separatist governments in South Ossetia and
Abkhazia to a semiofficial level. Over the objections of Georgia and
NATO, he sent troops into Abkhazia, saying the province feared a
Georgian attack.
A Russian fighter plane, violating Georgian airspace, shot down an
unmanned Georgian spy plane that had been sent -- despite the cease-
fire agreement -- on a surveillance mission, according to U.N.
investigators. In July, during a visit to Georgia by Secretary of
State Condoleezza Rice, two Russian warplanes flew into Georgian
airspace.
Dmitry Sanakoyev, a South Ossetian leader willing to work with the
authorities in Tbilisi, survived an assassination attempt in July.
"In the summer, we witnessed an increasing number of incidents --
explosions, shooting," said a European diplomat, adding that South
Ossetia's military "professionalism" was beginning to grow.
South Ossetian leaders declined to attend talks with Georgian leaders
in Helsinki, Western diplomats said. The South Ossetians said the
Georgian negotiator's title, minister of state for the reintegration
of Georgia, was insulting; Temur Yakobashvili, the minister, expressed
willingness to change his title to special envoy, but to no avail.
On Aug. 1, an explosion in a small patch of South Ossetia held by the
Georgians since the 1990s war wounded five Georgian policemen. Over
the next two days, a series of shootings killed six Ossetians and five
Georgians, according to figures compiled by the Organization for
Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE). Each side accused the other
of initiating artillery attacks and using heavier weapons.
Thursday, Aug. 7 |
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athair ambrois
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| Posted: Sun Aug 17, 2008 12:55 pm Post subject: Re: A Two-Sided Descent Into Full-Scale War |
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........ continued
On the morning of Aug. 7, after a night of Ossetian artillery fire,
Yakobashvili said, he traveled to Tskhinvali for a meeting with the
separatists that the Russians had convened at a Russian peacekeeping
base. "Nobody was in the streets -- no cars, no people," he said in a
conference call with reporters Aug. 14. "We met the general of the
Russian peacekeepers, and he said that the separatists were not
answering the phone." Yakobashvili left.
Around 2 p.m. that day, Ossetian artillery fire resumed, targeting
Georgian positions in the village of Avnevi in South Ossetia. The
barrage continued for several hours. Two Georgian peacekeepers were
killed, the first deaths among Georgians in South Ossetia since the
1990s, according to Georgian Prime Minister Lado Gurgenidze, who spoke
in a telephone briefing Aug. 14.
"Where were the Russian peacekeepers when the South Ossetians were
shelling the Georgian positions?" said Bryza, the U.S. envoy. ". . .
They didn't lift a finger to stop them."
Russian officials say the Georgians fired back during the day;
Georgians say they restrained themselves.
But by evening, Kezerashvili said, the Georgian side had had enough.
"At 6, I gave the order to prepare everything, to go out from the
bases," he said in an interview Aug. 14 at a Georgian position along
the Tbilisi-Gori highway. Kezerashvili described the movement of
armor, which included tanks, 122mm howitzers and 203mm self-propelled
artillery, as a show of force designed to deter the Ossetians from
continuing to barrage the Georgian troops' positions inside South
Ossetia.
Western officials in and around South Ossetia also recorded the troop
and armor movement, according to a Western diplomat who described in
detail on-the-ground reports by monitors from the OSCE. The monitors
recorded the movement of BM-21s in the late afternoon.
"On Thursday -- Thursday afternoon -- they noticed equipment and
troops on the road, rolling to Karaleti," a Georgian village near
Gori, the diplomat said. Kezerashvili said the BM-21s moved Thursday
night.
At 7 p.m., with troops on the march, Saakashvili went on national
television and declared a unilateral cease-fire. "We offer all of you
partnership and friendship," he said to the South Ossetians. "We are
ready for any sort of agreement in the interest of peace."
About 9 p.m., the Ossetians complained to Western monitors about the
military traffic, according to a diplomat in Tbilisi.
Russian troops and armored units had been in Russian territory just
north of South Ossetia for an annual summer military exercise. This
year, they stayed in the area after completing the maneuvers. Russian
intelligence officers were receiving reports about the movement of
Georgian armor, and they interpreted it as the beginning of an
offensive, according to a Russian official.
Saakashvili's televised call for a cease-fire, coinciding with the
movement of so many troops and weapons, was perceived in Moscow as an
attempt to buy time while Georgian forces positioned themselves for a
major attack.
"From 18:00, Georgian troops from inner districts are relocated to the
area" near the South Ossetian border, Anatoly Nogovitsyn, a colonel-
general on the Russian General Staff, told reporters in Moscow at a
retrospective briefing. "More than 20 armored units arrive."
