Russian Invasion of Georgia Might Jeopardize Space Station

mknewman writes "Sen. Bill Nelson, one of NASA's biggest proponents on the Hill, is openly questioning how Russia's military intervention in Georgia will affect our access to the space station after the Shuttle is retired in 2010. Currently, NASA is able to use Soyuz vehicles for crew access and lifeboat operations thanks to an exemption from the Iran Non-Proliferation Act. The exemption expires in 2011, only one year after the Shuttle is due to head to the museums."

Comments

What?

[Anonymous Coward]

The summary makes absolutely no sense.

Can anyone shed light on what is going on?

Re:What?

[mcvos]

Can anyone shed light on what is going on?

In particular, I'd like to know what non-proliferation in/of/for/by Iran has to do with Soyuz or Georgia.

Re:What?

[MozeeToby]

Ok, here goes. Most of the international community thinks that Russia is either over reacting or taking advantage of Goergia's internal conflict with a Goergian province that declared independence. This may lead to repercussions, possibly including not renewing the exemption to the non-proliferation treaty. If the internation community chooses not to renew that exemption, based on what the summary says it sounds like Russia will not be able to launch Soyuz vehicles after the exemption expires.

Keep in mind that this is based on the summary and a quick look at what Wikipedia has to say about the conflict and it's repercussions. Therefore, I might be completely wrong so this should be taken with a big grain of salt.

Re:What?

[Master Of Ninja]

I'm not sure that even not renewing the exemption (i admit I have no idea the details of it) will do that much. A lot of countries have broken treaties without blinking an eyelid. I can't see much being done against Russia, except issuing diplomatic statements. The UN will be paralysed by Russia's veto, and I can't see China being in a rush to side against Russia (or side for it). Russia and China (perhaps with Brazil and India - the BRIC countries) could just go it alone - they have a lot of the world's population in them.

I think the Georgians (or at least the president) were completely foolish to try and invade when Putin was at the Olympics and think that he wouldn't do anything. Compounding it is the fact that they seemed to be carrying out (from what I gather from the BBC) seems like ethnic cleansing by firing on the civilian population, and then killing Russian troops in the process. They burnt their bridges to some of their possible allies, who were also allies who being militarily over-extended aren't really in a position to help.

What I think will happen is that giving it a few weeks people will forget about this. The whole situation will be framed as Ossetians (sp?) are just like Kosovo - they have a right to be independent, and with Russian influence in the region they will eventually become re-united with Russia. The issue of the ISS is just a distraction - everything will stay the same.

Re:What?

[Z00L00K]

The only considerable problem here is the retirement of the space shuttles. In a way they are dinosaurs of the cold war era.

Much of the specifications originated from the US military since they wanted the space shuttles to be able to launch spy satellites and the devil knows what.

But there have been advantages with them for civilian use too, so they haven't been useless.

What's needed are actually smaller shuttles mainly for person transportation. The Soyuz capsules are in a way good, but leaves little control over the descent. A small shuttle will be able to do more controlled landings, which may be useful.

But there is a downside for a shuttle that is able to fly (even if it flies like a brick), and that is that it's a lot more expensive than a capsule like the Soyuz.

The current shuttles are getting old, and the biggest problem is more the question of spare parts than it is of the hull itself, even if the hull is important too. But the hull and structure can be replaced relatively easy while a lot of the equipment onboard the shuttles are ancient with computer age measurements.

Re:What?

[Anonymous Coward]

Clinton signed the Iran Non Proliferation Act penalizing any country doing weapons-related business with Iran. Russia has been selling missiles and nuclear fuel which meant we couldn't do business with them. Hence the exception.

The exception was a tough sell the first time and NASA concerned it's dead in the water when time comes to renew it.

Re:What?

[Znork]

This has nothing to do with the international community.

If you follow the links in TFA, here's the deal: The US has trade restrictions preventing the purchase of materials from countries that sell missile or nuclear technology to The AXIS of EVIL. Russia trades with some of them. Ergo, the US will prevent itself from purchasing Soyuz access from Russia.

Some old saying about cutting off the nose to spite the face comes to mind.

Re:What?

[Anonymous Coward]

Here's an interesting if a bit outdated article that might make the issue a little clearer: http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewsr.html?pid=15775
as well as this: http://opencrs.com/document/RL34477

It appears that the Iran Non-Proliferation Act "bans U.S. payments to Russia in connection with the International Space Station unless the U.S. President determines that Russia is taking steps to prevent [the proliferation of weapons and weapons technology to Iran]." An amendment was made to this in 2005 that exempted Soyuz flights from the payment ban through 2011.

Re:What?

[Junior J. Junior III]

The summary makes absolutely no sense.

Can anyone shed light on what is going on?

Well, you see, it's like this: Chewbacca is a Wookie from the planet Kashyyyk...

Re:What?

[camperdave]

In particular, I'd like to know what non-proliferation in/of/for/by Iran has to do with Soyuz or Georgia.

Basically, the US pays Russia a retainer for having the Soyuz craft docked at the ISS. The Iran non-proliferation act more or less forbids the US from dealing with any country that trades in arms and weaponry with Iran. Russia has a history of dealing in arms with Iran, so there are provisions and exceptions. I'm guessing these are in jeopardy with the recent conflict in Georgia.

Re:What?

[mea37]

It's about a U.S. law (the Iran Nonproliferation Act), not an international non-proliferation treaty.

Congress has expressly forbidden the U.S. from making ISS-related payments to Russia unless it determines that Russia is taking steps to curb proliferation of weapons technoogy to Iran. On something of a "we have to or we're screwed" basis, they enacted a temporary exemption so we could pay Russia to carry our crewmembers to the ISS.

So when the exemption expires, Russia's authority to launch Soyuz vehicles will not fall under question. US authority to purchase passage on those vehicles will be gone, though.

So:

1) If current events create enough antipathy towards Russia in the US Congress, then they may be unwilling to extend the exemption. Essentially they'd be re-enacting an economic sanction even though we don't have an alternate vendor for the service in question.

2) Even if Congress extends the exemption, there's some question about Russia's ongoing willingness to sell us passage on their rockets (at a reasonable price, or maybe at all) if diplomatic relations worsen.

Re:What?

[Anonymous Coward]

How do you invade your own territory? It is the Russians who are invaders arming militias on Georgian territory and forcing Georgia to take action.

Re:What?

[igny]

Well, Russia will still be able to launch Soyuzes, as well as dock them to the ISS. It is just NASA won't be able to take a ride on them, because NASA won't be able to pay for them.

Re:What?

[Master Of Ninja]

But does logic really matter in international politics? Serbia invaded Kosovo, which was part of Serbia, and got a kick in the teeth for their efforts. Kosovo is the precedent and a very dangerous one now. As they say rights are only guaranteed by power, and in this case might is right.

From the rough discussions I've seen is that Georgia has been historically very territorially aggressive, only limited by the fact that the Russians directly sit next to them. The region of Ossetia at least is from a different ethnic group (not sure about Abkhazia) and by the standard of Kosovo have the right to self determination. The most cynical view that I've seen is that Georgia wanted to make sure that any referendum on the future of Ossetia goes their way by essentially wiping out anyone who would vote to join Russia.

The current invasion of Georgia is due to their initial act of aggression, gambling wrongly, and losing it all. They're in for many years of re-building at the moment.

Re:What?

[linzeal]

Some of the missions; were capturing enemy satellites and manning an orbiting surveillance station. Check out more of it here. The military space shuttle designs still are classified but apparently the civilian one has most of those capabilities or they would of built their own shuttle.

Re:What?

[shallot]

What I think will happen is that giving it a few weeks people will forget about this. The whole situation will be framed as Ossetians (sp?) are just like Kosovo - they have a right to be independent, and with Russian influence in the region they will eventually become re-united with Russia.

I wouldn't use the word independence in this context. If the Ossetians want actual independence, they want it for both the southern and the northern part of their homeland, and the northern part is part of the Russian Federation. Moscow is very much unlikely to allow any such change, because this is Caucasus we're dealing here - they can't allow any sort of major independence drives in there because it would lead to a major mess. There are so many ethnic groups which could claim precedent, it's just not an option. Even if there was no geostrategic value in the region (which there is now because of the oft-mentioned oil and gas pipelines), it would still be delicate.

Re:What?

[TJamieson]

Small note, Abkhazia is also ethnically separate.

Re:What?

[stevied]

A quick google turns up this relatively recent report; from the first para:

The Iran Nonproliferation Act of 2000 (INA) was enacted to help stop foreign transfers to Iran of weapons of mass destruction, missile technology, and advanced conventional weapons technology, particularly from Russia. Section 6 of the INA banned U.S. payments to Russia in connection with the International Space Station (ISS) unless the U.S. President determined that Russia was taking steps to prevent such proliferation. When the President in 2004 announced that the Space Shuttle would be retired in 2010, the Russian Soyuz became the only vehicle available after that date to transport astronauts to and from the ISS. In 2005 Congress amended INA to exempt Soyuz flights to the ISS from the Section 6 ban through 2011. It also extended the provisions to Syria and North Korea, and renamed it the Iran, North Korea, and Syria Nonproliferation Act (INKSNA).

Re:What?

[stevied]

• Russia (apparently) supplies tech to Iran;
• the Act banned the US making payments to Russia in relation to the ISS if they were seen to be doing this*;
• when the shuttle retirement was announced, an exemption was added;
• the exemption will run out in 2011;
• the Russians are unlikely to do Nasa's work for it if they're not going to get paid ;-)

* Not sure why the ISS specifically. Presumably it's some symbolic political thing, the ISS being a demonstration of international cooperation, etc., etc..

Re:What?

[shallot]

There's a very useful picture on Wikipedia that illustrates the general situation in the region (I just keep forgetting which article links it so it takes me a while to find it again): map of the ethno-linguistic groups in the Caucasus region

Re:What?

[fm6]

Most of the international community thinks that Russia is either over reacting or taking advantage of Goergia's internal conflict with a Goergian province that declared independence.

A better way to put it: people think that Russia is supporting Georgian separatists (from two regions, not one) as a means of interfering in Georgian internal affairs, with an eye to resuming their historical domination of Georgia, one that lasted from 1812 to the break up of the Soveit Union in 1990 (with minor interruptions). In the past, this has been limited to giving the separatists military backing and granting residents of breakaway regions Russian Federation passports. Now this has escalated into an actual war (provoked by Georgian actions that can be characterized as an unprovoked attack on Russian-protect regions or as a legitimate attempt to secure Georgian borders, depending on who you talk to), complete with a full scale military incursion, in which the Georgian forces are totally outclassed by the Russian invaders. There are also accusations that Russian-backed separatist militias are attempting to force ethnic Georgians out of the breakaway regions. There have also been reports of massacres.

Last, but certainly not least, Russia is demanding that Georgia pick a new President. Since the current guy is democratically elected (and a strong advocate of closer ties to the west), this amounts to a demand that Georgia become a client state.

The effect on the ISS is miniscule compared with the other ramifications. NATO has agreed to allow Georgia to join, once they've met "technical requirements". If this had already happened, the U.S. would have a treaty obligation to help defend Georgia against the Russian invasion. We're talking world war here, not unlike the way a dispute between Serbia and Austria escalated into the first world war. It seems likely that one of the purposes of the Russian invasion is to make the U.S. think twice about its policy of expanding NATO eastward.

Barring a world war, there's not a lot anybody can do about this. The party line in Russia is that the west is determined to keep down all the Slavic countries. (In this narrative, the NATO attack against Serbia was about that, not about preventing genocide in Kosovo.) Putin's defiance of the west only makes him more popular, all the more so if we impose sanctions.

But of course the sanctions will happen: western leaders have to take action, no matter how symbolic, or look ineffectual. (Yes, they are ineffectual, but they can't afford to look it.) That pretty much brings to an end any Russian-western cooperation in space exploration.

Re:What?

[petermgreen]

The blunt fact is reusability did not produce the savings it's proponents said it would (indeed it probablly cost a lot more because of needlessly hauling a shitload of orbiter up on every mission) and it also prevented gradual improvements in most areas and continued manufacturability.

With a disposable craft you can refine the design much more easilly and if stuff becomes unavailible you have to deal with it then and there rather than ending up with a huge pile of stuff you have no ability to replace.

Re:What?

[martin-boundary]

How do you invade your own territory?

Be careful how you state this. If Georgia has truly invaded its own territory, then it follows that Saakashvili bombed his own people. Saddam was hanged for this.

Re:What?

[bluemonq]

Actually, the act bans the US government from doing ANY business with countries that supply tech to Iran. It's not just an ISS thing, though that happens to be the issue at stake.

Re:What?

[Anonymous Coward]

To sum it all up...

U.S. allied/controlled country of Georgia sneak attacks Russian civilian targets in the night. Russia responds with military action and gets blamed as being the aggressor by corporate/CIA controlled U.S. media. Dick Cheney states clearly the U.S. will back Georgia with troops. Putin states clearly he will attack anyone aiding Georgia, and may use nukes.

Re:What?

[oldhack]

Get out. Saddam got hanged for pissing off the US. Plenty nasty rulers killed their own people, and some still do.

Re:What?

[oldhack]

From the rough discussions I've seen is that Georgia has been historically very territorially aggressive, only limited by the fact that the Russians directly sit next to them. The region of Ossetia at least is from a different ethnic group (not sure about Abkhazia) and by the standard of Kosovo have the right to self determination. The most cynical view that I've seen is that Georgia wanted to make sure that any referendum on the future of Ossetia goes their way by essentially wiping out anyone who would vote to join Russia.

Well, that's the pro-Russia side's story. Despite "cease-fire", things seem to be still in flux, and no evidence of the damage due to Georgian bombing of S. Ossetia, which the Russian claims is a genocide, seems to be coming through.

Just balancing it out - no dog in the fight.

Re:What?

[Aceticon]

The situation is a lot more complex than that.

For a long time Russia has been giving Russian passports to ethnic russian citizens living in South Ossetia. It has also been supporting separatist groups in South Ossetia and providing them protection in the form of Russian "peacekeepers" stationed in South Ossetia to "protected Russian citizens" (said "Russian citizens" being the people living in South Ossetia that have been given Russian passports by the Russians).

The South Ossetian separatist groups have recently conducted attacks in Georgia, outside South Ossetia ...

Also, Russia has been complaining out loud about countries in their "sphere of influence" joining NATO ... Georgia has recently tried to join NATO but was refused entry ...

And then there is the pipeline in Georgia bringing Caspian oil to Turkey, transporting in 3% of the oil consumed in Europe and which was build through Georgia, purposely bypassing Russia because the Russians charge extra high "transport tariffs" on oil flowing through pipelines in their country (and have a nasty habit of turning the tap off for political reasons).

And let's not even get started on the fact that the Russian government plays the nationalistic flag heavily in Russia and that the recent oil and gas prices have boosted Russian economy (which nowadays is highly reliant on oil and gas) to a level where the Russians feel confident to try and reclaim "past glories" (read, the Soviet times territorial influence if not outright possession)

So this game has been running for a lot longer than the last couple of days and the play book starts long before Georgia "invaded" South Ossetia.

(by the way, latest news have Russian tanks continuing to go deeper into Georgia proper ... even after the Russian announced cease-fire)

Re:What?

[T.E.D.]

Be careful how you state this. If Georgia has truly invaded its own territory, then it follows that Saakashvili bombed his own people. Saddam was hanged for this.

...by his own people. After a trial. What's your point? If he actually committed crimes against humanity like Saddam, and the lawful and popularly-elected government of Georgia wants to prosecute the dude at some point in the future, that's their business, not ours. They can fry the guy for all I care.

Now if a large country with a military strong enough to threaten most of Europe starts invading its smaller neighbors with no notice to anyone and on the slimmest of pretextes, that most assuredly is an international issue.

Re:What?

[jollygreengiantlikes]

Here's a basic summary of what the Non-Proliferation Act covers:

http://opencrs.com/document/RL34477

The Iran Nonproliferation Act of 2000 (INA) was enacted to help stop foreign transfers to Iran of weapons of mass destruction, missile technology, and advanced conventional weapons technology, particularly from Russia. Section 6 of the INA banned U.S. payments to Russia in connection with the International Space Station (ISS) unless the U.S. President determined that Russia was taking steps to prevent such proliferation. When the President in 2004 announced that the Space Shuttle would be retired in 2010, the Russian Soyuz became the only vehicle available after that date to transport astronauts to and from the ISS. In 2005 Congress amended INA to exempt Soyuz flights to the ISS from the Section 6 ban through 2011.

Re:What?

[martin-boundary]

My point is that people can't have their cake and eat it at the same time. Either Saakashvili bombed his neighbours, or he bombed his own people. Pick whatever description floats your boat.

Re:What?

[rtb61]

You missed a point, where it is not the most friendly of peacemaking stances to publicly plant missiles in neighbouring countries, sure it generates lots of profits for arms manufacturers, but really, aren't all of those nuclear submarines with thousands of nuclear warheads enough already.

If they want to play at the peace game then they should do the peaceful things and not be running around trying to fire up the cold war just because a bunch of ass wipe arms manufacturers and their lobbyists and profiting by it.

NATO should only expand to reduce the cost and wasted resources of each member country of maintaining a fully fledged defence force and not be about starting and waging world war three or about geriatric corrupt politicians trying to gain votes.

The US played a bit heavily on threatening Russia with economic sanctions when the Russian economy was struggling, which put their nose seriously out of joint. Added to that the US under Bush has been pretty well antagonising nearly every other major oil producing country except for some 'strange' reason Saudi Arabia (home of al Qaeda, zero democracy, religious fundamentalism and, rampant discrimination, seriously, WTF), which has pushed those other countries together.

NO wonder nerds have a bad rep

[Goalie_Ca]

I can't believe that a slight pertubation to the timeline of the hopeless ISS is what really troubles nerds when two countries are at war. Seriously..!

Re:NO wonder nerds have a bad rep

[Evilest Doer]

I can't believe that a slight pertubation to the timeline of the hopeless ISS is what really troubles nerds when two countries are at war. Seriously..!

Or, you could look at it this way. Overall human progress is being delayed because two countries are involved in a pissing and "my-dick-is-bigger-than-yours" contest. Or, similar to what Ernest Rutherford said, we've got more important things to worry about than another stupid war.

Re:NO wonder nerds have a bad rep

[Anonymous Coward]

I can't believe that a slight pertubation to the timeline of the hopeless ISS is what really troubles nerds when two countries are at war. Seriously..!

Heaven forbid someone should look at the bigger picture. Part of good leadership is spotting consequences early and planning for the future.

There's public money at stake here you know.

Re:NO wonder nerds have a bad rep

[Free the Cowards]

That's right! No web site, anywhere, should ever talk about anything besides people dying, because people are always dying and it's always the most important thing happening.

Sheesh. You realize humans are capable of paying attention to more than one thing at a time?

Re:NO wonder nerds have a bad rep

[Peter Cooper]

Is that sarcasm? Things like nuclear power and landing on the moon came out of a "my dick is bigger than yours" contest between countries.

Re:NO wonder nerds have a bad rep

[BForrester]

I see the problem this way: in my neck of the woods, "pissing" and "my dick is bigger than yours" have always been championed as two separate contests.

I've played the scenario out in my mind a few times, and I can't see how this abominable combination would not end in disaster.

Re:NO wonder nerds have a bad rep

[Anonymous Coward]

I can't believe that a slight pertubation to the timeline of the hopeless ISS is what really troubles nerds when two countries are at war.

If you were a NASA astronaut on board the ISS you might feel a bit different about the three-year "slight pertubation to the timeline."

Seriously..!

Oh, get off your high horse.

Re:NO wonder nerds have a bad rep

[Anonymous Coward]

You want to talk about people dying? Johnny can't read! Why can't you think of the children?

Re:NO wonder nerds have a bad rep

[mahmud]

The disaster you are referring to has a name. It's called "watersports".

Re:NO wonder nerds have a bad rep

[pilgrim23]

Nerds like toys. ISS is a uber billion dollar toy. QED.

I wonder how many pictures of geologic formations, seismic indicators, temperature sensors, or other (strictly scientific of course)instrument packages have been pointed at the east side of the Black sea from the ISS lately...

Re:NO wonder nerds have a bad rep

[SupremoMan]

Human progress is delayed by a lot more things than this little pissing contest in the Caucasus.

Re:NO wonder nerds have a bad rep

[Anonymous Coward]

Is that sarcasm? Things like nuclear power and landing on the moon came out of a "my dick is bigger than yours" contest between countries.

Ergo, we should have more wars because wars = progress.

Not.

Re:NO wonder nerds have a bad rep

[Peter Cooper]

Ergo, we should have more wars because wars = progress.

Not.

Wars do promote progress, a lot of which becomes very useful for civilian purposes. I'd argue, however, that wars are a form of problem that gives countries the motivation to invest heavily into science and technology. Other problems that aren't war-related can do the same - such as global warming, terrorism (not strictly war), and health crises.

Short of trying to solve problems, what other motivation for heavy investment into the sciences is there? The majority of the population fail to recognize how scientific achievements improve their lives (and the reality is, they often don't for many decades). If a way to encourage heavy investment into the sciences can be found that doesn't involve responding to wars, health crises and other unpleasantness, then we'd move forward a lot quicker.

Re:NO wonder nerds have a bad rep

[Anonymous Coward]

Not everyone in this world has to be a clone of each other, caring about the exact same priorities you know.

There maybe countless wars involving billions or even trillions of sentinent entities on other planets we just don't know about. Where's your concern for them?

In both cases, there is precisely nothing we can personally do. But, at least most nerds don't act all big-headed and pre-tend we're helping by repeating some pointless rhetoric.

Re:NO wonder nerds have a bad rep

[Anonymous Coward]

Such contests may be sufficient conditions, but I hardly think they're necessary. Perhaps if the public was more interested in scientific endeavors we wouldn't need to kill millions of people or risk nuclear annihilation to do something great.

When push comes to shove

[Shivetya]

I am sure we will invent a new piece of legislation so we don't have to acknowledge our pesky integrity or morals.

After all, its just some little piss ant country, aren't the G8s allowed to run over one a year?

Whats next? Having doubts about going to the Olympics based on China's treatment of Tibet and other ethnic/religious minorities? Oops, looks like we forgot that one too, there G8 as well. I know, New G.... oops, can't go there... uh...

Oh yeah... Russia will have a hissy because we bitched, people will claim that talking would have worked or did work (ignoring the fact Russia got what they wanted and killed lots of people - but talking sure brought them back to life), and threaten to not allow us to fly but will cave in when we pay more.

Yeah, US foreign policy has been pretty much spineless when dealing with Russia since Reagans day... somehow since then we aren't allowed to piss them off. Peace sucks for the little guys as it means the big boys get to trample the little guys without worry about another big guy actually doing something about it.

I know, lets get the UN involved, they can write a strongly worded letter, well as long as none of the words offend the Russians and the Russians approve it of course.

Sheesh.

Re:When push comes to shove

[justdrew]

so you don't even know what Georgia did to provoke the response do you? Do you even know the bush assholes have been hostile and engaging in encircling Russia since the day they took office as if the cold war never ended? We provoked this idiot maneuver out of Georgia but they get to pay the price.

Re:When push comes to shove

[couchslug]

"Yeah, US foreign policy has been pretty much spineless when dealing with Russia since Reagans day... somehow since then we aren't allowed to piss them off."

We didn't risk much for the trivial players back then either. Some game pieces are expendable, while others have more value.

Re:When push comes to shove

[Colonel Korn]

Having doubts about going to the Olympics based on China's treatment of Tibet and other ethnic/religious minorities? Oops, looks like we forgot that one too, there G8 as well.

No, China's not part of the G8. They're part of the O5 ("Outreach 5"), a group of less developed nations recognized by the G8.

Re:When push comes to shove

[93 Escort Wagon]

Yeah, US foreign policy has been pretty much spineless when dealing with Russia since Reagans day...

I know it's fashionable to rail against the US, but in truth the European countries have shared this shortcoming due to their addiction to Russian oil.

Economic realities drive foreign policy for most countries in the world. We only manage to stand up in righteous indignation when we've got nothing really to lose. It's why we (eventually) were willing to isolate Apartheid South Africa, but never took any measures of consequence against China for {choose any one of many offenses}.

Re:When push comes to shove

[Robotbeat]

I completely agree. This has gone on far enough. Russia wants to annex parts of another country, so it backs "freedom fighters" and makes them Russian citizens, allowing Russia to claim that they're just trying to protect the interests of Russians in Georgia. Has anyone noticed that this is THE SAME EXCUSE THAT HITLER USED WHEN HE STARTED WWII??? Why, Russia is just trying to bring other Russians under the wings of the motherland! How NOBLE of them!

Seriously, if the separatists in Georgia actually wanted to form their own country, I could say that it is ARGUABLE that Russia's actions are justified, but this situation if FUCKING STRAIGHT-UP IMPERIALISM! Russia wants to have complete control over energy in this region, and so they're going to annex parts of Georgia (actually, all of it, if the West doesn't do anything).

