Pakistan Invades America -- "Without Permission"
By M. Junaid Levesque-Alam
17/09/08 "MRZine" -- -- The U.S. State Department lodged a sharp protest over ongoing Pakistani missile strikes and ground raids today, saying the Islamic Republic was violating American sovereignty.
"We will try to convince Pakistan . . . to respect [the] sovereignty of the United States -- and God willing, we will convince," State Department Spokesman Sean McCormack told reporters.1
The controversy stems from the Pakistan Army's recent decision, leaked in a prominent Pakistani newspaper, to mount intensifying air attacks and new ground assaults against extremists hiding in American safe havens across the ocean.
American papers reported that under the new policy, the Pakistani military will no longer seek America's permission in killing Americans, but will inform American diplomats about these killings as a friendly gesture between close allies.2
Pakistan Army General Ashfaq Kayani told reporters outside Islamabad late last night that the new strategy was justified. "We are working to prevent more attacks on the Pakistani people," he said.3
The general's stance signified strong Pakistani dissatisfaction with America's reluctance to crack down on religious fundamentalists and neoconservatives, who, experts note, have deep ties to American intelligence services and military leaders. The largely unchecked extremists, experts observe, have used America to bolster the agenda of their ideological counterparts across the ocean in Israel, and to strike directly against Pakistan and other parts of the Muslim world.
"We have to strike them over there so that they cannot order strikes against us here at home," General Kayani said, referring to American firepower that has terrorized hundreds of thousands of civilians on either side of the Pak-Afghan border and in the Middle East.
As Kayani spoke, new precision attacks and commando raids were being conducted against ranches in Texas, small towns in Alaska, the offices of AIPAC and energy-related lobbying firms in Washington, D.C. Commandos were also dispatched to America's unruly federally-administered Bible Belt, where resentment of government authority runs high.
Several high-value targets were killed in the attacks. Local media outlets claimed 50 civilians were also killed, but these assertions could not be independently verified. Pakistani officials said they would send in their own team to investigate the claims, time permitting.
Seeking to assuage domestic concerns, American officials downplayed the actions of their staunch ally. "The nation should not be upset by the statement of Pakistani General Kayani," White House Press Secretary Dana Perino said in an official statement.4 "Pakistan respect U.S. sovereignty and looks at us as partners," she added.5
U.S. officials also insisted no secret deal had been reached beforehand allowing Pakistanis to strike inside American territory. "Media reports about authorization for Pakistani raids into the U.S. are incorrect," the American ambassador to Pakistan, Anne Patterson, told Fox News last night. She added that the South Asian country had "no aggressive designs or postures" toward America.6
Regimes allied to Pakistan, including those in Iraq, Iran, Lebanon, Venezuela, Bolivia, and Palestine, expressed support for the new Pakistani strategy, citing the need to "remove and destroy" strongholds where key militants have masterminded attacks against their countries.7
Informed of this, Ambassador Patterson appeared unfazed, saying, "Pakistan respects American sovereignty." She insisted that Pakistani officials provided her with assurances that "no such order had been given" for new rules of engagement.8 Finally, the ambassador explained, America had already carried out its own recent military offensive that left hundreds of rural Americans dead, relieving the need for further Pakistani intervention.
But in Islamabad, Pakistani corps commanders said their new strategy would see continued implementation in the coming weeks. Speaking on condition of anonymity, one commander said that as far as Pakistan was concerned, "most things have been settled in terms of how we're going to proceed."9
Notes
Except for note 2, all the above-quoted statements are real quotes; only the roles have been switched.
1 Quote actually taken from Pakistani PM Yousaf Gilani. Reuters, Sept. 12, 2008. (http://wiredispatch.com/news/?id=343756)
2 It was actually the Pakistan daily, Dawn, which reported on the U.S. policy shift as follows: "Under this new policy, the US military will notify Pakistan's government when it conducts raids, but will not seek its permission." Sept. 12, 2008.
3 Quote actually taken from US Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Mike Mullen. Dawn (Pakistan Daily), Sept. 12, 2008.
