Posted on 08/28/2008 10:30:28 AM PDT by Schnucki
The Russian prime minister Vladimir Putin accused the United States of provoking a war in Georgia to improve Republican prospects in November's presidential election.
In comments designed to inflame tensions between the two countries, Mr Putin told CNN: "The suspicion arises that someone in the United States especially created this conflict with the aim of making the situation more tense and creating a competitive advantage for one of the candidates fighting for the post of US president."
The White House dismissed Mr Putin's suggestion it had orchestrated the conflict as "not rational".
Russia earlier forced to rebuff a French threat that the European Union would consider imposing sanctions at an emergency summit on the crisis in Georgia on Monday.
The French foreign minister Bernard Kouchner said sanctions were among the options being considered as a formal rebuke for Russia's military incursion into Georgia.
But he conceded that the move would split the efforts to present a united European front. "Some will propose sanctions, others will be against," he said. "Sanctions will certainly be brought up."
Sergei Lavrov, the Russian foreign minister, mocked Mr Kouchner's statement. "Apart from that, my friend Kouchner also said that we will soon attack Moldova and Ukraine and the Crimea," he said. "But that is a sick imagination and probably that applies to sanctions as well. I think it is a demonstration of complete confusion."
Brussels diplomats played down the comments by Mr Kouchner following talks between EU ambassadors.
"Kouchner has jumped the gun a bit by talking about sanctions. This summit should be more about helping Georgia than just Russia bashing," said one diplomat.
"The emphasis will be on aid, Russian compliance with the six-point ceasefire agreement and the EU presence on the ground."
A partnership agreement between the EU and Russia has expired and
(Excerpt) Read more at telegraph.co.uk ...
So do many Democrats....imagine that, Democrats and Communist on the same anti-American page. But don’t you dare question their patriotism....
Putin now orchestrating propaganda to influence the election so we get a weak knee democrat in office that he can bully.
Putin just realized that, thanks to him, he may be dealing with McCain instead of Obama, and he has no one to thank but himself.
I wonder if the McCain campaign sent Putin a box of candy. They should.
Why doesn’t ‘Putin-on-the-Ritz’ attack us then. Big mouthed coward.
If we follow Putin’s argument to its conclusion, then Bush not only orchestrated the Georgia affair but turned most of the West’s opinion against Russia. In other words, Bush is an evil genius.
Ian Traynor, Europe editor
guardian.co.uk
Thursday August 28 2008 18:09 BST
The Russian prime minister, Vladimir Putin, claimed today the Caucasus crisis was started by the Americans as an election campaign ploy.
As Russia found itself increasingly isolated internationally because of its invasion of Georgia and its decision to recognise two breakaway regions of Georgia as independent states, Putin suggested the Georgia war had been cooked up in Washington to create a neo-cold war climate that would strengthen John McCain's bid for the White House and wreck the prospects of Barack Obama.
Following yesterday's denunciation of Russian conduct by the G7 grouping of the big industrial democracies, Russia's key allies resisted Moscow's pressure today for support over Georgia.
At a summit in Tajikistan of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, which Putin set up seven years ago as a foil to western power, China and four former Soviet central Asian states called for respect for the territorial integrity of states and criticised the use of force to redraw borders, effectively delivering a rebuke of Russian conduct.
President Dmitry Medvedev went to the meeting in Dushanbe, the Tajikistan capital, to try to drum up support for Russia's position, but the summit statement only served to highlight Russia's worsening isolation.
"Russia does not feel isolated and is not afraid to be isolated," said Yevgeniy Chizhov, the Russian ambassador in Brussels.
*snip*
Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin has accused the US of provoking the conflict in Georgia, possibly for domestic election purposes.
Mr Putin told CNN US citizens were "in the area" during the conflict over South Ossetia and were "taking direct orders from their leaders".
He said his defence officials had told him the provocation was to benefit one of the US presidential candidates.
The White House dismissed the allegations as "not rational".