Re:When push comes to shove

[Shakrai]

so you don't even know what Georgia did to provoke the response do you?

I honestly think there is enough blame to go around on both sides here (Georgia overreached but Russia hasn't exactly gone out of her way to solve the issues in South Ossetia either) but I get nervous when a large country with a history of aggression and outright annexation starts to beat up on a small neighbor.

Why don't you ask somebody from Poland, the Baltic States, Finland or Ukraine what they think of recent Russian actions?

Re:When push comes to shove

[Abcd1234]

I know it's fashionable to rail against the US, but in truth the European countries have shared this shortcoming due to their addiction to Russian oil.

Luckily, this is a story about *US* foreign policy, particularly with respect to NASA, so your comment is entirely off topic, and only serves to muddy the waters.

Re:When push comes to shove

[pclminion]

Russia wants to have complete control over energy in this region, and so they're going to annex parts of Georgia (actually, all of it, if the West doesn't do anything).

Such as what? Go to war with them? No fucking thank you.

Re:When push comes to shove

[ShibaInu]

And, what are we going to do? The US military is tied up in Iraq and Afghanistan, and even if they weren't, getting to Georgia isn't going to be easy. The Euros don't have the balls to do anything meaningful to their largest energy supplier. So, what do you suggest? WWIII?

This is a larger part of a regional conflict that includes Chechnia. There are layers of ethnic hatred in the region that go back a long way and I find it hard to believe anyone's side of the story. This is a tragedy, but at this point the best thing to do is just to get the shooting to stop.

Re:When push comes to shove

[kesuki]

just so long as you realize these 'freedom fighters' of south osetia had won a majority election, which was then overturned by the Georgia government by holding a special election where the polls were guarded by armed guards to 'elect' a pro-Georgia government.

just so you realize only 28% of the population of south osetia is actually Georgians and that the entire reason for this war is that Georgia wants the tax revenue on all the freight lines that run from Russia to Georgia through south osetia.

yeah,yeah russia made the population of south osetia russian citizens so they could invade goergia, and possibly grab a significant portion of their oil fields, but it's not like georgia are good guys either.

Re:When push comes to shove

[Robotbeat]

Honestly, appeasement is what let Hitler take over Europe in WWII. I don't think this will come down to another world war, but what do you think of the possibility of another Soviet Union? The fact is, Russia hasn't changed much since the Cold War.

Re:When push comes to shove

[Bemopolis]

Yeah, US foreign policy has been pretty much spineless when dealing with Russia since Reagans day...

Yeah, I'm sure glad we had the foresight to arm and fund the muhajadin in Afghanistan. I mean, that went great and NEVER AFFECTED US EVER AGAIN...

Re:When push comes to shove

[X.25]

Why don't you ask somebody from Poland, the Baltic States, Finland or Ukraine what they think of recent Russian actions?

Why don't you ask someone from Balkans what they think about US actions in regards of bombing sovereign nation, taking part of their country and allowing it to declare independence?

Re:When push comes to shove

[woot account]

what do you think of the possibility of another Soviet Union?

Maybe it would cause the United States to get its ass in gear again. We developed a whole lot of stuff in the Cold War pissing match with the CCCP. It would probably do us good to have another.

Re:When push comes to shove

[Anonymous Coward]

>The US military is tied up in Iraq and Afghanistan

Actually, very small numbers (relatively) are in-theatre.

Re:When push comes to shove

[mrdoogee]

Not to mention that we helped Saddam Hussien solidify his power against Soviet backed Iran way back in the 1980s and he remains one of our Staunchest allies to this day.

Re:When push comes to shove

[Anonymous Coward]

We really need a -1, Stupid option.

Re:When push comes to shove

[Anonymous Coward]

You think THIS is Bush's fault too? God, man, get over it.

Unbelievable.

Re:When push comes to shove

[Net_fiend]

lol...this reminds me of a guy I knew in a Cisco class I took a while back who worked for the military. He used to always talk about the muhajadin and how nasty these guys are etc. Very interesting stuff that I didn't know ahead of time. Puts another side to the whole 9/11, Iran, Iraq, Afghan problems we have...which seem to be motivated by our nosey-ness into other countries' affairs. Heck Washington thought it prudent to stay out of world affairs.

Re:When push comes to shove

[Shakrai]

So the Finns, Estonians, and Poles were engaged in ethic cleansing and genocide when Stalin decided to try and conquer them?

I don't pretend to have all the answers for the Balkans but I think trying to compare Bosnia and Kosovo with Finland and the Baltic States is a bit of a stretch. Do you even remember what the Serbs were up to back in those days? The images of people in camps starving to death?

Re:When push comes to shove

[Robotbeat]

Maybe it would cause the United States to get its ass in gear again. We developed a whole lot of stuff in the Cold War pissing match with the CCCP. It would probably do us good to have another.

Can't argue with that! I think some nationalistic competition with Russia or China could prove much more valuable than this idea that we should sell our debt to China and have them buy our companies instead of "trying to get ahead of the Ruskies." It took 14 years between the first experimental nuclear chain reaction (the Chicago Pile) until the first COMMERCIAL power plant. Now, it takes twice that time to get a nuclear power plant finished. Granted, safety is much better now, but that just seems ridiculous to me. We DO need to get our rear in gear. We could subsidize shale oil and coal-to-gasoline for use as mostly a ginormous strategic oil reserve (there's enough oil in there to last at least half a century for the US) while doing an X-Prize for battery/electric car technologies. We don't need to rely on foreign countries for energy. If we subsidized both coal to gas and shale oil, petroleum would drop to probably around $50/gallon and couldn't be used as a political tool by third-world dictators.

The US electrical grid needs to be upgraded... with high-temperature (liquid nitrogen instead of liquid helium) superconductors (a coast-to-coast superconducting line would be worth it for the lowered line losses alone), which don't mire the landscape and are developed domestically. This technology, once mature, could lead to significant advances in all different areas of heavy electrical engineering.

The wind-belt running North-to-South through the prairie states needs to be mined for wind energy.

The Federal government should invest a portion of the Dept. of Energy's budget to buying up useful energy technology patents and making them available for free for any domestic production. (I'm thinking of Nanosolar, here.)

Domestic manufacturing needs to be encouraged, and cheap electricity will help. Cheap nuclear is definitely possible.

Re:When push comes to shove

[Anonymous Coward]

I expect they'd feel the same way. Allow me to present your argument formally:

1. Russia is beating up a small country (again).
2. The United States has beat up small countries in the past.
3. Therefore, Russia should be allowed to beat up small countries.

Yeah. See? Kind of a non sequitur.

Re:When push comes to shove

[Anonymous Coward]

Honestly, appeasement is what let Hitler take over Europe in WWII.

Actually, appeasement is what gave the UK and the US enough time to build up their own military and stop Hitler from taking over. You may recall Hitler dying in a bunker and not on a throne. But, don't let the facts of history change your political viewpoints.

Re:When push comes to shove

[Pros_n_Cons]

Seriously, if the separatists in Georgia actually wanted to form their own country, I could say that it is ARGUABLE that Russia's actions are justified

So if Americans are rioting in Canada and Canada squelches the rioters its okay for the US to invade Canada?

Re:When push comes to shove

[MightyMartian]

I honestly think there is enough blame to go around on both sides here (Georgia overreached but Russia hasn't exactly gone out of her way to solve the issues in South Ossetia either) but I get nervous when a large country with a history [wikipedia.org] of [wikipedia.org] aggression [wikipedia.org] and outright annexation starts to beat up on a small neighbor.

Why don't you ask somebody from Poland, the Baltic States, Finland or Ukraine what they think of recent Russian actions?

At some point we're all going to have invoke a little realpolitik here. As far as Russia is concerned, Georgia as a whole has long been a client state, and as far as the regions with Russian populations, well maybe they'll allow the fiction of independent states, but for all intents and purposes they're part of Russia. Georgia knew this before it went and did something incredibly stupid, and the US knew this before it seems to have encouraged the whole crazy scheme. Since no one really can go after Russia in any meaningful way (let's remember it has nukes, huge energy reserves and a permanent seat on the Security Council), we might as well start facing the fact that it's going to continue to view all those scattered former Soviet republics which were, for the most part, part of the Russian Empire or at the very least closely aligned states as still being within its sphere of influence (read: part of Mother Russia).

This isn't just about Georgia or oil pipelines. It's about sending a message to the Western Slavs that whatever their current technical affiliations, their independence is very much at the whim of the Kremlin (as I said before, it's been this way for centuries). Western Europe would be better advised to not worry so much about the expansion of the EU and NATO, but in finding some way of getting away from dependence on the Russian Empire's oil and gas, and accepting the fact that all this post-Wilsonian and post-Cold War self-determination talk, while certainly a lovely sentiment, just ain't gonna be. Anyone who thought the Age of Empires was dead was living in a pipe dream. The Great Bear has healed a lot of its wounds, and it wants its backyard and patio furniture back, and no one... and I repeat no one has the will or even the muscle short of truly mad acts to stop it.

Re:When push comes to shove

[Anonymous Coward]

1. Relax and save your energy for something useful :) Hitler wasn't the first and certainly won't be the last one to do this.

2. How would you react to Russia or, more interestingly, China providing state officials, giving money and sending military aid and equipment to Mexico? You didn't like when they helped Castro, did you? I guess you remember those times? So what's so different about Russia's dislike of the current Georgian government? Especially, considering that this government is stupid enough to break international treaties it has signed.

3. Is Russia the only one that wants control over energy in a certain region of the world? No other country comes to your mind, does it?

4. You're a hypocrite, my friend.

Re:When push comes to shove

[KKlaus]

I accidentally modded you offtopic so I'm replying so it will let me undo my mod.

And to add a little content, if you ask people in Kosovo what they think of us bombing the Serbs, they are very happy. The Serbs obviously not so much.

But I don't think the Japanese loved our bombing in world war two either; that doesn't mean it was the wrong thing to do.

Re:When push comes to shove

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh grow a pair. There are no 'innocent' countries. Ask Russians, Ukrainians, Byelorussians, Romanians what they think of what Poland did to their countries in 15th-17th centuries.

PS. By the way I meant brain hemispheres. What did you think?

Re:When push comes to shove

[Shakrai]

And to add a little content, if you ask people in Kosovo what they think of us bombing the Serbs, they are very happy

As with most things it's a matter of perspective. I honestly don't know enough about the Caucuses to form an opinion as to who "started it". My gut tells me that the people placing 100% of the blame on Georgia aren't telling the whole story though.

Re:When push comes to shove

[Darinbob]

Kosovo was essentially created by Marshall Tito, as an autonomous region. The borders were drawn to limit Serbian power and domination of Yugoslavia, but it was still majority Albanian. It had never been a part of Serbia properly. Kosovo autonomy was revoked by Milosevic (giving him one extra vote in the Yugoslavian presidency). At which point Albanian was removed as an official language, Serb was taught in the schools, etc. There was a period of resistance, terrorism, crime, etc, after this.

The UN had resolutions regarding Kosovo, there were the Dayton agreements, Kosovo Verification Mission, etc. There was a long time-line here. Both sides were at fault. Things reached a climax after the massacre at Rachak, and NATO decided it had to step in and force a peace; force Serbia and Milosovic to stop acting like thugs, and threaten the KLA to behave or they'd be abandoned, and restore the pre 1990 autonomous status of Kosovo. Further peace talks were attempted. All before any bombing. The bombing was by NATO, an alliance, not a US unilateral action. The US is not the boss of NATO, and NATO was acting in the interests of Europe in this case.

The difference here from Georgia and South Ossetia is the time line and number of parties involved. Russia acted immediately after the attacks on Tskhinvali, with no negotiations, no UN consultations, no diplomacy, no formal protests, no attempted peace process, etc. Russia responded in less than one day. Russia acted unilaterally.

There are very interesting similarities though: Kosovo was never really a part of Serbia, and South Ossetia was never really Georgian, except by the drawing of borders for political reasons. Both Kosovo and South Ossetia had armed separatist/resistance movements. Both Serbia and Georgia attempted harsh crackdowns. Both Serbia and Georgia badly underestimated the backlash that they would get from NATO or Russia.

Re:When push comes to shove

[anaesthetica]

In the interests of historical accuracy: the funding, training, and arming of mujahedeen was begun under Carter (not Reagan), six months before the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. >>source

Re:When push comes to shove

[Anonymous Coward]

Why dont you ask england what it thought about a French navy, allowing a huge part of its lands to make good on its declaration of independence?

Re:When push comes to shove

[shallot]

Why don't you ask someone from Balkans what they think about US actions in regards of bombing sovereign nation, taking part of their country and allowing it to declare independence?

Your quick retort is off base there, because it implies that only Serbians who are against those things live in the Balkans. Other people from the region generally saw those acts either as salvation or as interventions necessary to get things fixed.

Indeed, many a Croatian, Bosniak or Albanian will tell you that the US and others should have intervened in the Yugoslav wars much before and with much more force, than they did.

Foreign intervention by great powers(tm) is a historical fact of life, anyway, and they are hardly ever universally right or universally wrong.

Re:When push comes to shove

[MightyMartian]

That's bullshit. Even as late 1935 when Germany rearmed the Rhineland, the Allies had air parity. It might have been messy, but they could have driven the Germans back across the frontier, at a helluva lot less cost than what it ultimately took. Appeasement wasn't about buying time, it was about buying the Germans.

Re:When push comes to shove

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't really care what they think about it after murdering so many people.

Re:When push comes to shove

[Jherek Carnelian]

Do you even remember what the Serbs were up to back in those days? The images of people in camps starving to death?

Like this picture?

Turns out those people were OUTSIDE the fence, and not imprisoned in some sort of detention camp. If I had the time, I'd find a reference for you, but it took me long enough just to find the picture.

Re:When push comes to shove

[uassholes]

I'm married to a Bosnian. Whenever she heard bombing during the seige of Sarajevo, she hoped it was the US saving them. Clinton finally did something after five years. Despite the delay, Bosnians think Clinton is the Second Coming.

Re:When push comes to shove

[Anonymous Coward]

It's kinda ironic... Stalin was actually a Georgian native, from the city of Gori.

Re:When push comes to shove

[Anonymous Coward]

The difference here from Georgia and South Ossetia is the time line and number of parties involved. Russia acted immediately after the attacks on Tskhinvali, with no negotiations, no UN consultations, no diplomacy, no formal protests, no attempted peace process, etc. Russia responded in less than one day. Russia acted unilaterally.

Another difference is that Russia already had peacekeeping troops in the region, backed by UN mandate. Do you think that if Serbian would attack Kosovo, the NATO forces would first negotiate, consult, try to solve the issue diplomatically, formally protest etc. and only then react militarily?

Re:When push comes to shove

[Anonymous Coward]

ignoring the fact Russia got what they wanted and killed lots of people

WTF ? Russia killed near 100 soldiers
Georgia killed 2000 civilians and destroyed houses of another 30,000 and you still claim that the bad guy is Russia?

No the fucking bastards here are USA who allowed and support Georgia in this genocide!
An you know what? It's because Georgia is important location for US on the way of the "OIL".

USA care only about OIL - it does not even care about it's own people moron.

Re:When push comes to shove

[JAlexoi]

Was it me, or did the major news agencies report that a Russian proposed resolution, calling for immediate cease-fire, was blocked by claims that it "was unacceptable for Gerogians"? And did that happen BEFORE Russians "barged in"?
As you guessed, the answer to both questions is YES. And Russians are in Abchazia and S.Osetia based on OSCE.

Re:When push comes to shove

[JAlexoi]

Just replace rioters with Kosovo Albanians and Canada with Serbia... and you get the answer....

Re:When push comes to shove

[Shakrai]

At some point we're all going to have invoke a little realpolitik here. As far as Russia is concerned, Georgia as a whole has long been a client state, and as far as the regions with Russian populations, well maybe they'll allow the fiction of independent states, but for all intents and purposes they're part of Russia.

Well if they want to start playing the game like that again then we can respond in kind. There's a little piss ant country about 90 miles off the coast of Florida that used to be an American client state as I recall. Or if we want to go after something with ramifications for the global energy markets (Georgia has the only pipeline in that region not controlled by Moscow) we could look further to the South.

Since no one really can go after Russia in any meaningful way

That depends on what you consider "meaningful". If Russia is hell bent on bringing Georgia back into her orbit we probably can't stop them (is Georgia worth WW3?), but we don't have to let them stay in the G-8 or get into the WTO either. Sooner or later Putin will have to decide what's more important -- further economic integration with the World or ruling over the Slavs?

This isn't just about Georgia or oil pipelines. It's about sending a message to the Western Slavs that whatever their current technical affiliations, their independence is very much at the whim of the Kremlin (as I said before, it's been this way for centuries)

Didn't Hitler try the same thing with German populations not under the rule of Berlin? Shouldn't that have taught us a lesson about trying to redraw the map based on ethic distributions? Or did I miss the part of the UN charter that says all Slavs have to be ruled from Moscow?

Western Europe would be better advised to not worry so much about the expansion of the EU and NATO, but in finding some way of getting away from dependence on the Russian Empire's oil and gas

I would agree with this. For all the griping Americans do about being owned by "foreign oil" the Europeans have it much worse. At least we can obtain a good portion of ours from friendly (Canada and Mexico) countries.

accepting the fact that all this post-Wilsonian and post-Cold War self-determination talk, while certainly a lovely sentiment, just ain't gonna be

So which countries do you propose we abandon? Georgia? The Baltic States? Ukraine? Where do you draw the line? The Baltic States are members of the EU. If the EU is willing to let them be absorbed by Moscow what does that say about them? What about countries without Slavic populations that Moscow has long sought to dominate? Will you also abandon Finland and Poland? Both of them are members of the EU and one (Poland) is a NATO member.

Re:When push comes to shove

[Anonymous Coward]

One word for you. Chechnya.

Re:When push comes to shove

[MJMullinII]

Not to mention that we helped Saddam Hussien solidify his power against Soviet backed Iran way back in the 1980s and he remains one of our Staunchest allies to this day.

Saddam Hussein isn't anyone's ally anymore, he's six feet under.

BTW, the Soviets DID NOT back the Iranians.

The Soviets didn't trust the Iranians because of all their God talk. We didn't have any use for the Iranians because of their behavior in regard to our embassy being taken over.

Saddam Hussein, sensing that the Iranians were pretty much blacklisted (sensing quite correctly, I might add) and that no one would come to their aid, invaded with the intention of capturing their Oil Fields.

Make no mistake, the Iran-Iraq War was nothing but a bank robbery. Saddam intended to capture the Iranian Oil Fields and pool them with his own (which if he had been successful, BTW, he would have overtaken Saudi Arabia as the World's leading Oil Producer).

The fact that he didn't win shows his incompetence.

Re:When push comes to shove

[MJMullinII]

so you don't even know what Georgia did to provoke the response do you? Do you even know the bush assholes have been hostile and engaging in encircling Russia since the day they took office as if the cold war never ended? We provoked this idiot maneuver out of Georgia but they get to pay the price.

It'll teach the Georgians, or anyone else for that matter, to pay closer attention before poking hornet's nests, won't it?

Re:When push comes to shove

[MJMullinII]

Why don't you ask somebody from Poland, the Baltic States, Finland or Ukraine what they think of recent Russian actions?

Why don't you ask someone from Balkans what they think about US actions in regards of bombing sovereign nation, taking part of their country and allowing it to declare independence?

Because the Serbs treated the people of Kosovo like shit and they finally caught it in the ass.

Re:When push comes to shove

[MJMullinII]

ignoring the fact Russia got what they wanted and killed lots of people

WTF ? Russia killed near 100 soldiers
Georgia killed 2000 civilians and destroyed houses of another 30,000 and you still claim that the bad guy is Russia?

No the fucking bastards here are USA who allowed and support Georgia in this genocide!
An you know what? It's because Georgia is important location for US on the way of the "OIL".

USA care only about OIL - it does not even care about it's own people moron.

And the rest of the World likes things JUST THE WAY THEY ARE.

If they were forced to choose, I think the World would EAGERLY join an American Empire BEFORE a Russian one.

Re:When push comes to shove

[Anonymous Coward]

The difference here from Georgia and South Ossetia is the time line and number of parties involved. Russia acted immediately after the attacks on Tskhinvali, with no negotiations, no UN consultations, no diplomacy, no formal protests, no attempted peace process, etc. Russia responded in less than one day. Russia acted unilaterally.

There are very interesting similarities though: Kosovo was never really a part of Serbia, and South Ossetia was never really Georgian, except by the drawing of borders for political reasons. Both Kosovo and South Ossetia had armed separatist/resistance movements. Both Serbia and Georgia attempted harsh crackdowns. Both Serbia and Georgia badly underestimated the backlash that they would get from NATO or Russia.

Because they can and they know US ain't gonna do nothing about it except yaping their loud mouth. Georgia asked for it and now it's time they bend over and take it like a slut

Re:When push comes to shove

[tcolberg]

Charlie Wilson: "These things happened. They were glorious and they changed the world... and then we fucked up the endgame."

moral decline

[polar red]

These problems occur, when a country prouding itself to be the greatest, democratic nation on earth, breaks its own rules(like : not intruding on other nations Sovereignty), which lead to other nations breaking those same rules, ... This empire is on its way out i fear, and the results won't be pretty.

Re:moral decline

[couchslug]

"which lead to other nations breaking those same rules, .."

Our Cold War opponents broke them at will in the recent past anyway, because it served them well and they could.

"Rules" are window dressing to amuse the earnest and naive people who believe in them. Power is what matters, because to the extent one has power one can make up and enforce rules.

Re:moral decline

[polar red]

"Rules" are window dressing to amuse the earnest and naive people who believe in them

That's all true, but when you keep shouting at the top of your lungs about those moral standards, you're a hypocrite

Re:moral decline

[mcvos]

These problems occur, when a country prouding itself to be the greatest, democratic nation on earth, breaks its own rules(like : not intruding on other nations Sovereignty),

This is a very good point. Recent actions of the US have given other nations like Russia and China plenty of excuses to do what they like, and to push their own interests.

Whenever the US criticised China for its human rights record, China can criticise the US right back for its human rights record.

And because the US invaded a souvereign nation with a flimsy excuse (when it was really about oil), now Russia can use the same flimsy excuse to invade a foreign nation (which is really about oil). And they make claims of genocide too, because that worked so well in Bosnia and Kosovo.

Re:moral decline

[FleaPlus]

That's all true, but when you keep shouting at the top of your lungs about those moral standards, you're a hypocrite

Believe it or not, there are worse things than hypocrisy.

Re:moral decline

[polar red]

you may believe so, but the perception that the US won't keep its word, will hinder any diplomatic action. Diplomacy is the only way to keep international peace.

Re:moral decline

[extrasolar]

Hypocrisy, yes. But I don't think that word stings them as much as it does you. Perhaps you're one of the naive people that the grandparent is talking about :)

Re:moral decline

[MightyYar]

you're a hypocrite

Seems there's plenty of that to go around. I, personally, was amused when Russia claimed that the US was being hypocritical after several years of denouncing the aggression of the US :) It was like, wait, are you changing your mind now?

Re:moral decline

[swb]

Diplomacy is the only way to keep international peace.

Huh? I'm pretty sure military power has settled more conflict than diplomacy. WW I, II to be sure weren't ended with diplomacy.

Re:moral decline

[thedonger]

That statement is ignorant of history. Diplomacy can only work for a short amount of time before something happens which will require the kicking of someone's ass. Given enough time someone will come along who really wants to kill you and/or take what you have, no matter how badly the "let's all hug and get along" crowd want it to not be true. Human nature is, after all, driven by the same basic instinct as the rest of the animal kingdom: the will to survive.

Force cannot replacement diplomacy any more than diplomacy can replace force.

Re:moral decline

[polar red]

2500 years of european history TEACHES you that the ONLY time europe was in peace, was after the formation of the european union. this formation was completely voluntary, and without need of violence.

Re:moral decline

[polar red]

read your history a bit more careful. WWI ended after the Versailles treaty or the armistice of November 11, and WW2 ended after the surrender of 19/08/1945. this falls under DIPLOMACY. Without surrender, the battle keeps raging.

Re:moral decline

[phoenix321]

Are you absolutely sure on this?

Really?

Then complete disarm yourself unilaterally and leave your door open. We'll see how that works out..

Re:moral decline

[polar red]

Compare the borders between France and germany, with the same orders in 1937

Re:moral decline

[Anonymous Coward]

>Believe it or not, there are worse things than hypocrisy.

Not to liberals. Well, maybe privatized health-care.

Re:moral decline

[phoenix321]

France didn't leave the door open but fortified their borders to the extreme. Even after 60 years no one knows why they didn't anticipated the Germans coming through Belgium like they did EVERY time before, but that's a different story.

Anyway, the Germans would've come through with France arming *or* disarming. It would have made little difference. Just like diplomacy made no difference, as UK's Chamberlain found out soon enough.

