Some were Russian citizens. "Russian authorities denied basic rights to many of the detained," the authors from Human Rights Watch wrote, "including access to a lawyer or the possibility of appealing the expulsion decision taken against them. Most were given trials lasting only a few minutes. Georgians were held in sometimes appalling conditions of detention and in some cases were subjected to threats and other ill-treatment. Two Georgians died in custody awaiting expulsion."
In March 2007, Russian military forces attacked villages in Abkhazia that had recently fallen under Georgian control. This was an illegal act, and when the United Nations investigated the incident Moscow did not cooperate. Another attack--one that failed--occurred in Georgia proper, near Tbilisi, in August 2007. Russian intransigence followed that incident, too.
Then, in April, Putin issued an order that, according to Johns Hopkins professor Svante E. Cornell, treated Abkhazia and South Ossetia "as parts of the Russian Federation." Also around this time, Russian MiGs began destroying Georgian unmanned aerial vehicles. Russia increased its troop deployment in Abkhazia. And in July, as Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice was about to visit Georgia, Russian jets flew over South Ossetia in a show of force. Also that month, thousands of Russian troops went to the Georgian frontier for so-called "training exercises." According to the New York Times, Russian cyberattacks on Georgian computer networks began "as early as July 20."
Such was the pattern of Russian belligerence prior to Saakashvili's commitment of ground forces to South Ossetia in early August. Russia views that decision, of
course, as its casus belli. But even here, the story may be more complicated than Georgian provocation and Russian reaction. For his part, Saakashvili wrote in the Washington Post last week that "a massive assault was launched on Georgian settlements" in South Ossetia just hours after his government sent a peace envoy to the territory.
"Our government then learned," Saakashvili went on, "that columns of Russian tanks and troops had crossed Georgia's sovereign borders. The thousands of troops, tanks and artillery amassed on our border are evidence of how long Russia had been planning this aggression." So Saakashvili sent in his troops, and the war began.
Whatever the precise sequence of events, however, nothing Saakashvili did provided a reason for Putin to invade Georgia proper; or to bomb Georgian targets in the days after the initial ceasefire; or to charge Saakashvili with crimes against humanity; or to attempt regime change in a democracy that abides by international norms and seeks integration in the liberal international order. Nothing.
Nor is it true that the ultimate blame for this conflict lies with the United States and its NATO and EU allies. It is true that these nations and alliances encourage democratic governance, free markets, and the promotion of human rights in all countries, including those in Russia's near abroad. And it may well be that Russia sees many of the independent states on its borders, so long under its hegemony, moving in a liberal direction. But why does Russia feel threatened by this? And what say ought Russia to have over the decisions of other governments to choose freedom and prosperity?
No one forced Georgia or Ukraine or Poland or Latvia or Lithuania or Estonia to move toward Europe and the United States. The elected leaders of those countries decided for themselves. And they made that decision partly because they understand the distinctions between dominance and submission, freedom and slavery, prosperity and penury, aggression and comity. They lived those distinctions. Is it too much to ask that we learn from our friends, and call a culprit a culprit and a victim a victim?
--Matthew Continetti, for the Editors
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