Call it the 800 pound gorilla in the room, but allowing Russia's blatantly aggressive invasion of Georgia to continue unchallenged is unconscionable.

Russia needs to be warned off NOW, before Georgia falls, not after the UN takes six months to decide whether or not to issue an official "scolding". We went into Iraq with FAR less provocation, yet we're standing by and allowing a young democracy and official ally to be torn asunder by a belligerent and hostile power.

If we allow Putin to dismantle Georgia, then he will only become more aggressive. It also says to the world that the United States is impotent when it really matters. And that's dangerous for America.

I guess when Bush "looked into Putin's soul" he missed a thing or two.

I’ve been saying for years that the "End of the Cold War" was a premature declaration. The real threats in the 21st century continue to be conflicted nation-states, not terrorism – the latter killing far less people every year than automobile accidents.

Or, to put it better than I could, read this.

 

Yeah, this current situation is very scary and delicate. The whole world knows that our media has turned us into a divided country and no matter what Bush does the world will proclaim it's the wrong thing. I sure wouldn't want to be in the White House right now. Obviously we're much more cautious when dealing w/ a country like Russia who can fight back. I don't have any answers, but I sat around after work, flipping channels trying to find out what was going on with the Georgia situation. All's I found was news about Edwards affair, how his affair would've effected Hillary, McCain a Washington Star and Obama a Celebrity, McCain has some spat going on with Paris Hilton, bah-blah, bah-blah, bah-blah. Finally I found out some info on Fox, but it seems like there's minimal coverage of this important situation.

 

Bit hypocritical, isn't it?

There's tons of coverage about it on the BBC.

 

How about when USA bombed Serbia in 1999? USA didn't listen anyone back then, not even NATO.
By the way, what happen to all nuclear weapons that Bush claimed Iraq has?

America is the last country in this world who should complain that Russia is attacking Georgia.

You (the USA) needs to mind your own business and stop trying to fix the situation while making it worse.

 

They just haven't found them yet, is all.

I don't think America can afford such a luxury.

 

I don't know if hypocritical is the right word, but I know what you mean. I'm pretty sure I get BBC - I'll flip it on as I go to bed. Great, something to help me sleep worse.

 

I can't beleive this is getting like no attention. I thought I was alone in thinking this is major bad. This is the same crap Hitler pulled with Czechoslovakia after already annexing Austria and Sudetenland. From my understanding there is an ethnic minority in Georgia who wishes to no longer be Georgian. Putin offers these people citizenship in Russia. They agree and then raise arms against the Georgian government. When the Georgians respond with conflict and kill the rebels, Putin gets bent out of shape and says you're killing Russian citizens and we can invade you for that. WTF. So while all this happens, Bush is in China, sitting chairs away from Putin and the world pretends nothing is happening. The world needs to be taught that an ally of the U.S. will be protected, helped, defended, or at least we should grandstand for them. Even for their strategic location alone. We need our friends and it seems we are quickly running out.

I don't know why the strongest most kick *** country on earth has to hang its head in shame about being the best. Liberalism the disease caused this malaise. From the 60's and even before they have told us that our military is evil and undermined it at every turn. Our military is why we are here. The liberators of Paris and of Italy, the liberators of Bagdad and of the Philippines. It is better to be feared than loved. I am sorry folks but it is the way of the world. You can wish for peace all you want, but until Putin or whoever the leader of the Chinese Communist Party is has their boot on your neck, they don't give a crap about world peace. Perhaps Patton said it best and I paraphrase, No soldier ever won a war by dieing for his country, he won a war by making some dumb bastard die for his!

We've got to start acting like we've got a pair and drill for oil, drill through a polar bears head if you have to, and let other pseudo powers know what they can and can't do. We are still the sleeping giant, I firmly beleive it, the world doesn't want any part of the real can of woopass we can open up when we are really pissed off.

 

The US's actions in the recent past definitely put us in a precarious situation when dealing w/ another superpower taking actions that some would argue are similar to past US actions. But, in your opinion, is standing back and watching Russia invade another country the right thing to do? I'm not asking if Iraq was right for the US, but is Russia's actions acceptable?

 

You can add 05GT-O.C.D.'s stamp of approval to your sig. I'm glad to know that I'm not alone in my feelings. So many uneducated people in this world, specifically many of my friends and co-workers, make me feel like I'm the only one who worries about the future of this country/world. Everyone else seems to just regurgitate babble they hear from some other ignorant person who would believes that Russia has tanks Atlanta.

 

No, Russian actions are not acceptable.

But for the USA to butt in after everything they did in the past 20 years or so is not acceptable either.

If I was Putin I wouldn't listen to Bush (or any USA president) either. Back when the USA was bombing Serbia they killed over 3,000 civilians (and over 30,000 are still sick because of the radiation) and didn't listen absolutely to anyone to stop, not Russia and not even NATO, which the USA is the part of.

