Tuesday, August 12, 2008

Russia Declares Cease Fire: Lesson to the West Taught

Just as I suspected the Russians declared a unilateral cease fire and agreed to the demands of the West. There is no way that any war of aggression in the 21st century will be fought longer then a week or so without extenuating circumstances.

Russia succeeded in its military goals, punished Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili -- a staunch U.S. ally -- and showed its ex-Soviet neighbors that it is the sole military power in the region, said Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt in an interview in Tbilisi. "Do you see any other troops here?" he said.

I was thinking about this and I wonder what these ex-Soviet nations are going to do? They could toe the Russian line and fall under their sphere of influence or they could start to buff up their own armies. In fact they might even go as far as to form their own protection scheme seeing that NATO will probably never admit Georgia now that Russia is their enemy.

Maybe they could call it the Black Sea Alliance, or the Caspian Sea Alliance, or maybe name it after something that's not based on location. It seems that the West will not protect their interests so they can either fall in with Russia or form up in order to counter Russian aggression. I think they should include Turkey into the mix so they will have influence into the Middle East as well as counter the Russian threat.

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