Kezerashvili said that around the same time, Georgians were receiving
intelligence reports suggesting that Russian troops were gearing up to
move south through the Roki Tunnel. Russia denies any such muster.
In a series of phone calls, Saakashvili contacted Western and NATO
leaders and diplomats. "I started to call frantically," he said in an
interview with foreign journalists.
Bryza, the U.S. envoy, said: "Our response was, 'Don't get drawn into
a trap. Don't confront the Russian military.' " Bryza said he was not
told that Georgian armor was already moving toward the South Ossetian
line and continued to do so even after Saakashvili declared a cease-
fire.
The earlier movement of Russian troops into Abkhazia and around other
terrain to the north was feeding sentiment among leaders in Tbilisi
for a military response, Bryza said. "They felt they had to defend the
honor of their nation and defend their villages. It was a very
dangerous dynamic. That was part of an action-reaction, 'Guns of
August' scenario that we tried to defuse."
According to Kezerashvili, on Thursday night, about three hours after
Saakashvili's televised address, a new round of South Ossetian shells
struck a Georgian peacekeeping position in the village of Sarabuki and
an administration building in the village of Korta used by Sanakoyev,
Tbilisi's South Ossetian ally.
Russia denies any such late-night bombardment. OSCE monitors in
Tskhinvali also did not record any outgoing heavy artillery fire from
the South Ossetian side at that time, according to a Western diplomat
with access to the organization's on-the-ground reporting.
At 11 p.m., Saakashvili said, he received the first reports that
Russian units were passing through the tunnel.
"We started to check, and around 11:50, I got confirmation that
Russian armor was coming in," Saakashvili said. "So what we do now? I
said, 'Now we respond with fire.' " To do otherwise, he said, would
have been to cede Georgian sovereignty. He had no choice, he said.
In calls to the U.S. administration, Georgian officials did not convey
the scope of what was to come, Bryza said. "During these intense
exchanges between the leadership here and me, when they said they were
going to lift the cease-fire, we said, 'Don't put your forces in
harm's way, because you cannot prevail,' " he said. "And the response
was: 'We understand that. We are going to shell the road on which the
Russians are approaching and try to keep them back.' That's what they
said."
The Russians, however, deny entering the Roki Tunnel until after
Georgia began a full attack on Tskhinvali. The Russian Defense
Ministry and the Russian prime minister's office did not respond to
requests for the exact time of the entry into the tunnel or
information on the subsequent movement of Russian troops.
A U.S. official familiar with intelligence from the region said the
administration could not put a time on the Russian move into South
Ossetia. "It's not clear," the official said. "You'd have to have had
somebody there with a stopwatch, and something overhead at precisely
that moment."
Friday, Aug. 8 |
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athair ambrois
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| Posted: Sun Aug 17, 2008 12:56 pm Post subject: Re: A Two-Sided Descent Into Full-Scale War |
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........ continued
"This is unfortunately when everything started," said Kezerashvili,
the Georgian defense minister. "At 12 at night."
Georgian forces fired artillery rounds into Tskhinvali, which sits in
a hollow. They attacked villages on surrounding higher ground. By 1
a.m., they were shelling the road along which a Russian column of more
than 100 vehicles, including tanks and other armored vehicles, was
moving south from the Roki Tunnel.
The column stopped for 90 minutes, Kezerashvili said.
By 2 a.m. on Friday, Aug. 8, Kezerashvili said, Georgian ground troops
had advanced to the edge of Tskhinvali, and Georgian units had
unleashed the BM-21 multiple rocket system, which can launch 40
rockets in 20 seconds.
Kezerashvili said the system was used to target separatist government
buildings in the center of Tskhinvali, including the Defense Ministry
and the Interior Ministry, where police forces have their
headquarters. "It's not like a very open and big city, and I can tell
you that we only targeted the places, the governmental organizations,"
Kezerashvili said.
But military experts said the BM-21 is a weapon for battlefield combat
and not for use anywhere near civilians. "The BM-21 was designed to
attack forces in large areas, and, as a consequence, if you use them
in an urban environment, the likelihood of collateral damage is high,"
said retired Army Maj. Gen. William L. Nash, a senior fellow at the
Council on Foreign Relations.
The artillery fire on the city continued until daylight, according to
the reports of three OSCE monitors who were there in a cellar; their
building was shelled and damaged. The three got out of Tskhinvali on
Friday afternoon during a lull in fighting.
By 10 a.m. on Aug. 8, about 1,500 Georgian ground troops had entered
the center of Tskhinvali; altogether, there were 9,000 Georgian troops
in the larger combat theater. But within two hours, the Georgians were
pushed back by Russian artillery and air attacks.
