War in Georgia - the EU needs to step in

By Andrew Wilson - 10 Aug 08

This article as published in the Independent on Sunday, on 10 August, 2008

The hostilities in Georgia are more than a war in Europe's backyard. It is a war in Europe itself, with dire consequences.

The Georgian President, Mikheil Saakashvili, elected in a landslide in 2004 on a manifest destiny platform of restoring national unity, has miscalculated and may have stepped into a Russian trap. Vladimir Putin came to see Georgia as Russia's Cuba - an outpost of a foreign power in his backyard - and trouble has been brewing for months.

The South Ossetian capital Tskhinvali is surprisingly close to Tbilisi. But a quick campaign made no sense from Saakashvili's position of weakness. He may have built up his armed forces with American help since 2004, but his most important assets are moral, although his image as the leader of a beleaguered democracy was already tarnished by his suppression of anti-government demonstrations in Tbilisi last November.

Saakashvili may have thought the Olympics Games would give him cover, especially as Putin was in Beijing and Russia hosts the next Winter Games just over the border in Sochi in 2014. But this only made him look duplicitous, especially as he announced a ceasefire just before launching the invasion.

The Georgian may therefore already be losing the all-important propaganda war. The Russians always thought Saakashvili would be easy to provoke and have been prodding and jabbing since the spring. A minority of Nato states may argue that the conflict increases the case for Georgian membership, but in others, scepticism is more likely to grow.

A second set of lessons should be learned by Europe. It's not that European governments failed to notice the problems ahead. The Lithuanians have been agitating; Javier Solana visited Georgia in June; the Germans have been trying to broker a diplomatic solution. But EU states did not stand solid enough behind the Germans. Too many had their heads in the sand, and the wrong signals were sent to both sides. The Georgians felt isolated. We created a vacuum where Saakashvili thought he had to act on his own, and the Russians thought they could act with impunity. The lesson: even if we think an issue is peripheral, we should get involved early on, when conflict prevention is still possible.

Finally, there are some hard facts for Russia. Russian troops are on sovereign Georgian territory. There are credible reports of attacks on "Georgia proper", although the very use of the term undermines the nation's territorial integrity. It is Russia that has escalated the conflict by hitting towns such as Kutaisi, Poti and Gori, and the likely consequences will destabilise the region as a whole.

Even if Russia withdraws, Georgia will be chastened and lessons will learned by neighbouring states. The prospects for a deal between Moldova and the "Transnistrian Republic" will diminish, despite the elections due next March. Russia will feel its Black Sea fleet can stay in Ukraine's Crimea beyond the current agreed date of 2017.

If Georgia is more seriously damaged, Russia may feel it has established a veto on who joins Nato in the future. But it is not too late for the West to get properly involved. Both sides risk serious collateral damage: the Georgians to their Nato and EU ambitions, the Russians to President Medvedev's proposals for a new security treaty in Europe and to their relations with the incoming US president.

We should recognise that the Russian "peacekeepers" are not peacekeepers any more, and press for a Lebanon-style force with an international mandate that could perhaps be agreed by the nascent US-EU-Nato-OSCE mission. Both sides have miscalculated, but, for all the talk of "genocide", both have incentives to step back from the brink.

Comments for this entry are closed.

Just a short and quick comment. Russia is unlikely to agree to an international peace-keeping force, especially an EU - led one, after this incident.

The Russians would view that as 1) opening up the Caucasus to increased Western influence - a development they want to prevent actually, and 2) reversing their military victory over Georgia. With an international mission stationed their, there would be no immediate opponent keeping Georgian troops out of South Ossetia (one might remember that UNIFIL had no possibility to prevent Israel from waging war against Lebanon).

After this fatal mistake by Georgia, the EU needs to concentrate on finding a formula for peace, extract a commitment from Russia on Georgia’s independence, and reign in the Saakashvili’s dreams of being in the US’s backyard.

Florian Kitt | Brussels | 11 Aug 08, 11 Aug 08 EST

Interesting txt, which doesn’t cover some of the most important aspects of the crisis.

Namely, it would be difficult to argue that Saakashvili engaged in this action without… encouragement from the abroad. In this regards it would be interesting to see the reactions of his patrons. Would they just let him go, after testing the russian capacities to handle their regional problems - or just warn them that in order to pretend to be a major power - you must learn how to deal with your own Iraq’s…

Second, one question still remains problematic and that is national sovereignity. Since, example of Kosovo, where US led NATO attacked one country (bombing dozen of civilian targets unrelated to Kosovo drama) and afterwards placed part of its territory under the UN mandate and finally - recognized its self-declared independence - presents an excellent scenarion for Russia and dozens of similar situations world wide.
EU and USA rethorics of “un-precedent case” now reveals itself as the pure failure…

Gospava Fernandez | Andrijevica South | 11 Aug 08, 11 Aug 08 EST

This piece makes some very interesting retrospective points, but arguable fails to deliver a credible ‘what next’ option for the EU.

NATO membership for Georgia is effectively off the table for the foreseeable future. For one, the sinews of collective security will never stretch this far, and I’m sure we don’t need to bother sketching out the awkward scenarios Georgian membership could present for NATO Member States. Given Russian sensibilities on ‘post-Soviet space’, some kind of hybrid force in the region also looks tenuous, (it would clearly require a high political price to allow for such an outcome). Russian accession to the WTO is arguably all the West has left on that score, but it couldn’t guarantee delivery in any case.

