What Georgia Taught Us About Europe

From Simon Tisdall in the Guardian:

The Georgian eruption had wide-ranging consequences. It embarrassingly exposed the disunity, rivalry and weakness that characterises an energy-dependent European Union in its dealings with Russia. And it placed on full display the emptiness of western security assurances to Georgia as Russian tanks rolled towards Tbilisi.

The war threw the already stalling process of Nato (and EU) eastwards enlargement into disarray, not just in Georgia but also in Ukraine, and left the Bush administration floundering for retaliatory options against Moscow.

But most of all it revealed the bellicosity and insecurity of a Kremlin leadership still apparently controlled by prime minister and former president Vladimir Putin.

Photo: Georgian servicemen bury unknownGeorgian soldiers killed in the armed conflict between Georgia andRussian-backed South Ossetian separatists during a funeral in TbilisiAugust 19, 2008. NATO allies said on Tuesday they were “seriouslyconsidering” the implications of Russia’s actions in Georgia and thatregular contacts were impossible until its troops had been fullywithdrawn. REUTERS/David Mdzinarishvili (GEORGIA)