Being a sheep doesn't protect you from anything but other sheep - and you can't help your woolly friends, either.

But now people in Europe are beginning to re-discover the fundamentals of power: diplomacy is refraining from using your power, not an excuse for having none.

Re:moral decline

[polar red]

Did i suggest disarming ? No, i suggested using diplomacy to solve problems. Battle should be used as a last resort. And even then : it NEVER has solved anything, if only works when it is followed by diplomacy.

Re:moral decline

[Anonymous Coward]

couchslug is not the one shouting about those moral standards. That was your post.

Re:moral decline

[2short]

Done. I own no weapons, and while I usually close my door, the lock doesn't work. I just live somewhere without much crime because the local economy is good, and I get along with my neighbors.

Economic power and diplomacy are much more effective than military solutions if you want to solve problems without creating new ones.

Re:moral decline

[rk]

I hear what you're saying, but you don't suppose decades of the US and the Soviet Union sitting on top of Europe had anything to do with that?

Re:moral decline

[Themer]

Couldn't that be because of the end of WW2? Seems force caused the borders to be able to be open like that no?

Re:moral decline

[Anonymous Coward]

read your history a bit more careful. WWI ended after the Versailles treaty or the armistice of November 11, and WW2 ended after the surrender of 19/08/1945. this falls under DIPLOMACY. Without surrender, the battle keeps raging.

Diplomacy sure as hell didn't end WW2.

Major, unrestrained, no-holds-barred ass-whipping ended WW2.

2500 years of european history TEACHES you that the ONLY time europe was in peace, was after the formation of the european union. this formation was completely voluntary, and without need of violence.

Yeah... right. I'm sure all the bodies and destruction before that came about didn't have a damned thing to do with it.

Re:moral decline

[swb]

Maybe you should check your dictionary for the definition of surrender. That little piece of diplomacy requires a compelling force.

Re:moral decline

[Dog-Cow]

Diplomacy may have ended the fighting, but without the fighting, the war would have only ended when one side was defeated. That's not a preferrable outcome.

Re:moral decline

[polar red]

jeezes ... use your f-ing brain for a change ! Would you attack me if i put out my hand to shake yours ? or would you attack me if i take on a aggressive stance ?

Re:moral decline

[The Dancing Panda]

Actually, the Romans had things pretty well taken care of for about 200 years, Pax Romana and all.

Re:moral decline

[BlueStrat]

That statement is ignorant of history. Diplomacy can only work for a short amount of time before something happens which will require the kicking of someone's ass. Given enough time someone will come along who really wants to kill you and/or take what you have, no matter how badly the "let's all hug and get along" crowd want it to not be true. Human nature is, after all, driven by the same basic instinct as the rest of the animal kingdom: the will to survive.

Force cannot replacement diplomacy any more than diplomacy can replace force.

The relative ability (real or perceived) of each side in a conflict to use force is the only reason diplomacy ever works. If either side, rightly or wrongly, perceives that the other is unable or unwilling to use force, diplomacy fails. Force, throughout human history, has been and will continue to be the only real deciding factor in any serious international conflict at the end of the day.

That's not to say that economic and other factors have no affect, but if the party under economic and/or other pressures perceives that it can simply use force against it's foe with limited repercussions, then those pressures become secondary to the ability and willingness to use force.

I've always liked this quote:

"Diplomacy is saying 'nice doggy' until you find a rock." -- Wyn Catlin

Cheers!

Strat

Re:moral decline

[MightyMartian]

Why everyone blames France solely is quite beyond me. The disarmament treaties from Versailles left France completely vulnerable to attack. France was basically bullied into that by the United States and Great Britain. They deserve the blame for why the French were incapable of little more than the Maginot Line. Even Churchill stated as much in his history of WWII.

Re:moral decline

[MightyMartian]

Diplomacy may have ended the fighting, but without the fighting, the war would have only ended when one side was defeated. That's not a preferrable outcome.

That's nothing more than a diplomatic nicety. The Georgian army was defeated with 48 hours of its own offensive on South Ossetia. Much of the army was in disarray and fleeing back into Georgia. I guess the diplomats and the soldiers have two different definitions of defeat.

Re:moral decline

[NullProg]

These problems occur, when a country prouding itself to be the greatest, democratic nation on earth, breaks its own rules(like : not intruding on other nations Sovereignty), which lead to other nations breaking those same rules, ... This empire is on its way out i fear, and the results won't be pretty.

Yes, because the Russians spent nine months before the Georgia invasion asking the UN for permission to uphold its own mandates. Did the Russians let the Georgians know they were coming if they didn't open up access for weapons inspectors. Did the Russian parliament vote and give Putin permission to invade? The United States Congress voted and granted that power to Bush.

Where is this rule that claims the United States will not intrude on any other countries sovereignty? We reserve the right to kick anyones ass anywhere at anytime.

Enjoy,

Re:moral decline

[couchslug]

"That's all true, but when you keep shouting at the top of your lungs about those moral standards, you're a hypocrite "

Hypocrisy is necessary for propaganda, and never think that propaganda isn't necessary in contests between large groups of people. Even though many people will point out hypocrisy, it still gives the necessary element of "implausible deniability" so people who have bought in anyway have something to invoke.

Re:moral decline

[FleaPlus]

Out of curiosity, what additional diplomatic concessions do you think should have been made prior to the US and Britain invading Afghanistan?

Re:moral decline

[phoenix321]

No, I'm not blaming France. On the contrary, I'm saying that France had no chance to avoid the conflict either way, with or without the Maginot Line.

That was the whole point of my post: demonstrating that against a strong and determined aggressor, personal preferences for disarmament or defense are not able to prevent an attack, in fact, being defenseless only emboldens the aggressor.

I'm sorry that this came out ambigously. Nevertheless, diplomacy in my opinion is only useful, when one can credibly demonstrate an available, physical force.

Reason, laws and self-limitation of participants in whatever issue only work when continued failure to comply to any social rules CAN be overruled physically.

When one has all options and a superior physical strength, then kindness, reason and even mercy suddenly become very optional qualities. That's one of the reasons for the 2nd Amendment, the federal structure of many Western states and the balance of power that Western nations maintain in their judicial, executive and legislative branch.

Power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely. That's what we're seeing in Georgia right now.

Re:moral decline

[JAlexoi]

>> Believe it or not, there are worse things than hypocrisy.

True. But the worse thing than hypocrisy in words, is when hypocrisy is in actions.
US has showed both at the same time....

Re:moral decline

[Anonymous Coward]

Done. I own no weapons, and while I usually close my door, the lock doesn't work. I just live somewhere without much crime because the local economy is good, and I get along with my neighbors.

This is tangential to the discussion at hand, but have you considered the possibility that you're just lucky? I live in a "nice" neighborhood (but not at all affluent), am on friendly terms with my neighbors, and the local (and even the state) economy is doing well. We've had two break-ins in a single year (and I think I can be certain neither was perpetrated by my neighbors). You see, many burglars have hit upon the idea that going to someone else's neighborhood to commit crimes is the way to go. Regardless of where you live, the crime may come to you; regardless of how modestly you might live within a thriving well-distributed economy, there will always be someone of lesser means who would rather take than earn; regardless of how well you get along with your neighbors, you cannot expect them to monitor your home around the clock. For years, I had the exact attitude you've expressed in that sentence...until experience corrected my naivete.

- T

Re:moral decline

[Anonymous Coward]

jeezes ... use your f-ing brain for a change ! Would you attack me if i put out my hand to shake yours ? or would you attack me if i take on a aggressive stance ?

Disclaimer: I'm not the other AC.

You think you know the proper answer to that, and you'd be right most of the time. But you fail to realize (or just don't want to accept) that there are some who would attack you either way, especially if they think you have something they want and they're the sort who are willing to take it by force. Indeed, for those people, your offer of a handshake is more likely to be seen as an opportunity for "easy takings".

Back to the greater topic, international relations cannot be meaningfully distilled to the relative simplicity of personal relationships. Diplomacy works when those engaging in it have the means to "back it up". Disagree? Consider this: What if Britain, France & Germany denounce Russia for using excessive military force in Georgia - that's diplomacy in action. Do you suppose it would hold the same weight coming from Maldives, Tonga & Haiti instead?

- T

Re:moral decline

[MJMullinII]

These problems occur, when a country prouding itself to be the greatest, democratic nation on earth, breaks its own rules(like : not intruding on other nations Sovereignty),

This is a very good point. Recent actions of the US have given other nations like Russia and China plenty of excuses to do what they like, and to push their own interests.

Whenever the US criticised China for its human rights record, China can criticise the US right back for its human rights record.

And because the US invaded a souvereign nation with a flimsy excuse (when it was really about oil), now Russia can use the same flimsy excuse to invade a foreign nation (which is really about oil). And they make claims of genocide too, because that worked so well in Bosnia and Kosovo.

I'm so sick of this "war for oil" bullshit.

Our invasion didn't net us one OUNCE (or LITER for you metric Nazis) of FREE oil.

The Iraqis have BILLIONS upon BILLIONS upon BILLIONS in unspent oil revenue BECAUSE WE FIX WHAT WE BROKE.

They have been asked to pay for nothing that wasn't their responsibility to pay for.

There are a lot of points we would probably agree on about the Iraq War, BUT LETS DISPOSE OF THIS UNTRUTH RIGHT HERE.

Re:moral decline

[mcvos]

This is a very good point. Recent actions of the US have given other nations like Russia and China plenty of excuses to do what they like, and to push their own interests.

Whenever the US criticised China for its human rights record, China can criticise the US right back for its human rights record.

And because the US invaded a souvereign nation with a flimsy excuse (when it was really about oil), now Russia can use the same flimsy excuse to invade a foreign nation (which is really about oil). And they make claims of genocide too, because that worked so well in Bosnia and Kosovo.

I'm so sick of this "war for oil" bullshit.

Our invasion didn't net us one OUNCE (or LITER for you metric Nazis) of FREE oil.

Who ever said anything about free oil? It's not about free oil, it's about access and control. The US doesn't want an anti-American asshole to laugh in their face while he prices his oil in euros instead of dollars, while Russia doesn't want a former vassal state to compete directly with them and threaten the new revenue stream that made Russia rich, while the EU wants an alternative to access to central Asian oil and gas. Nobody wants it for free, but nobody wants to be at the mercy of someone they can't control either.

Maybe it's not so much about the oil itself, but about power over oil. And ofcourse about simple power and obedience itself. The US doesn't like it when other countries don't do what they want, and Russia doesn't like it when other countries don't do what they want either. In the end, it's both a lack of respect for souvereignty.

Ofcourse the big difference is that the US invaded an undemocratic dictatorship, whereas Russia is invading a democracy. A country that's far more democratic than Russia itself.

But oil definitely does play a big role. It's what makes other countries have an interest in what happens in a country. It makes them more likely to interfere when things don't go their way.

Re:moral decline

[MJMullinII]

Well, that I will not argue with. In fact, you have probably stated it pretty fairly (truth be known).

HOWEVER, I have heard others phrase it in such ways as to make it seem as though someone is being robbed, and that makes me angry.

Re:moral decline

[polar red]

i know that. let's go to your "there are some who would attack you either way" ... who is behaving like that? ... IRAQ ... And all the while saying that they're the good guys ...

Re:moral decline

[2short]

"have you considered the possibility that you're just lucky?"

Sure, I may well be lucky, but I'm not naive. I have considered the cost vs. benefit of owning a gun and/or fixing my lock. Based on the chances/results of either producing a positive outcome vs. the chances/results of them producing a negative one, I don't think they are worth it.

As a side note, the part about getting along with my neighbors was meant to note that I didn't expect I'd need to shoot them. I don't expect them to provide any significant monitoring of my home, which is why the lock is pointless: It would just make a crook break the window.

Life is uncertain, and there is nothing you can do about that. Bad people might do bad things to you no matter how nicely you live in how nice a place. But do locks & guns reduce that risk? Where I live, I think not. Most places, locks are a good idea. There are even places where guns are a good idea, but not many, and I don't want to live there.

Re:moral decline

[Anonymous Coward]

First, thanks for the well-reasoned response - a courtesy not commonly provided to ACs around here.

Bad people might do bad things to you no matter how nicely you live in how nice a place. But do locks & guns reduce that risk?

Well, I'd say "maybe" and "no", respectively. I'd say nearly anywhere you live, if some people use their locks and others don't, those who don't use their locks are easier targets. However, if everyone in a given locality uses their locks, then maybe the lock is no longer a deterrent. I doubt that firearms ever reduce the risk of burglary; perhaps if a potential burglar somehow knows a particular homeowner (or renter, etc.) has a gun, the burglar would be inclined to look elsewhere, but that seems far-fetched. Guns are only potentially useful when criminals are intent on much worse things than burglary, and that's rare in most civilized places.

Where I live, I think not.

I hope you're right, and that things remain peaceful for you. I live outside a smallish city within 2 hours drive from a much larger city. A couple of the nastier crimes committed here in the last year or so include a rape and a rape/murder, both in the course of robbery. The perpetrators travelled from the larger city here specifically because it would be easier to commit those crimes here (fewer safeguards, less general suspicion, and so on), and because they thought that since they weren't from here, it would be difficult for the police to track them down. Fortunately, our local police have an excellent closing rate on violent crime.

Hah, the captcha is "defense"...

Regards,
- T

Re:moral decline

[2short]

"First, thanks for the well-reasoned response - a courtesy not commonly provided to ACs around here."

I don't usually respond to ACs, not because of any discourtesy, but because it's usually a waste of time. I'd suggest logging in if you want a response; it give people a hint you might read their reply.

"I'd say nearly anywhere you live, if some people use their locks and others don't, those who don't use their locks are easier targets."

You really think someone who wants to break in is going to try the door, find it locked, and go on to the next house? I can't see it. Maybe someone tries my door, and figures it's their lucky day, they don't have to break the window. But I'm going to get robbed either way.

"Guns are only potentially useful when criminals are intent on much worse things than burglary, and that's rare in most civilized places."
And even then, their potential usefulness depends on them being loaded and ready to hand, which pretty much guarantees the chance of them being used accidentally or in the heat of passion far outweighs the chances of their being used as desired.

priorities man!

[Anonymous Coward]

Shit, if germany decided to kill the jews again, CmdrTaco would be wondering how this affects his BMW's warranty.

Re:priorities man!

[eln]

To be fair he did get the extended warranty protection, and that shit ain't cheap.

Re:priorities man!

[NFN_NLN]

Shit, if germany decided to kill the jews again, CmdrTaco would be wondering how this affects his BMW's warranty.

How does Slashdot know to take away my mod points at the right time? It's uncanny. I haven't used them in 6+ months and then when I need them.... nada.

+1 Informative wrapped in uncomfortable funny bonus point for effective use of Godwin.

Re:priorities man!

[Rob Kaper]

I haven't used them in 6+ months and then when I need them.... nada.

I believe that's an intended feature of Slashdot, if you're more active on the site you're more likely to get them back sooner.

Re:priorities man!

[Anonymous Coward]

Shit, if germany decided to kill the jews again, CmdrTaco would be wondering how this affects his BMW's warranty.

Others would be wondering if they would do so in a more eco-friendly way, rather than carbon-spewing ovens.

After all, Jews are bio-degradable.

Re:priorities man!

[TheRaven64]

No, if you're more passive you get to use them. You get mod points more if you read stories but don't post in them (giving them to people who post in every story they read doesn't make sense, since they will never be able to use them). I usually post in stories, and rarely get mod points. When I'm busy and only have time to read a few comments in a story and not to post, I get them all the time.

Re:priorities man!

[pipingguy]

When I'm busy and only have time to read a few comments in a story and not to post, I get them all the time.

I had a similar experience (but while posting fairly often), even getting mod points more and more frequently, so I turned off the 'willing to moderate' switch. No sense in getting them and not using them.

I always modded up, following the recommendations.

Re:priorities man!

[Anonymous Coward]

And the New York Times would declare it a quagmire after week 1.

Re:priorities man!

[haifastudent]

Taken from some other /.er's sig: (more or less)

Mod points are like condoms. When you have them you don't know what to do with them, and when you need them they are nowhere to be found.

Re:priorities man!

[haifastudent]

I believe that's an intended feature...

I wondered how long it would take for someone to turn the thread into Microsoft bashing.

US manned spaceflight ends in 2010

[Animats]

US manned spaceflight will end in 2010, when the Shuttle is retired. There won't be any follow-on for at least a decade. The US can't afford it any more.

NASA might be able to sell their interest in the ISS to China or Russia.

Re:US manned spaceflight ends in 2010

[maxume]

How do you figure the US can't afford it anymore? Too much debt? Too many promises to pay money in the future?

As it stands, even with the recent erosion in the dollar, average Americans have more material wealth than they had 50 years ago, or 30 years ago. Probably not more than 10 years ago, but that is only 10 years, things generally don't move in a straight line up up up the way they did between 1950 and 1990.

Re:US manned spaceflight ends in 2010

[Free the Cowards]

The US can't afford it any more.

What bullshit! The US doesn't want to pay it any more. It can certainly afford it. Bringing NASA up to Apollo levels of funding would be a virtually unnoticeable drop in the current federal budget.

Re:US manned spaceflight ends in 2010

[mcvos]

As it stands, even with the recent erosion in the dollar, average Americans have more material wealth than they had 50 years ago, or 30 years ago.

The average American, yes. But the US government has a lot more debt than it had 30 years ago.

Re:US manned spaceflight ends in 2010

[khallow]

The US can easily afford manned flight and many other expenses as well. I can see some unlikely scenarios where the US doesn't maintain the cohesion to continue a manned space program, but I believe that the various doomsday scenarios are overrated. The US isn't likely to fall apart as a result of too much public spending, peak oil, etc.

Re:US manned spaceflight ends in 2010

[maxume]

My point was more that the wealth is there, it just isn't being put to that specific purpose at the moment.

Re:US manned spaceflight ends in 2010

[Anonymous Coward]

This is bogus, I work in astrophysics, and rocket design. There wont be available human travel because nothing we have currently is man-rated. Not due to the us money issues. Ares, although total crap will be ready to take the human flight crown in 2014, and if the us would take even 1% of the current DoD budget and place it toward the development of ares, it would be ready within a year.

Re:US manned spaceflight ends in 2010

[New_Age_Reform_Act]

Not to mention the American GNP grows much faster than the debt.

Re:US manned spaceflight ends in 2010

[igny]

''The US doesn't want to pay it any more. ''

Well the US can't get it for free either.

Re:US manned spaceflight ends in 2010

[Ioldanach]

As it stands, even with the recent erosion in the dollar, average Americans have more material wealth than they had 50 years ago, or 30 years ago.

The average American, yes. But the US government has a lot more debt than it had 30 years ago.

NASA's budget for the 10 year period from 1963-1972, during the Apollo program, averaged $25 billion per year, with a peak of $33.5 billion in 1965, in adjusted dollars. NASA's 2008 budget is around $17 billion. 2007's appropriations for Iraq alone were $170 billion, and 2008's are around $190 billion.

Restoring NASA's budget to the average Apollo budget would run an extra $8 billion, which is really a drop in the federal budget bucket, and I'd rather they borrowed a bit for the education and technological advancement that would be required than looking for yet another place to start a war. The problem is there's nothing sexy to go up for that will turn heads. There's no oil up there, or other chemicals we can use as fuel down here. If someone were to find a cost effective way to mine rare minerals from asteroid belts, then maybe the feds would find a reason to fund NASA. (Though I don't know what treaties would have to say about that.) Then again, that's a task I'd rather leave to private industry, since if its subsidized by the government, we'll never know how cost effective it really is.

Re:US manned spaceflight ends in 2010

[UnderCoverPenguin]

Ares, although total crap will be ready to take the human flight crown in 2014

Assuming the funding is not reduced.

Given a projected deficit of US$400bn (http://www.cbo.gov/ftpdocs/96xx/doc9648/08-2008-MBR.htm) for the current (2008) fiscal year and nearly US$445bn (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/7547192.stm) for FY 2009, as well as US$9tr debt (http://www.treasurydirect.gov/NP/BPDLogin?application=np), I think we can expect that the Ares budget will be reduced substantially.

Re:US manned spaceflight ends in 2010

[DerekLyons]

Bringing NASA up to Apollo levels of funding would be a virtually unnoticeable drop in the current federal budget.

Apollo, at it's peak funding (which only lasted about three years anyhow), reached nearly 5% of the budget. As the price of most of the kinds of services an Apollo style project would purchase has increased faster than inflation... You'd have to go higher than 5% to produce the same effective budget.
 
Hardly a 'drop in the bucket'.

Re:US manned spaceflight ends in 2010

[Free the Cowards]

The budget has also increased faster than inflation. That 5% would probably still be 5%, or lower, today.

In any case, even if it were significantly greater, we could afford it. We'd just rather spend the money on other things, like occupying Middle Eastern countries.

Re:US manned spaceflight ends in 2010

[marco.antonio.costa]

SpaceX will be serving the ISS in 2010. 2011 at the latest. They're making serious progress.

Also, the flight test webcasts are geekily fun to watch.

and......

[pablo_max]

Seriously... who cares? Without the shuttle, there is no need for the ISS. They only exist to give reason for the others existence. The shuttle was useless and spending all that time in LEO with a skeleton crew with no time for real science makes the ISS useless IMO.
I say NASA should strap some motors on that POS and send it out to L1 and use it as a supply depot or a "just in case" spot on the way to the moon.
I have always hated the shuttle and the ISS.

Re:and......

[MozeeToby]

How would it be a just in case spot on the way to the moon? Any mission to the moon would have to perform a large burn to stop at that point, not to mention another burn to send the ship back to earth. Unless if there's a problem only with the life support systems and they know for a fact that the engines are in perfect working order they would probably be better off pulling an Apollo 13 and slingshotting around the moon which would require only one or two small burns.

anonie-mouse

[Anonymous Coward]

apparently, Georgia attacked first, a prodominantly russian population.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O_jCdbcAjNM

Re:anonie-mouse

[mcvos]

apparently, Georgia attacked first, a prodominantly russian population.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O_jCdbcAjNM

Only predominantly Russian because Russia started handing out Russian passports to foreign nationals.

Russia has ultimate weapon.

[BitterOldGUy]

...somehow since then we aren't allowed to piss them off.

Russia has the greatest weapon of our time: oil. They have more than the Saudis. Nobody is going to piss them off and disrupt their supply.

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[Erwos]

This is exactly it, and it's even more true for Europe. Europe is extremely dependent on Russia for their energy needs. That's why the reaction has been relatively quiet compared to the usual shrill screams that they have when a large country runs roughshod over a smaller one (even one that might have deserved it). It's the same reason they kowtow to the Arab states, and it's the same reason they can't seem to find it in themselves to do anything serious about Iran (notice the comma - I know Iran isn't an Arab state).

You can call it pragmatic or whatever, but I laugh a little every time I hear some smug European government official tell us how he or she is "principled" when it comes to foreign relations. The principle they're practicing ain't the same one they're preaching. The principle is, of course, "advance my country by any means possible". (Which is how it's always been, really.) The Russians and Chinese, however much I dislike their governments, at least tend to be up front about it.

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[mcvos]

...somehow since then we aren't allowed to piss them off.

Russia has the greatest weapon of our time: oil. They have more than the Saudis. Nobody is going to piss them off and disrupt their supply.

Oil is what the Russia/Georgia conflict is actually about! There's lots of oil and gas in the Caspian Sea and central Asia. There are a couple of ways to get it, but two of the most important ones are:

1: through Kazakhstan and Russia
2: through Azerbaidjan, Georgia and Turkey

There's your conflict, including the reason why the US and EU want Russia out of Georgia.

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[Anonymous Coward]

The Russians and Chinese, however much I dislike their governments, at least tend to be up front about it.

If the Russian goverment would care about the country they would be the indisputable number one with their natural resources...

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[MightyMartian]

Oil is a big part of it, but it's hardly the only element. The real cause of it is that a reascendant Russian Empire is telling all the fledgling statelets that broke off during a decade of political and economic chaos after the collapse of the Communist Dynasty are being reigned back in. This is a pattern of behavior for Russia that is centuries old now. It has long viewed every region with Slavic populations as being either an integral part of Mother Russia or a client state. This was the case under the Muscovite Princes, under the Russian Czars and under the Communists (and in particularly under Stalin and the later Soviet leaders).

Oil certainly is a motivator, but I'm not even sure it's the main one. We're dealing with cultural and political forces and ideals that survived the Tatars, basically foreign rule under German noblemen (and in Catherine the Great's case, noblewoman), the upheavals of the late 19th century, the revolution and the civil war, the Bolshevik takeover, the harsh reign of Stalin and the inept rule of his successors, and even the near collapse of central authority after the fall of the Soviet Empire. It is has been a basic tenet of Russian foreign policy for centuries that wherever you find Slavs, they ultimately should owe their allegiance to the Muscovite Princes (whatever form that might take at any particular moment in time). Unfortunately, in a world of petroleum-dominated economics, we tend to think of things in terms of dollars and cents, and yet one should never underestimate the power of nationalism. Oil is simply the current coin by which Russia can exert its muscle, but the situation is no different than it was twenty years ago or two hundred years ago.

