. Listened to PM. Big mistake. Grim programme. Eddie Mair’s take can be summed up simply. 1. Russia won. 2. Georgia had it coming 3. The US could do nothing.
RUSSIA 1 GEORGIA O
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It seems like a fairly accurate summary, does it not?
If you are going to flick bogeys at the school bully, dont be surprised when he comes over and gives you a good thumping.
Good to see Russia has calmed down though. They are a threat, but we are not in a position to deal with them.
Gaz,
Tiny Georgia fighting for its very existence is not “flicking bogeys” it was trying to protect its citizens from Russian supplied ossetian bandits killing civilians! Do you think the Georgian leader woke up one morning and said right lets invade Russia, we have a tiny handfull of old soviet era tanks and planes against Russias thousands of modern tanks and planes, it should be a walk over? The facts are being forgotten here. The fact that thousands of ethnic Ossetians and Abkhazians fled the Russian(FSB) controlled areas in the earlier conflict and now live in Georgia in complete safety and enjoying full rights and equality with the Georgian majority should tell you something about the true nature of Georgian society! How many ethnic Georgians live in the FSB controlled areas?
Sorry David, but this may need a new thread …
I just could not believe the spin in this article.
Soaring inflation could fall back fast: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/7555803.stm
… Apparently, the Bank of England are “the policy makers” … No fault of course lies with the Government.
the russians seem have learned a few “ceasefire” tactics from the pallywooders…
“you cease , we fire”
http://www.civil.ge/eng/article.php?id=19068
“12 Aug.’08 / 18:01
Russian forces have again appeared in Poti on Georgia’s Black Sea coast destroying military installations there, a Georgian government source told Civil.Ge.”
On the O/T subject of inflation: was there ever such a fatuous and meaningless concept as ‘So the Governor, Mervyn King, will have to write again soon to the Chancellor, explaining what has gone wrong.’
It seems like a fairly accurate summary, does it not?
If you are going to flick bogeys at the school bully, dont be surprised when he comes over and gives you a good thumping.
Gaz | 12.08.08 – 7:23 pm | #
You’re certainly right about the bully part, but Georgia is either a sovereign country or it is not. By your logic, the US would be within its rights to invade Cuba (or Canada for that matter).
Alex:
Yes, Al Beeb’s propagandizing for the Labour Economy is in typical form:
“Most economists expect inflation to fall as rapidly as it has risen – on the assumption that increases in utility, fuel and food prices will not be repeated next year.”
Most economists, eh? Weasel words from a weasel Hack.
my god – mervyn king WILL HAVE TO WRITE A LETTER…
oh the horror.
how about growing some balls and firing the incompetent fool? along with all of the FSA?
“‘So the Governor, Mervyn King, will have to write again soon to the Chancellor, explaining what has gone wrong.'”
You mean Brown and Darling don’t know?
Yes,you’re right they are clueless.
I think that BBCs PM editors were probably influenced by Simon Sebag Montefiore’s article in The Times this morning
Another battle in the 1,000 year Russia-Georgia grudge match
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/guest_contributors/article4509624.ece
I think that’s why Eddie Mair also used the game metaphor, “They have played a blinder” or why, Adams said that Russia “will emerge from this enhanced”
What concerns me is how PM can say “The death toll is unknown”, or, that the Georgian military “operation”, has “backfired catastrophically”. These comments strike me as obscene- it appears that the Genocide claims are being taken with a very large pinch of salt. I heard the Red Cross hoping to get into SO soon, hopefully the truth about the claims and counter-claims will be investigated “impartially”- isn’t this what objective reporting is all about? On visiting the BBCs key statements page we can read:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7556857.stm
They have Putin’s statement from yesterday:
“They [the Americans] of course had to hang Saddam Hussein for destroying several Shia villages. But the current Georgian rulers who in one hour simply wiped 10 Ossetian villages from the face of the earth, the Georgian rulers which used tanks to run over children and the elderly, which threw civilians into cellars and burnt them – they [Georgian leaders] are players that have to be protected.”
These are very serious claims-and should not be dismissed as simple propaganda by one side. It will take some time, but hopefully when Western media teams get into SO they will be able to investigate this.
