Georgia

We aren't sure why we are going back to Georgia, we'd pretty much foretold what would happen and its happening. Perhaps we need to go back because the west is having one of its "youse dirty rate betrayed us" moments, whereas the sad reality is the Russians, whatever else they have done, have not betrayed the west.

The ceasefire document they signed was at the west's insistence, not at theirs; they kept saying in as many ways as possible they were not going to leave Georgia and that Tbilisi can forget about South Ossetia and Abkhazia and so on and so forth, so what part of the Russian position did the west not understand?

Instead of blaming the Russians, maybe the west needs to blame itself for not believing the other guy when he says straight out, I'll do this but not this.

The short and the shorter of it is that the Russians have withdrawn from some areas like Gori city proper and Senaki, but they insist they are going to maintain a presence in the port city of Poti, and that Russian "peacekeepers" are going to stay in Georgia to assure the security of the breakaway zones. And the Russians have begun their heavy duty effort to subvert the pro-west government and replace it with a pliable pro-Moscow government.

The more the west has threatened, the more Moscow has sneered, and it should. There is nothing so pathetic as a bunch of high living jackasses so out of shape a 3-year old girl could whip their sorry behinds, making threats against Moscow. Whatever sympathy Orbat.com may have had for the west has evaporated not even so much as because the west failed to act, it is still pushing hot air through all orifices at a rate that bodes ill for any hope of stopping climate change.

More to the point would be discussion on how the west is going to strengthen the air, sea, and ground defenses of the Baltics, Poland, Ukraine, Georgia and so on against the next time the Bear gets a serious case of the munchies. Lets hear where the tanks, SAM systems, air defense interceptors, missile gunboats are going to come from instead of yapping annoyingly at the Bear's heels.

You dont want to get involved in a direct war with Russia, fine, that's a legitimate objective. But then be prepared to start laying out the $100-billion for arms that the front-line states will require to hold off Russia on their own - that's just a back-of-envelope guess on our part, and we are NOT talking about buying M-1s at $10-million each and Typhoons at $100-million each and missile gunboats at $300-million each. If that's what we are talking about, try multiplying the estimate we made by a factor of 5-10.

The Baltics have three light infantry brigades and a reserve brigade - total. This is a force even weaker than Georgia fielded. Where are the NATO troops to fight the Russians? The only ones with the guts to fight are the Americans, but where are the ground forces required to stop a Russian army of 3-4 divisions?

Oh, we get it, stupid us: The US will use airpower to stop the Russians, nothing so messy as slugging it out on the ground.

Let's consider a rather simple scenario: Russia tells Western Europe: you let a single US plane take off from your airbases, and we're going to charbroil you with our SS-20s. Russia makes not one threat against the US.

So what do you think is going to happen, particularly when the Russians say: "We only want our old provinces back and we want Eastern Europe to demilitarize. West of the old Inner German Border, you all do what you want."

We think its very likely west Europe will tell the US: "all your aircraft are grounded and you cannot overfly our territory with your carrier air groups or your long-range bombers, and if you start firing cruise missiles, we're going to declare neutrality and kick you out."

Now replay this scenario. It is 2013, and instead of an army of 3-4 divisions the Russians have four armies with 15 divisions. The threat is then not just to the Baltics but to Ukraine and Poland, no nukes need to be fired. Lets go to 2018, and the Russians have rebuilt their air defenses, and have 10 fighter wings and 10 air defense missile brigades to throw into the fary. What is the west's reaction then?

And obviously, it need not come to war. Just as the Russians did not have to go to Tbilisi to set the stage for the overthrow of the pro-western lot in Georgia, they simply have to threaten. Back in Germany, Italy, France, Spain etc there will be such a rush for the toilets that the sewer systems will collapse.

So lets stop threatening, and start acting. US needs to federalize at least heavy Guard divisions and reinforce Western Europe, and NATO needs to provide the Baltics and Ukraine with money so that they can start preparing tank heavy forces that pose a credible deterrent to the Russians.

So you know exactly what's going to happen: Western Europe is not going to agree to any step up of armaments and defense preparedness or a muscular policy of confronting the Russians nose-to-nose. So what does the US do then?

Well, that answer is easiest of all. Pack up and go home, and let the Europeans figure it out. If they call for help, see if it is in America's interest to intervene, then intervene. The Euros are big boys and girls now. If they wont defend themselves, the US is under no obligation to do their job for them. They have a population and GDP larger than that of the US. This is not 1946 when the US had to do the job because the Euros were completely beaten down.

Always interesting and stimulating.

It's neither.

There is nothing so pathetic as a bunch of high living jackasses so out of shape a 3-year old girl could whip their sorry behinds, making threats against Moscow.

My, what trenchant analysis.

I don't know too many US Marines that have been whipped by three year old girls.

No one has made threats against Nazi Russia. In fact, they've spoken far too politely to the gang of thieves in the Kremlin.

Lets be clear that if tomorrow the Russians decided they wanted to take the Baltics, given six months prep time, they could take the three countries in 72-hours, and what is NATO going to do about it?

The Baltics have three light infantry brigades and a reserve brigade - total. This is a force even weaker than Georgia fielded. Where are the NATO troops to fight the Russians? The only ones with the guts to fight are the Americans, but where are the ground forces required to stop a Russian army of 3-4 divisions?

I imagine that the Poles and other eastern European members of NATO would be willing and capable in such a scenario.

I am not sure which particular brand of crack the author is smoking, but it must be potent stuff.

During the Cold War, we built a fair-sized West German army, stiffened its spine with 250,000 American troops who were combat ready, and made it plain that these were a mere trip-wire for nuclear war.

Even at that, the western alliance barely held together, the Dems weren’t particularly loyal to it nor were the western Europeans who were continually demonstrating for an end to our presence there.

Reagan managed to pull the rabbit out of the hat, but remember the Dems tried to throw him out of office, and the Euros were rioting against us all the while.

In Poland, the “western alliance” will be non-existent. Getting permission from German bases to deploy against a Russian attack may be problematic; they tried to stop us from supporting our Iraq and Afghan ventures from there a few years back. They are not particularly reliable partners and if Russia moves against Ukraine, they are not likely to want to be involved.

We can be trusted to back the easterners with certain kinds of support prior to a fight, but once the fight is on our role would no doubt be support only. We aren’t likely to send ground troops, and unless we have forward bases in Ukraine and Poland, which seems unlikely at this point, we aren’t even going to offer air support. We aren’t going to send our warthogs out to kill Russian tanks if they have to take off from German bases.

Which means Poland and Ukraine have to build their own tank killers. They have to build high-tech high-speed military forces capable of defeating an invading force several times larger. They need soldiers who know what they are about, which is probably not a problem in Poland but might be a problem in the Ukraine.

Most Euro armies are designed for use as extras for Hollywood movies and not much more. Poland, the Baltics, and Ukraine need to build their own alliance within an alliance and let everyone know that they will respond to any attack on the least among them. And they need to build the hair-trigger force capable of doing it. If Moscow can take them on separately, they are all done for already. They may as well surrender now.

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