Georgian leaders maintain that the Russian counteroffensive accounts
for much of the damage to Tskhinvali. "When aircraft started bombing
our positions in Tskhinvali, this is when most civilian buildings were
burned," Kezerashvili said. "Our soldiers were near civilian houses."
Russians say the damage was the result of Georgian fire.
About three hours after pulling back, Georgian ground troops staged
another push into the city. Russian aircraft, flying in pairs, with as
many as eight planes attacking at once, hammered the Georgian lines,
which were simultaneously under artillery fire. There were only a few
direct clashes in the streets between Georgian and Russian troops,
Kezerashvili said.
By 11 p.m. on Friday night, the Georgians had retreated for a second
time.
Later, "we tried to enter Tskhinvali again, a third time,"
Kezerashvili said. "But when we entered, we got a very heavy attack.
What the officers are telling me is that it was something like hell."
Three hundred Georgian troops remain missing, with 160 confirmed dead,
according to the Georgian Ministry of Defense.
Unable to replenish their ranks, Georgian forces grew exhausted as
Saturday wore on. Fresh Russian troops continued to arrive. "I think
they had something around 15- to 20,000 in the theater," Kezerashvili
said. "I had only 9,000. They were already bringing in new soldiers.
They had a chance to rest, and our soldiers were becoming tired and
more tired because I had no additional forces to change them. After
two days of battle, they were too tired."
Early Sunday morning, Aug. 10, Kezerashvili ordered his troops to fall
back to Gori. The shooting war was effectively over. |
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AGGreen
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| Posted: Mon Aug 18, 2008 5:21 am Post subject: Re: A Two-Sided Descent Into Full-Scale War |
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***You must delight, Father, in the 100,000 + Georgian refugees. What a guy!
"athair ambrois" <emrys@globe.net.nz> wrote in message
news:c1bbb55a-05b6-4e88-820a-6de2a4eebac5@a2g2000prm.googlegroups.com...
| Quote: | A Two-Sided Descent Into Full-Scale War
By Peter Finn
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/08/16/AR2008081600502_pf.html
Washington Post Foreign Service
Sunday, August 17, 2008; A01
TSKHINVALI, Georgia, Aug. 16 -- Nine days ago, late in the afternoon
of Aug. 7, Georgian tanks, artillery and infantry began moving out of
bases in Georgia and toward South Ossetia, a zone long held by
separatists who are backed by Moscow.
About 800 troops from Georgia's 4th Battalion left a base in Tbilisi,
the Georgian capital, that Thursday afternoon, according to Georgian
Defense Minister Davit Kezerashvili. Later that day, units armed with
the BM-21 Grad, a multiple rocket system whose World War II version
was known as Stalin's Rain, moved out of their base in Gori, about 40
miles away.
As the Georgian units approached the contested zone from the south,
Russian army forces were massed just to its north, separated from it
only by the 4,000-yard-long Roki Tunnel through the Caucasus
Mountains. The Russian units were receiving intelligence reports about
the Georgian movement. About 8 p.m., Russian military aircraft took
off and skirted Georgian airspace, staying just outside it, according
to Kezerashvili.
For days, separatists and Georgian troops had skirmished along the
border, but this movement of armor was a major new development.
Georgia and Russia were on a collision course. In three hours, full-
scale war would begin.
With a huge air, land and sea campaign, Russian forces routed the
Georgians in the following days and advanced far into Georgian
territory, overrunning major cities and military bases. An ensuing
uproar in the West, accusing Russia of using excessive force, has
clouded details of how the war began.
Interviews with Georgian leaders, Russian officials, Western diplomats
and Bush administration officials, together with briefings by the
Russian military in Moscow, show that a series of escalating military
moves by each side convinced the other that war was imminent.
The Georgian leadership took steps, sometimes against the advice of
its allies, sometimes without telling them, that accelerated the
advance to a war in which Georgia could never prevail, according to a
U.S. account. But the key question -- who finally triggered full
conflict? -- remains in dispute. The Georgians said they staged their
offensive only after Russian troops began streaming into South Ossetia
and the Russians saying they advanced only after the Georgians began
attacking South Ossetia's capital, Tskhinvali.
The Kremlin, long angry over Georgia's close ties with the United
States and Western Europe, may have been itching for a fight, as
Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili has long insisted. If so,
Saakashvili facilitated the lopsided matchup. Some Western officials
say that although he faced clear provocations, he was reckless. "If it
was a trap, and there's good reason to think it was, he walked right
into it," one Western diplomat said, speaking on the condition of
anonymity.
