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Georgia: The Ripple Effect

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  • Georgia: The Ripple Effect

    GEORGIA: THE RIPPLE EFFECT
    By Jonathan Marcus

    BBC NEWS
    http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/1/hi/world/e urope/7609016.stm
    2008/09/10 16:59:15 GMT

    Russia's military intervention in Georgia has inevitably had a dramatic
    impact on the region.

    But the implications of its decision to unilaterally re-draw Georgia's
    boundaries by recognising the independence of the two separatist
    enclaves of Abkhazia and South Ossetia go way beyond the Caucasus -
    the ripples spreading into Turkey, the wider Middle East and beyond,
    reaching as far as the Caribbean.

    The crisis has given an added boost to Turkey's efforts to become a
    significant diplomatic player in the region.

    Turkey is a key member of Nato, though it also has important trading
    ties with Russia.

    As a neighbour of Georgia it does not want to be precipitated into
    an unwanted confrontation with Moscow.

    The Turkish government's efforts to conclude a Caucasus Stability
    and Cooperation Pact - something that has already taken the Turkish
    president on an unprecedented visit to his country's historical
    enemy, Armenia - are an effort to improve the climate in an often
    tense region.

    Chain reaction

    The wider Middle East is already reacting to events in Georgia.

    Israel appears to be fundamentally re-thinking its military ties to
    Tbilisi, concerned that these might encourage Russia to retaliate by
    making advanced weapons sales to Syria.

    The Syrians have rushed to Russia's support, perhaps hoping to
    resurrect the close Cold War relationship between Damascus and Moscow.

    Even before the Georgia crisis erupted, Russia - angered at US missile
    defence plans in central Europe - was sending signals that it might
    step up military ties with Cuba.

    Now, in the wake of US naval deployments to the Black Sea, Moscow is
    despatching one of its largest warships - a nuclear-powered cruiser -
    accompanied by a small flotilla, to the Caribbean for exercises with
    the Venezuelan Navy.

    Mixed messages

    The message to Washington is clear - if you meddle in what we see as
    our backyard, the Russians are saying, then we will meddle in yours.

    It all sounds like the makings of a trailer for a new Cold War drama.

    But to some extent that would be to mis-read the signals.

    Some may call it posturing, but it is posturing to a purpose. Messages
    are indeed being sent.

    All the indications are - at least for the moment - that Russia is
    not intending to recreate the global struggles of the Cold War era.

    It has so far refused sensitive arms sales to Syria, for example.

    And many experts believe that Russia's chief aim in all of this is
    to assert itself closer to home, to draw strict limits to Nato's
    further expansion.

    Further political battlegrounds lie ahead - most immediately in Ukraine
    where the events in Georgia have already worsened existing political
    divisions between those who look to the West for the future and those
    who look towards Moscow.

    The European Union's decision, this week, to offer Ukraine closer
    relations but not a clear path to future membership highlights the
    delicacy of the diplomatic challenges facing Western nations as they
    struggle to respond to a newly resurgent Russia.

    Europe at one and the same time wants to draw Ukraine "Westwards" in
    political terms, while not exacerbating the country's internal strife.

    Stretched state department

    Beyond Europe, the stakes are even higher.

    What price now a new UN Security Council resolution bringing in any
    kind of tougher sanctions to roll back Iran's nuclear programme?

    If the current atmosphere between Washington and Moscow is anything
    to go by then such a resolution may be a dead-letter.

    As the Bush Administration seeks to polish up its foreign policy legacy
    during its closing months in office, it can expect no help from Moscow.

    Was Russia mishandled by the Bush administration, or was it simply
    given insufficient attention?

    That will be for the historians to judge.

    But, in a sense, it is clear that the Georgia crisis - like so many
    other aspects of this administration's performance abroad - has been
    inextricably bound up with the Iraq crisis.

    It was Georgia's willingness to provide troops for operations in
    Iraq that established its military relationship with Washington in
    the first place and fixed its image as an out-post of democracy in
    Washington's collective mind.

    And it may also be the extraordinary demands of dealing not just with
    the conflict in Iraq, but that in Afghanistan too, that meant that
    even a state department headed by a Russian expert in Condoleezza
    Rice was unable to give relations with Moscow sufficient time.
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