Russia may be forced to release its hold on some of the Western Slavic peoples like the Poles, Czechs, Slovaks and Ukrainians (the first three have long been more Western European in culture and religion, the latter is of greater pain to the Russian identity, many seeing the Ukraine as an organic part of Russia), but you can be goddamned sure that everywhere else where there is some sort of ethnic Russian minority or some pro-Russian Slavic population we're not likely going to be able to have as much luck.

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[Vellmont]

They have more than the Saudis.

Kind of. Russia has more PRODUCTION than the Saudi's. When it comes to reserves though, nobody beats Saudi Arabia. Canada comes close if you count currently economically recoverable oil sands.

But you're right that the production capacity gives them a big sword to rattle around, at least until they run out (which will happen a lot sooner since they have smaller reserves)

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[Krupuk]

Mod parent up: +5 informative.

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[Anonymous Coward]

(even one that might have deserved it)

You mean just like Georgia?

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[Bastard of Subhumani]

you can be goddamned sure that everywhere else where there is some sort of ethnic Russian minority or some pro-Russian Slavic population we're not likely going to be able to have as much luck.

And there are quite a lot of those, in part due to Stalin's habit of moving people around. Add the Baltic states to your list.

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[jabithew]

That, and a permanent veto on the UN Security Council.

"The Motion to send a peacekeeping force to prevent a Russian invasion of Georgia...fails."

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[jabithew]

Yeah, I'm really disgusted with the EU, they've been spineless on Russia. The fact that a lot of our energy market is state owned (though not here in the UK) means the Russians can use a divide and rule strategy to isolate protesting countries (see the routine bad treatment of the ex-Soviet states). They know they can sell the gas to another state instead.

If the companies were private, they wouldn't have that leverage as they would have to stop all gas exports to Europe, as opposed to being able to do it nation-by-nation. This would hurt Europe a lot, but it would hurt Russia a lot too. At the moment Russia could stop selling gas to Germany at the drop of a hat and not have any effects elsewhere in Europe.

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[jabithew]

Azerbaijan, Georgia and Turkey are all Western aligned at the moment. But each forms a crucial link in the chain. If we lose one, we lose the lot.

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[bendodge]

They have more than the Saudis.

So do we in the US, but we aren't allowed to touch it. Those fish are more important than humans you know.

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[steelfood]

Since the fall of the U.S.S.R, Russia's been working hard at westernizing. They're just completing the transition by invading another smaller country for oil under the pretext of national security.

Tongue-in-cheek of course.

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, actually as any strategy game fan knows 'you don't touch your reserves, untill you've exhausted the ones outside your borders'. Doing otherwise is utterly stupid.

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[Anonymous Coward]

Europe has some trump card up it's sleeve my dear friend.

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[NeutronCowboy]

Good grief. Finally some decent assessment of the situation, and it sits at "Interesting".

For some reason, every discussion on the topic of South Ossetia is currently reading like Nashi is trying to astro-turf Slashdot, and has gotten a hold of massive mod points.

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[defaria]

They don't have more than the Saudis! That's just not true.

http://wolf.readinglitho.co.uk/mainpages/oilworldmap.html

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[ilyanov]

Imagine if the Russians had armed and trained Serbia to the point where the Serbs felt they could forcefully re-integrate Kosovo back into their territory. What do you think Nato or the EU forces have done. Pretty much everyone I have read seems to think that the use of force to settle disputes is acceptable. It was wrong of the Georgians to think that they had to resort to violence to get Ossetia back, even more so with Russians "peace keepers" there. It was equally wrong of the Russians to have responded to Georgia with violence. What I hate is this damned moralizing as if one country has rights which are somehow divine to violently intervene to settle differences. All this talk of empires and genocide is the wrong response. So, what stopped Georgia demonstrating to the Ossetians and the Russians, given their democracy and their free markets, that they wouldn't eventually win the argument for the future? An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind said the good Lord. I say none of them deserve to be the guardians of peace and freedom, for such a state for ever defended and expanded at the point of a gun can only accumulates one's nation's quota of bad karma.

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[MightyMartian]

Of course use of force is wrong... that is it's wrong when it's by someone we don't currently like against someone we do currently like.

You and a lot of other people seem to have been living in a rather strange fantasy land. The world doesn't function the way any current group of peace protesters, free market advocates, neo-Conservative geopolitical reactionaries or cynical political hacks want it to be. Here's the low down. Russia has been an empire for centuries. At various periods it has lost control of its hinterlands (which have been ever-expanding ever since the Tatars were overthrown), but it has always regained that control as a new regime (at one point the Muscovite Princes, later the Czars, later still the Soviets and now the Putin-dominated republic) consolidates power. This has only been exacerbated by the West's ill-thought out strategy of enlarging the EU and NATO into Eastern Europe and further right into the Caucusus.

I suppose this is in part because a whole bunch of very foolish people thought Russia was permanently relegated to bankrupt second-rate power. But the formula we have been seeing since Putin took power is extremely familiar to those who have even a cursory knowledge of Russian history. That all these folks, some of them in such supposedly well-informed places as the State Department and Britain's Foreign Office only goes to show you that somehow over the last seventeen years those with meaningful knowledge of Russia have either been pensioned off or are busy giving lectures at universities.

I'm not saying that Russia is right. Of course its not. Under not just the Soviets, but even under the Czars, peoples like the Georgians (like the Estonians, Ukrainians and so forth) have suffered. In a perfect world things would be much different. But we don't live in a perfect world, we live in this world, a world where wealth, power, nationalism and if nothing else, the sheer force of history itself pushes events along on an inertia which we often can only watch in impotence and disbelief.

The long and short of is this. Russia is not going tolerate NATO moving right into its geographical kidneys. It may permit the illusion of independence for the former Soviet republics, providing they recognize where the real authority lies. It's possible that the Western Slavic and Baltic countries may indeed be able to escape the resurgent Empire (though I wouldn't lay money either way yet), but for countries like Georgia, forget about it.

The Balkans War and everything that followed was a direct result of the Soviet collapse. NATO was able to yank Kosovo out of splintered Yugoslavia only because Russia was still in serious turmoil. I'm not defending the Serbians. They, collectively, can be an insanely vicious, hateful and ultimately self-destructive people (and don't think the Russians don't think so either). Their atrocities against the ethnic Albanians earned them the loss of Kosovo and the permanent obliteration of the uber-nationalistic Greater Serbia claptrap. But the window of opportunity for such events has now closed, and the job of the foreign offices/ministries/departments of every nation and extranational agency in the world better understand that very quickly. Foreign policy should be based on reality, not on pipe dreams.

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[Anonymous Coward]

http://www.stratfor.com/weekly/russo_georgian_war_and_balance_power

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[vojarus]

Atrocities against Albanians? Care to explain then how come there are 99% of Albanians on Kosovo? Who told you about atrocities? CNN? Fox? You should also ask them about murdered Serb boys, old people, women and thousands of missing non-Albanian people and burned centuries old churches, monasteries and non-Albanian homes. Ask them what should do Serbs who were forced out of their homes. Ask them why Hague decided not to protect witnesses against Albanian Naser Oric who wanted to testify against him.

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[MightyMartian]

I'm not going to get into a ludicrous debate with what it appears to be yet another Serb or pro-Serb mouthpiece. You guys did evil things, and deserved what you got, and I'm glad your Greater Serbia bullshit is forever put to rest. Not even Russia actually likes you guys, the Panslavism of the last century or so aside. Invoking moronic conspiracy theories only shows the pathetic and delusional nature of Serbian "nationalism".

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[vojarus]

Thank you on your objectivity. You're right, I probably dreamed that, it never actually happened. I'm sure that you, 3000km away, know exactly what happened.

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[MightyMartian]

You keep lying to yourself, if it makes you feel better. Serbia is forever crippled. The Russians may bellow about Kosovo from time to time, but you Serbs have been a thorn in their ass as much as Europe's. That's the real irony. You Serbs were so violent, hateful and maniacal that even your natural overlords cried only a few crocodile tears as your country was permanently carved up.

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[vojarus]

Yeah, we can't wait for some war to start so that we can lose young people. I can't believe how ignorant people can be. You know only one side of the story, yet you act like you know all.

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[mcvos]

And there are quite a lot of those, in part due to Stalin's habit of moving people around. Add the Baltic states to your list.

No doubt Putin would love to add the Baltic states to the list, but they're part of NATO already, so he's too late. Attacking them will get him at war with all of NATO, and that's more than even the new oil-rich Russia can afford.

He'll do everything to make sure Ukraine and Georgia won't join NATO, however.

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[mcvos]

Azerbaijan, Georgia and Turkey are all Western aligned at the moment. But each forms a crucial link in the chain. If we lose one, we lose the lot.

Exactly. And while Turkey is out of Russia's reach, Georgia and Azerbaijan are not. I wouldn't be at all surprised if some conflict in/with Azerbaijan became big news somewhere in the next couple of years.

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[mcvos]

Since the fall of the U.S.S.R, Russia's been working hard at westernizing. They're just completing the transition by invading another smaller country for oil under the pretext of national security.

I wish they were westernizing. It looked that way under Gorbachev and Yeltsin, but under Putin they're completely back to the line of the Czars (including the soviet czars).

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[MightyMartian]

Then stop starting wars. Serbia has a rather sordid history of starting things that others have to finish.

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[SupremoMan]

I view Oil more as means than the cause. If Europe had alternative supplies of energy, Russia would be severely weakened on the world stage. They know this, and they fear the day when natural gas and Oil are things for a museum display (I'm a pessimist but I believe a day like this will come). That is why they are using the Oil and natural gas supplies as leverage now, while they still can, to do as much bad as they can get away with to strengthen their position.

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[mcvos]

Oil is a big part of it, but it's hardly the only element.

Ofcourse there's a lot more to it. There always is. It wouldn't surprise me if Georgia hadn't even thought about the oil (if they did, they wouldn't have antagonised Russia so much). But to Russia, it's definitely near the top, and for US+EU, I suspect it's the straw that makes them support Georgia and condemn Russia. They need an alternative source of oil/gas, and Georgia can give them that.

The real cause of it is that a reascendant Russian Empire is telling all the fledgling statelets that broke off during a decade of political and economic chaos after the collapse of the Communist Dynasty are being reigned back in. ... It is has been a basic tenet of Russian foreign policy for centuries that wherever you find Slavs, they ultimately should owe their allegiance to the Muscovite Princes (whatever form that might take at any particular moment in time). Unfortunately, in a world of petroleum-dominated economics, we tend to think of things in terms of dollars and cents, and yet one should never underestimate the power of nationalism. Oil is simply the current coin by which Russia can exert its muscle, but the situation is no different than it was twenty years ago or two hundred years ago.

But even that is ultimately about oil. How do you think Russia recovered from its economic collapse? It has lots of oil and gas, a near monopoly on access to central Asian oil and gas so it can buy those cheaply, and oil prices are going through the roof, so it can sell them at an insane profit to the EU.

That's why Russia is able to reign in it's "client states" in the first place. And now one of them is threatening that monopoly. Ofcourse it doesn't help that Georgia has been antagonising Russia for some time now, supporting breakaway provinces and seeking NATO membership, all of which undermines Russia's control over its neighbours, and therefore also Russia's control over central Asian oil.

So it goes both ways: Russia needs the oil to rebuild their empire and excert control over its neighbours, and it needs that control to keep their oil profits. It's not just about oil; it's about power. But these days, power usually involves lots of oil. The US is really not all that different in that respect.

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[vojarus]

Which wars exactly?

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[MightyMartian]

I wonder whose bullet ended up inside some Austrian guy named Franz Ferdinand. Seems to me that guy was an heir to some sort of empire, and that may have had something to do with a bit of a war that, well, pretty much redrew the map of large areas of Europe.

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[MightyMartian]

A lot of those client states were already being conquered before the Age of Oil. It's not about oil, other than the fact that oil represents the economic unit of this day and age. It is ultimately about an empire that has, and not for the first time, seen some hardship and some weakening of central control, but is again moving to assert authority.

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[Ba3r]

fwiw, Stalin was a Georgian http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Stalin

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[MightyMartian]

I'm not even sure NATO is worth that much. It's buried in the Afghani mire, and I can guarantee you right now that Europe would sell the Baltic states back to Russia if it came to push and shove. But Russia doesn't require that they get officially reintegrated into Russia, not directly anyways. If Russia is still seen as the overlord, I'm sure all those former republics will be permitted their own governments. It'll be a looser alliance than the old Empire or the Warsaw Pact, but Moscow will still be every bit as much in charge.

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[MightyMartian]

He was an ethnic Russian (his mother was a native Georgian, as I recall). Long before Stalin came along the Russians were colonizing these border regions. Stalin just sped up the process.

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[vojarus]

He was killed by the member of group called Black hand, the same group who killed Alexander I of Serbia, year before. And, you're telling me that without that, WWI wouldn't have started? Yeah, right. Here is the ultimatum, Austria gave to Serbia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/July_Ultimatum

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[bendodge]

That works well in C&C, but unlike C&C we can't take their oil by force. We have to become virtual servants to the oil providers.

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[mcvos]

I'm not even sure NATO is worth that much.

NATO is the US+EU+some other countries. Its member countries own more than half the world's military, and it has promised to defend any member state that comes under attack. That's why NATO is in Afghanistan: a member state was under attack. If ever a member state is actually invaded, you bet NATO will strike back. It can't afford not to.

and I can guarantee you right now that Europe would sell the Baltic states back to Russia if it came to push and shove.

I can guarantee you it won't. The Baltic states aren't just part of NATO, they're part of the EU, part of Schengen, part of the EU's internal borderless free market. The EU giving up the Baltic states is like the US giving up Alaska. Or maybe Puerto Rico or something.

But Russia doesn't require that they get officially reintegrated into Russia, not directly anyways. If Russia is still seen as the overlord, I'm sure all those former republics will be permitted their own governments.

But they don't just have their own governments anymore. They're subject to the European Parliament, the European Commission, the European Courts. They're close to Russia, but they're out of its grip.

For other former Soviet-states, joining NATO and the EU is the road to freedom, the way out of Russia's grasp, and that's what Russia wants to prevent at any cost.

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[IntelligenceLite]

Not that I think we should go after Russia, militarily, but the whole oil angle is stupid. We get, what, 2% of our oil from them? Whoopty! Open ANWR and we'll triple what we get from Russia.(Alas--if only the granola eaters would grant us access to our own resources.)

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[Anonymous Coward]

This is exactly it, and it's even more true for Europe. Europe is extremely dependent on Russia for their energy needs.

Not true. Some countries in Europe depend on Russia for energy, but far from the majaority.

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[amorsen]

I can guarantee you right now that Europe would sell the Baltic states back to Russia if it came to push and shove.

We'd be right back to the cold war if that happened. No trade between EU/Nato and Russia. It would be a very cold war for Poland, come winter...

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[Anonymous Coward]

Please don't write such intellectually informed opinions. They don't belong here, for starters, I bet you even read at least several TFA's for that post.

Something about Stalin waking up from his nap and wanting to reexert his authority would have been better.

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[Bloke down the pub]

Its member countries own more than half the world's military, and it has promised to defend any member state that comes under attack.

Travel back to the 1930s, replace Russia with Nazi Germany and Nato with the League of Nations.

I'd be happy to be wrong. Sigh. I think I need a drink.

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[JAlexoi]

Well interpretations of history, are usually interesting.

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[JAlexoi]

+1
Finally something sober....

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[mcvos]

Travel back to the 1930s, replace Russia with Nazi Germany and Nato with the League of Nations.

The League of Nations was not comparable to NATO. The League of Nations was an impotent precursor to the UN. NATO was designed to be a credible threat to the USSR and the Warsaw Pact. The USSR and the Warsaw Pact fell apart, while NATO has grown.

Ofcourse NATO is not itching to go to war with Russia. That's about the second worst thing that could happen to NATO. But the worst thing is to not respond to a member being invaded. That would instantly kill NATO.

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, I'm really disgusted with the EU, they've been spineless on Russia. The fact that a lot of our energy market is state owned (though not here in the UK) means the Russians can use a divide and rule strategy to isolate protesting countries (see the routine bad treatment of the ex-Soviet states). They know they can sell the gas to another state instead.

If the companies were private, they wouldn't have that leverage as they would have to stop all gas exports to Europe, as opposed to being able to do it nation-by-nation. This would hurt Europe a lot, but it would hurt Russia a lot too. At the moment Russia could stop selling gas to Germany at the drop of a hat and not have any effects elsewhere in Europe.

The thing is that Russia can't stop selling gas to Europe but would want it really much. However, Russia is currently COMPLETELY in EU's mercy.

Russia has a lot of oil. Oil, not gasoline. Russia doesn't have much facilities to actually make anything out of it. So, they sell oil very cheaply to border countries (Like Finland in which I live) and we sell them back gasoline for a lot higher prices. The same is true for not only oil but pretty much everything - they sell us materials because they can't turn them to products and we sell them products and profit.

Naturally Russia doesn't like this situation but currently they are completely dependant on Europe and thus EU. Even more than EU is dependant on them. It's just that EU hasn't taken advantage of this yet.

EU: Spineless? Perhaps. More dependant on Russia than Russia is on us? Perhaps not. Will keep being as spineless towards Russia in the future despite Poland, baltic countries, etc. having recently joined? Not likely.

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[Anonymous Coward]

> Europe is extremely dependent on Russia for their energy needs.

Some parts are, some aren't. The UK is particularly dependent upon Russian gas (methane, not "gasoline" = petrol), as gas is the main source of both heating and electricity in the UK. OTOH, France is essentially self-sufficient, with most of its electricity coming from nuclear power (from Niger's uranium, all of which belongs to France), and most of its oil from various "client" states.

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[Anonymous Coward]

Europe is extremely dependent on Russia for their energy needs. That's why the reaction has been relatively quiet compared to the usual shrill screams that they have when a large country runs roughshod over a smaller one

Well shit - we've got nukes. Let's use 'em.

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[Anonymous Coward]

While I have no specific interest in the disagreement between you and MightyMartian, do you really believe the article you linked paints Serbia in a positive light?

- T

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[MightyMartian]

There are more ways to conquer a country than a military invasion. Georgia was an easy target, an object lesson for every single country within the former Soviet sphere who thinks that NATO, the United States and the EU are going to save their asses. NATO can't, for instance, force Russia to open up the gas pipelines if they decide, say, to shut them off to Poland or the Ukraine. As Frank Herbert once wrote, the power to destroy something is the power to control it. Russia is holding the cards here, and Bush, the EU and NATO know it. It has the oil, gas, military might and most important of all, the will to use any and all of them.

Shut off the Ukraine's gas supplies in January and then explain precisely how NATO is going to be anything other than a paper tiger.

Re:Russia has ultimate weapon.

[MightyMartian]

Serbs are rather funny that way. They perceive every single bad thing that has happened to them as being someone else's fault. Even when they are the authors of their own misfortune, if nothing else, they bleat on about conspiracies against them. Rather than looking into their hearts and seeing that the Greater Serbia was an ambition too far, that no one, not even their allies in Moscow were really ever going to let them have it, they instead lash out, blaming the West, the ethnic Albanians, whoever, whatever, and however. Anyone but themselves.

need space taliban?

[wardk]

if only there was a terror threat from space. NASA would be up to their eyeballs in no-need-to-account-for cash.

Re:need space taliban?

[MozeeToby]

Piece of cake, just come up with some science that needs to be done on the ISS that could theoretically be used to fight terror.

For instance, I hypothesize that bomb sniffing dogs can be more effectively trained is microgravity... I'll take my grant mony now, thank you.

Shit, I forgot...

[BitterOldGUy]

Commentary from Marketplace NPR

Of course it will hurt further missions

[Anonymous Coward]

People don't realize just how close Georgia is to Florida.

The Russians are coming.

Sen. Nelson was confused

[Anonymous Coward]

He was worried because Georgia is near Florida, and this would potentially put communists on both sides of NASA.

Russian Retaliation

[MissingRainbow]

Let us all be correct in the terminology here. It is not Russian Invasion, but Russian Retaliation. It was Georgia, with support from USA and Israel, who first initiated the attack against Russian peace keepers. In my opinion, it is dangerous to have the US as an enemy but fatal to have as a friend. I encourage everybody to read the articles at WSWS for a good analysis.

Re:Russian Retaliation

[Anonymous Coward]

And the Russians just HAPPENED to have their Black Sea fleet ready to sail, and 40K men at the border - just as Georgia attacked....

Re:Russian Retaliation

[dunkelfalke]

please look up the geographical position of georgia.
it directly borders to chechnya where russia waged two wars in the last 15 years and where still lots of troops are in a ready state.

also, a couple of ships of every military fleet are ready to sail.

Re:Russian Retaliation

[TheSync]

It was Georgia, with support from USA and Israel, who first initiated the attack against Russian peace keepers.

Stalin divided Ossetia between the Russian and Georgian Soviet Republics in 1922 (part of a Communist "divide and control" plan). After the breakup of the USSR, South Ossetia desired to re-unite with North Ossetia, but Georgia sent troops in to crush the rebellion, sparking a war in 1991-92. Russia has been helping the rebels and has provided Russian passports to Ossetians in South Ossetia. Sporadic mortar fire between Georgians and South Ossetians has been going on ever since (which is why Georgia claims they had to "invade").

South Ossetia has voted overwhelmingly for independence (just like Kosovo). On the other hand, Russia didn't seem to be willing to let go of Chechnya.

All this ethno-nationalistic stuff is stupid and counterproductive. In a free country, people of many ethnicities should be able to live together in peace and work on making some $$$ together.

Re:Russian Retaliation

[apathy maybe]

I don't believe you, or the author of the WSWS article really know what is going on. Heck, I know I don't. I don't that most *news* folks know what is going on.

I don't trust the BBC or CNN ("Communist News Network", even if they are right-wing to the core) to provide impartial accurate coverage, and they claim to be impartial and independent.

So why am I going to trust someone with an explicit barrow to push? (Even if it is a barrow that I could get on board and travel with, at least some of the way.)

I'm afraid the only thing that anyone who is not on the ground (and even then you have major problems with knowing what is going on) can do is to weigh it all up, and in the end condemn all sides.

The Georgians should support the staging of an independent binding plebiscite on independence in those regions where people have expressed a desire for it. The Russians should fuck off back home and respect the outcome of such a plebiscite. The USA and the EU should shut the fuck up about territorial integrity (it only suites them to talk about it when they want to, i.e. not when the country is Serbia or Germany post WW1) and fuck off too.

Does that cover everyone?

Re:Russian Retaliation

[asuzuki]

You are absolutely right to question the semantics of this conflict. Without truly indepdendent media coverage we have no way of knowing exactly what happened in these last days.

The consensus in my country is that it was a Georgian aggression, with an albeit disproportionate reaction by Russia.

From reading previous (modded up) posts I am getting the impression that most Americans are all to eager to step back into the cold war and blame Russia.

I mean seriously, the Georgian president talking about a Russian aggression (standing in front of an EU flag, no less) and asking the West (hey, wake up, Russia is the West!) to help, don't make me laugh....

Re:Russian Retaliation

[Bucc5062]

that is a stark and scary article. Sadly enough it rings true to the point where even and an optimist like myself, I wonder not if, but when will this administration drop the other shoe and push us into a third war front.

It really sucks to be a thinking aware pawn in this current game of global chess.

Re:Russian Retaliation

[Anonymous Coward]

Hi, your linked blog has nothing to do with the current situation. I would like to question why you have linked it here. Either way the idea of "Russian peace keepers" within another country does not sound like a non-initiatory act.

Re:Russian Retaliation

[sesshomaru]

From reading previous (modded up) posts I am getting the impression that most Americans are all to eager to step back into the cold war and blame Russia.

The avalanche has already started, it is too late for the pebbles to vote.

Re:Russian Retaliation

[Anonymous Coward]

Russian "peacekeepers", right. Just like Russian "citizens".

Re:Russian Retaliation

[savuporo]

Well, here is another piece of analysis
http://www.stratfor.com/weekly/russo_georgian_war_and_balance_power

Georgia made a mistake only in giving in to provocations, which had been ongoing for a very very long time, and the whole thing was clearly preplanned by Russian side. What exactly happened in the night of the 7th, and who started firing rockets, we will probably never know. But what matters is this is not a single isolated event, i.e. the story does not begin with shootings at Tshinvali on last thursday night.

Re:Russian Retaliation

[uglydog]

I think everyone agrees that Georgia started this. Most are saying that the Russian retaliation goes too far. I personally don't think that they over-reacted any more than the US has lately. But I'd love to know your sources for the fact that US and Israel supported Georgia. Wsws.org does not mention that.

Re:Russian Retaliation

[Anonymous Coward]

Israel has nothing to do with the current crisis. Try to keep your strong anti-semitism to yourself, because it is unacceptable unless you live in Iran.