On second thoughts, what if the BBC sends John Sweeney in? What if he finds evidence that the Russians deliberately planted bombs and wiped out 10 villages in SO and blamed that on the Georgians. What if he blames Scientologists?
Johnj,
The MSM will never be allowed in to Ossettia without Russian minders, just like they had Hisbulla minders, the MSM will only be allowed to see what Russia wants them to see.
What concerns me though is that NO one is asking Russia to prove their genocide allegations.
Mailman
just watched a newsnight report from the town of Gori, which was abandoned by the Georgian military.
looks like south ossetians are going into the town on vengence shootings.
this could turn VERY nasty if they dont get a handle on it.
“johnj | 12.08.08 – 10:11 pm ”
bear in the mind that the Russians have form on this – blaming the Germans for the Katyn massacre for decades is just one example.
mass rape and murder of German civillians during the advance of the Red Army in 44/45 is another example – covered up for decades and only now coming to light.
(see the Antony Beevor book, “Berlin”)
wire update: georgians have agreed to the ceasefire agreement, which Sarko got the Russians to sign earlier today – he’s in tbilisi now.
gotta hand it to Sarko and the French – they’ve played a blinder on this one.
yeah – i know. EU Presidency and all that… BUT they, the French, have done it. so , i’ll credit them with that.
can ANYONE imagine Jonah Brown and his Milipede pulling off such a diplomatic coup?
what a sad state of affairs UK Plc finds itself in…
nah. thought not.
typo… should have moved the sentence “what a sad state of affairs UK Plc finds itself in” to the end of the comment. sorry bout that.
“What concerns me though is that NO one is asking Russia to prove their genocide allegations.
Mailman
Mailman | 12.08.08 – 10:47 pm”
Who asked for proof from Kosovan “refugees”? It’s not the done thing.
The problem is when there is a deafening silence in every other conflict it’s difficult to make noise in a conflict when those claiming genocide are, in the opinions of some, the baddies.
Like the Serbs were the obvious baddies because they killed some muslims? And comrade Bill Clinton – he of the big cigar – came to the help of the ummah? Didn’t you leftie idiots love the US back then?
You’re a good example that watching Al Beeb for a long time makes you talk (John) Bullshit.
P.S.: Get yourself a more fitting screenname. Try Karl Marx oder Josef Stalin.
I understand that at the closing ceremony of the China Olympics were are going to be ‘represented’ by an Urban dance troupe and a rap group. I wonder if they will carry out a few drive by shootings in the stadium?
Oh and I also understand there will be a London double decker bus going around with David Beckham on it.
Shouldn’t that be a bendy bus with a crushed pedestrian being dragged along underneath it?
Perhaps we could have Abu Hamza leading the choir of the Finsbury Park Mosque in a re-creation of the London bombings. They could have Hazel Blears leading them around carrying the black flag of Islam.
That would just about sum up London would it not?
“Like the Serbs were the obvious baddies because they killed some muslims? And comrade Bill Clinton – he of the big cigar – came to the help of the ummah? Didn’t you leftie idiots love the US back then?
You’re a good example that watching Al Beeb for a long time makes you talk (John) Bullshit.
disillusioned_german | 12.08.08 – 11:58 pm”
Guten abend, How about you read my comment again. You will find I was making the exact opposite point to the one you thought I made.
“Who asked for proof from Kosovan “refugees”? It’s not the done thing. ”
The Hague.
“The Hague.
Peter | 13.08.08 – 1:16 am”
Yawn. It forgot to prosecute Turkey (US ally) for its massacres of Kurds though. US Kangaroo justice.
Let me put it this way then: The first country that decides to nuke Saudi Arabia (Mekka) will get my fullest support.
Given that the Soviet Union was one of if not the greatest manufacturers of lies and propaganda in human history, and given that the old Soviet mindset could be described as “hopelessly ingrained” in Moscow even after its fall, then I think we can say that those who blindly accept the Russian’s claims of Georgian atrocities are somewhat akin to those starry eyed leftists who visited the Soviet’s Potemkin villages and came back grinning from ear to ear carrying free bottles of vodka and proclaiming that they’d “seen the future”.