Georgia tried to retake the Russian-backed separatist region of South Ossetia this month by force after a series of clashes.
Russian forces subsequently launched a counter-attack and the conflict ended with the ejection of Georgian troops from both South Ossetia and another rebel region, Abkhazia, and an EU-brokered ceasefire.
Diplomatic wrangling
Mr Putin said in the interview: "The fact is that US citizens were indeed in the area in conflict during the hostilities.
"It should be admitted that they would do so only following direct orders from their leaders."
*snip*
“It's Bush's fault”...
Hey... It plays every day in the MSM why shouldn't he do it too?
I saw Dennis Kucinich (D-Mars) make just such a statement to BOR on Fox last night.
paragraphs to foreign affairs.
On the other end of the experience continuum is John McCain, who sat in the audience in Munich watching the Russian president. McCain has security and foreign policy credentials that date back almost 30 years, to the time he traveled the world with John Tower and Scoop Jackson as the Navy’s Senate liaison. He spends a lot of time visiting foreign leaders and attending conferences like the one in Munich. Though his opponents are anxious to brand him a hothead, McCain’s response to Putin was measured. ‘’Will Russia’s autocratic turn become more pronounced, its foreign policy more opposed to the principles of the Western democracies and its energy policy used as a tool of intimidation?’’ he asked in his speech given a few hours after Putin
Vladimir and Barack
Watching Obama, listening to Putin.
By John Dickerson
Posted Monday, Feb. 12, 2007, at 7:37 PM ET
http://www.slate.com/id/2159459/
A blogger does better than the Telegraph in dealing with the origin of the Georgia conflict:...an excerpt:
The West is ideologically divided. Too many of us believe the Russian lies. We believe, in our simplistic way, that tiny Georgia provoked mighty Russia. We haven’t bothered to find out what actually happened. Here are just a few indications that Moscow planned everything in advance: (1) Last month the Russian army practiced invading a small country; (2) Russia recalled its ambassadors to Moscow for a meeting on July 15 to discuss a new foreign policy concept connected to the necessity of “defending” Russian speaking people in unnamed other countries; (3) Moscow’s South Ossetian proxy evacuated ethnic woman and children before beginning an intense bombardment of Georgian villages; (4) The South Ossetian artillery opened fire at 11 pm, while the Georgian artillery didn’t return fire until 12:30 am; (5) Russian mechanized columns were actually moving into Georgia prior to Georgia’s push into South Ossetia on 8 August ; (6) The Russians were mobilizing ships in the Black Sea weeks before the supposed “Georgian aggression”; (7) Georgian internet sites came under intensive Russian attack in advance of military operations.
Regarding this last point, the New York Times published an article by John Markoff titled Before the Gunfire, Cyberattacks. According to Markoff, “Weeks before bombs started falling on Georgia” someone was attacking Georgian Web servers. Of special interest, there was “a stream of data directed at Georgian government sites containing the message: ‘win+love+in+Rusia.’” Later attacks brought images of Adolf Hitler set next to images of Georgian President Saakashvili, to the Web site of the Georgian parliament. Moscow’s attacks on Georgian government sites began “as early as July 20, with coordinated barrages of millions of requests … that overloaded and effectively shut down Georgian servers.”
Do you still think Georgia started the war?
As incredible as it sounds, the Russian disinformation specialists want you to believe Dick Cheney started the war. On Aug. 14 Russian television served up a poisonous dosage from Dr. Sergei Markov, a senior political scientist at the Kremlin. According to Markov, Dick Cheney wants to help John McCain win the election in November. To this end Cheney is attempting to start a new Cold War with Russia. Given a Cold War atmosphere, McCain would defeat Obama at the polls. Markov further claimed that the U.S. was engineering an armed conflict between Ukraine and Russia.
While the Russians burn and pillage Georgian towns and villages, strangling Georgia’s economy to the point of collapse, the free world dithers. As one American analyst bitterly remarked, “The Europeans have telegraphed their total capitulation to Russia, and Moscow knows it. The Kremlin has looked into the soul of Europe and found – there is none.”
