Who do you support in the Georgia/Russia conflict?

[StateBoiler]

Who I or anyone else on these message boards support is immaterial unless I grab a gun and fly over the Atlantic to help shoot.

Is anyone on here going to head over to Georgia and volunteer?

[StateBoiler]

When one reviews previous Russian attacks and violations of Georgian sovereignity, it becomes rather clear who broke the ceasefire.

Every single American military observer/insider I've read on this has said Saakashvili started this in the hope to achieve surprise.

[StateBoiler]

Who I or anyone else on these message boards support is immaterial unless I grab a gun and fly over the Atlantic to help shoot.

Is anyone on here going to head over to Georgia and volunteer?

That's a silly position.  So in WWII was it immaterial for the people at home to support the war or not?  Last I checked the majority of Americans did not go to war, yet the support at home was essential to the victory.  How about with sport, can someone support a team without joining them?  I think so, that's why money is made via merchandise.

Support certainly is material in any conflict or situation, and it can come in many different ways.

On WWII, that's because it was our country people had their families or people they knew were involved. If I had a brother in this, I think I'd hope for the best for whatever side he was on. This conflict involves two countries few if any of us have ties to.

And besides, I can say I'm cheering for Luxembourg if Belgium invaded them. But unless I'm actually helping them, my support is not worth much toward helping Luxembourg win, is it? I don't care about someone reading on a computer cheering as if it's a football game, and neither do the Georgians or Russians unless you have some kind of tangible amount of power.

[StateBoiler]

When one reviews previous Russian attacks and violations of Georgian sovereignity, it becomes rather clear who broke the ceasefire.

Every single American military observer/insider I've read on this has said Saakashvili started this in the hope to achieve surprise.

Which does not minimize the fact that that Russia has given Georgia numerous justifications for war before. I wonder how these insiders explain the South Ossetian attacks on Georgian villages. Ignore them?

-Georgians declare ceasefire with South Ossetia, South Ossetians say they put down their guns.
-Within 12 hours Georgian Army invades South Ossetia.

I'm not arguing that the Georgians aren't justified to attack Russia. I'm just saying that if they attack Russia, they have to put up with the consequences of that decision, and what's going on now is that. And that type of arrangement keeps peace. I'm sure some in Iran or North Korea would love to attack the U.S. But they don't. Why? Because they know we would search them out and kill them and level their country if they did so, so they choose the self-preservation route.

Let me make this perfectly clear: Saakashvili is a f***ing idiot. This is what it would be like if Taiwan ever attacked China first. If you notice, the Bush administration are not supporting Saakashvili at all (they're supporting Georgia's right to the status quo with a ceasefire, which means South Ossetia and Abkhazia return to their previous state as outside of Georgian control, Bush is not supporting the President). Why? Because they know this fact: Saakashvili is a f***ing idiot. What he did was the equivalent of if Castro ever decided to drop a missile on Miami. We would level the holy snot out of Havana and the rest of the country just in retaliation for being pissed off. We did the same thing to the Taliban in Afghanistan after 9/11.

You don't piss off something incredibly more powerful than yourself that doesn't like you to start with. All Russia needed was an excuse because each country was hostile to one another for a long time and Saakashvili was stupid enough to give it to them. Israel did the same thing with Lebanon in July 2006 after Hezbollah kidnapped the two Israeli soldiers. Israel proceeded to bomb the crap out of the entirety of the country, even the Christian areas that didn't like Hezbollah.

[StateBoiler]

-Georgians declare ceasefire with South Ossetia, South Ossetians say they put down their guns.
-Within 12 hours Georgian Army invades South Ossetia.

I'm not arguing that the Georgians aren't justified to attack Russia. I'm just saying that if they attack Russia, they have to put up with the consequences of that decision, and what's going on now is that. And that type of arrangement keeps peace. I'm sure some in Iran or North Korea would love to attack the U.S. But they don't. Why? Because they know we would search them out and kill them and level their country if they did so, so they choose the self-preservation route.

Let me make this perfectly clear: Saakashvili is a f***ing idiot. If you notice, the Bush administration are not supporting him at all (they're supporting Georgia's right to the status quo with a ceasefire, which means South Ossetia and Abkhazia return to their previous state as outside of Georgian control, Bush is not supporting the President). Why? Because they know this fact: Saakashvili is a f***ing idiot. What he did was the equivalent of if Castro ever decided to drop a missile on Miami. We would level the holy snot out of Havana and the rest of the country just in retaliation for being pissed off. We did the same thing to the Taliban in Afghanistan after 9/11.

You don't piss off something incredibly more powerful than yourself that doesn't like you to start with. All Russia needed was an excuse because each country was hostile to one another for a long time and Saakashvili was stupid enough to give it to them. Israel did the same thing with Lebanon in July 2006 after Hezbollah kidnapped the two Israeli soldiers. Israel proceeded to bomb the crap out of the entirety of the country, even the Christian areas that didn't like Hezbollah.

It's your Castro dropping a bomb in Miami analogy that's idiotic. Get this straight: SOUTH OSSETIA IS PART OF GEORGIA

And according to the U.S., Taiwan does not exist and is a part of China. We don't have even officially have diplomatic relations with them. Now are you going to tell me Taiwan doesn't exist?

I don't deal with de jure. I deal with de facto.

Somaliland, Transnistria, Nagorno-Karabakh, Abkhazia and South Ossetia, Turkish Cyprus, Taiwan, the Sahrawi Arab Republic, Kosovo are all independent countries. If they weren't, their leaderships would not exist and those regions would be controlled by the central governments of Somalia, Moldova, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Cyprus, China, Morocco, and Serbia. But they're not. If the Serbian government does not control the land of Kosovo, then how can someone think Kosovo is a part of Serbia?

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You and I are just going to disagree on this. I've already stated my case. When the Confederacy broke away from the Union in the 1860s, no foreign power ever recognized them. It didn't change the fact it was an independent country until the Union forcefully retook it though in 1865.

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Why should Saakashvili aid Putin and Medvedev then?

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No sh*t. In other news, 2+2=4.

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They could've done the same option Cuba has: don't piss off the bigger, larger neighbor that doesn't like you too much.

[StateBoiler]

http://lefarkins.blogspot.com/2008/08/georgia-cries-uncle.html

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If either the Georgian military or political class believed that the US and the EU would provide material assistance, then this was a larger miscalculation than I had previously believed.[/quote]