Jason,
Thank goodness we have the Hague warcrimes tribunal then, where, hopefully, the judges aren’t such rabid Russophobes as yourself!
Putin is one of the worst criminals of modern times. He got himself elected on the basis of a wave of apartment bombings which killed 300 innocent people. These were attributed to the Chechens, even after one KGB team were actually arrested planting one bomb in an apartment block. He then used these bombings as a justification for his genocidal war in Chechenya.
You would have to be very naive to think that he cares a damn about the South Ossetians. North Ossetia is in Russia, and if it dared to declare independence he would have it destroyed without a second thought. South Ossetia was useful only as a pretext to goad the Georgians, nothing more. The South Ossetians served his plan. If the Georgians had been loyal Kremlin stooges and had asked permission to wipe out South Ossetia, he would have been just as happy to grant their request. The only honest thing he has ever said is that politics is a cynical business. It certainly is the way he practises it.
The KGB has taken over Russia, there is no way of denying this simple fact, no matter how hard the useful idiots of the BBC may try.
JohnJ,
Just want to get something clear if I may, To be anti Putin/FSB/KGB/oligarch/ganster is NOT the same as being anti Russian OK? Putin is a pure bred KGB nutter and lives and breathes the tactics and mindset of probably the cruelest most unethical secret service ever to ‘grace’ the planet! The FSB would happily liquidate the entire population of S/O without blinking if it served their interests so to do! There are many ossetians/Abkhazians living in Georgia is the same true the other way round? My relatives in the Ulkraine fear Putin the most and they are ethnic Russians!
I am pro Russian and anti Putin!
How about Georgia offers independance to South Ossetia on condition Russia gives independance to North Ossetia.
Russia will rush to accept that then won’t they, not!
If that happened the Russians would crush North Ossetia like Chechnya before it.
The BBC will swallow anything the Russians throw at them, long live pravda eh?
Rob,
To believe that Putin was responsible for the Russian apartment bombings (“the largest series of coordinated terrorist attacks in Russia’s history”) is a ridiculous ‘conspiracy theory’ on a par with those who credit the Americans to be really behind 9/11, or, why not, those who deny gas chambers at Auschwitz, etc. Do we get the picture?
The celebrated John Sweeney, made a programme on this, it went out on BBC2 years back (before his one on evil Scientologists)
Extreme anti-Americanism, and hatred of Bush, seems to find its equivalent in a form of Russophobia that is anti-Putin. The left and right indulge in this, I find those on the left are usually just as anti-Putin as they are anti-Bush. It’s rather sad visiting biased-bbc and seeing conspiracy theories presented as fact like this. Any genuine criticism here of a biased BBC (how it represents Russia & Georgia in its reporting) loses credibility when Putin is addressed as if it was the school playground- a monster! Stalin, Hitler, perhaps yes- but Putin? I can remember those who liked to talk about Thatcher and Reagan in the same tone!
Any facts in the MSM about those 10 villages?
Johnj:
Taking everything said by Russia with a huge pinch of salt given the empirical FACT of their history of lies and propaganda is NOT being “phobic”. The word phobia suggests an irrational, unfounded fear – not a justified sense of caution.
John J:
Do you deny that KGB officers were actually arrested by police planting one of these apartment bombs? The official line was that it was an “exercise”. Do you believe this?
Do you deny that Putin was a KGB officer whose rise to power began with the wave of anti-Chechen fear generated by these apartment bombs?
Do you deny that Putin has instigated an authoritarian crackdown in Russia? That all TV and radio stations which do not toe the line have been closed down? That almost all print media which do not toe the line have been closed down?
Do you deny that Putin has rolled back private ownership of business in the most brutal way? Even foreign companies such as Shell and BP are finding it difficult if not impossible to do business in Russia.
Do you deny that the Russian state was behind the murder of Litinenko? Do you believe that any non-state player could have got access to Polonium 210?
Do you deny that Vladimir Putin is a Chekist who has presided over a KGB takeover of the organs of the Russian state?
And you think it it somehow Russophobic to criticise any of this? With friends like you, Russia needs no enemies.