According to the New York Times, the White House suddenly finds the Russian leadership “deceptive and evasive.” Where have these people been during the past nine decades? When has the Kremlin been anything but “deceptive and evasive”? Nothing is more exasperating than the recent comments of Defense Secretary Robert Gates, who was “not predicting a return to the Cold War.” But the Cold War never ended, Mr. Gates! The Russian side merely repeated the Soviet experiment of Lenin’s New Economic Policy. What Moscow did in the 1920s was accomplished on a larger scale in the 1990s. Do these America Sovietologists have any common sense whatsoever, or has the economic requirements of our commercial culture so overwhelmed strategic common sense that recognizing one’s enemy has become impossible for them?
According to Gates, “My view is that the Russians [are] … interested in reasserting Russia’s … great power or superpower status … in Russia’s traditional spheres of influence.” A correction is required at this point. The Russians are interested in the destruction of the United States.
It is time to understand what we are dealing with.
A blogger does better than the Telegraph in dealing with the origin of the Georgia conflict:...an excerpt:
The West is ideologically divided. Too many of us believe the Russian lies. We believe, in our simplistic way, that tiny Georgia provoked mighty Russia. We haven’t bothered to find out what actually happened. Here are just a few indications that Moscow planned everything in advance: (1) Last month the Russian army practiced invading a small country; (2) Russia recalled its ambassadors to Moscow for a meeting on July 15 to discuss a new foreign policy concept connected to the necessity of “defending” Russian speaking people in unnamed other countries; (3) Moscow’s South Ossetian proxy evacuated ethnic woman and children before beginning an intense bombardment of Georgian villages; (4) The South Ossetian artillery opened fire at 11 pm, while the Georgian artillery didn’t return fire until 12:30 am; (5) Russian mechanized columns were actually moving into Georgia prior to Georgia’s push into South Ossetia on 8 August ; (6) The Russians were mobilizing ships in the Black Sea weeks before the supposed “Georgian aggression”; (7) Georgian internet sites came under intensive Russian attack in advance of military operations.
Regarding this last point, the New York Times published an article by John Markoff titled Before the Gunfire, Cyberattacks. According to Markoff, “Weeks before bombs started falling on Georgia” someone was attacking Georgian Web servers. Of special interest, there was “a stream of data directed at Georgian government sites containing the message: ‘win+love+in+Rusia.’” Later attacks brought images of Adolf Hitler set next to images of Georgian President Saakashvili, to the Web site of the Georgian parliament. Moscow’s attacks on Georgian government sites began “as early as July 20, with coordinated barrages of millions of requests … that overloaded and effectively shut down Georgian servers.”
Do you still think Georgia started the war?
As incredible as it sounds, the Russian disinformation specialists want you to believe Dick Cheney started the war. On Aug. 14 Russian television served up a poisonous dosage from Dr. Sergei Markov, a senior political scientist at the Kremlin. According to Markov, Dick Cheney wants to help John McCain win the election in November. To this end Cheney is attempting to start a new Cold War with Russia. Given a Cold War atmosphere, McCain would defeat Obama at the polls. Markov further claimed that the U.S. was engineering an armed conflict between Ukraine and Russia.
While the Russians burn and pillage Georgian towns and villages, strangling Georgia’s economy to the point of collapse, the free world dithers. As one American analyst bitterly remarked, “The Europeans have telegraphed their total capitulation to Russia, and Moscow knows it. The Kremlin has looked into the soul of Europe and found – there is none.”
According to the New York Times, the White House suddenly finds the Russian leadership “deceptive and evasive.” Where have these people been during the past nine decades? When has the Kremlin been anything but “deceptive and evasive”? Nothing is more exasperating than the recent comments of Defense Secretary Robert Gates, who was “not predicting a return to the Cold War.” But the Cold War never ended, Mr. Gates! The Russian side merely repeated the Soviet experiment of Lenin’s New Economic Policy. What Moscow did in the 1920s was accomplished on a larger scale in the 1990s. Do these America Sovietologists have any common sense whatsoever, or has the economic requirements of our commercial culture so overwhelmed strategic common sense that recognizing one’s enemy has become impossible for them?