4 Quote actually taken from PM Gilani. (Source: note 3)
5 Quote actually taken from Pakistani Ambassador Husain Haqqani. (Source: note 3)
6 Quotes actually taken from Ambassador Haqqani. (Source: note 3)
7 Quote actually taken from U.S. ally and Afghan President Hamid Karzai. Washington Post, Sept. 12, 2008. ()
8 Quotes actually taken from Ambassador Haqqani. (Source: note 7)
9 Quote actually taken from anonymous U.S. official. (Source: note 7)
M. Junaid Levesque-Alam is a Pakistani-American who blogs about America and Islam at Crossing the Crescent (www.crossingthecrescent.com). He writes about American Muslim identity for WireTap magazine and has been published in CounterPunch, Dissident Voice, The Nation (online), and The American Muslim. He works as a communications coordinator for an anti-domestic violence agency in the NYC area and obtained his undergraduate degree in journalism from Northeastern University. He can be reached at: junaidalam1 AT gmail.com
In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. Information Clearing House has no affiliation whatsoever with the originator of this article nor is Information ClearingHouse endorsed or sponsored by the originator.)
Thursday, September 18, 2008
Wednesday, September 17, 2008
Waffenstillstand und das Treiben im Hintergrund - Teil 2
Der mysteriöse Sarkozy Brief – Teil 2
Also hier ein Paar Tatsachen über die Geschichte dieses Schreiben!
In den frühen Morgenstunden des 8. August, begann Georgien die Südossetische Stadt Tskhinvali, welche unter dem Schutz von international anerkannten russische Friedenstruppe stand, mit Artillerie zu beschiessen.
Russland bat unmittelbar danach um eine UN-Erklärung um den Frieden wieder herzustellen.
Der „Westen“ lehnte dies aber ab. (Warum?).
Darauf reagierte Russland in dem es innerhalb der folgenden 12 Stunden Bodentruppen in Bewegung setzte um dem Geogischen Angriff entgegen zu treten.
Am 10. August waren die Georgische Truppen geschlagen und befanden sich auf dem Rückzug aus Südossetien. In Folge der drohenden Niederlage bat Saakashshvili Waffenstillstandsgespräche.
Am 11. August reisten der französischen Außenminister Kouchner und sein finnischer Kollege Stubb nach Georgien. Sie stellten eine Waffenstillstandsvereinbarung auf, aber vermutlich ohne mit den Russen gesprochen zu haben (?????). Diese Vereinbarung soll, so wird behauptet, von Saakashshvili unterschrieben worden sein. Anschliessend sollten sie mit dieser Vereinbarung im Gepäck nach Moskau reisen Allerdings kam diese Vereinbarung nie in Moskau an!! Wer hat diese Vereinbarung zurückgewiesen? Russland, Georgien oder auch jemanden anders?
In der Nacht vom 11. auf den 12. August flohen die georgischen Truppen regelrecht aus dem westlichen Teil von Georgien und der Gegend um die Stadt Gori in Richtung Tbilisis, da befürchte wurde, dass die Russen ihren Marsch in Richtung der Hauptstadt Tbilisis fortsetzen würden.
Am 12. August kritisierte der russische Aussenminister Lavrov der Westen weil dieser versäumt habe Georgien zu überzeugen keine Gewalt anzuwenden.
“Our foreign partners have done nothing to force Tbilisi, to use their influence with Tbilisi, for the signature of a legally-binding document" on renunciation of force, Lavrov said.
"Unsere ausländischen Partner haben nichts unternommen, haben ihren Einfluss nicht genützt um Tbilisis, zur Unterzeichnung eines rechtlich bindendes Dokument und Verzicht auf Gewalt zu bewegen“.
Nach dem versagen der Kouchner Mission flog Präsident Sarkozy am 12. August nach Moskau um ein neues Abkommen auszuhandeln.
Die Russen machten ihm dann klar was sie wollten, und Präsident Sarkozy schrieb alles auf.
Präsident Sarkozy flog anschliessend nach Tbilisis um M. Saakashshvili zu treffen.
M. Saakashshvili und seine amerikanischen Einflüsterer lehnten diese Version eines Abkommen ab.
Störend war eigentlich nur ein Wort (1) im Punkt 6 des Abkommens.
Im Text: - Launch of international discussions on status, security and stability arrangements for Abkhazia and South Ossetia.
