Here's a synopsis based on my own limited knowledge. When the Soviet Union broke up Georgia declared independence, ironically its first President was the last Soviet Foreign Minister. There were some tensions early on with Russia regarding soviet military facilities on the Black Sea and territory with some minor skirmishes. Things have tended to be rather uneasy since independence with Georgia suffering its own inner political turmoil while also bickering with Russia, I believe at one point they asked if they could join NATO. The South Ossetia region is a part of Georgia that is settled by Russians and has cultural and political leanings towards Russia. They fear they will be second class citizens in Georgia. There are also some pretty strong suspicions that the Ossetians are armed and encouraged to fight the Georgians to keep Georgia destabilized and eventually allow Russia to take over again.
In the Soviet era, especially under Stalin, there was a lot of geographic shuffling of different ethnic groups in an attempt to quell nationalistic dissent (and for more mundane things, like jobs). They ended up creating all these pockets of trouble by having foreign ethnic groups well-established far from home. So, the successor states have these break-away groups of people who want autonomy from the state because they are a different people-group. I assume South Ossetia is one of those issues. Russians set up shop in Georgia before the collapse of the USSR. Now, they have areas that are historically Georgian but are populated by Russians who call it home. The separatists don't want to leave because they've been there for quite some time. But, Georgians don't want to give away the land because it's always been considered Georgian territory. Imo, the Russians should leave South Ossetia, but they probably won't listen to me.
Conditions haven't ripened enough to make any of the parties involved war weary, so this will continue for a while.
I don't know much about the issue with Georgia, but this Putin guy worries me. He wants a throw back to the "glory" days of the USSR and he's willing to do anything achieve it. He's willing to invade other nations (Chechnya), suspend rights and even assassinate political dissidents to do it. Why is there not more international outcry?
Actually, based on my lifelong research errr i mean wikipedia, the Ossetians seem to be distinct from the Russians. It says here they are related to Iranians. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ossetians And here, it says in the current conflict, it's the Ossetians, Russians, and some Abkhazian volunteers vs. the Georgians. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_in_South_Ossetia_(2008) Wikipedia rulez
Is it me or are the two sides saying vastly different things? I don't know what to believe exactly...so I choose to ignore it for the time being. Georgia saying they shot down 4 Russian aircraft and Russia denying they lost any aircraft. The only thing I know for certain is there is a spat and Russian tanks are on the move. Other than that, I don't know a damn thing.
Heh. Like the Russians would ever admit that their aircraft were shot down by puny little Georgia. This stuff worries me. Where is all the international indignation about "arrogance" and "unilateral action" against Russia? I guess the French don't have the cojones to speak up this time? From what I gather Russia claims that the Georgians killed a few of their men while fighting Ossetian separatists, and they're using that as an excuse to invade the country and bomb it to crap.
Just pretend those other nations have weapons of mass destruction or that they are beyond the gates of hell. Actually, the glorious communist party does not like putin at all. They compare him to the czar. The reason the brotherhood lost spain, aside from the nazi germany and franco alliance, was the conflict of ideaologies within the brotherhood. There were Marxists,trotskyites, leninists, maoists, stalinists, anarchists, and dreamers like orwell. Instead of concentrating on the evil forces of franco and hitler, they spent their entire time bickering at each other. I hope that the communist party can ammend the relationship with Putin.
Ongoing entrenched ethnic conflicts is one of the places where you should be very careful in trusting Wikipedia. My understanding is that 'South Ossetia', the area in Georgia, was essentially uninhabited until the Soviets decided to move in tons of Ossetians and Russians into Georgia in the 1930's. This is very much a problem of the Russian Soviet arbitrarily relocating populations into the territory of other 'Soviets'.
Roll your eyes all you want. I'm willing to bet they aren't fighting for the same reason that we are in the middle east.
When I was in Moscow last year there was a trade dispute going on with Georgia, and Georgian wine and other products were forbidden from being imported into Russia. All my colleagues loved to eat at the Georgian restaurants, but I thought Georgian food was really nasty. It was similar to middle eastern food and was pretty disgusting.
