The crisis in Georgia should focus all our minds. It is a terrible tragedy with innocent people being killed and forced to leave their homes. Convoys of refugees in Europe are a sight that no one wants to see. We should condemn the Russian retaliation as utterly disproportionate and never forget the human aspect of what is happening.
And then we should take a deep breathe and think about what we say very carefully.
There is an obvious temptation to reach for evermore hyperbolic phrases to condemn Russia’s actions. Talk of Russian Bears and echoes of cold-war politics are flying around the blogsphere.
But this is not the cold war.
We must not confuse the Kremlin in 2008 with the Kremlin in 1978. The Soviet Union and today’s Russia are very different. That is not to say that Russia is not driven by its own national interests; just that there is no ideological desire to expand its philosophy across the world.
Also, it is too simplistic to dismiss the trouble in South Ossetia as a battle for a pipeline. It is about Russia being strong enough to assert its influence in an area next to its borders.
Clearly it shouldn’t have crossed its borders, and shouldn’t be bombing in the way it is but this does not mean we are seeing a return to a Russian Bear threatening global thermonuclear war.
The best analysis comes this morning from William Rees-Mogg in The Times. Forgive me if I quote two important paragraphs:
“The new Russia of Vladimir Putin is nationalist in the old tsarist fashion, and is determined to protect Russian interests. In the 1990s, the Yeltsin years, Russia could not assert these traditional Russian positions, because it was too weak. They are being reasserted now, and this reassertion is backed by Russia’s growing importance as a provider of oil and gas.”
“Russia probably lacks the economic or population base to maintain Putinism in world competition. The US may well have another generation as the leading world power, but its lead is narrowing. Europe has not resolved the cultural differences of its membership. China and India are emerging superpowers. But these groupings are almost as uncertain as the European powers were in 1914, and the scarcity of future energy supplies makes them feel insecure.”
In a world shrouded in such uncertainty, we need caution. This is a site about Tory politics, so in that spirit, we should applaud William Hague’s cautious language on this subject.
Related posts:
Appeasment never works, it only encourages the aggressor to be more bold.
To be clear, I am not advocating appeasement. But I am counselling caution.
We need to think through how things will play out, and jumping too far too fast could only make things even worse.
David Cameron, Conservative leader The World at One, Radio 4
Mr Cameron said Russia’s actions are “disproportionate and despicable” and accused it of acting “as a dangerous bully”.
“We should be working with our European partners and making clear that what Russia has been doing and is doing is completely unacceptable.
“What Russia has done is use massive and disproportionate force. It is acting as a dangerous bully.
“I think it shouldn’t stand. I think part of the problem here is that NATO was rather unclear over whether Georgia could have accelerated membership.
“I think that if Georgia was a member of NATO we’d have greater leverage over how it behaved.
“We need to speed up NATO membership.
“Let’s be clear that it is Russia who has violated Georgia’s territory.
“There are very worrying consequences if Europe doesn’t act, NATO doesn’t act, and speak clearly with one voice.
“I think there’s a simple point here – the only language that bullies understand is when someone stands up to them. Think of the implications for the Baltic states.
“Are we going to allow Russia to behave in this way in relation to other countries?
“What Russia is doing is disproportinate and is despicable.”
Well at least Cameron takes a robust line, unlike you dripping wets. Guido
This a naked war of aggression by a major power on a much smaller neighbour. Surely our language cannot be strong enough in condemning Russian behaviour!
We can be as strong as we like in the language of condemnation (comment 2.46pm and Guido). The first paragraph of my piece says that we should condemn it “utterly”. I am happy with this statement from the Bush White House:
http://edition.cnn.com/video/#/video/world/2008/08/10/vause.lok.china.bush.cnn
This language avoids agressive macho posturing. Am I splitting hairs? Maybe. But I think its important. This is a much bigger geo-political game right now.
I’m probably splitting hairs now, but you actually said we should condemn it as “utterly disproportionate”. That’s pretty weak language. Why not “utterly unacceptable and wrong” followed by calls for a complete and immediate cease-fire? Russia is bombing targets in a sovereign nation on a pretext of defending people in another part of that sovereign nation, they have invaded that part of the country (and now Abkhazia as well), and they’re doing so while suggesting that the Government of Georgia needs to be overthrown. Russua doesn’t really accept the rights of the new states that were formed after the fall of the USSR and it seems to me that we either strongly back countries like Georgia or they will simply become Russian satellite states.