Beginn von internationalen Verhandlung über den Status, Regelungen der Sicherheit und Stabilität für Abchasien und Südossetien.
**störend war das Wort „Status“
Da hatten wohl welche eine böse Vorahnung? Diese Formulierung wurde nämlich schon in einem anderen, ähnlichem Fall gebraucht. Sie ahnen es vielleicht?.
Ja es war der Kosovo.
Diese Formulierung wurde durch den „Westen“ auf dem Balkan gebraucht um den Kosovo von Serbien zu trennen.
Georgien forderte, dass das Wort „Status“ entfernt werden sollte. Russland war dann überraschend schnell einverstanden damit, wohl weil die Formulierung „Verhandlung über die Regelungen der Sicherheit und Stabilität“ stark genug war für die eigenen Zwecke, zumindest so lange wie es im Abkommen keine Garantien gab für „territoriale Integrität“.
Nachdem das Unwort „Status“ aus dem Artikel 6 entfernt worden war akzeptierte M. Saakashshvili das Abkommen, jedoch ohne es Formel zu unterschreiben.
In den folgenden Tagen und Wochen sollte aber dieser Punkt im UN-Sicherheitsrat noch für einige Hektik sorgen. Der „Westen“ (sprich die USA) wollten die Wörter „territoriale Integrität“ im Text einer Resolution haben. Die Russen verlangten aber, dass die genaue Formulierung aus dem von ihnen unterzeichnete Abkommen gelten müsse. Diese Formulierung könnte zu einem späteren Zeitpunkt genützt werden um Südossetien und Abchasien von Georgien zu trennen.
In der Nacht vom 13. auf den 14. August flog C. Rice nach Paris um sich mit Präsident N. Sarkozy zu beraten. Es war vorgesehen, dass sie anschliessend mit dem formelle Abkommen nach Tbilisis weiterreisen würde um es zur Unterschrift vorzulegen.
Ein Paar Tage später erfuhr die Welt, dass Präsident N. Sarkozy, durch C. Rice unter Druck gesetzt, einen Brief an M. Saakashshvili geschrieben hatte in welchem ein Paar „Punkten“ des Waffenstillstands-Abkommen geklärt wurden. Diese „Klärung“ änderte den Sinn einiger Punkte des Abkommens.
Die Russen wurden mündlich über diesen Brief informiert, meinten aber „dass wen Präsident N. Sarkozy seinem Amtskollegen in Georgien „Liebesbriefe schreibt, es sie nichts anging“
Am 15 August kam C. Rice in Georgien an und später am Tag wurde berichtet, das M. Saakashshvili das Abkommen unterzeichnet hätte.
Aber hat der das wirklich?
Ynetnews.com am 16. August - Late on Friday US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice spoke with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov from her plane after leaving the Georgian capital Tbilisi. A US official said Lavrov told Rice Russia would faithfully implement the ceasefire agreement, but wanted to see Saakashvili's signature on the document first.
Spät am Freitag sprach US-Aussenministerin C. Rice vom Flugzeug aus mit dem russischen Aussenminister Lavrov. Ein US Sprecher sagte „Lavrov bestätigte, dass Russland das Waffenstillstands-Abkommen einhalten würde aber, dass sie zuerst das unterschriebenen Dokument sehen wollten“
Am 16. August unterschrieb der russische Präsident D. Medvedev das formelle Abkommen, dass ihm die Franzosen zukommen liessen.
Die Verhandlungen waren vorbei. Das Waffenstillstands-Abkommen konnte jetzt in Kraft treten.
Aber halt! Nicht so vorschnell!
Da nach Unterschrift solche Vereinbarungen ausgetauscht werden, wurde festgestellt, dass es jetzt zwei Versionen des Abkommen gab.
Was war denn da geschehen?
Wer hat da was manipuliert?
Die Russen?
Die Georgier?
Vielleicht die Amerikaner?
Die Franzosen?
Wer war da am Werk?
Auf jeden fall war die Version des Abkommens die durch M. Saakashshvili unterzeichnet worden war nicht identisch mit der die D. Medvedev unterzeichnet hatte.
Die von den Russen unterzeichnet Version entsprach dem durch N. Sarkozy ausgehandelte Abkommen.