Re:Russian Retaliation

[Kohath]

It was Georgia, with support from USA...

Yes. Everything bad that happens is the fault of the USA. It's the answer that's always available. It works for dictators. It works for their sympathizers on US university campuses. It works for any aggressor in any situation. It saves having to think or understand any situation and provides an excuse for any action.

Re:Russian Retaliation

[Belial6]

"The Georgians should support the staging of an independent binding plebiscite on independence in those regions where people have expressed a desire for it."

Would you support the same for the American South? Are you saying that the Union invasion of the Confederacy made the North the bad guys?

Re:Russian Retaliation

[alienw]

FINALLY. It's amazing how the American and even European mass media manage to spin the story to make it look like Russia is the aggressor. Let's look at the facts:
- Georgia attacked a capital city, in the middle of the night, during active diplomatic negotiations with Russia. They picked a time when they thought Russia would be unable to quickly respond.
- Georgian troops killed and committed atrocities against thousands of Russian citizens living in South Ossetia.
- Georgian troops attacked Russian peacekeeping forces in South Ossetia, killing most of the troops involved.

The US government has not hesitated to overthrow entire regimes over much less. I fail to see why Russia cannot do the same.

Re:Russian Retaliation

[NeutronCowboy]

Wow, I haven't seen a reference to the International Committee for the Fourth International in Ages - ever since I didn't get commercials for the French Communist Party. You could also get your news from The Economist (http://www.economist.com/world/europe/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11893699) or even Time Magazine (http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1831857,00.html?cnn=yes). Or pretty much any other news source that covers international events. Anything will have more and better analysis than what is essentially a worldwide organ for Russian-style communists.

Re:Russian Retaliation

[hob42]

Note: I do not own any Confederate flags, do not have any particular "southern pride", and groups like the KKK disgust me. Now that that's out of the way...

Yes, and they were.

What makes any place a sovreign nation? If the Confederate States didn't qualify as one, I don't know what does. Our own sacred Declaration of Independence asserts the moral right of self governance, to dissolve the ties of government that does not represent and protect the interests of the people, whether that government is England or our own federal government.

Re:Russian Retaliation

[Anonymous Coward]

WSWS has quite an intformative coverage (if you filter out random "working class" rants out of their text). I frequently hop to the site to find out what's really happening globally.

Granted, they are bit biased, but I find their coverage by miles better than mainstream media which are dumbed down to the point that you can't draw any conclusion apart from what is served (e.g. who's "bad" and who's "good"), and that is usually propaganda.

Other good source of international politics news is the Russian state TV channel for those who are able to understand some of the Russian (I'm slavic so I can understand a bit). They just care about serious stuff more than about David Beckham or a woman with three tits (just the imaginated example).

Re:Russian Retaliation

[apathy maybe]

Let's sort a couple of my principles into some semblance of hierarchy shall we?

Independence of the individual, autonomy for the individual, freedom for the individual. That trumps all the rest.

So in the case of the slave holding south, well they shouldn't hold slaves.

However, I also think that self-determination is an extension of this principle, people have the right to choose what (if any) government they live under (I would choose none, but it seems I don't actually get a say).

So yeah, the north were a pack of imperialist bastards invading the south against the express wishes of the people in the south. (Actually I don't know my US Civil War history that well, I don't know if the people generally actually wanted independence, or if it was merely some few rich plantation and slave owners.)

So to repeat, in the case you mention, the invasion of the south by the north was a bad thing, however, I hate slavery.

Re:Russian Retaliation

[hob42]

Someone needs to write this one down. Next time we need an excuse for war, hand out passports to friendly people in country nearby, and get some restless locals to terrorize target country. Then when country responds, complain of atrocities against American citizens, and throw some bombs at target capital.

Why didn't we think of this before? Sounds more effective than making up stories about WMDs.

Re:Russian Retaliation

[Belial6]

Well, since the abolition of slavery was inevitable whether the Civil War happened or not, the difference between what we live in today vs. what US slaves lived in vs. true individual autonomy is just shades of gray, as well as things like the Emancipation Proclamation that very specifically only freed slaves in the Confederacy while keeping slavery in the North legal on a federal level, means that slavery is a total non-issue as it applies to the Civil War. Slavery was a propaganda talking point. In fact Lincoln was quoted as saying "If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it".

That doesn't challenge your quote, but your quote also implies that slavery was an issue concerning the Union invasion of the South.

Note: I consider the issue of who was right and who was wrong to be an intellectual curiosity only. I've just recently been explaining the Civil War to my 4 year old son, and when thinking about how best to explain it, it has occurred to me that the Union could easily be considered the bad guys. It takes some serious twisting of the information, lies of omission, or just plain out regular lies to come up with the traditional North=Good South=Bad conclusion.

Re:Russian Retaliation

[Belial6]

A very brave stance. It is much like complementing Hitlers shoes. Many will take any try to turn a well reason and thought out idea, and try to turn it into a statement in support of the lunatic fringe.

I by the way agree with your ENTIRE post.

Re:Russian Retaliation

[Anonymous Coward]

It was Georgia, with support from USA...

Yes. Everything bad that happens is the fault of the USA. It's the answer that's always available. It works for dictators. It works for their sympathizers on US university campuses. It works for any aggressor in any situation. It saves having to think or understand any situation and provides an excuse for any action.

Yes. Everything bad that happens is the fault of the Russians. It's the answer that's always available. It works for neocons. It works for their sympathizers in US think tanks and on US cable "news". It works for any aggressor in any situation. It saves having to think or understand any situation and provides an excuse for any action.

Re:Russian Retaliation

[Anonymous Coward]

Do you realize that Georgians attacked Tskhinvally with massive fire of tanks, artillery, and MRLS (multiple rocket launch system)? Do you understand that it's impossible to deploy all that machinery in a moment? Georgians must have been deploying their weaponry for days if not for weeks before the attack.

Do you realize that Russians have their reconnaissance and intelligence? Do you realize they have millitary satellites to watch what's going on on the Earth? Why do you think Russians were unable to notice that the Georgian are preparing for the attack?

Re:Russian Retaliation

[tokul]

Let us all be correct in the terminology here. It is not Russian Invasion, but Russian Retaliation.

Does that include handing Russian passports to citizens of other country and supporting pro-Russian separatist movements in neighboring countries?

might have to keep flying shuttles a little longer

[jollyreaper]

I still have my doubts as to whether the shuttle replacement will pan out.

The Georgians ...

[BitterOldGUy]

wonder why, since they're helping in Iraq, doesn't the US help them?!? Now, the Georgians will have to pull their troops out of Iraq leaving US with more of the burden - rightfully so.

Troll indeed!

Re:The Georgians ...

[krazytekn0]

Is anyone informed on this issue? Their troops are already gone from Iraq we flew them back home

Re:The Georgians ...

[phoenix321]

The Georgian soldiers were flown home in specially designated cargo planes. Each flight was meticulously announced to the Russians to make sure any attack couldn't mean an error but would surely be a voluntary call for nukes on Moscow.

most Georgian troops are back in Georgia now, but they can't really do anything against several hundred modern Russian tanks.

I'm thinking...

[dimethylxanthine]

OSSD (Open Source Spaceship Design) anyone? Could throw up a solid, reusable ship for 1/100 the cost AND on time! (There's plenty of concepts around the net if you look, surely). Except that would be way too economically viable.

Re:I'm thinking...

[Anonymous Coward]

OSSD (Open Source Spaceship Design) anyone? Could throw up a solid, reusable ship for 1/100 the cost AND on time! (There's plenty of concepts around the net if you look, surely). Except that would be way too economically viable.

Yeah, I'd trust my ass to "ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY, MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE".

Re:I'm thinking...

[stranger_to_himself]

I guess you could design a spaceship that way, but who would you get to build or test it?

Re:I'm thinking...

[Bill, Shooter of Bul]

Yes, for too long have the world's space powers ignored my design of a positronic interferometer based plasma drive. It runs on homeopathisized , magnetic water and an organic copper catalyst. It removes carbon dioxide from the air and harnesses the 4 CORNER SIMULTANEOUS 4-DAY TIME CUBE.

Re:I'm thinking...

[bond_ionic_bond]

Take the X-Prize, for instance. There were a number of potentially feasable projects, that could possibly do with better management or a more solid budget (which would still be 1/1000 of what NASA gets for some of their projects). Take Canadian Arrow, Pablo de LeÃn, et al.) Who says Government shouldn't invest into the public sector?

They can have Georgia

[Anonymous Coward]

and Florida too.

but we get to keep South Carolina

Russian are not invading Gerogia

[jessedorland]

Georgian were murdering native population, russian stepped in to protect them. Western media has always protest criminals, and branded victims as devil.

Re:Russian are not invading Gerogia

[Anonymous Coward]

Yup, murdered 6 of them, so the Russians killed thousands to "punish" them. Fucking retard, put down your bong. The Russians caused this conflict in 1922. Read history, you fucktard

Re:Russian are not invading Gerogia

[WetCat]

Thousands? Explain yourself please?

I doubt this will really matter

[Bullfish]

I doubt this will really matter in the end. Especially long term. The Russians will likely leave by the end of the week as soon as the Georgian military is dismantled. In the end, Georgia started this, and really, what effect did the crushing of the Prague spring, the Hungarian uprising of 56 etc really have on relations between the west and Russia?

And as others have pointed out, the Georgians started it with an area of effect attack on a city populated by ethnic Russians. If there is trouble with the ISS, it will be for other reasons.

Re:I doubt this will really matter

[Anonymous Coward]

While Georgia attacked an area populated by ethnic Russians, it wasn't an attack on the ethnic Russians. It was an attack to keep that population from declaring independence from the rest of the state.

It's like if the areas predominately populated by mexicans tried to become their own state. You're sure as hell that the U.S. would attack them, but we are not attacking the mexicans due to their ethnicity.

Re:I doubt this will really matter

[Anonymous Coward]

Georgia didn't start a fight with Russia at all. They simply tried to take back a part of their country. It's no different then if Maine were to break off from the U.S. because it has a Canadian ethnic majority and then we try to take it back and Canada sends everything they got into it to take it (except imagine the U.S. being the smaller and weaker country here). It's completely unfair what Russia did and is doing and it was in Georgia's rights to try and take back that province.

Re:I doubt this will really matter

[ObsessiveMathsFreak]

and really, what effect did the crushing of the Prague spring, the Hungarian uprising of 56 etc really have on relations between the west and Russia?

It seriously dried up the amount of people in the west sympathetic towards communism and marxism in general. It deprived the Soviet Union of most of their left wing political support, as well as their supply of spies.

How many Rusophiles will change their opinions after this particular incident?

Re:I doubt this will really matter

[fishbowl]

>It was an attack to keep that population from declaring independence from the rest of the state.

Any such attack, only justifies the people declaring independence.

Re:I doubt this will really matter

[Bullfish]

Not likely many, this is a totally different situation and world order. The US for example, had some moral credibility at the time. So I doubt any "russophiles are going to change their mind either". Haven't you even read thecomments posted under this topic? Sounds like most think the Russians has cause (at least to step in some).

As well, the USSR didn't really suffer from any of those effects you describe. They were annoyances, but not a big deal to them. What ended up killing the USSR in the end was rot from within. You can't keep a country going forever when the national sport is alcoholism.

Re:I doubt this will really matter

[Anonymous Coward]

It seriously dried up the amount of people in the west sympathetic towards communism and marxism in general. It deprived the Soviet Union of most of their left wing political support, as well as their supply of spies.

I think that's extremely wishful thinking.

How many Rusophiles will change their opinions after this particular incident?

Probably not as many as one might hope.

Re:I doubt this will really matter

[Darinbob]

the Georgians started it with an area of effect attack on a city populated by ethnic Russians.

No. It was populated primarily by Ethnic Ossetians! They are Russian citizens technically but only because they were given Russian passports.

Re:I doubt this will really matter

[MightyMartian]

The Georgia you see on a map today is largely the creation of the Soviets. South Ossetia is no more a part of Georgia than Belgium was a part of the United Kingdom of the Netherlands.

Re:I doubt this will really matter

[j_sp_r]

It's like Kosovo tried to split of from Serbia and they tried to take it back by force, and NATO send everything in that they got to take it. Without knowing who tells the truth you cannot say if Russia's action was justified or not. It's just what the media tells you at the moment.

Re:I doubt this will really matter

[MrWa]

the Georgians started it with an area of effect attack on a city populated by ethnic Russians

I know there were previous posts about cyberwarfare but I didn't realize this was just a World of Warcraft game...

Re:I doubt this will really matter

[DNS-and-BIND]

Dude, there are still plenty, plenty of people in the West who cried when Communism failed and freedom broke out. Check out back issues of "Mother Jones" magazine from 1989-1991. Heck, it's still popular.

"When Communist U.S.S.R. was a superpower, the world was better off."
-- Janeane Garofalo

Squeal like a pig!

[Baldrson]

'NASA's plans to launch new manned missions to the International Space Station three years after the space shuttle retires in 2010 aren't panning out.'

'Officials at the space agency said Monday that they will still hold to their word that the Constellation program--a mission of the newly developed Ares 1 rocket and Orion crew capsule to the ISS--will happen by March 2015, five years after the space shuttle program shuts down. But a previous goal of an early launch in 2013 has now been moved to 2014 because of budget constraints. NASA officials are also leaving wiggle room there.'

http://news.cnet.com/8301-11386_3-10015009-76.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-5

Hard to believe those culturally insensitive crackers managed to go from zero to the Moon in eight years using 1960s technology...

Re:Squeal like a pig!

[justdrew]

is it any wonder? We should have been working on the next gen replacement for the shuttle since 1990 at least. We've fucked up and now it's all going tits up.

yes, Russian actions completely justified

[justdrew]

what would America do if some asshole country rockets barracks of our peacekeepers in the middle of the night for no reason after 10+ years of mostly peace? we'd go get some revenge and we'd teach a lesson. which is all Russia did. Good for them.

Re:yes, Russian actions completely justified

[Anonymous Coward]

The war between Georgia and Russia is a classic "He started it first!" "Nuh-uh! He started it first" "No, I saw what he did. He started it first." etc. You may have seen such a scene on a playground once and even been a part of one. The truth is that both sides are culpable.

Re:yes, Russian actions completely justified

[Anonymous Coward]

what would America do if some asshole country rockets barracks of our peacekeepers in the middle of the night for no reason after 10+ years of mostly peace?
No Asshole, we would just leave. See History: Section:Beruit.

Re:yes, Russian actions completely justified

[andot]

By russian standards is justified to kill their own people for the "greater good". They doesn't care about killing millions, why they should care about killing 10 their own troops. They have done it before and they will do it again. There is no risk for russian government in doing so, because most russians will never heard about it or doesn't believe it anyway. Do not underestimate russian propaganda machine. There are no free journalism in russia. All the Georgian incident is clearly preplanned and started months ago. Even cyberattacks started days before 08.08.08. The new tactics from russia is attacking their enemies from internet. Not only hacking servers or doing DDos attacks. All internet boards a full pro-russian comments in bad english or in some other language - the new information weapon.

Re:yes, Russian actions completely justified

[vojarus]

So, you're saying that all this time english speaking boards were pro-west propaganda and it was ok, untill the other side arrived? Or maybe, people just want to speak in their own language and want to comunicate with english speaking people. Maybe they want you to hear their side of story? I didn't know that english is only allowed language on internet.

Re:yes, Russian actions completely justified

[andot]

You didn't get the point at all. I bet many pro-russian commentars are originated from russia and written by people who are connected to russian government and KGB. Other russians are misguided because russian media is full of lies. Totally. I have seen it. Russian TV says exactly what their government want them to say. Bad english is first sign how to you can pinpoint russian - russians are very bad in foreign languages.

Re:yes, Russian actions completely justified

[Anonymous Coward]

You are welcome to demonstrate your perfect Russian by joining any Russian-language internet board and educating Russians who do not have any free press. Yes, Russians have internet and satellite TV and are able to watch CNN and BBC. But who in his right mind would call CNN and BBC a free press! Right?

The question on everyone's mind

[Anonymous Coward]

Who is this General Shermanski we keep hearing about?

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[krazytekn0]

Georgia killed 6 people... Russia has killed thousands of Georgians.
Also of note is the fact that Russia staged this two front military effort in less than 12 hours, before Putin left the Olympics... Sounds like a pre-planned deal just waiting for an excuse to me.

Movie 2010...

[rmdyer]

When I read the headline, my immediate thought was from the movie 2010 from 1984. The Russians (the soviets then), allowed Americans to share a ride on their space ship to Jupiter to save an ailing American spaceship caught in a gravity well from the 2001 movie ending (the one with HAL 9000). Halfway through the movie, there was a conflict on earth that got out of control and put the Soviets and Americans at odds. So the Americans and Soviets in space were required to separate.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0086837/

Re:Movie 2010...

[mrdoogee]

All these worlds are yours, except Europa. Attempt no landings there.

Re:Movie 2010...

[Dever]

but Europa is a girls best friend!!!

and forever too!

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Seakip18]

10 years of peace? Where are you getting that from? I don't think any corner of this globe has had peace for that long, let alone anywhere with disputed borders/sovereignty.

Back on topic,

It's surprising how they didn't account for it. The only fix I see that includes Russia, is to have a Russian on board the station at all times. That way, if they refuse to help in the direst circumstances, they are letting their own countryman die.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[jgtg32a]

Just like every other war?

All that's needed is some almost plausible BS to go in.

restoring 'constitutional order'....

[Anonymous Coward]

is not done with howitzers.....3h ahter declaring not to use force an entire capital is devastated by bombing ????

mr saakasvili deserves to be removed from power....clearly he abuses it.

the phrase 'restoring constitutional order' is bogus.....a piece of paper is not worth a 1000 lives in my opinion.

Georgia gambled....and lost big time

is this a proxy war by bush???? is a thought I cannot get out off my head

I am unwilling to help those who indiscriminately bomb towns.....there was no 'urgency' for georgia to restore 'order'.......clearly a provocation.

besides my ranting....the ISS has nothing to do with all this.....the russians have a better record of bringing supply's up there than any other country.

There is a big problem actually

[thermian]

Due to the desire of the US to use the space shuttle to service the ISS, it was placed in a much lower orbit then would otherwise have been the case. Certainly it was much lower then most interested parties wanted.

As a result of this it is constantly being slowed by friction caused by contact with the outer atmosphere. We are talking very slight friction, but at the speed of the ISS that slight friction is enough to bring it into a lower orbit over time.

One of the main worries after the challenger disaster was that space shuttle had been used to correct this reduction in orbit periodically by firing its thrusters whilst docked. Instead they had to use Soyuz capsules to try and do the same thing.

Its bad either way, but if there is tension and both countries stop going there, the orbit will deteriorate to the point where only a specialised mission to boost it would work. That may not be possible, or indeed successful.

While it would have to drop a long way to re-enter the atmosphere and burn up, it wouldn't have to drop too far to start being prohibitively complicated and expensive to get it back into its normal orbit.

Re:There is a big problem actually

[ray-auch]

The ATV can already boost the ISS orbit, and it is neither Russian nor American.

Re:There is a big problem actually

[TorKlingberg]

The European Automated Transfer Vehicle can also re-boost the station. If I remember correctly, even more than the shuttle can.

Re:There is a big problem actually

[MightyYar]

Due to the desire of the US to use the space shuttle to service the ISS, it was placed in a much lower orbit then would otherwise have been the case. Certainly it was much lower then most interested parties wanted.

I think you have that exactly backwards. Or at least twisted. The Russians launch from baikonur, the Americans from Florida - they had to compromise on both inclination and altitude so that both countries could make it there. Also, when the shuttles weren't flying after Columbia, they DID boost the altitude until the shuttles were back.

Re:There is a big problem actually

[Anonymous Coward]

Due to the desire of the US to use the space shuttle to service the ISS, it was placed in a much lower orbit then would otherwise have been the case.

It wasn't placed lower because of the shuttle, the orbit inclination was increased to meet the needs of the Russian side. Because the inclination the space shuttle has to use more fuel to match the inclination of the ISS. The ISS still can be boosted to a higher orbit once construction is complete and the shuttle retired.

Re:There is a big problem actually

[Anonymous Coward]

You got it assbackwards. The iss is in a construction orbit right now. That means it's lower so its easier to lift stuff to there. When it's done, its altitude will be doubled.

Its orbit is inclined in a way that gives Russia a much easier time getting to it, while the US needs to spend more energy and fuel. this was done to convince the Russians to get on board with the whole project.

Look at any ground track of the iss, it goes parallel to the earths rotation when it's at Russian latitudes, not US ones. This means that at liftoff the Russians can use more of the momentum of the earths rotation for orbital insertion.

Also there was no iss when Challenger was destroyed in the 80's. You probably meant Colombia.

Re:There is a big problem actually

[DerekLyons]

Due to the desire of the US to use the space shuttle to service the ISS, it was placed in a much lower orbit then would otherwise have been the case. Certainly it was much lower then most interested parties wanted.

  False The ISS orbit was lowered because a) the increase in orbital inclination to allow the Russians to participate lowered the effective cargo capacity of the Shuttle and b) the original orbital altitude was too high for Soyuz and Progress to reach anyhow.
 
 

As a result of this it is constantly being slowed by friction caused by contact with the outer atmosphere. We are talking very slight friction, but at the speed of the ISS that slight friction is enough to bring it into a lower orbit over time.

  Misleading Even at the original planned altitude ISS would have required periodic reboost. You have to go pretty far out before you don't need reboost.
 
 

One of the main worries after the challenger disaster was that space shuttle had been used to correct this reduction in orbit periodically by firing its thrusters whilst docked. Instead they had to use Soyuz capsules to try and do the same thing.

  False The primary method of reboost is the Progress, not Soyuz. Shuttle provides large reboosts in order to reduce the amount of fuel required by Progress and thus to increase the amount cargo Progress can carry. The main worry after the Columbia accident was that the ATV, which also backed up Progress, was running behind schedule - which meant there wasn't any backup at all.
 
 

Its bad either way, but if there is tension and both countries stop going there, the orbit will deteriorate to the point where only a specialised mission to boost it would work. That may not be possible, or indeed successful.

  Misleading ATV is now available to backup Progress and Shuttle, so barring another Shuttle accident, this concern is years away. (The bigger concern is that in the unlikely event both countries stop going, the ISS isn't designed to operate autonomously for significant periods.)

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[justdrew]

near peace, sure there were limited actions by a few hot head militants from time to time. that's why there were peacekeepers present. until Georgia decided it would be a good idea to murder them in their sleep with rockets.

American planning in action

[HiggsBison]

This is the United States of America, mister. We do not think ahead. We do not plan ahead.

Our shuttle was a marginally workable exercise in pork barrel politics. And now it's up for retirement long before it can be replaced. Probably to be replaced by another pork barrel exercise, eventually. Or obsoleted by a burst of finesse from Europe or the third world. (But I'm not holding my breath.)

Russia thinks ahead and plans ahead. Now they're holding all the space exploration cards. Of course now they're the only ones who can get to the ISS, or to put it another way, they got stuck with the task. I wonder how well they thought that through.

Re:American planning in action

[fahrbot-bot]

Russia thinks ahead and plans ahead.

I believe the phrase you're looking for is, "Russians don't take a dump, son, without a plan".
- Adm. Painter, The Hunt for Red October

Ahhh, Permanent UN Security Council members and their toys...

Re:American planning in action

[Anonymous Coward]

Russia thinks ahead and plans ahead.

Right, just like China has been planning for the 2008 Olympics for the past 1000 years.

Re:American planning in action

[Anonymous Coward]

Doesn't Russia produce some of the best chess players in the world?

Possible solution...?

[bond_ionic_bond]

Maybe it's time [for NASA] to look at some of the commercial space projects being developed out there and take note how they're doing it. Perhaps even take one (or two) projects showing success under its wing and develop it further... Would surely save millions, decrease dependence on wacko nations like Russia and take reusability to a new level... Just my 2c.

Georgia shot first...

[Anonymous Coward]

...just like Han.

typically, your numbers are dead WRONG

[justdrew]

even if it was only six, which it wasn't, no fucking way is that even close to right, remember Georgia had 24+ hours before there was significant Russian response, during which they proceeded with ethnic cleansing operations all over the place.

Re:typically, your numbers are dead WRONG

[Columcille]

The ethnic cleansing thing was one of the most amusing statements ever to come from Russia. Ethnic cleansing? Whatever. Georgia responded to separatists who once again launched terrorist attacks on Georgia. Russia, still pouting about Kossovo and unhappy to see a working democracy, decided to take the opportunity to show (1) Putin is still running things and (2) about all he knows how to do is drop bombs.

Re:typically, your numbers are dead WRONG

[Anonymous Coward]

By killing and butchering women and children everywhere.

Geez Columcille, why don't you go work for Saakashitsvilli?