According to Gates, “My view is that the Russians [are] … interested in reasserting Russia’s … great power or superpower status … in Russia’s traditional spheres of influence.” A correction is required at this point. The Russians are interested in the destruction of the United States.
It is time to understand what we are dealing with.
A blogger does better than the Telegraph in dealing with the origin of the Georgia conflict:...an excerpt:
The West is ideologically divided. Too many of us believe the Russian lies. We believe, in our simplistic way, that tiny Georgia provoked mighty Russia. We haven’t bothered to find out what actually happened. Here are just a few indications that Moscow planned everything in advance: (1) Last month the Russian army practiced invading a small country; (2) Russia recalled its ambassadors to Moscow for a meeting on July 15 to discuss a new foreign policy concept connected to the necessity of “defending” Russian speaking people in unnamed other countries; (3) Moscow’s South Ossetian proxy evacuated ethnic woman and children before beginning an intense bombardment of Georgian villages; (4) The South Ossetian artillery opened fire at 11 pm, while the Georgian artillery didn’t return fire until 12:30 am; (5) Russian mechanized columns were actually moving into Georgia prior to Georgia’s push into South Ossetia on 8 August ; (6) The Russians were mobilizing ships in the Black Sea weeks before the supposed “Georgian aggression”; (7) Georgian internet sites came under intensive Russian attack in advance of military operations.
Regarding this last point, the New York Times published an article by John Markoff titled Before the Gunfire, Cyberattacks. According to Markoff, “Weeks before bombs started falling on Georgia” someone was attacking Georgian Web servers. Of special interest, there was “a stream of data directed at Georgian government sites containing the message: ‘win+love+in+Rusia.’” Later attacks brought images of Adolf Hitler set next to images of Georgian President Saakashvili, to the Web site of the Georgian parliament. Moscow’s attacks on Georgian government sites began “as early as July 20, with coordinated barrages of millions of requests … that overloaded and effectively shut down Georgian servers.”
Do you still think Georgia started the war?
As incredible as it sounds, the Russian disinformation specialists want you to believe Dick Cheney started the war. On Aug. 14 Russian television served up a poisonous dosage from Dr. Sergei Markov, a senior political scientist at the Kremlin. According to Markov, Dick Cheney wants to help John McCain win the election in November. To this end Cheney is attempting to start a new Cold War with Russia. Given a Cold War atmosphere, McCain would defeat Obama at the polls. Markov further claimed that the U.S. was engineering an armed conflict between Ukraine and Russia.
While the Russians burn and pillage Georgian towns and villages, strangling Georgia’s economy to the point of collapse, the free world dithers. As one American analyst bitterly remarked, “The Europeans have telegraphed their total capitulation to Russia, and Moscow knows it. The Kremlin has looked into the soul of Europe and found – there is none.”
According to the New York Times, the White House suddenly finds the Russian leadership “deceptive and evasive.” Where have these people been during the past nine decades? When has the Kremlin been anything but “deceptive and evasive”? Nothing is more exasperating than the recent comments of Defense Secretary Robert Gates, who was “not predicting a return to the Cold War.” But the Cold War never ended, Mr. Gates! The Russian side merely repeated the Soviet experiment of Lenin’s New Economic Policy. What Moscow did in the 1920s was accomplished on a larger scale in the 1990s. Do these America Sovietologists have any common sense whatsoever, or has the economic requirements of our commercial culture so overwhelmed strategic common sense that recognizing one’s enemy has become impossible for them?
According to Gates, “My view is that the Russians [are] … interested in reasserting Russia’s … great power or superpower status … in Russia’s traditional spheres of influence.” A correction is required at this point. The Russians are interested in the destruction of the United States.