Moscow Times am 20. August - The copy signed by Saakashvili somehow lost a preamble that said the document was the result of an agreement reached between Medvedev and Sarkozy. When this became known, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said he would use diplomatic channels to find out who had modified the text.
Die von M. Saakashshvili verlor ein Teil - die Präambel, welche sagte, dass das Abkommen das Ergebnis einer Einigung zwischen D. Medvedev und N. Sarkozy war.
Als dies bekannt wurde sagte der russische Aussen Minister Dergei Lavrov, dass er alle diplomatische Kanäle bemühen würde um heraus zu finden was da geschehen war.
Nun wie auch immer, C. Rice holte das Dokument in Paris ab, auf ihrem Weg nach Tbilisis.
Das Dokument, welches von Paris aus nach Moskau gesendet wurde zur Unterschrift hatte eine Präambel.
Das Dokument, welches nach Tbilisis gesendet wurde, kam ohne Präambel an.
Hatte C. Rice diese Präambel während des Fluges entfernen lassen?
Warum? Und in welchem Zusammenhang stand das mit diesem ominöse Sarkozy-Brief?
Die Verhandlungen waren vorbei, das Abkommen unterschrieben und getauscht und der legale Teil abgeschlossen.
Dann kam der Donnerschlag!
Am Samstag den 16. August kam eine Reuters Meldung über die Ticker.
PARIS, Aug 16 (Reuters) - Russia must withdraw from all major towns in Georgia under a peace accord it has signed, despite conditions authorising "additional security measures," according to a letter sent by French President Nicolas Sarkozy to Georgian leader Mikheil Saakashvili.
"As I specified at our joint press conference in Tbilisi, these 'additional security measures' can only be implemented in the immediate proximity of South Ossetia to the exclusion of any other part of Georgian territory," read the letter, made public by Sarkozy's office on Sunday.
The French-brokered agreement drafted this week authorises Russian forces to take extra security measures on a temporary basis pending the arrival of international peacekeepers -- which requires a U.N. Security Council resolution.
...
Sarkozy's letter said that under the accord, Russian forces would not be authorised to remain in any major towns outside South Ossetia and road and rail transport should be guaranteed.
"More precisely, these 'measures' may only be implemented within a zone of a few kilometres from the administrative limits between South Ossetia and the rest of Georgia, in such a way that no major urban centre is included -- I am thinking in particular of the town of Gori," the letter read.
"Special arrangements will have to be defined to guarantee freedom of movement along the road and rail routes of Georgia," it said.
PARIS, 16. August (Reuters) – Gemäss einem Schreiben von Präsident N. Sarkozy an den georgischen Präsidenten M. Saakashvili, muss Russland sich im Rahmen eines Friedensabkommens, dass es unterschrieben hat, und trotz der Genehmigung "zusätzlichen Maßnahmen zur Gefahrenabwehr," ausüben zu dürfen die in diesem Abkommen enthalten ist, aus allen wichtigen Städten in Georgien zurückziehen.
"Wie ich es in unserer gemeinsamen Pressekonferenz in Tbilisi präzisiert habe, können diese "zusätzlichen Maßnahmen zur Gefahrenabwehr“ nur in der unmittelbaren Nähe von Südossetien und unter Ausschluss aller anderen Teile des georgischen Territorium durchgeführt werden“, so das Schreiben, dass am Sonntag von Sarkozys Büro veröffentlicht wurde.
Die durch französisch Vermittlung diese Woche erarbeitete Vereinbarung erlaubte den russischen Streitkräfte zusätzliche Maßnahmen zur Gefahrenabwehr durchzuführen und dies bis zum Eintreffen internationaler Friedenstruppen – welche durch eine Resolution des UN-Sicherheitsrates eingesetzt werden können .
...
Sarkozys Schreiben sagt, dass es im Rahmen der Übereinkunft, den russischen Streitkräfte nicht erlaubt wäre, sich in Städten ausserhalb Süd-Ossetien aufzuhalten, sowie, dass Strassen-und Schienenverkehr gewährleistet sein soll.
"Genauer gesagt, dürfen diese "Maßnahmen" nur innerhalb einer Zone von ein paar Kilometer Breite rund um die administrativen Grenzen zwischen Südossetien und dem Rest von Georgien durchgeführt werden. Diese Massnahmen dürfen auf keine urbanen Zonen ausgedehnt werden - ich denke da insbesondere an die Stadt Gori".