Rob,
Sorry mate, that sounds as plausible as M16 being responsible for 7/7 attacks.
Although you could always post a link to back your claim up aye?
Mailman
Mailman:
“Sorry mate, that sounds as plausible as M16 being responsible for 7/7 attacks.”
What does? Three FSB operatives were arrested for planting a bomb in the basement of an apartment building in Ryazan. The FSB then declared that it had been a training exercise and they were released.
Just because MI6 had nothing to do with 7/7, does that mean that the KGB/FSB would not stoop to killing a few hundred Russian civilians so as to get the second Chechen war going? This is an institution which, in its time, has killed literally millions of people. Killing 300 to further their aims is absolutely nothing to them. Just as whatever happens to the people of South Ossetia matters nothing to Vladimir Putin. They are pawns in his game. At the moment it suits his purposes to pose as their defender. If at a future time it suited him to wipe them out, he would do it without a second thought.
Miliband and EU, re-Russia: sheer empty posturing-
“Russia warned over ‘Soviet past'”
[Extract]:
“EU foreign ministers are meeting to try to co-ordinate an international response to the crisis in Georgia.”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics
/7557887.stm
While the ineffectual defence forces of the EU dither, the US takes action:
“US forces to deliver Georgia aid”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/7559252.stm
The BBC could point out the contrast between the responses of the EU and
the US.
“US forces to deliver Georgia aid” George R | 13.08.08 – 8:31 pm
I wonder if they’ll supply “Bush legs” for them, or maybe some more military aid.
JohnJ: Why exactly are we supposed to love the Russians? I don’t like ’em very much. I don’t trust ’em and that’s that. And, no, I’m not a Socialist.
John Bull,
I told you at the start, you may well be able to bamboozle the useful idiots in the EU and run rings around the EU handwringing surrender merchants and you may well disable NATO through those same useful idiots and credit where its due, Putin played a blinder by showed the EU for what it is, a paper tiger! BUT the USA is a different kettle of fish, you mess with US interests at your peril, you spit in uncle Sams face at your peril. If Russia is stupid enough to tread on Americas ‘blue suede shoes’ once too often you will be very sorry I can assure you.
The B52s are ready with the latest cruise missiles, the B2s are ready with the latest 2000lbrs and there is a fleet on the way with plenty of F18s super hornets, Putin had better stop now while he is ahead because if uncle Sam unleashes the storm there will be lots of mourning mothers in the motherland soon.
Rob,
Linky or it never happened 🙂
Mailman
John,
Are you suggesting that Uncle Sam NOT help one of its friends?
I see in the papers this morning stories of Uncle Sam sending weapons to Georgia.
Could be interesting if some of those Russian petrol tanks on tracks start ronsoning off what would happen to the general conscripts moral and conduct. Bet it would head south faster than a french white surrender tissue! 🙂
Mailman
“The celebrated John Sweeney”
This ad hominem ‘evidence’ all on its tod (‘celebrated’, my aunt: as though it proved anything, even if true which it isn’t), shows your rant for what it is.
The fact is that Russia was built on state terrorism.
IS oxfordian…IS!
Mailman
“Are you suggesting that Uncle Sam NOT help one of its friends? mailman | 14.08.08 – 9:45 am”
No, just that it’s money down the drain. Maybe when the Georgians elect someone else NATO will take an interest – as long as he isn’t nuts.
Mailman:
“Linky or it never happened”
There’s a big internet out there, why not use it? You could even read the book Litvinenko wrote before the KGB murdered him.
You are quite free not to believe the KGB was behind the apartment bombings, it doesn’t matter to me. But the question you have to ask is Lenin’s: “Who, whom?” Who benefits, at the expense of whom? The man who benefitted was the little known Chekist Vladimir Putin, who became Prime Minister, then President, now Prime Minister again. He became one of the richest and most powerful men in the world, and the KGB siloviki took over the Russian state. The losers were the Chechens whose country was destroyed. So by all means believe if you wish that the Chechens chose to provoke Russia by murdering 300 people, and believe too that the FSB agents arrested for planting the bomb found in Ryazan were really just taking part in an exercise. You can believe in the tooth fairy as well if you like, it’s a free country, unlike Russia.