It is time to understand what we are dealing with.
A blogger does better than the Telegraph in dealing with the origin of the Georgia conflict:...an excerpt:
The West is ideologically divided. Too many of us believe the Russian lies. We believe, in our simplistic way, that tiny Georgia provoked mighty Russia. We haven’t bothered to find out what actually happened. Here are just a few indications that Moscow planned everything in advance: (1) Last month the Russian army practiced invading a small country; (2) Russia recalled its ambassadors to Moscow for a meeting on July 15 to discuss a new foreign policy concept connected to the necessity of “defending” Russian speaking people in unnamed other countries; (3) Moscow’s South Ossetian proxy evacuated ethnic woman and children before beginning an intense bombardment of Georgian villages; (4) The South Ossetian artillery opened fire at 11 pm, while the Georgian artillery didn’t return fire until 12:30 am; (5) Russian mechanized columns were actually moving into Georgia prior to Georgia’s push into South Ossetia on 8 August ; (6) The Russians were mobilizing ships in the Black Sea weeks before the supposed “Georgian aggression”; (7) Georgian internet sites came under intensive Russian attack in advance of military operations.
Regarding this last point, the New York Times published an article by John Markoff titled Before the Gunfire, Cyberattacks. According to Markoff, “Weeks before bombs started falling on Georgia” someone was attacking Georgian Web servers. Of special interest, there was “a stream of data directed at Georgian government sites containing the message: ‘win+love+in+Rusia.’” Later attacks brought images of Adolf Hitler set next to images of Georgian President Saakashvili, to the Web site of the Georgian parliament. Moscow’s attacks on Georgian government sites began “as early as July 20, with coordinated barrages of millions of requests … that overloaded and effectively shut down Georgian servers.”
Do you still think Georgia started the war?
As incredible as it sounds, the Russian disinformation specialists want you to believe Dick Cheney started the war. On Aug. 14 Russian television served up a poisonous dosage from Dr. Sergei Markov, a senior political scientist at the Kremlin. According to Markov, Dick Cheney wants to help John McCain win the election in November. To this end Cheney is attempting to start a new Cold War with Russia. Given a Cold War atmosphere, McCain would defeat Obama at the polls. Markov further claimed that the U.S. was engineering an armed conflict between Ukraine and Russia.
While the Russians burn and pillage Georgian towns and villages, strangling Georgia’s economy to the point of collapse, the free world dithers. As one American analyst bitterly remarked, “The Europeans have telegraphed their total capitulation to Russia, and Moscow knows it. The Kremlin has looked into the soul of Europe and found – there is none.”
According to the New York Times, the White House suddenly finds the Russian leadership “deceptive and evasive.” Where have these people been during the past nine decades? When has the Kremlin been anything but “deceptive and evasive”? Nothing is more exasperating than the recent comments of Defense Secretary Robert Gates, who was “not predicting a return to the Cold War.” But the Cold War never ended, Mr. Gates! The Russian side merely repeated the Soviet experiment of Lenin’s New Economic Policy. What Moscow did in the 1920s was accomplished on a larger scale in the 1990s. Do these America Sovietologists have any common sense whatsoever, or has the economic requirements of our commercial culture so overwhelmed strategic common sense that recognizing one’s enemy has become impossible for them?
According to Gates, “My view is that the Russians [are] … interested in reasserting Russia’s … great power or superpower status … in Russia’s traditional spheres of influence.” A correction is required at this point. The Russians are interested in the destruction of the United States.
It is time to understand what we are dealing with.
We have some people parroting the Soviet line right here on FR. They’re usually on in the morning, though, what with the time difference to Belgrade and all.
“Putin now orchestrating propaganda to influence the election so we get a weak knee democrat in office that he can bully.’
If that it is aim then it will likely backfire. The worst thing for Obama is to focus attention on foreign policy and his lack of experience in those matters.
From the man who ordered the planing and execution of the invasion of Georgia.
ROFL!!!
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