"Besondere Vorkehrungen solle getroffen werden, um die Bewegungsfreiheit entlang den Strassen - und Schienen Strecken von Georgien zu garantieren".
Keine einzige dieser Spezifikationen wird in der sehr kurzen, legalen, unterzeichneten und bindenden originale Vereinbarung erwähnt.
Warum glaubt N. Sarkozy, dass er im Nachhinein das Abkommen nach belieben umdeuten kann?
Da lief zweifellos ein geheimnisvolles Spiel!
Etwa nach dem Motto - S arrangiert einen Vertrag zwischen A und B, wo B 10.000.- bezahlen muss. Nachdem der Vertrag unterschrieben ist, sagt S zu B, dass er die 10.000.- als 100.- interpretiert, B mag diese Interpretation sehr. Aber warum sollte A damit einverstanden sein?
Wollte da jemand den Schachspieler mit einer Pokerpartie austricksen?
Warum wurde diese Schieberei plötzlich publik gemacht?
Wer hat der Presse zugespielt?
Das Schreiben, dass Reuters am Samstag veröffentlichte, wurde völlig geheim gehalten, bis Inner City Press (ICP) wind davon bekam:
Da das Dokument am Donnerstag Inner City Press übergeben wurde, und nachdem zahlreiche Reporter sowie hochrangige Diplomaten im Sicherheitsrat das Schreiben haben wollten, entschloss sich die französische Regierung, das Dokument aus Gründen der „Transparenz“ zu veröffentlichen.
War diese „Transparenz“ vielleicht eher eine kleine Rache?
Werden wir es je erfahren?.........
*****
Hier noch der Text des Waffenstillstands-Abkommen in der englische Fassung
The six-point ceasefire agreement
Article published on the 2008-08-16
- 1 - No recourse to the use of force.
- 2 - A lasting cessation of hostilities.
- 3 - Unfettered access for humanitarian aid providers.
- 4 - Georgian forces must withdraw to their usual barracks.
- 5 - Russian forces must go back to positions they held prior to the outbreak of hostilities. Pending an international peace monitoring mechanism, Russian peacekeepers will take additional security measures.
- 6 - Launch of international discussions on security and stability arrangements for Abkhazia and South Ossetia.
*****
Und die Meldung von Inner City Press
At UN, Russia Finalizes Georgia Draft As Sarkozy's Add-On Points Are At Issue
Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of Inner City Press at the UN: News Analysis
UNITED NATIONS, August 21 -- Amid reports of Russian troops "laying siege" to the Georgian port of Poti, at the UN on Thursday Russia finalized its draft Security Council resolution, saying it could be voted on in 24 hours. U.S. Ambassador Alejandro Wolff indicated that the U.S. could not support, and would veto, the Russian draft, which mirrors the six point agreement French president Nicolas Sarkozy reached with his Russian counterpart Dmitry Medvedev on August 12.
The trick is, Sarkozy purported to "clarify" his agreement with Medvedev in August 14 letter to Georgian president Mikhail Saakashvili, to which Sarkozy went on to add three points. Inner City Press asked French Ambassador Jean-Pierre Lacroix if Russia had agreed to the three added-on point, and to explain the discepancy about the security zone, whether it is around the whole of South Ossetia or only by the capital, Tskhinvali, and who long these "provisional" measures can last. Lacroix answered only the last of the three points, saying the provision means until the OSCE and possibly EU, of which France currently has the presidency, establish the "international mechanism" referred to in the fifth of the six points.