That said, the ‘loss’ of Georgia is clearly problematic, which is where the energy question could come into play (and not in the hysterical way the media have depicted today). Rather than writing a political blank cheque of support for Tbilisi through the NATO option, in the short term, the EU would be better placed (and more credible) in outlining its support for Saakashvili by making clear that it does not regard Georgia as ?another? Russian supply route. To do so would provide tacit consent of Russian tutelage in the region. Instead, the EU should look to as many options as possible for pipeline ventures from Central Asia and the Middle East, with Georgia pencilled in as a key transit state. This would provide Saakashvili with a much needed shot of political adrenalin from the West without exposing the EU (and principally the US), to broader risks NATO membership, or indeed a hybrid force, could entail. The EU would hardly be creating longer term difficulties for itself in terms of security of supply, not least because Turkish options are far from ‘problem free’. If anything, Georgia remains a useful check to Ankara?s ?arbitrage? ambitions on the energy front.

But clearly, this is more triage than curative in diagnosis. Self determination issues remain inherently difficult to resolve; the effects hitting the headlines are largely strategic, but the causes remain underpinned by normative confusion (albeit with a hefty dose of political self interest) across the UNSC. Until such issues are resolved, we will keep getting new wine in very old bottles to address. It is probably this normative side, rather than the unperfected art of ?hard ball? from the EU, that Brussels can have its greatest effect.

Matthew Hulbert | London | 11 Aug 08, 11 Aug 08 EST

The overall reactions to this new war was very interesting to observe in the press. It took some time before we had precise information on the chronology of the events or on the clear origin of this disater. But we had nevertheless immediately many various, loud and contradictory reactions. Naturally, the new EU members were very quick to sentence Russia to hell, Sweeden Minister of Foreign Affair even compared the Russian rethoric to Hitler?s one.
Then we had a quick and impressive involvement of Mr Sarkosy, as current president of the EU, spending three and a half hours with Mr Medvedev and Putin, and getting apparently their full attention. It is not so bad for the European diplomacy, allthought I doubt Mr Sarkosy had the mandate to do so. But well this time his audace seemed to have been appropriate, and we just need to forget that the same gentleman so dramatically and so loudly damaged the clear and incontestable mandate that Mr Mendelson had to negociate the Doha round on behalf of the EU? But well?
As a European, I like the result of Mr Sarkosy trip to Moscow and Tbilissi but I totally share your view and regret that there is no point in the agreement relating to an International (European) force which would replace the Russian Army in North Ossetia. Maybe too early at this stage.
It is obvious that Mr Saakachvili made a big mistake by attacking Tskhinvali. Or did he foresee what would happen and still hope to receive international help or attention in order not to stay alone face to the Russian bear?
If I well understand Mrs Tkechelachvili,the minister for Foreign Affair of Georgia, the Georgian attack to Tskhinvali is the answer to the arrival in North Ossetia of 180 tanks within 2 hours, i.e. a clear breach of Russian liabilities in South Ossetia. No need to say that Russia overreacted.
All this raises the question of the mandate that Russia, as well as Georgia and Ossetia by the way, received from the UN in 1992 to maintain the peace in South Ossetia. The poor management from the Russian side for few months of the growing tension between Russia and Georgia, the sudden reinforcement of Russian military presence in North and then in South Ossetia, and the unacceptable overreaction to the Georgian attack raise indeed important questions on the way Russia fulfills its UN mandate and even clearly raises the question of the rational of having Russia still as an official peacekeeper in this region.
I fully agree with you that the EU, and if not, at least the UN, should ask reconsidering the Russian mandate in South Ossetia and quickly suggests an alternative intervention force which would be more neutral and credible in the region. This is a clear test of the fairness and independence of the EU foreign policy.
Having said that, Georgia obviously weakened its position towards Ossetia, and Russia is totally entitled to claim for the independence of this region which does not belong neither to Georgian history nore to its culture. It will be very difficult for countries having reckonised the independence of Kosovo in a more dubious legal context to argue that the Osset, or the Abkhasian, case is, or are, very much different. Last but not least EU has unfortunately already shown that it has no other solution to propose than ethnic purification, from the former Yugoslavia to ? Belgium?

Therefore a very personal plan :
Sarkosy plan to immediate extinguish the fire + European observers to control the implementation of this first agreement;
A more ambitious political plan to solve the problem:
o A EU intervention force replacing the Russian Army in South Ossetia,
o A referendum for the independence of South Ossetia in min. 5 years,
o Possibly the same on Abkhazia
o Clear commitment of Russia and Georgia not to try to solve this conflict through violence
o Immediate start of negociation to welcome Georgia in the EU
o Signature of a military alliance between the EU and Georgia, to defend the Georgian territory as of today and as defined per the results of the future referendum.

Too ambitious? Not realistic? You might be right and therefore Europeans will continue to say No to a Europe who does not dare to give real solutions to real questions.

Jean Brochier | 14 Aug 08, 14 Aug 08 EST

With some analysts (e.g. prof. Ria Laenen, Univeriity of Louvain - KUL, Belgium), I am convinced that the Russian behaviour (military reaction, out of proportion) was caused by the non existing foreign policy of the EU in Europe, leading to some provocation towards Russia. In the West Balkans, eg. freesing Bosnia and accepting Kosovo independency. This is humiliating to Serbians and to others as well: the same non EU policy goes for Moldova etc.

How could the EU, probably extremely divided over such issues as the breaking up of Yougoslavia and the Soviet Union, play an important role in the Georgia case? How? To my opinion, the first precondition is to solve the ex-Yugoslavia case through a European conference, having the actual borders on the agenda. I have dr. David Owen, the former British foreign minister, on my side.

Tombeur, H. G. | Belgium | 21 Aug 08, 21 Aug 08 EST

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