In Georgia, popular anger against Russia remains high, and Saakashvili
has yet to be called to account for the decision to assault
Tskhinvali, a small city in which thousands of civilians were forced
into their cellars by shelling.
Russian officials say 2,000 people died in Tskhinvali. That figure has
been described as inflated by human rights groups. But there
unquestionably was a large toll of civilian deaths and injuries, which
has outraged Russia and shocked Georgia's Western allies.
"It's deplorable, simply deplorable, to fire on civilians like that,
and illegal," said Matthew Bryza, the U.S. special envoy to the
region, in an interview. "It's horrible."
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athair ambrois
Guest
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| Posted: Mon Aug 18, 2008 2:07 pm Post subject: Re: A Two-Sided Descent Into Full-Scale War |
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On Aug 18, 12:21 pm, "AGGreen" <AGGreen@not_the_imposter.edu> wrote:
| Quote: | ***You must delight, Father, in the 100,000 + Georgian refugees. What a guy!
|
You'd be wrong.
Any figures available yet of the number of Georgian citizens killed by
Saakashvili during the two nights when he bombarded Tskhinvali?
Anybody seen the photos of the destruction which he brought to
Tskhinvali, destroying around 70% of the city.
Are you, Al, delighing in the deaths of these civilians and the
destruction of their city? I doubt it, so why attribute any "delight"
to me? |
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athair ambrois
Guest
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| Posted: Tue Aug 19, 2008 4:21 am Post subject: Re: A Two-Sided Descent Into Full-Scale War |
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On Aug 19, 2:49 pm, "AGGreen" <AGGreen@not_the_imposter.edu> wrote:
| Quote: | Are you, Al, delighing in the deaths of these civilians and the
destruction of their city? I doubt it, so why attribute any "delight"
to me?
***Because you have expressed favoritism bordering on delight toward the
Russian aggressors.
|
You're absolutely incorrect. Who could possible delight in death and
war? What sort of person makes such suggestions?
I have expressed "delight" that Russia acted swiftly in bringing
Saakahvili's death-dealing spree to a speedy halt. Of course that
involved casualties but can you imagine if Saakashvile had been
allowed a free hand to go on shelling Ossetia for more than two
nights? The death toll would be greater. Russia acted correctly to
bring the bombardment of Ossetia to a halt. So my delight, as I am
sure you understand well enough, was not in the deaths which have
occurred but in the thousands more deaths which Russia prevented. |
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AGGreen
Guest
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| Posted: Tue Aug 19, 2008 7:49 am Post subject: Re: A Two-Sided Descent Into Full-Scale War |
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"athair ambrois" <emrys@globe.net.nz> wrote in message
news:b6155ea4-5c38-44b1-977b-0b931886159b@r15g2000prd.googlegroups.com...
On Aug 18, 12:21 pm, "AGGreen" <AGGreen@not_the_imposter.edu> wrote:
| Quote: | ***You must delight, Father, in the 100,000 + Georgian refugees. What a
guy!
|
You'd be wrong.
Any figures available yet of the number of Georgian citizens killed by
Saakashvili during the two nights when he bombarded Tskhinvali?
***While taking back soverign Georgian territory?
Anybody seen the photos of the destruction which he brought to
Tskhinvali, destroying around 70% of the city.
***Russia is keeping the press at bay.
Are you, Al, delighing in the deaths of these civilians and the
destruction of their city? I doubt it, so why attribute any "delight"
to me?
***Because you have expressed favoritism bordering on delight toward the
Russian aggressors. |
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athair ambrois
Guest
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| Posted: Tue Aug 19, 2008 2:07 pm Post subject: Re: A Two-Sided Descent Into Full-Scale War |
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On Aug 20, 12:46 am, "AGGreen" <AGGreen@not_the_imposter.edu> wrote:
| Quote: |
I have expressed "delight" that Russia acted swiftly in bringing
Saakahvili's death-dealing spree to a speedy halt. Of course that
involved casualties but can you imagine if Saakashvile had been
allowed a free hand to go on shelling Ossetia for more than two
nights? The death toll would be greater. Russia acted correctly to
bring the bombardment of Ossetia to a halt. So my delight, as I am
sure you understand well enough, was not in the deaths which have
occurred but in the thousands more deaths which Russia prevented.