While the document handed to Inner City Press Thursday at the stakeout begins, "The Presidency of the Republic [of France], for the sake of transparency, wished to make public the letter," afterwards numerous reporters and even senior diplomats in the Security Council asked Inner City Press for copies of Sarkozy's letter. Inner City Press made copies, for the sake of France's transparency.
http://www.innercitypress.com/unsc4georgia082108.html
*****
Quellen:
http://edition.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/europe/08/23/russia.georgia.withdrawal/
http://www.rfi.fr/actuen/articles/104/article_1331.asp
http://www.moonofalabama.org/2008/08/saakashvili-wan.html
http://www.innercitypress.com/unsc3sossetia080808.html
http://www.moonofalabama.org/2008/08/index.html
http://www.moonofalabama.org/2008/08/sack-saak.html
http://en.rian.ru/world/20080811/115955128.html
http://www.moonofalabama.org/2008/08/israeli-quad-bi.html
http://www.presstv.com/detail.aspx?id=66360§ionid=351020602
http://www.zeenews.com/articles.asp?aid=461798&sid=WOR
http://www.innercitypress.com/un2georgia081908.html
http://www.dw-world.de/dw/function/0,2145,12215_cid_3568058,00.html
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3583186,00.html
http://news.yahoo.com/s/bloomberg/20080816/pl_bloomberg/a3vi2oro48xu
http://www.themoscowtimes.com/article/600/42/370003.htm
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/LG452548.htm
http://www.rfi.fr/actuen/articles/104/article_1331.asp
http://www.innercitypress.com/unsc4georgia082108.html
Tuesday, September 16, 2008
Waffenstillstand und das Treiben im Hintergrund - Teil 1
Der mysteriöse 'Sarkozy Brief'
Ist es nicht komisch, wie manche "westlichen" Politiker getobt haben über die Unterzeichnung der Waffenstillstandsvereinbarung und die Regelungen zur Präsenz der russischen Friedenstruppen in Georgien. Aber sie taten dies, natürlich, aus einem bestimmten Grund. Sie wollten, das akzeptierte und unterzeichnete Waffenstillstands-Abkommen nachträglich ändern.
Um zu verstehen, was hier geschehen war, müssen wir zurück schauen auf die Tagen in denen das Waffenstillstands-Abkommen entstand.
Versuchen wir es doch mal
Also hier ist eine kurze Version:
Die USA versuchten das Waffenstillstands-Abkommen zwischen Georgien und Russland nach der Unterzeichnung zu ändern.
N. Sarkozy verhandelte mit Russland und Georgien und erreichte eine für beide Seiten annehmbares Abkommen. Die US-Regierung war ziemlich erbost darüber und übte heftige Kritik an Sarkozy.
C. Rice kam nach Paris und übte starken Druck auf N. Sarkozy aus um ihn dazu zu bringen einen neuen Brief an M. Saakaschwili zu schreiben mit einer für Georgien und die USA freundlichere Auslegung des Waffenstillstands-Abkommen.
Zu bemerken ist, dass ein solches Schreiben rechtlich wertlos ist.
Im Nachhinein wollten die USA dieses veränderten „Dokument“ als legales Teil des Waffenstillstands-Abkommen nutzen um im Sicherheitsrat der Vereinten Nationen eine Resolution gegen Russland zustande zu bringen.
Sie wollten mit Hilfe des „Sarkozy Schreiben“ russischen Truppenbewegungen und Kontrollpunkte in Georgien, die gemäss dem originale Waffenstillstands-Abkommen legal waren, als illegal behandelt sehen. Die westliche Propagandamaschine und die Massenmedien spielten da auch voll mit.
Russland hatte natürlich eine andere Sicht der Dinge, hatte diesem neuen Schreiben nie zugestimmt und alle Trümpfe auf seiner Seite.
Um zu verstehen um was es genau geht ein kleiner Blick über die damalige Situation in Georgien:
Nach in kraft treten des Waffenstillstands-Abkommen haben die Russen ihre Truppen auf die Demarkationslinien zwischen Südossetien bzw. Abchasien und Georgien zurückgezogen die in den Vereinbarungen aus den 90er Jahren festgelegt wurden.
Aber zusätzlich hielten sie, gemäss Waffenstillstands-Abkommen, Truppen im Hafen von Poti, in Senaki und in der Nähe der Ost-West Strasse nördlich von Gori.
Ohne ein grosser Stratege zu sein kann jeder die Logik dieses Handelns verstehen.
Der Hafen von Poti ist der wahrscheinlichste Punkt über welchen neue schwere Waffen nach Georgien geliefert werden könnten. (es ist unwahrscheinlich, dass die Türkei Waffenlieferung an Georgien zulassen würde).
Die Truppen in und um Senaki sind notwendig um die Verbindungslinien zwischen Abchasien und Poti zu decken.