Re:typically, your numbers are dead WRONG

[insomniac8400]

Georgia struck first. They were hoping to take control of Ossetia by force. And Ossetia only provoked Georgia by claiming to be independent for the last 20 years, Ossetia did not spark this confrontation. The world community is at fault for not supporting Ossetia as a sovereign nation. Ossetia even had democratic elections to affirm that everyone there does not want to part of Georgia. Make no mistake Georgia attacked Ossetia because the US still recognizes Ossetia as part of Georgia which would make this attack in the eyes of the US, a civil war. The problem with Georgia's plan is that Russia accepts Ossetia as a separate country and the US wasn't going to be able to stop Russia from doing what we would have done in such a situation. If you don't like that logic, think about Israel. They are a country we accept to exist, but Palestine does not. So Palestinians attack it, and we help to stop those attacks. The only thing that has hurt our relationship with Russia was John McCain getting involved with the current president's business and claiming Russia was the invader based on the incorrect news headlines. And to top it off Joe Lieberman, who is Jewish, sides with John McCain. It boggles my mind that a man from a country constantly attacked because it's enemies don't recognize Israel's right to exist could do a 180 and not recognize Ossetia's right to exist. McCain basically made a speech off the incorrect information in the press and Joe Lieberman is a hypocrite trying to be vice president.

Re:typically, your numbers are dead WRONG

[Columcille]

Most of the world recognizes Israel. Most of the world does not recognize South Ossetia. This isn't just the US throwing its weight around. Russia is trying to force things its way. Russia could choose to recognize the People's Republic of Texas if it wanted to but that wouldn't change the fact that Texas remains part of the US. And I know all the Russians living in South Ossetia do not want it to be part of Georgia, but there is something odd about Russian Citizens getting to say what Georgia should do with its territory.

Re:typically, your numbers are dead WRONG

[Anonymous Coward]

Where did those 150+ tanks magically appear from?

Those 4000 troops that were sealifted within 48 hours?

That kind of staging takes months to prepare.

South Ossetia exists to collect welfare payments for its 200,000 citizens who in turn vote for whoever the kleptocrats want.

Russia has now entered Georgia. Rape, pillage, and burn. If your grandparents are from the Soviet Bloc, ask them about the Russian Army.

Re:typically, your numbers are dead WRONG

[megaditto]

The land belongs to the people who live there. For example,
America doesn't belong to the British, it belows to Americans.
Kosovo does not belong to Yugoslavia, it belongs to the Albanians.
Iraqi Kurdistan does not belong to Iraq, it belongs to the Kurds.
Poland and Estonia does not belong to Russia, it belongs to the Poles and to the Estonians...

Does Ossetia belong to Georgia, or to the Ossetians?

Re:typically, your numbers are dead WRONG

[Anonymous Coward]

The ethnic cleansing thing was one of the most amusing statements ever to come from Russia. Ethnic cleansing? Whatever. Georgia responded to separatists who once again launched terrorist attacks on Georgia. Russia, still pouting about Kossovo and unhappy to see a working democracy, decided to take the opportunity to show (1) Putin is still running things and (2) about all he knows how to do is drop bombs.

*Separatists* - I freaking laughed. Lets call everyone a separatist and then use unguided rocket artillery to kill everything in sight. Georgians were dead wrong, only because they were "our" allies and they were killing Russians. they got so easily off the hook. If they would killed 10 Americans, we would carpet bomb them to oblivion.

Re:typically, your numbers are dead WRONG

[janrinok]

If you can't even spell Kosovo correctly, what does it say for the rest of your 'facts'? Of course, you have never been there but you sure do fight a good armchair war. Why don't you try reading one of many news agency feeds to find out what went on, and what is going on now? For example, the Russians ARE looting in Gori at present so they are far from being angels in this matter but Georgia started this war itself. In Gori, many of the locals have decided to leave - a form of 'amusing' ethnic cleansing in your words - but, as they leave, they are being made to give up their possessions. My only question is what on earth was Georgia up to? Did they really think they could win and, if so, why?

Re:typically, your numbers are dead WRONG

[tindur]

Obviously to Russia?

Re:typically, your numbers are dead WRONG

[Anonymous Coward]

Working democracy, you say? A little fact checking would not hurt:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7087209.stm

But that's besides the point. Say what you will about Putin, Chechnya, Russia, etc, but all that does not make it ok to start blasting civilians with tanks and multiple-launch rocket systems. For a good chronology of events and some video, check out here:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7551576.stm

Re:typically, your numbers are dead WRONG

[setagllib]

That whole area has been a military hotspot for a long time, so it's entirely reasonable that Russia would have armies within spitting distance. Russia has the world's largest border to defend, so do you really think that all of the armies are chilling in camps far away from the actual threats?

Re:typically, your numbers are dead WRONG

[BrentH]

And this is where it gets interesting: America belongs to the Indians too. And they were there first, right? And New York belongs to the Netherlands, because they were first, right? And why does California not belong solely to the Californians? And Texas to the Texans? And Miami to the Miami-ans? And why don't I have my very own country, the size of my house? It just doesn't work this way, and with Russia funding the seperatists, just because they can't stand they lost the territory themselves in the first place, is just pathetic and absolutely wrong. How is this Russian invasion about Ossetia anyway? It's about the paychecks of a few jobless Ossetians with short dicks, and with Putin and his equally short dick.

Re:typically, your numbers are dead WRONG

[vojarus]

Where were you when NATO funded separatists in Kosovo?

Re:typically, your numbers are dead WRONG

[Anonymous Coward]

Look at what other countries borders are there, that whole area has been a hotspot for 15-20 years. 4000 troops and 150+ tanks would only be a fraction of the troops permanently stationed there ready for action and russia would have plans for responses to attacks from any of those regions.

Re:typically, your numbers are dead WRONG

[statemachine]

Where did those 150+ tanks magically appear from? Those 4000 troops that were sealifted within 48 hours? That kind of staging takes months to prepare.

48 hours? Oh, is that all?

I guarantee the USA could easily match that anywhere in the world, and not just at its own borders. 48 hours is nothing. Borders are easy. Russia probably created a divot in the map and its military just slid in.

Re:typically, your numbers are dead WRONG

[Jorophose]

Where was Russia when Chechnya wanted independance?

Right there, with tanks, planes, and guns. Parent deserves +5 Insightful but is not correct in this case. Georgia was aggressed by Ossetia, and has every right to move into its own territory. When Russia moved in and continued past South Ossetia, and even entering with such force without a word beforehand, is an act of war.

Re:typically, your numbers are dead WRONG

[Columcille]

When were people in Kosovo launching terrorist attacks against Serbia? It sort of went the other way around.

Re:typically, your numbers are dead WRONG

[amorsen]

The land belongs to the people who live there.

If a country sends thousands of its citizens to settle in an occupied part of a different country, does that part then belong to the people who were sent there?

Re:typically, your numbers are dead WRONG

[Anonymous Coward]

Just like what USA did with Colombia and "PANAMA"

No Russians are doing exactly the same things as USA did with many sovereign countries.

And do not forget the fact that between 75 and 90% of the people in south osetia recognize themselfs as Russians - that's why Russia is there to protect their people.

Also the Georgian operation was called "clean ground". We call it genocide here.

BTW make your own research and you will find for yourself that Georgia killed 1500-2000 civilians before Russians rush in to protect them, with less then 15, 000 soldiers ...

Re:typically, your numbers are dead WRONG

[JAlexoi]

Actually, the Kosovo separatists were funded by Albania directly(though 2nd level funding is unknown).

Re:typically, your numbers are dead WRONG

[JAlexoi]

You must have missed ALL the news from that region. For like 4 years now?
Not only there are a lot of troops there, there are some big military bases there also. Let alone Chechnya is just around the corner.
FYI: Russian army was nothing more than the sum of all nations put together... Witch Georgians were a part of.

Re:typically, your numbers are dead WRONG

[JAlexoi]

Correction: FYI: Soviet army was nothing more than the sum of all nations put together... Witch Georgians were a part of.

Re:typically, your numbers are dead WRONG

[aralin]

I don't think you have all the facts here. The people who now call themselves the government in Kosovo are the very same terrorists blowing up trains in Serbia few years ago. So Kosovo is a perfect parallel for the South Ossetia. Russians were against Kosovo being separated from Serbia, but when US, NATO and EU said that it is ok, they took it as a precedent and went for the same in South Ossetia. Bush just cannot have it both ways as he pleases.

Now I would prefer if Kosovo remained in Serbia, the Albanians, who were moved there by Mussolini as part of the WWII Nazi relocation efforts to neutralize problematic countries (eg Serbia) could go back to Albania and South Ossetia could remain part of Georgia for all I care.

Re:typically, your numbers are dead WRONG

[aralin]

See Israel vs Palestine, West Bank and Gaza settlements.

Re:typically, your numbers are dead WRONG

[Pictish Prince]

Too bad the mods only go up to 5.

I give parent +10 Informative.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Z00L00K]

Both sides are guilty here, no doubt.

But Russia made it worse by their actions.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[krazytekn0]

don't bother replying to me in anger I see that my numbers are wrong...

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[wumpus188]

Georgia killed 6 people... Russia has killed thousands of Georgians.

Watching much Fox lately or just pulling numbers out of your ass?

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[dunkelfalke]

now please explain to me how georgia could kill only 6 people by shelling a sleeping capital city at midnight?

also of note is the fact, that georgia borders chechnya where lots of russian troops are waiting for any action.

Since my wife works at NASA...yeah...this matters.

[sckeener]

I do not see what is wrong in discussing all the ramifications of this conflict.

Do you want us to not plan for the future at all until the conflict is over?

Besides this is a 'nerd' site...what do you expect us to discuss? ISS and space exploration are about as Nerdy as you can get. There is already a posting about the internet war between the two countries....do you know of any other nerdy subjects that might be affected by the war? if so, please post them. I'm sure /. would love to toss around the subject.

Europe to the rescue?

[damburger]

Converting the ATV to a manned vehicle seems to be the quickest way of restoring access to the ISS if the Russians don't want to let us go there. Its got a proven launch vehicle, and the cargo version has already flown. Just need to develop a heat shield really.

Re:Europe to the rescue?

[khallow]

Apparently the ATV docks through the Russian modules. It's not as easy as you would think to wean the ISS off of Russia. I gather down the road that the Japanese might have their own docking port and cargo vehicle, but these might not be capable or reliable enough for people. Second, the US has a standard docking port for people. My take is that it'd be easier to adapt a Delta IV Heavy or Atlas V Heavy (with a lightweight Orion on top) for ISS transport than it would be to adapt the ATV.

Re:Europe to the rescue?

[damburger]

Orion hasn't flown, whereas ATV has - and in combination with the launch vehicle it would use to boot.

The docking port is a problem though, you are right. However it might be easier to bypass that than to develop Orion, and it might be easier to convince the Russians to let us use Zvezda than to let us have Soyuz launches.

Also, I think rebuffing the Chinese was dumb. They've plans for their own station (which would presumably have become an ISS module like the European space station did) and a craft that can reach it.

Re:Europe to the rescue?

[khallow]

Orion hasn't flown, whereas ATV has - and in combination with the launch vehicle it would use to boot.

The Ariane 5's record really is the selling point here. So I have to say, you're probably right. However, from NASA's point of view a US-owned launcher is superior to a ESA launcher.

Also, I think rebuffing the Chinese was dumb. They've plans for their own station (which would presumably have become an ISS module like the European space station did) and a craft that can reach it.

No, I think NASA did the right thing. China has earned a bad reputation in the space launch business. No reason to expect them to act different in their dealings with the ISS.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[DustoneGT]

If the United States government supports Georgia, we should rescind our Declaration of Independence and rejoin the British Empire.

Let's look at a similar situation in history. A renegade province of Mexico rebelled and kicked the Mexican government out. A strong ally to the North took them in and waged war with the Mexican military, killing many and eventually taking much more land. I'm talking about Texas.

If we want to back Georgia on this one, we should give Texas back to Mexico.

The South Ossetians want to be an independent country. The voted overwhelmingly to do so in 2006. The Russians respect that. The Georgians and their allies (read: us) do not.

The right of a people to choose their leadership should not be overlooked here.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Shakrai]

The only fix I see that includes Russia, is to have a Russian on board the station at all times. That way, if they refuse to help in the direst circumstances, they are letting their own countryman die

Because if there is anything that Russia is known for it's having a great respect for the value of human life ;)

the reason "they" kowtow to the Middle East

[boombaard]

the reason "they" kowtow to arabia?
Russia is just as dependent on the money the EU pays them as the EU is of russia's oil.. (there are no significant pipelines connecting russia's supply (east of the Siberia) to anyone else's demand) This apparently as opposed to Bush's dumping Georgia as an "ally" as soon as Putin decides he's allowed to stomp on them.
Yes, consistency is King here

Re:Russia's response was reasonable and justified

[Seakip18]

Eh....Near peace is too hard to quantify. Often, we don't realize the trouble that is brewing unless we're there. With the sudden and such violent outbreak, it's usually for premeditated reasons, not this retaliating for a single shot from a rebel.

Georgia is stone-cold wrong for their actions(and should be punished by a multinational organization...don't we have a couple of those) and Russia is only making the situation worse by their actions.

It's a hard line to walk, between restraint and possibly allowing people to die or attacking back with force and drawing condemnation from the west, who, coincidentally are the only ones who can punish Georgia without force.

Re:NO wonder nerds have a bad rep NO...

[davidsyes]

It's more like:

My dick has more PIERCINGS than yours... but yours is like a weak sieve

or

You're bigger, but you're impotent

or

You're directionless... all talk, no wand, so no magic

I imagine, though, that the US will proclaim, "Fuck Russia! We'll go it ALONE", only to in delusion watch Russia form alliances with which the US cannot compete, especially if overseas launch sites are cheaper and prevalent. So far, it seems the USA "leadership" is more interested in being number one at destroying others' vehicles, beaming back pretty solar system pictures, and making bellicose Space Domination assertions.

Besides, so much of Europe needs oil coming from Russia that this thing will fade and the US and maybe Canada will be kicking up sand, grousing and grumbling. Russia is someone the US doesn't want to F*ck with. That area is "Russia's Back Yard", so to speak, and all the US's currency will be worth is grousing. Doing any more will just exacerbate things. If Iowa, or Nebraska had cause or prodding to secede, how long would the rest of the US wait before the various US marshals and federally-deployed troops move in to "restore order" or "rescue US-passport-holding citizens held hostage in break-away states"?

So, uh... lets not retire the Shuttle then...?

[AnomaliesAndrew]

There, NASA, fixed that for you.

Seriously... I never quite understood why we were going to neuter our space program before the shuttle replacement was ready.

Does this make sense to anybody other than NASA accountants?

Re:So, uh... lets not retire the Shuttle then...?

[sconeu]

It's budgetary. Congress said, "NASA, you get X dollars for manned launch programs." The Shuttle program takes Y dollars. Orion/Constellation takes Z dollars. The issue is that X > Y + Z. Therefore you have to cut shuttle operations, or delay/cut Orion, or do both.

Re:So, uh... lets not retire the Shuttle then...?

[Ellis D. Tripp]

Because the shuttle replacement can't fly until all the required ground support facilities (launchpads, assembly/checkout areas, etc.) are ready, and they are currently being used FOR THE SHUTTLE.

The shuttle needs to be retired so the infrastructure can be rebuilt/refitted for the Constellation program. Either that, or give NASA an Apollo-era budget to build all new facilities from the ground up.

Re:So, uh... lets not retire the Shuttle then...?

[AnomaliesAndrew]

Surely by "Apollo-era budget", you must mean something like 6-10% of the Iraq war budget...? ;-)

(Just putting our priorities in perspective... *sigh*)

I actually hadn't really thought about the limited launch real estate though... thank you!

Re:So, uh... lets not retire the Shuttle then...?

[AnomaliesAndrew]

Alternatively, you could appeal to the explorer in all of us and increase "X" a little.

It works when you appeal to the oil-baron, war-monger inside of Congress anyways.

Re:So, uh... lets not retire the Shuttle then...?

[sconeu]

Oh, I agree, but good luck with Congress.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Shakrai]

The right of a people to choose their leadership should not be overlooked here.

Is that why the Russians are busy trying to undermine Saakashvili?

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Atilla]

Did you get these numbers from a bubble gum machine?

There were about a dozen of Russian peace keeper troops dead, along with over 1500 civilians, all of which died either during the "hailstorm" barrage from Georgia side, or directly by Georgian troops... But who cares about civilians, right?

your idea of democracy is a guy who wins with 97%?

[justdrew]

sounds like bullshit show elections to me.

Thank you Russia.

[flyingfsck]

Georgia is in a state of civil war. Russia needs to be commended for its swift action and putting the conflict down within hours, thus limiting the damage and casualties.

Solution contained below, next question.

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't retire the space shuttle in 2010. Its an artificial deadline generated by a budget challenge. Budgets change....especially after an election.

Youtube wins...

[Anonymous Coward]

That was a good movie. Perhaps we should all watch it again during this time of conflict.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SGnArvsvdqg&feature=related

That Sums Your US Politicians Up!

[pandrijeczko]

Civilians dying in a potential civil war and all your politicians care about is how they're going to get bloody astronauts up to space station???

Now can you understand why a lot of the rest of the world doesn't like you very much?

Re:That Sums Your US Politicians Up!

[rk]

Pure flamebait. One politician raising the issue does not equal "all your politicians care about", and regardless, it's a valid question more pointed at our stupid foreign policies and their unexpected consequences.

And if people don't want to personally like "me" because of shit my stupid politicians (none of whom I've voted for, at last count) do, then fine. They're jackasses and I don't much like them either.

Georgian Invasion of South Ossetia May...

[MrSteveSD]

Jeopardize Space Station, would be an equally valid title. I'm sure the Russians have suspicions that the US was ultimately behind the Georgian bombardment and invasion of South Ossetia.

Watching the media reporting on this has been fascinating. If Russia had been the Western Ally rather than Georgia, the media would have been focusing on the Georgian bombardment and invasion of South Ossetia and all the casualties it caused. People killed in Russian air-strikes would get a mention in words, but certainly not pictures. When the media report on official enemies, the gloves come off. The BBC's Newsnight program called Russian announcements Orwellian Newspeak. I can't recall the BBC ever calling US or UK announcements Orwellian Newspeak, no matter how propagandistic and dubious they sound. Instead the media is happy to band around phrases like "Winning Hearts and Minds" without question.

For anyone interesting in the way the media works, watch the documentary "Manufacturing Consent" (based on the book by Herman and Chomsky). http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wksCW3ooJ5A

Re:Georgian Invasion of South Ossetia May...

[Bill, Shooter of Bul]

Yeah, as far as I can tell this is basically a replay of the Bosnian wars or even WWI. The good guys are the ones that end up winning, or end up drawing the largest power into the conflict.

Re:Georgian Invasion of South Ossetia May...

[Anonymous Coward]

They were talking same about Al Jazeera at the time of Iraq invasion, IIRC.

It's all about blatant (and to me very obcous) propaganda. These days it's hard to find non biased sources (user edited content like wikipedia is sometimes helpful). I don't even count on western media anymore.

Math typo

[sconeu]

Damn... I meant X < Y + Z.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[krazytekn0]

http://science.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=644803&cid=24585705

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[krazytekn0]

http://science.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=644803&cid=24585705

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Anonymous Coward]

Russia was helping the rebels who had started a series of attacks in Georgia proper, including mortar attacks and an IED against police. How long was Georgia supposed to allow the rebels to employ snipers and other open insurgency against them? Just because the Russians were encouraging and helping the rebels doesn't mean they should just sit and take it. Although because the Russians were helping, it means their only real option was to sit and take it, as this has proved an utter disaster as the Red Bear restart their imperial conquests.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[krazytekn0]

I love it insightful! How bout +1 knee-jerk without noticing comment about typo http://science.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=644803&cid=24585705

Higher Orbit?

[camperdave]

Due to the desire of the US to use the space shuttle to service the ISS, it was placed in a much lower orbit then would otherwise have been the case. Certainly it was much lower then most interested parties wanted.

Now that the shuttles are no longer being used, how feasible would it be to boost the ISS into a higher, less degrading orbit?

By 2010 maybe we can hitch a ride with China

[punterjoe]

...or one of the other nations developing a space program while we in the US devolve ours. ;)

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Anonymous Coward]

Really crappy aim?

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Anonymous Coward]

The Russians are very closely aligned with the rebels in South Ossetia (the Russians sign most of their paychecks). They used the rebels to provoke Georgia into attacking (which they did because their leader thought the US would back them up).

So Georgia attacks first, and Russia gets to attack back while looking like the good guys.

Meanwhile, the rest of the world is not willing to risk too much to defend Georgia. Although Europe is more willing to do so than the US because of the pipeline going through Georgia.

The situation is very complex, with lots of ego on both sides.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[sm62704]

Ok, I haven't read all of the comments yet so there's a chance I may be rudundant (but I doubt it). My questiosn is, why is war between Russia and Georgia any of our damned business, anyway?

How would we feel if we attacked Mexico and Russia butted in? It seems Sen. Bill "ha ha" Nelson and the rest of his co-conspirators in the Senate and Congress needs to butt out of Russia's and Georgia's business.

If NATO or the UN steps in then that's different, but afaik they haven't.

I'm sick of my country playing the world's policeman.

Re:your idea of democracy is a guy who wins with 9

[BLAG-blast]

No! In a "real" democracy, the guy with 49% beats the guy 51%.

sounds like bullshit show elections to me.

More or less BS sounding show elections than the guy winning with 49%....?

Invasion?

[insomniac8400]

Russia acted as we should have acted. They stopped Georgia from massacring the country of South Ossetia. Please someone fix the title.

Re:Invasion?

[Anonymous Coward]

Your propaganda is awful.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Anonymous Coward]

"WE should apologize for egging Georgia on."

There is no "I" in "WE" buddy.

Bill Gibson figured this out

[Gilmoure]

Didn't William Gibson write about this in Red Star, Winter Orbit

Bah!

[wcrowe]

Maintaining access to the space station? Bah! That would require planning. Planning is for sissies. We're 'Mericans, dammit!

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Tubal-Cain]

<devil'sadvocate>He admits hit numbers were wrong. We get it. But him being wrong doesn't necessarily mean that yours were right. </devil'sadvocate>

Yes, you are wrong.

[AxeTheMax]

You're right, in that you are completely wrong! And your summary should be taken with a very big grain of salt. Your summary;

1. confuses the non proliferation treaty (an international treaty) with an act passed by the US alone,
2. confuses the 'international community' with the United States,
3. seems to assume that Russia needs US permission to launch its own space vehicles.

Are you sure you're not the US department of State?

Re:Yes, you are wrong.

[patrikor_007]

Read the parent and the Summary again. You seem to have missed something.

1. They're actually referring to a US law, the Iran NonProliferaction Act, not the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. This law, without an exception such is currently in effect, would keep the US from paying for passage on Soyuz vehicles.
2. This has less to do with the international community as a whole and more to do with who the US wants to do business with.
3. The parent stated clearly that Russia's authority to launch their own vehicles is not in question. What will be in question is US lawful authority to pay for passage on these vehicles.

Re:Yes, you are wrong.

[AxeTheMax]

Well, I've read the parent post to mine, again. I even followed it using the parent button. I haven't missed anything, except that I forgot that 'summary' is used to refer to an intro to a slashdot article - I used it to refer to the parent post. BTW, the parent post is that by MozeeToby.

Re:Yes, you are wrong.

[patrikor_007]

right you are. my apologies. it is i who have missed something; i somehow was looking at the wrong parent :)

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[TikiTDO]

Where do you get this six people number? I've heard everything from Georgia killing hundreds to thousands, but I can honestly say I haven't heard this magical six.

The Wikipedia time-line places the initial civilian casualties due to Georgian assault at somewhere between 1600 (Ossetia's numbers) and 100 (Georgia's numbers), which leads me to think the real numbers are around 850.

Granted, the Russians are not innocent fluffy bunnies here. Clearly they've done their own share of stupidity in this conflict, but I think Russia's claim of Western media bias checks out if you don't even know the civilian casualties GEORGIA reported.

Also, if Russia really planned some sort of attacks, do you really think there would be two military efforts instead of twenty that took the country in a similar fashion to what US did in Iraq?

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Bruha]

I'd love to know where you get your intelligence.

Oh you're taking Russia's word that they were only responding to Georgian aggression. Great thinking there buddy.

Russia will occupy these two provinces and suddenly there will be new breakaway regions adjacent to these. Russia will rinse and repeat, while the west begin a process of appeasement or hollow diplomatic actions and Russia will eventually forcefully integrate Georgia back into the fold.

Yeah our commitment to democracy goes only so far.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Anonymous Coward]

Who let this moron in?

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[krazytekn0]

did you read the name? or any of the names? but good points

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[krazytekn0]

Europe hasn't done anything, other then a "hey Russia we might have to slap your wrist for this" and a "hooray Russia for saying you stopped killing the Georgians"

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Anonymous Coward]

I guess you don't have any Russian ancestors who immigrated to the United States. That'd explain why you feel that the United States shouldn't be involved.