***I detect backpedaling.
|
Not at all! Go back and read my message of "delight" several days
ago, I said then what I say today. |
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athair ambrois
Guest
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| Posted: Tue Aug 19, 2008 2:13 pm Post subject: Re: A Two-Sided Descent Into Full-Scale War |
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On Aug 20, 12:46 am, "AGGreen" <AGGreen@not_the_imposter.edu> wrote:
| Quote: |
I have expressed "delight" that Russia acted swiftly in bringing
Saakahvili's death-dealing spree to a speedy halt. Of course that
involved casualties but can you imagine if Saakashvile had been
allowed a free hand to go on shelling Ossetia for more than two
nights? The death toll would be greater. Russia acted correctly to
bring the bombardment of Ossetia to a halt. So my delight, as I am
sure you understand well enough, was not in the deaths which have
occurred but in the thousands more deaths which Russia prevented.
***I detect backpedaling.
|
Here is my original message of "delight."
__________________________
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.religion.christian.east-orthodox/msg/734eacb01860a647
You know what I delight in? For two nights, the 8th and 9th of
August, Georgia subjected South Ossetia's Capitol Tskhinvali to
horrendous bombardment from missile artillery. Georgia destroyed 70%
of the Capital and 10 surrounding villages.
I delight that Russia did not wring it hands and call for six months
of talking and waffling in the UN but it did what was needed to stop
further ethnic cleansing. It went in and stopped the Georgian
aggression in a couple of days.
I would be very delighted if the States learnt a good lession from
this - how to deal effectively with such situations. How NOT to cross
the territorial boundaries of another nation and then sit there for
years and years while the bloodshed waxes and wanes.
Bravo for the speedy and decisive way Russia handled the crisis!
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.religion.christian.east-orthodox/msg/734eacb01860a647 |
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AGGreen
Guest
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| Posted: Tue Aug 19, 2008 5:46 pm Post subject: Re: A Two-Sided Descent Into Full-Scale War |
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"athair ambrois" <emrys@globe.net.nz> wrote in message
news:f6a053e2-c446-49c0-93ca-21aab13ceed3@a3g2000prm.googlegroups.com...
On Aug 19, 2:49 pm, "AGGreen" <AGGreen@not_the_imposter.edu> wrote:
| Quote: | Are you, Al, delighing in the deaths of these civilians and the
destruction of their city? I doubt it, so why attribute any "delight"
to me?
***Because you have expressed favoritism bordering on delight toward the
Russian aggressors.
|
You're absolutely incorrect. Who could possible delight in death and
war? What sort of person makes such suggestions?
I have expressed "delight" that Russia acted swiftly in bringing
Saakahvili's death-dealing spree to a speedy halt. Of course that
involved casualties but can you imagine if Saakashvile had been
allowed a free hand to go on shelling Ossetia for more than two
nights? The death toll would be greater. Russia acted correctly to
bring the bombardment of Ossetia to a halt. So my delight, as I am
sure you understand well enough, was not in the deaths which have
occurred but in the thousands more deaths which Russia prevented.
***I detect backpedaling. |
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Digimortal@starpower.net
Guest
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| Posted: Tue Aug 19, 2008 7:25 pm Post subject: Re: A Two-Sided Descent Into Full-Scale War |
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You do understand that we are about to see more prophecy fulfilled
right before our eyes again! Ezekiel
On Aug 19, 10:13 am, athair ambrois <em...@globe.net.nz> wrote:
| Quote: | On Aug 20, 12:46 am, "AGGreen" <AGGreen@not_the_imposter.edu> wrote:
I have expressed "delight" that Russia acted swiftly in bringing
Saakahvili's death-dealing spree to a speedy halt. Of course that
involved casualties but can you imagine if Saakashvile had been
allowed a free hand to go on shelling Ossetia for more than two
nights? The death toll would be greater. Russia acted correctly to
bring the bombardment of Ossetia to a halt. So my delight, as I am
sure you understand well enough, was not in the deaths which have
occurred but in the thousands more deaths which Russia prevented.
***I detect backpedaling.
Here is my original message of "delight."
__________________________
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.religion.christian.east-orthodox/m...
You know what I delight in? For two nights, the 8th and 9th of
August, Georgia subjected South Ossetia's Capitol Tskhinvali to
horrendous bombardment from missile artillery. Georgia destroyed 70%
of the Capital and 10 surrounding villages.
I delight that Russia did not wring it hands and call for six months
of talking and waffling in the UN but it did what was needed to stop
further ethnic cleansing. It went in and stopped the Georgian
aggression in a couple of days.
I would be very delighted if the States learnt a good lession from
this - how to deal effectively with such situations. How NOT to cross
the territorial boundaries of another nation and then sit there for
years and years while the bloodshed waxes and wanes.
Bravo for the speedy and decisive way Russia handled the crisis!
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.religion.christian.east-orthodox/m... |
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