Die Truppen um Gori schützen die Ost-West Verkehrsader.
Wie lange diese Truppen da bleiben werden war zu dieser Zeit (Mitte August) noch nicht klar
Und so eine Situation gefällt der US-Regierung absolut nicht
CNN am 23 August 2008 U.S. Deputy State Department spokesman Robert Wood said the Russians "without a doubt have failed to live up to their obligations under the ceasefire agreement."
An immediate concern expressed by all sides involved buffer zones outside of two Georgian breakaway provinces, South Ossetia and Abkhazia. Russia insists it has the right to create these zones under the cease-fire deal, but Wood said, "Establishing check-points and buffer zones are definitely not part of the agreement."
Robert Wood, Sprecher des Stellvertreter des US-State Department sagte, „die Russen haben es ohne Zweifel versäumt ihren Verpflichtungen aus dem Waffenstillstands-Abkommen nachzukommen“. Bedenken bestehen vor allem über die Pufferzonen um die beiden abtrünnigen georgischen Provinzen, Süd-Ossetien und Abchasien.
Russland besteht darauf, das Recht zur Schaffung dieser Zonen gemäss Abkommen zu haben. Aber Wood sagte: "Die Schaffung von Check-Punkte und Pufferzonen sind definitiv nicht Teil der Vereinbarung."
Da irrt aber Herr Wood ganz gewaltig.
Punkt 5. in dem Waffenstillstands-Abkommen (dem originale) sagt: die russische Streitkräften müssen sich auf ihre Positionen die sie vor Ausbruch der Feindseligkeiten besetzten zurückziehen.
Bis zur Einsetzung von internationalen Friedens-Kontrollmechanismen werden russischen Friedenstruppen alle zusätzlichen Massnahmen zur Gefahrenabwehr übernehmen.
Eine kurze, ausgezeichnete und nach Sicht der Russen breit angelegte Formulierung
Diese „internationalen Friedens-Kontrollmechanismen“ benötigen ein Mandat des Sicherheitsrats oder eine OSZE-Vereinbarung, die beide nur mit Russlands Zustimmung beschlossen werden können.
Ebenso kann "Zusätzliche Massnahmen zur Gefahrenabwehr" sehr breit ausgelegt werden.
Russland kann alle gewünschte militärische oder polizeiliche Massnahmen dies es für nötig hält anwenden. Selbst wenn die Russen beschliessen würden auf Tbilisis Strassen den Verkehr regeln zu wollen, könnte rechtlich niemanden was dagegen unternehmen.
Der CNN Bericht versucht Robert Woods falsche Empörung mit dem ominöse Sarkozy Schreiben zu Rechtfertigen:
CNN am 23 August 2008 In a letter clarifying that point, French President Nicolas Sarkozy -- who helped broker the deal -- wrote that such measures "may only be implemented in the immediate proximity of South Ossetia to the exclusion of any other part of Georgian territory."
He added that the measures must be "inside a zone of a depth of a few kilometers from the administrative limit between South Ossetia and the rest of Georgia in a manner such that no significant urban zone would be included."
Präsident Sarkozy, der das Abkommen ausgehandelt hatte, machte in einem Schreiben zu diesem Punkt klar, dass solche Massnahmen nur in der unmittelbare Nähe von Südossetien und unter Ausschluss des restliche Teile Georgiens durchgeführt werden können, und, dass Urbane Zonen ebenfalls ausgeschlossen wären.
Ouah! Was für ein Schreiben? Geschrieben wann? An wen?
CNN wird es uns nicht sagen, Warum? Ja warum wohl?
Monday, September 15, 2008
Neue Lage in Pakistan - Schusswechsel an der Grenze
Über die Ticker der Presseagenturen kommen Meldungen wonach es an der Grenze zwischen Pakistan und Afghanistan zu Zusammenstösse gekommen sein soll!
Wie gemeldet wurde, sollen US-Truppen die in Pakistan eindringen wollten durch Pakistanischen Kräfte am Grenzübertritt mit Gewalt behindert worden sein.
Über Dauer und Intensität des Schusswechsels gibt es verschiedenen Angaben.
Ob nur Warnschüsse oder Stundenlangen "Kämpfe" ist noch nicht klar.