If the U.S. attacked Mexico, Russia would get involved if it had reason to. For example if Mexico and Russia were trading partners. Or there were a lot of Mexican or US immigrants in Moscow. Of course the latter is absurd since no Mexican or American is stupid enough to move to Russia.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[gplus]

Yes, and we shouldn't try to make Georgia a NATO country. I saw a headline today: "French diplomat: The Georgian president is insane!"

If Georgia want to be the new Serbia, we shouldn't be best buddies with them. If they were in NATO they could f*cking provoke the start of WW3.

Let's reframe the question

[miletus]

something like "how will ramming NATO up Russia's ass affect the ISS?". Oh, right, that might suggest that U.S. policy is not based on pure, moral high-mindedness.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[tomz16]

it should have no effect on our relations. WE should apologize for egging Georgia on./ Those cowards staged a missile attack on a city in the middle of the fucking night. After 10+ years of peace. fuck Georgia, they got what they deserved.

EXACTLY! I've been shocked by the abysmal coverage we've been getting from the major news outlets in the US! I felt sorry for the Georgians until I did some of my own research.

This is a simple story FULL of douchebaggery on all sides...

Background:
- Russia has bad bad bad history with Georgians

- The South Ossetians have wanted to split from Georgia for 10+ years now via several democratic votes, and identify themselves with the Russians (use the same currency, etc.).

- Russia is sympathetic to South Ossetia, and again, HATES GEORGIA.

- Russia has tactical incentive to stop Georgia from joining/bringing NATO into Russia's backyard. They are looking for an excuse to mess Georgia's shit up, and it's no secret.

- Russia has been flexing its war muscle for the past year or two after having run into some petro dollars.

- Georgia doesn't want to let South Ossetia break away, and there has been sporadic fighting in the region related to this fact.

- AGAIN, Russians hate hate hate the Georgians, and are kind of partial to the South Ossetians.

What happened:

- Georgia KNOWS that Russia is amassing troops on the border (big time), and is just looking for an excuse.

- Georgia KNOWS that Russian peacekeepers are in South Ossetia.

- Georgia is counting on the fact that its western ties will keep Russia out... maybe even hoping that we will intervene on their behalf if they start shit.

- Georgia sucker punches South Ossetia in the middle of the night with heavy weaponry (probably supplied by us or our allies). Kills 1500+ civilians, and about a dozen Russian Peacekeepers. (keep in mind that 1,500 civilians is a significant percentage of all South Ossetians, making this a borderline genocidal act)

- Georgia acts all surprised when Russia completely tank fucks them the next day. They act even more surprised when Russia doesn't stop at repelling their attack on South Ossetia and keeps messing their junk up.

- The USA airlifts Georgian troops from Iraq into the theater of combat to fight AGAINST the Russians (SERIOUSLY! WTF GUYS? Let's mind our own business. If you were a Russian, how would you feel about the USA right now?)

and the media reports "Russia invades Georgia"

Bullshit.

The worst part is that if Georgia had actually made it into NATO, we could have very well gotten ourselves tangled up in WWIII here.

p.S. if you need it in pictures :

here

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Anonymous Coward]

Georgia killed 6 people... Russia has killed thousands of Georgians.

Saccharin killed some rats... guns killed lots and lots and lots of people.

Re:your idea of democracy is a guy who wins with 9

[patrik]

We all signed on to the same game: that is a representative democracy, the candidates know the rules and they know they go for electoral votes and not popular votes. Bush was the last person I wanted to see in office, but it's stupid to say it was invalid because you can't use the correct metric.

There were other issues that occurred in the US elections that make them suspect, but that does not excuse irregularities (especially much larger ones) in other people's elections.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[mea37]

Consistant foreign policy would be nice, yes.

But as long as you're trying to put things in first-person perspective, how would you expect the U.S. to respond if one or more states were to suddenly declare independence?

"Ok, no worries about the federal money and infrastructure build-up from which you've benefitted. We'll just relocate any strategic military assets we might have placed within your borders." I doubt it. More likely, a civil war.

Any "democratic" government probably ought to have a specific procedure for secession. Absent that, any attempt to break away from ones parent country has always been, and will always be, a morally grey area. While the U.S. certainly has benefited from, and engaged in the role of being, foreign aid to one side in a civil war, that doesn't make it right in the general case.

I'm not convinced either side (Georgia or Russia) is taking the "high road". I also don't claim to have the historical -- or even current event -- perspective to weigh all the factors in the rights-and-wrongs of a border dispute. Given the one-sided nature of most of the posts here, I'd wager most of the posters are in that same ill-informed boat.

My two cents: By default, I assume national sovereignty. If a population wants to secede, I generally consider it an internal affair; and just because the local population expresses a wish to be separate, that doesn't automatically make it so from a sound international standpoint.

But were there human rights violations, war crimes, etc. going on between Georgia and Southern Ossetia? That would certainly weaken any sovereignty claims... Lacking those things, what were peacekeepers doing on Georgian soil in the first place? Did Georgia accept their presence, or were they essentially an occupying force?

If I put my troops in harms way, can I really claim the right to retalliate when they get hurt? Can Russia draw a strategic connection between bombing near the Geogian capital (something like 30 miles out of their way) and protecting those in Southern Ossetia?

Simply too many questions to justify all the "Country X is good and Country Y is evil" rhetoric around here.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[flyingsquid]

also of note is the fact, that georgia borders chechnya where lots of russian troops are waiting for any action.

Keep in mind that Russia attacked on two fronts: one in South Ossetia, and one in Abkhazia, and it took place on land, on air, at sea, and electronically. From a tactical standpoint, the electronic warfare campaign probably didn't do much, Georgia isn't heavily wired like other countries. What is unsettling is that, according to a New York Times piece, the information attacks began weeks before the actual hostilities. It's clear that the Russians were just waiting for an excuse to go into Georgia.

Did Georgia behave irresponsibly? Sure. But Russia's response- launching a second front in Abkhazia, driving deep into Georgia and cutting the country in half by occupying Gori, bombing the airport in Tblisi, and hitting civilian targets (intentionally or not)- is disproportionate. It would be as if you challenged someone to a fistfight and then he beat you with a baseball bat so badly you ended up in the hospital, and kept beating you after you asked for mercy. And it's one thing when a tiny nation of 30 million does something irresponsible, but Russia is a major economic and military power. What's reallydisturbing about Russia's behavior in Georgia is that it isn't an exception, it's part of a pattern. Look at what we've seen recently: poisoning of a dissident with radioactive Polonium, the media put under strict government control, political dissent largely crushed, the poisoning of an opposition candidate in the Ukraine with dioxin, and now a major military offensive into Georgia. Of course, the way that the Bush Administration has behaved in recent years- suspending the rule of law, 'regime change', domestic spying, and torture- means that America isn't in much of a position to lecture other countries on how to behave. On the other hand, America's international policy is almost guaranteed to improve in November, whereas there is no indication that Putin is surrendering his grasp on power anytime soon.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[arth1]

My questiosn is, why is war between Russia and Georgia any of our damned business, anyway?

As always, oil.
The big BTC (Baku-Tblisi-Ceyhan) pipeline is a way to get oil to the West without dealing with Russians, and the pipeline is 13% owned by US interests.

Plus, of course, Russians are the traditional enemy, which the US is against, no matter what. Remember how we protested so heavily against the invasion in Afghanistan, and supported the poor oppressed Taliban in their noble fight against the godless commies? No? People tend to forget...

how about the x-38 instead?

[Anonymous Coward]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X-38_Crew_Return_Vehicle

Time to revive a little autonomy?

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Anonymous Coward]

Presumably in exactly the same way Hamas only manages to kill 1 or 2 people, shelling sleeping Israeli cities on a regular basis.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Anonymous Coward]

> Did Georgia behave irresponsibly?

So murdering 2,000 innocent people is just "behaving irresponsibly"? Tsk, tsk, what a naughty Georgian president! But what happens when 2,700 Americans are murdered? America goes apeshit, invades countries half way around the world, and causes 10's perhaps 100's of thousands of deaths.

After preventing thousands more murders, Russia attacked the Georgian army to teach them a lesson. They should have kept going until they got the Georgian president.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[FishWithAHammer]

The South Ossetians want to be an independent country. The voted overwhelmingly to do so in 2006. The Russians respect that. The Georgians and their allies (read: us) do not.

Do you really think the Russians are just going to leave?

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't think It's a problem for them. As soon as this settles down a bit, Saaka will probably be thrown out of presidential palace by his own people for the lost war (and suicidal move).

Regarding the oil/gas, without doubt a major motive for this war, I guess one of peace conditions will be that Gazprom builds and controls all future pipelines through Georgia. I suppose they could also blackmail BP to sell stakes in BTC (similar to Kamchatka case), otherwise Russians could easily interrupt it's operation very often, incurring losses for BP and other investors.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[defaria]

"Proportionate" wars yield stalemate by definition. Disproportionate wars are how wars are won!

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[dlevitan]

Keep in mind that Russia attacked on two fronts: one in South Ossetia, and one in Abkhazia

This is incorrect. Russia actually only attacked in South Osetia. The military actions in Abkhazia were (supposedly) only done by Abkhazians. Russia probably contributed air support but likely no troops.

What is unsettling is that, according to a New York Times piece, the information attacks began weeks before the actual hostilities. It's clear that the Russians were just waiting for an excuse to go into Georgia.

Russia and Georgia have been itching to fight for a long time. As long as the status quo remained, fighting in South Osetia was low key. The fact that Georgia decided to launch an offensive to retake South Osetia triggered this conflict, and I see no reasonable way to defend Georgia.

Did Georgia behave irresponsibly? Sure. But Russia's response- launching a second front in Abkhazia, driving deep into Georgia and cutting the country in half by occupying Gori, bombing the airport in Tblisi, and hitting civilian targets (intentionally or not)- is disproportionate.

If you defend Georgia in this conflict then you should also be against Kosovo's independence. The fact of the matter is that South Osetia and Abkhazia are ethnically different from Georgians and each wants independence. Saakashvili made it a point of his policies to reintegrate the two areas into Georgia against their wishes. Then, right at the start of the Olympics, he had his military move in and start shelling the capital. The Russian response has been to destroy the capacity of Georgia to engage in military actions in South Osetia. As in most wars, the civilian population is hurt. However, compared to what Russia could have done had it wanted to (carpet bombing of civilian areas), they seem to have done a good job of trying not to hurt the civilian population of Georgia. At last reports regarding Gori, the Russian military has been demilitarizing and letting all civilians go. While I don't support the Russian advance farther into Georgia, I can also completely understand why they want this to end once and for all.

In fact, I personally find Saakashvili to be the person to blame in this situation. Not only did he order the invasion of South Osetia, but he has consistenly used scaremongering as a tactic to draw support for Georgia. In fact, his own government has directly contradicted him in his claims that Russia is advancing on Tbilisi. If anyone has to go, it's him.

On the other hand, America's international policy is almost guaranteed to improve in November, whereas there is no indication that Putin is surrendering his grasp on power anytime soon.

Unlike with Bush though, Putin/Medvedev are held in high regard by a good majority of the population. Their actions have helped most average Russians from what I've seen and have brought Russia back from collapse. Whether or not all of their actions and policies have been good for the world or Russia, the majority of them have helped Russia and I seriously doubt they would be voted out even in a completely free election. As for the US, quite frankly, neither of the candidates is much better than Bush and I doubt that our standing in the world will change much.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Homer's Donuts]

This is more like US v Cuba rather than US v Mexico.

Putin is after control of natural gas. The fact that he is threatening to reabsorb a former Soviet satellite is just icing on the cake. Oh, does Bush look stupid? Sprinkles on top.

The Shuttle is not going anywhere

[PingXao]

The Ares replacement rocket isn't going to be ready until 2014 according to NASA, which means it won't really be ready until 2018 or so. I predict the space shuttle will fly until at least 2015 once we get a new president - Obama or McCain - who will undo Bush's decision to end the program by 2010. Congress will need to get on board and re-order NASA's marching orders, because funds to keep the shuttle flying will have to be taken, in part, from the Ares/Orion/Constellation program itself, possibly pushing it even further out until the 2020 - 2025 timeframe.

The shuttle is old, expensive, and not as safe as everyone thought it was going to be, but it does its job well and there's literally nothing quite like it. You can debate whether the costs of manned spaceflight are worth the return we get, but there's no way on Earth that the Congress and a real President are going to keep America grounded for half a decade or more while the Russians, the Japanese, the Europeans and possibly even the Chinese, continue to send men and women into space.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[GHynson]

America would do the same S^&*
if Texas broke from the union and then did a missle attack on New Mexico.

The flip side...

[Dzimas]

One could also argue that the American invasion of Iraq has jeopardized the Space Station even more.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[sm62704]

I guess you don't have any Russian ancestors who immigrated to the United States.

My anscestors were Irish, but you haven't heard me calling for war against England for their opression of the Irish.

Putin's a Bully

[tjstork]

What Georgia is really all about is Putin sending a signal to all the states bordering Russia that they could be next, and to also test the resolve of NATO in a public way that is safe for Russia.

It's obvious that the Russian invasion of Georgia was pre-planned and that they baited Georgia into doing what they do. Attacks of the scale the Russians have done take time to organize, and the Russian response was immediate. How else, one might ask, do the Russians suddenly appear not even a day after the crisis, with several hundred tanks and thousands of men, without first having had a plan.

Putin baited. Georgia foolishly took the bait and provided Putin an excuse to smash Georgia in such a way as to intimidate those NATO states that are actually bordering Russia, and those states that might join NATO (like the Ukraine).

Anyone thinking that this is about Russia defending its own people is a fool. I thought we'd learned from the Sudetenland that this sort of an argument is crap. This is an effort by Russia to bully the states on its borders, as they have been doing now for the last few years with things like turning off the gas, turning on the gas, issuing passports in bulk to people in one's own country...it's classic Soviet Era stuff.

AS far as the Space Station goes, well, the Shuttle is just going to have to keep flying until Ares is ready. That's it. The only reason the Shuttle is being grounded is because the Congress mandated panel did what Congress told it to do, and, the Congress can easily change those parameters to allow for new geopolitical realities. The shuttle will fly, it won't be safe, but, Alan Shephard rode a fricking ICBM during the cold war "built by the lowest bidder", and that's what space shuttles do.

What happens is this: USA continues shuttle, kicks the Russians out, probably keeps the Russian modules, and the NATO countries have a nice little space station.

Re:Putin's a Bully

[__aapego3562]

Why the fuck do we need NATO for? Have you people forgot why NATO was created anyway? When the cold war ended so should NATO. And if South Ossetia wants to be independent or if it want to join Russia it should...why? Because it has "the right" like Kosovo had. USA supported Kosovo indepedency...why don't they support South Ossetians now? Double standards?

What happens is this: USA continues shuttle, kicks the Russians out, probably keeps the Russian modules, and the NATO countries have a nice little space station.

Yeah right, with the money that USA gives for space program...They rather spend their money for their army and their "fight for democracy"...so who is the bully now?

Re:Putin's a Bully

[Andronicus]

Bless you, sir. That was a fine piece of analysis.

I would like to see some UN resolutions put forward in the Security Council by the US, just to see if Russia exercises her veto.

If that were to happen, it could provide a golden opportunity to reform the UN, or dismantle some of its major international missions (most of which have been proven time and again as ineffectual failures). Even Kofi Annan once admitted that pretty much the only lever of power at his disposal was talk.

I don't dislike some of the humanitarian missions the UN has taken up. But many other humanitarian missions are woefully inefficient and some have even made situations worse. Apart from this, the non-humanitarian side really just needs to go away forever. Nobody's fooling anyone, and of late it's only served to give a forum to tyrants.

Re:Putin's a Bully

[evilviper]

Why the fuck do we need NATO for?

So that France doesn't decide to nuke Spain / Italy / Algeria when a border dispute gets a little too hot for comfort...

Re:Putin's a Bully

[Anonymous Coward]

What happens is this: USA continues shuttle, kicks the Russians out, probably keeps the Russian modules, and the NATO countries have a nice little space station.

Haha, you forget that the space station is International and nobody can *kick* Russia from it.
But the problem is that US do not have transport to ISS. Which simply means USA will be kicked off and we will have a nice European + Russia space station ;)

Re:Putin's a Bully

[JAlexoi]

Attacks of the scale the Russians have done take time to organize...

FYI: North Caucasus has one of the highest troop density in Russia, so the scale is not surprising.

...first having had a plan...

I am pretty much sure that every good military commander has a plan for every occasion.
Let alone, tensions have been rising for 4 years now.

...intimidate those NATO states that are actually bordering Russia, and those states that might join NATO...
Anyone thinking that this is about Russia defending its own people is a fool.

Russians did this not to send a message to NATO, but to prove a point about Kosovo.
"You're allowed, so damn sure we will be allowd too."

kicks the Russians out

This one is hardly ever happening...

Re:Putin's a Bully

[__aapego3562]

Why the fuck do we need NATO for?

So that France doesn't decide to nuke Spain / Italy / Algeria when a border dispute gets a little too hot for comfort...

What kind of border dispute? Where do you live? France is a member of EU (as Italy and Spain) and will probably soon become a member of NATO. And I live near these countries and there was no border dispute probably since ww2.

Re:Putin's a Bully

[Anonymous Coward]

Err WRONG. The US can't control the Russian modules, they can't fabricate spares, the station is going to de-orbit if anyone of the two big partners bails.

The US won't take over the Russian modules.

NASA and the USSR managed to work together during the height of the cold war, they will work a way around this problem the same way. US won't continue the shuttle either, they are getting old, they need replacing. There's only three left - how much more attrition can the fleet/public take?

Re:Putin's a Bully

[evilviper]

What kind of border dispute?

Any kind.

there was no border dispute

It's called a hypothetical.

You are assuming that the world will forever stay as peaceful as it is today, which is a horrendous bet.

Re:Putin's a Bully

[__aapego3562]

What kind of border dispute?

Any kind.

there was no border dispute

It's called a hypothetical.

You are assuming that the world will forever stay as peaceful as it is today, which is a horrendous bet.

Well there were several crises with Nato member states during history and Nato did not intervene and it should have. So don't talk about world peace and everything else and how Nato is preserving it. Nato will help no member state, it is an outlived organization in the hand of few (probably one) states, serving their interest and nothing else. In the last 20 years Nato didn't do anything relevant to preserve world peace...so as I said it should be abolished. But Nato is indirectly supporting USA in it's aims towards Russia, that are, well making a lot of dispute and tensions not just between these to countries but between Russia and european countries as well. If this is your idea of Nato and preserving peace...well then I am not surprised...

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[ganjadude]

If you do not do what the international community wishes.... We will have to write you a very stern letter telling you how unhappy we are!

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[UncleTogie]

I'd like some clarification, please... You said:

This is incorrect. Russia actually only attacked in South Osetia.

but two sentences later, you said:

Russia probably contributed air support but likely no troops.

I'd consider "air support" to mean attacking, unless you meant support operations like C3....

Which did you mean?

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[cobrakai87]

Very well put. While I have to say that it is certainly not in the best interests of the USA to allow the continued invasion of Georgia, I certainly feel that the Russians had the right to do some retaliating. That being said, I think there is no need for the Russians to target civilians. Simply crush their military bases to show them who is in control. Also, while this is unconfirmed, Russia's supposed attacks on the oil lines into Turkey seems unnecessary, they are simply risking antagonizing the rest of Europe into actually doing something.

Bomb them, they have WMD

[Anonymous Coward]

Just bomb them. They have Weapons of Mass Destruction. On top of that we could bring about Real Democracy via Regime Change in Russia. But only use our Smart Bombs. After all, it is only the Government, not the People that is the problem. It would be sad to see Collateral Damage inside the Theatre. Hopefully we wont suffer from too many Inoperative Personel. But we wont know anyway since it would be Unpatriotic to show anything the White House deems as Unpatriotic. Besides, we can get all the Fair and Balanced News we need from the Embedded Journalists. This really could be the Mother of All Wars. I cant wait to watch the Shock and Awe at 8pm on 52 Channels.

After we Liberate Russia and declare Mission Accomplished, NASA can use their rockets. We can even watch the launch on the Internets by using the Googles. I just hope the Tubes dont break.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Tubal-Cain]

Oops.

Uhhhhh....

[DarthVain]

Fred the Astronaut: "Houston we have a problem."
Houston: "..."
Fred the Astronaut: "Houston?"
Houston: "..."
Fred the Astronaut: "..."
Houston: "..."
Fred the Astronaut: "$%@!"

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Anonymous Coward]

http://science.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=644803&cid=24585705

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Anonymous Coward]

and the media reports "Russia invades Georgia"

Bullshit.

And how would you call the situation of Russian army moving beyond the conflict zone and camping near Thbilisi? Peacekeeping?

Otherwise, your post really deserves the "5 Informative" score. Good to know someone in the US actually cares.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[dunkelfalke]

as someone who has done a couple of martial arts for a while, let me say you: a proprotionate fight can exist only in sports. if you are under a real threat for your life you'll do everything necessary to survive and to make sure that your opponent cannot continue his attacks.

there was no second russian front in abchasia by the russian army, only by abchasian separatists who were in fear that they'll going to be attacked next right after ossetians.

the occupation of gori and the bombings of international airport tbilisi (an ugly and dirty town btw, but i had a fiancee there once) are lies perpetuated by the georgian government. the journalists of the afp news agency already disproved these lies.

anyway, pretty much of what you said can be said about current georgia. saakashvili has one of his former comrades (who was more moderate and wanted a peaceful solution with south ossetia and abchasia) killed, the georgian media is also unter strict government control, political dissidents were beaten up by riot police at the demonstration last year and now a major military offensive into south ossetia.

and now saakashvili says about georgia being the last bastion of the western civilisation before the evil russian barbarians (and this is almost a citation of his speech yesterday).

Making a strategic joint venture with a

[Maimun]

semi-totalitarian state, i.e. Russia, was a huge mistake. The sooner the West realises the conceptual difference, the better. Losing the ISS is not the biggest possible tragedy - losing the new Cold War is.

Re:Making a strategic joint venture with a

[MightyMartian]

Oh for fucks sake, Russia is not the same beast as it was during the Soviet Era, but if the US and the other powers keep acting like it is, and start building missile silos where hammer-and-sickle flags used to fly, you may get your wish. The Russia of today, bad as it is, is much preferable to the USSR, or even to the Czarist regime (which, a few grand alliances aside, was always the great shadow cast over Central Europe).

Re:Making a strategic joint venture with a

[Urkki]

Well, the parent post said "semi-totalitarian", and therefore recognizes that Russia is not the same as USSR.

However, just looking at the history of Russia/USSR/Russia, it's the their job to prove they're not the same beast. But they're doing the opposite... With their opression of free press and with their heavy-handed tactics with their neighbors, they are seriously hinting that they indeed are the same beast.

But being the same is no big surprise, the surprise would have been if Russia had changed... And for a moment it looked like they might even pull it off, but right now it doesn't look good, no, not good at all.

Re:Making a strategic joint venture with a

[amorsen]

Having a bunch of unemployed rocket scientists roaming the world did not seem like an especially good idea at the time. We can just deorbit ISS if the cold war comes back in full force.

Now if the ISS was actually something important that the countries in the joint venture couldn't do without, you would have a point.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Anonymous Coward]

This just in... The Russians have agreed to Obama's request to stop. Kaine Gives Obama Credit for Russian Ceasefire

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Anonymous Coward]

Come on, thousands of killed Georgians? Where did you take this figure?

Georgia said Wednesday that 175 Georgians had died in five days of air and ground attacks that left homes in smoldering ruins.

And the creditability of even this figure (175) might be questioned considering that for the last 3 days every morning Georgians say that Russians are started to advance to Tbilisi and already took the city of Gori. And this only to say in the evening that no Russian troops were found in Gori.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Anonymous Coward]

How exactly did those rebels provoke the Georgian government into breaking an international treaty of which it was a signing party?

Understanding Russians Designs on Asia and Europe

[reporter]

Read the shocking essay titled "Welcome Back To the Great Game" and just published by the "Wall Street Journal" (WSJ).

The author insightfully wrote, "We could walk away from [savage Russian brutality against Western nations], hoping for things to cool off, and let the Russians impose sway over the lower Caucasus for now. But no one will fail to notice our weakness. If we don't draw the line here, it doesn't get easier down the road with any other border or country. We would be risking the future of Afghanistan, and the stability of Iraq, on the good will of Moscow and the mullahs in Tehran. This is how the game of grand strategy is played, whether we like it or not."

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe Georgia shouldnt have been so eager to jump in and start killing Iraqis with their batty boys in the USSA. Paybacks a bitch.

Only on /. ...

[toby]

Would that be considered more newsworthy than the fact that over 1000 civilians died in the first attack. :(

Re:Only on /. ...