 

And they never will.

Wanna take a wild guess why?

 

I 100% understand your feelings and what your saying.

 

I understand your anger at U.S. over that ridiculous bombing in '99. Why NATO bombed Serbia and its civilians to pressure Milosevic out of Kosovo is beyond me, and I was definitely not for it. It would be like us bombing Moscow now to get Putin to pull out of Georgia. It would be insane as far as I'm concerned.

But Russia is to be feared. And Putin is not to be trusted. That I know. You may not trust U.S. after actions in Yugoslavia, that was not handled well at all. Actually that was Clinton waging war at 30,000 feet so he would not have to see the devastation. And it was not reported right here because the media was on his side as he is a liberal democrat.

I do agree with invasion of Iraq and I continue to. Obviously it was not a war for oil, because we have yet to get a drop or see a dime from it. Saddam and the government of Iraq had it coming, but not the people of Iraq. I think if we can always make the case that first off we are for democracy and that we make wars against governments and not their people we are right as long as our cause is justified. I don't think we yet have a case for Iran, nor anywhere else for that matter. But we do have an obligation to exercise a little muscle and perhaps do a little military training exercise at our closest ally to Georgia and flex a little militray muscle without use of force. Just a few strong words and continued pounding on the world stage of public opinion would be enough. Where would we be now if we had not done the same and more for France or South Korea.

As far as the U.S. in war goes, we are not perfect. But we have been right enough times and won enough times to be feared by dictators and tyrants. They just know that right now they have us because our own media hates our power more than they (Russians or Chinese) do.

 

Here is something that I just found. It's written in Serbian, but I'll translate.

Poslednji sukobi u Gruziji sve češće se porede sa dešavanjima na prostoru Srbije 1999. godine, kao i sa događajima na Kosovu. Tako je bivši ambasador Rusije u Srbiji Aleksandar Aleksejev izjavio da između događaja u Južnoj Osetiji i na Kosovu ima mnogo paralela, odnosno da se koriste isti postupci sada, kao i na Kosovu.
"Rusiju kritikuju danas oni koji su ubijali Srbe 1999. godine", rekao je Aleksejev.
Još oštriji na rečima bio je ruski ambasador u NATO-u Dmitrij Rogozin.
"Rusija ne prima lekcije od onih koji su 1999. godine ubijali građane Srbije i uništavali njenu civilnu infrastrukturu. To je velika razlika između NATO-a i Rusije koja je ograničila svoje akcije isključivo na vojne ciljeve", rekao je Rogozin.
"NATO je svojevremeno odlučio da bombarduje, ne samo srpke trupe na Kosovu, već čitavu Srbiju, Beograd, televizijske stanice, mostove, državne institucije. Na hiljade građana Srbije je pobijeno u tim napadima. Zgrožen sam kada čujem da oni koji su ćutali pred hiljadama srpskih žrtava 1999. godine sada sebi daju za pravo da dele moralne lekcije", poručio je ambasador.

And translation:

The situation in Georgia is very similar to what happened in Serbia in 1999. Former Russian ambassador in Serbia Aleksandar Aleksejev told the media that the same people who were killing Serbs in 1999 today criticize Russia.
Russian ambassador at NATO Dmitrij Rogizin also had few things to say.
"Russia doesn't take lessons from those who in 1999 were killing Serbian citizens and destroying their civilian places. That's the huge difference between NATO and Russia, who is only attacking military places. NATO decided to bomb not only Serbian troops at Kosovo, but also entire Serbia, Belgrade (Serbia's capital), TV stations, bridges and government places. Thousands of Serbian citizens were killed during those bombings. I'm shocked to hear those who killed thousands of Serbs in 1999 now giving themself a right to give moral lessons."

 

Russia isn't just invading another country, they're invading a U.S. alley. It says to the world that America is unwilling to - or perhaps more accurately - cannot, come to the aid of its allies.

 

I agree with most of that, except the part about drilling into polar bears' heads. I like polar bears and I'm not in favor of that.

 

I was being facetious.

 

I understand everything you're saying.

I like to know what's happening around the world, but I don't even want to think about politics and even less talk about it.

I think the USA has enough problems here in the States without going oversea and Bush and the next president should try to fix those problems first.

 

I know, that was a little more facetious than I intended but you get my point. The only reason we are scared anymore of anyone is not militarily, but economically. We fear losing our nice cars and our big screen TV's or our relatively cheap oil and gas when the world is stable. But throw in a little World War 3 and the markets go in the crapper, the commodity markets go through the roof, and our nice little world full of Britnie Spears and Paris Hilton crotch shots goes up in smoke. We are burying our heads in the sand right now. I only hope we will be ready when we need to be.

 

That's total bullsh*t!