[khallow]

In a similar fashion, I'm sure there's a much more important problem you can impotently whine about. To be honest, the possibility of a long term collapse in Russia/US/EU space cooperation may well be more important and newsworthy than thousands of civilian deaths in Georgia.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Anonymous Coward]

thank you

Maybe it's a blessing

[Anonymous Coward]

Not the Georgian conflict - that's a tragedy. But I've been conviced for a long time that there is nothing valuable going on with the ISS. If we lost our transport capability post-Shuttle, then maybe we'd have a good excuse for backing out of comittments to the ESA.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm sorry but where did you take that Russians "hate hate hate" Georgians? That's absolutely not true. It's a pity that we came to this conflict. We lived peacefully together for many years. But Russia has pledged to protect Ossetians. If Russia did not protect South Ossetia then North Ossetia would be pretty much pissed off. North Ossetians were already pretty angry after the Beslan tragedy. The Russia just had to respond to show that it is willing and able to protect its citizens. What's worth is the state that is not able to?

Russian peace keepers

[toddhisattva]

Russian peace keepers

Russia has not had peace keepers since the Mongols "pacified" them!

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[orasio]

The fact that you are writing that states that they have a great respect for the value of human life.
In the cold war, the URSS had enough nukes to add glass parks in every US city. If they didn't care for human life, they would have taken the chances they had. The guy making the decision would not be affected, anyway.
And they had more territory, so in an all out nuclear war, realistically they would end up losing less than the US. Specially if you take into account that their regime would allow them to keep more control over their own people, a nuclear scenario could be seen as a win, if you didn't care about killing millions of people.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Anonymous Coward]

Its simply amazing that given the history of soviet behavior in the post ww2 period that any of you dopes believe in anything the Russians say especially the Russian shills here.

    But its not surprising, your a bunch of Slashtards who dont know shit, have soft hands and skin only know how to work a keyboard. You have never had to do anything beyond whine about your working conditions of which at its worst means your using Windows, god forbid.

Russia is a country run by a mafia, its that simple and anything they say or do is a lie or a hostile action with nothing but the intention of expanding their form of the shakedown, that what they do and thats who they are and the proof is in their history.

      Why, because they cant reason beyond thuggery and when you look at the developments that propelled the human condition forward, they have made little contribution, probably because most russians have been demoralized over the last century or more by the collectivist and confiscationist slavery they have been subjected to and that some have willingly died for or fostered, enforced. Its their own fault

    If after 60 plus years of history you fucking dopes dont see that, you deserve to greet them as your new overlords and for some of you that may be the case, I pity you fools, your futures have been stolen and squandered by the hate, greed and incompetence of your soviet masters, the oligarchs and the longer you tow the line, the longer you will be condemned to repeat all the history that placed you exactly where you are now on this very day on the great treadmill of human idiocy

      I say its time to put the bear down, he has proven himself dishonest and at times downright evil and there is no room for him anymore, he is a human stain.

Caboose Says:

[jameskojiro]

Kennedy Space Center is in Florida, Johnson Space Center is in Alabama, Georgia is between Florida and Alabama. There will be problems with moving things back and forth.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[sesshomaru]

Good things the Georgians are such soft, fluffy people. Why they're as innocent as babes...

Re:your idea of democracy is a guy who wins with 9

[Kenrod]

You seem to have a bizarre objection to the use of the electoral college vs. popular vote. The use of the electoral college was a compromise with less populous states to give them slightly more power than populous states to help them avoid being pushed around. The real power behind this idea is in the Senate, where every state has two votes. The power in presidential elections is watered down quite a bit, but it is still there.

But you're obviously only complaining because your guy lost.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Atilla]

if you're referring to South Ossetia and Abkhazia, I doubt they will be "occupied" by Russia, since the majority of their local population already holds Russian passports. If you read up the history of the two provinces, you will find that they _chose_ to break away from Georgia back in the 90's for various reasons. Now, here in the West, they're called "separatists."

krazytekn0, sorry, I did not see your other post... damn slashdot comment system.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Jerry Beasters]

They attacked. Georgia broke no treaty, as it had already been broken.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Dramacrat]

How would I call it? Common fucking sense.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Jerry Beasters]

Doesn't change the fact that they are still in Georgia, not Russia.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Anonymous Coward]

Our commitment to continuing the human race ranks a little bit higher on the ladder then democracy.

War with Russia = Mutually Assured Destruction

DUH!

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Jerry Beasters]

"The South Ossetians have wanted to split from Georgia for 10+ years now via several democratic votes, and identify themselves with the Russians (" People keep saying this...and? We in the U.S. had a civil war over some states that tried to leave our Union. Sure, they had the right to try, but as American land the federal government had every right to go to war with them to stop it. Georgia has every right to keep their land, by war if necessary.

Actually China would most likely not use a Veto

[Britz]

Because China has a strong "non interference with internal issues" foreign policy doctrine and also views international borders to be pretty much indisputable. This has a lot to do with Tibet. Maybe they wouldn't vote in favour of an Anti-Russian-Resolution, but they would never veto it.

Brazil and India don't matter in the UNSC. Everyone wants to reform the UN to change some of that, but it didn't happen yet.

Whatever Georgians did seems to be foolish, but there must be more behind it. For once there is the pipeline issue and the Russian-US tension over influence in that region especially because of the oil. Apart from the killings by Georgians Russia invaded Georgia and also ethincally cleansed Southern Ossetia from the last remaining Georgian settlements as well as helped destroy the last Georgian foothold in Abkhazia. So the Russians are at least even in doing evil stuff. They also bombed cities all over Georgia and blocked their port. And they are still moving within Georgia. This is not over yet.
Russia is putting their foot down and many nations are watching if and how the EU and the US react. So far it didn't look very promising.

But for all the "back to the cold war" talk I think while we should very strongly confront Russia about Georgia some channels should remain open. And the ISS could be one of them.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Helios919]

Has the death of the 1500+ civilians been carefully and independently verified & confirmed as having been directly caused by the georgians? I'd like to think that the georgian president was not dumb enough to blindly fire into the region at the very least so as to not jeopardize his relationship with the west and with his term (& with the georgian history books).

The US airlifting georgian trops was completely justified. Georgia was a key ally in Iraq and facing an invasion from Russia into a sovereign and non-aggressive (against other sovereign states, unlike Iraq) that is Georgia, the US would have fucked itself diplomatically had it not obliged to georgia's formal request.

I find it funny when I see people (80% of which are russians) justifying Russia's invasion by which means it plays god and murders innocent georgians (the killing of innocent s. ossetians does not justify the killing of innocent georgians), and destruction of georgian economic infrastructure. And it continues as we speak (eg. currently russia has broken the truce and is ravaging the city of Gori in Georgia. Most unfortunate is the fact that the west cant do anything tangible to punish russaia short of invading it, because Russia is not a normal country.

It need not be stated that the russians are going to suffer from this over the long-term, while Putin & friends will benefit. Unsuprisingly, the russians seem to be very happy about the state of things. Unfortunately for them, many people outside of Russia aren't, being that Russia has a sizeable army and a working nuclear arm stockpile.

Russia's actions over the past week have justified the US and Europe's focus on expanding and improving their NATO infrastructure over the past few years. While I previously was under the belief that the west was overdoing it, I have now understood that Russia is in effect dangerous to the stability of the western world and must be contained in which ever way possible.

And yes, I do agree that Georgia is not completely innocent. But again, this does not in any way justify what Russia has done and has been doing in that region for the last decade.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[serialdogma]

They only became a part of Georgia in 1921 under the Soviet Union. Pretty much since the fall of the USSR and Georgian independence the South Ossetians have expressed their wish though referendums (in 1992 and 1998) and a full-blown war in 1992 to seek independence from Georgia and reunite with North Ossetia which is currently a part of the Russian Republic of North Ossetia-Alania.
They only fell into Georgia proper with end of the Soviet autonomous oblast of South Ossetia in 1990. There was only two years that they had been in Georgia proper before the start of their fight for independence from Georgia.
Really the border should of been redrawn with Georgia independence in late 1991.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Anonymous Coward]

Somebody (not parent) needs to brush up on their geography a little bit. Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Center are in Florida, not Georgia...

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[oni]

you know, I'm starting to really think you're right. Which is worse for the civilian population, 100 years of occupation and animosity where civilians look the other way about that house down the street that everybody knows is being used by insurgents, after all, it's none of my business ...or nuking hiroshima and nagasaki, causing every civilian to say, "FUCK THIS" and absolutely, unequivocally give up and **cooperate** with rebuilding, stop tolerating insurgents in their midst, and resulting in them becoming one of the strongest and most populous countries in the world.

What's the difference between germany/japan and iraq? The behavior of civilians.

Johnson Space Center is in Houston, TX..

[Ellis D. Tripp]

The one in Hunstville, Alabama is Marshall Space Flight Center:

http://www.nasa.gov/centers/marshall/home/index.html

Re:your idea of democracy is a guy who wins with 9

[Anonymous Coward]

"No! In a "real" democracy, the guy with 49% beats the guy 51%."

That goes double for me!

Albert Gore, the most beloved of candidates was forced to depend on Florida for our victory, that land of a land where most people came from somewhere else, old Jews butterfly ballot for Pat Robertson and where an occasional person would set themselves on fire by smoking and pumping gas into their car at the same time.

Now if Bush had not conned the Homies of our beloved Albert to vote Republican in Tennessee, Iraq would be a sovereign nation today unoccupied by oil stealers (though since Al DID lose, I'm still waiting for my share o light sweet crude).

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[megaditto]

Its simply amazing that given the history of soviet behavior in the post ww2 period that any of you dopes believe in anything the Russians say especially the Russian shills here.

So they did invade a few countries and overthrew a few democratically elected governments, but so what? I mean, which country wouldn't do the exactly same thing if given a chance?

Life is not fair, but in this world you either fuck with people, or they fuck with you.

You should stop bitching and join the club of all the other weak countries shafted by the Roman Empire, the British Empire, the French Empire, the Russian Empire, and the United States (who invaded some 30+ countries since 1946)...

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Kesha]

Reuters video of Georgian troops firing Grad rockets at Tskhinvali: http://www.reuters.com/news/video?videoId=88607&videoChannel=1

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Jorophose]

And twenty years later, the Russian Empire is formed once again.

Calling all bets, come on boys lay the cash!

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Jorophose]

(SERIOUSLY! WTF GUYS? Let's mind our own business. If you were a Russian, how would you feel about the USA right now?)

If you were a Georgian how would you feel when you knew Russia had an army amassed just outside the border ready to mess your shit up?

South Ossetia was attacking the rest of Georgia. Chechnya did the same. When Chechnya wanted independance the Russias moved in with all their force and did the typical russian-army move. When Georgia doesn't want to lose a part of its country to an oppressor funding domestic terrorism, Russia is somehow good for moving in and attacking the country IN TOTALLY UNRELATED PROVINCES??

This is an idiot's war but damnit, it's like Ontario would demand to be part of the US, and for 10 years launch attacks across Canada, then finally when the rest of Canada turns against it to shut it up the US comes in to "liberate it" and everybody lets them do that.

(And now I've got to go sit in my corner and cry about how I'm too good at predicting the future...)

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Anonymous Coward]

And somebody else not only needs to brush up not only on *their* politics and current events. Russia is in control of Baikonur Cosmodrome, where Soyuz and Progress missions are launched. When the Shuttle is retired, there will be a period of a few years before another American spacecraft can reach the ISS. So during that period, NASA had planned on sending American astronauts to the ISS by way of Soyuz. That's only allowed by an exemption in the INPA. And Congress might be more wary of renewing it after this attack/peacekeeping operation.

The Shuttle, Retire?

[Andronicus]

I know the program is supposed to end in 2010. If, however, I had $1 million, I would wager that the shuttle will continue in at least some fashion until the U.S. can fly its intended replacement vehicle. Perhaps that means only a once or twice per year ISS servicing mission.

I will also make a side-bet (if I had another $1 million) that the arrival and placement into regular service of said vehicle won't come until after 2015.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Anonymous Coward]

And somebody else and not only needs to not only brush up on not only their grammar and sentence style, but not only their english language education.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[RicktheBrick]

You believe the Russian President or any of their officials. They will tell the world anything to justify their aggression. At least read the Georgian's side http://georgiamfa.blogspot.com/2008/08/q-georgian-genocide.html before making statements. Truth is always the first casualty of war. Unless their statements are verified by independent observers they can not be accepted as being true.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Homer's Donuts]

Our commitment to continuing the human race ranks a little bit higher on the ladder then democracy.

War with Russia = Mutually Assured Destruction

DUH!

Guess we are going to find out.

Obama v. McCain

Obama calls for ceasefire, gets it.
McCain calls for peacekeeping force,also gets it.

http://www.aim.org/don-irvine-blog/kaine-gives-obama-credit-for-russian-ceasefire/ http://www.johnmccain.com/mccainreport/Read.aspx?guid=d33859f1-7f2e-4eef-8ce0-c2f3eb9aa05a

So far, dead even.

Apparently Russia has already given the ceasefire a chance and it didn't work so well for them. President Bush announced a stab at McCain's plan of a peacekeeping force.

My friends in the blogosphere tell me that Ivan will not be able to resist taking shots at those cute Air Force and Navy girls and boys. So we will have "War with Russia".

When we have the "War with Russia" and it results in "Mutually Assured Destruction" I will vote for whatever Obama/Putin/Democrat/Socialist is available. I will also STFU if I am not yet dead.

However, if the war does not result in "Mutually Assured Destruction" I would expect you to think long and hard about those who have sacrificed their lives for your freedom. I would also castigate you to not cast another ballot until you understand the responsibilities of liberty.

No war, we both vote for Ron Paul.

Is it really worth giving up a democratic republic to avoid Mutually Assured Destruction?

Re:Since my wife works at NASA...yeah...this matte

[bitrex]

If the chance of Russia gaining sole access to the ISS actually becomes plausible, it would be best to deorbit the thing.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Anonymous Coward]

In Germany, they came first for the Communists, And I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Communist;

And then they came for the trade unionists, And I didn't speak up because I wasn't a trade unionist;

And then they came for the Jews, And I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Jew;

And then . . . they came for me . . . And by that time there was no one left to speak up.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Anonymous Coward]

This is an idiot's war but damnit, it's like Ontario would demand to be part of the US, and for 10 years launch attacks across Canada, then finally when the rest of Canada turns against it to shut it up the US comes in to "liberate it" and everybody lets them do that.

well NO actually. When the USSR broke up ossetia declared independence as did georgia and many other countries, unfortunately georgia decided that they would ignore this and simply claim ossetia for itself regardless of what the people there thought (basically an invasion). Ever since georgia invaded, south ossetia has been fighting for the same freedom that georgia got but sadly the only people recognising this has been the russians. The evil here is most definitely georgia, ossetia is NOT part of georgia, georgia have been trying to make it part of georgia.

Go Russia!

[Anonymous Coward]

It was stupid President Bush plan trying to build a missile defense plan. Now he could not do anything except humanitarian aid. That is why it now wants to punish Russia... War in Iraq is even worst, so don't blame Russia. Of course both countries are stupid..

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Homer's Donuts]

In Germany, they came first for the Communists, And I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Communist;

And then they came for the trade unionists, And I didn't speak up because I wasn't a trade unionist;

And then they came for the Jews, And I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Jew;

And then . . . they came for me . . . And by that time there was no one left to speak up.

And then they came for the Anonymous coward ... But no one knew who he was...

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Anonymous Coward]

I'd like to point out that is what Russia said and has not been verified as Russia refuses to allow outside verification. It was also claimed to be over 2000 then they suddenly dropped it to 1600

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[GargamelSpaceman]

At first glance,this is my theory:

I think Russia has designs on all the little 2 bit countries between the caspian and black? seas. Georgia is only the first to fall.

Russia wants to monopolize central asian oil. They hate that there is under construction a pipeline through Turkey that bypasses them.

Before all this, Russia offered Russian passports to South Osstians which most accepted. This allows the Russians to claim they are defending Russians.

My crackpot theory is that it was Iranian state sponsored operatives operating in South Osstia ( which is ethnically Iranian ) that provoked Georgia into invading South Osstia in order to give the Russians an excuse to take over Georgia.

Iran wants to befriend Russia since that would provide the necessary protection for them to thumb their nose at the rest of the world in many ways including the development of a nuclear arsenal.

Iran is building an undersea pipeline to India and have other customers besides the West which is unreliable since it frequently imposes sanctions against Iran. The Iranians are probably willing to forego such a low value market as the west and don't mind giving the Russians control to the pipeline route through the transcaucusus, in exchange for the benefit of coming under the Russian umbrella of protection.

Fast forward 5-10 years into the future. Peak oil is upon us.

This protection, and the development of nukes that can destroy Israel riding on missile technology learned from the Russians may embolden the Iranians to take over Iraq as the US withdraws in the coming years. Russia will approve of this oil coming under the control of the Russo-Iranian alliance.

Would we really risk stopping the Iranians from taking over Iraq, especially if the Iraqis ( at least in the south ) largely approved of the takeover, if it would likely mean Israel gets nuked and we anger the Russians into joining the conflict?

When Saudi Arabia ( which would be next ) is attacked, would we fight then?

Maybe Iraq joins the alliance voluntarily and the now economially diversified Iranians supply the weapons which Russia doesn't want to take the heat for doing ( they only supply the expertise to the Iranians who in return helpfully drive oil prices through the roof with their antics keeping Russian coffers filled to the brim ). Who knows.

We gotta pull the rug out from under this sort of crap by developing cheaper alternatives for energy.

Maybe we end up buying the Russo-Iranian ( and annexed arabian ) oil for a while, paying for their military build-up. As oil becomes more expensive than the alternatives, they decide to use their military ( all they have left ) to take other forms of wealth by force.

Jesus Returns.

As the world is fighting, aliens from Tau-Ceti land in flying casserole dishes and start shooting people with disintegrator guns. Jesus is killed by one of the aliens as it exits his spaceKraft, squishing him under the metal door. Ironically, the Tau-Cetians resemble Flying Spaghetti Monsters.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Anonymous Coward]

If the United States government supports Georgia, we should rescind our Declaration of Independence and rejoin the British Empire.

You're voting for Obama too?

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Falconhell]

True enough McGrew, but Irish Americans happily supported terrorism financially right up until 9/11-It was no coincidence that after that the IRA gave up-when their US funding stopped. As usual, terrorism was OK with America as long as it was somewhere else.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Anonymous Coward]

What is unsettling is that, according to a New York Times piece, the information attacks began weeks before the actual hostilities. It's clear that the Russians were just waiting for an excuse to go into Georgia.

To get the opponent to launch military campaign against another party, having Russian peacekeeping forces, deployed to prevent events exactly like that. Pretty good excuse, don't you think?

Did Georgia behave irresponsibly? Sure. But Russia's response- launching a second front in Abkhazia, driving deep into Georgia and cutting the country in half by occupying Gori, bombing the airport in Tblisi, and hitting civilian targets (intentionally or not)- is disproportionate.

Georgia built up its military power for a number of years; it's disproportionally beefed up - if such terms make any sense at all. So, to prevent Georgia to regroup and start immediately another campaign, the military forces should be weakened. Face it, Georgia is much more powerful than Ossetia, and fighting only on Ossetia soil wouldn't change the root cause. That's why airforces should be grounded (hence airfields bombing), that's why there are attacks on the Georgian (not Ossetian) territory. Tbilisi airport, unfortunately, can be directly used by military. However, if there was intent to hit civilian targets (didn't Georgia do just that in Tshinvali?), Russia could likely occupy Tbilisi.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Anonymous Coward]

Information can be found by googling for South Ossetia timeline. This info comes from the BBC:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/country_profiles/1102575.stm

Quick summary, Russian troops have been acting as peacekeepers in South Ossetia since 1989. Russian troops have been acting as peacekeepers in Abkhazia as part of a negotiated deal back in 1994.

Georgia has been suppressing other ethnicities independence movements since before Georgia got it's independence.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[JAlexoi]

the media put under strict government control

To be fair, only TV is under strict control, other types of press is quite free.
And you'd be surprised, there are some dictators inside Russia. Big country, big problems....

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[JAlexoi]

As it's a bit closer to me, I see that mostly Russians want a STABLE politician. I mean they even said that a guy that is more anti-russian is preferable(because they WOULD know what to expect of him)...

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Anonymous Coward]

Thank you very much for showing who hates whom. Your statements are plain and sheer xenophobia.

Re:Understanding Russians Designs on Asia and Euro

[Anonymous Coward]

We would be risking the future of Afghanistan, and the stability of Iraq

Hehe. Stability of Iraq.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Anonymous Coward]

Did you get these numbers from a bubble gum machine?

Did your get *your* numbers from Russian propaganda machine?

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Anonymous Coward]

And everyone knows that wikipedia is always right! I always trust a mob to get my information straight! Also DID NO ONE NOTICE THAT HE TOOK BACK HIS COMMENT BEFORE ANY OF YOU POSTED YOUR PISSED OFF RESPONSES!

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Elldallan]

The point is not what US would do if 2000 americans were murdered but what US would do if say 2000 mexicans got killed. Would US still go apeshit, I don't think so.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Teriblows]

russia supported a low level war for years now. there was no peace. who are you kidding. russia doesn't care about free break away states. look at Chechnya. its all about their own interests and you are a convenient idiot as they used to call apologists for the ussr, i guess they still exist for todays russia.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Mattsson]

But who cares about civilians, right?

They're "collateral damage". =P

Honestly, any army that can't stick to only killing military targets should be disbanded for ineptitude and it's leaders thrown into jail for murder.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Elldallan]

Having respect for human lives and not wanting to destroy the whole world yourself included are two quite different although distantly related things.

Your assumptions about an eventual nuclear war is quite flawed as you include only the immediate effects and discard that the US had the numerical advantage when it came to nukes. Things like nuclear fallout and nuclear winter would take care of everyone who didn't have the fortune of dying instantly.

very good

[Anonymous Coward]

I think it is very good that US will not have access to space, because US supports war :-)

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Elldallan]

The South Ossetians want to be an independent country. The voted overwhelmingly to do so in 2006. The Russians respect that. The Georgians and their allies (read: us) do not. The right of a people to choose their leadership should not be overlooked here.

Ok, time for a reality check here, have you ever heard about a place called Chechnya? If you haven't it's a place in russia that also wants to be free, the russian response to that was to viciously supress that with military force and by installing a puppet regime in that province.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Anonymous Coward]

I think you would have the US grovel, apologize, and leave the foreign country.

That IS the argument you are making.

Re:NO wonder nerds have a bad rep NO...

[smithmc]

That area is "Russia's Back Yard", so to speak, and all the US's currency will be worth is grousing. Doing any more will just exacerbate things. If Iowa, or Nebraska had cause or prodding to secede, how long would the rest of the US wait before the various US marshals and federally-deployed troops move in to "restore order" or "rescue US-passport-holding citizens held hostage in break-away states"?

But... Iowa is a part of the US; it would be entirely appropriate for US forces to react to an Iowan secession. South Ossetia, however, is part of Georgia, not Russia. It was annexed, along with the rest of Georgia, by the Russian Empire in 1801, and was then made part of the Georgian SSR under the Soviet Union (with some limited autonomy), and naturally Georgia kept control of it when they broke away. Therefore, South Ossetian secession (say it five times fast!), whether one supports it or not, is a Georgian matter, not a Russian one.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[T.E.D.]

Let's look at a similar situation in history. A renegade province of Mexico rebelled and kicked the Mexican government out. A strong ally to the North took them in and waged war with the Mexican military, killing many and eventually taking much more land. I'm talking about Texas.

This is only similar if you are casting *Mexico* in the role of Russia here. Texas was an internationally accepted part of the USA at the time.

It should also be mentioned that the war was was generally percieved in the USA at the time as an immoral and cynical act on the USA's part. The main motivator of it was really the slave states' desire for more southern territory to pack the Senate with, to balance out all the new "free" northern states comming online. They were deathly afraid that the free states would get a 2/3 majority in the senate and change the constitution to outlaw slavery.

Comparing *anything* to the Mexican - American war isn't exactly being kind.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[orasio]

Alright. I understand you think so. I just disagree.
Nuclear war could have been pretty bad for the ecology, but nowhere near half the people in the planet would get killed.
In that kind of scenario, the soviets _could_ see an opportunity to rebuild everything like a marxist utopia. Remember they already had bunkers, they didn't have to die themselves.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[darkwhite]

I'm fairly certain the ceasefire had absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with Obama, and any such attribution is wishful thinking. The Russian media mentioned the French foreign minister and/or Sarkozy mediating a ceasefire, but I doubt even that is likely. This operation seems to have been clearly defined in scope and duration immediately after Georgia attacked, and no external influence would have altered its course.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[darkwhite]

Kills 1500+ civilians

As it turned out, that number was overstated by a factor of about 10.

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[anothy]

If we want to back Georgia on this one, we should give Texas back to Mexico.

sounds like a plan!

Re:Russia's ressponse was reasonable and justified

[Anonymous Coward]

Hypocrisy is always wrong, except when I do it, then it's OK.