Ein offizieller Sprecher des pakistanische Militärs sagte "Das pakistanische Militär war nicht an der Aktion beteiligt"
Quellen:
Wie gemeldet wurde, sollen US-Truppen die in Pakistan eindringen wollten durch Pakistanischen Kräfte am Grenzübertritt mit Gewalt behindert worden sein.
Über Dauer und Intensität des Schusswechsels gibt es verschiedenen Angaben.
Ob nur Warnschüsse oder Stundenlangen "Kämpfe" ist noch nicht klar.
Ein offizieller Sprecher des pakistanische Militärs sagte "Das pakistanische Militär war nicht an der Aktion beteiligt"
Quellen:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/7396366.stm
http://www.heise.de/tp/blogs/8/115952
Noam Chomsky über die georgische Krise und westliche Propaganda
Ossetia-Georgia-Russia-U.S.A.:
Towards a Second Cold War?
By Noam Chomsky *
Aghast at the atrocities committed by US forces invading the Philippines, and the rhetorical flights about liberation and noble intent that routinely accompany crimes of state, Mark Twain threw up his hands at his inability to wield his formidable weapon of satire. The immediate object of his frustration was the renowned General Funston. "No satire of Funston could reach perfection," Twain lamented, "because Funston occupies that summit himself... [he is] satire incarnated."
It is a thought that often comes to mind, again in August 2008 during the Georgia-Ossetia-Russia war. George Bush, Condoleezza Rica and other dignitaries solemnly invoked the sanctity of the United Nations, warning that Russia could be excluded from international institutions "by taking actions in Georgia that are inconsistent with" their principles. The sovereignty and territorial integrity of all nations must be rigorously honored, they intoned - "all nations," that is, apart from those that the US chooses to attack: Iraq, Serbia, perhaps Iran, and a list of others too long and familiar to mention.
The junior partner joined in as well. British foreign secretary David Miliband accused Russia of engaging in "19th century forms of diplomacy" by invading a sovereign state, something Britain would never contemplate today. That "is simply not the way that international relations can be run in the 21st century," he added, echoing the decider-in-chief, who said that invasion of "a sovereign neighboring state...is unacceptable in the 21st century." Mexico and Canada therefore need not fear further invasions and annexation of much of their territory, because the US now only invades states that are not on its borders, though no such constraint holds for its clients, as Lebanon learned once again in 2006.
"The moral of this story is even more enlightening," Serge Halimi writes in Le Monde Diplomatique and CounterPunch newsletter, "when, to defend his country's borders, the charming pro-American Saakashvili repatriates some of the 2,000 soldiers he had sent to invade Iraq," one of the largest contingents apart from the two warrior states.
Prominent analysts joined the chorus. Fareed Zakaria applauded Bush's observation that Russia's behavior is unacceptable today, unlike the 19th century, "when the Russian intervention would have been standard operating procedure for a great power." We therefore must devise a strategy for bringing Russia "in line with the civilized world," where intervention is unthinkable.
There were, to be sure, some who shared Mark Twain's despair. One distinguished example is Chris Patten, former EU commissioner for external relations, chairman of the British Conservative Party, chancellor of Oxford University and a member of the House of Lords. He wrote that the Western reaction "is enough to make even the cynical shake their heads in disbelief" - referring to Europe's failure to respond vigorously to the effrontery of Russian leaders, who, "like 19th-century tsars, want a sphere of influence around their borders."
Patten rightly distinguishes Russia from the global superpower, which long ago passed the point where it demanded a sphere of influence around its borders, and demands a sphere of influence over the entire world. It also acts vigorously to enforce that demand, in accord with the Clinton doctrine that Washington has the right to use military force to defend vital interests such as "ensuring uninhibited access to key markets, energy supplies and strategic resources" - and in the real world, far more.
Clinton was breaking no new ground, of course. His doctrine derives from standard principles formulated by high-level planners during World War II, which offered the prospect of global dominance. In the postwar world, they determined, the US should aim "to hold unquestioned power" while ensuring the "limitation of any exercise of sovereignty" by states that might interfere with its global designs. To secure these ends, "the foremost requirement [is] the rapid fulfillment of a program of complete rearmament," a core element of "an integrated policy to achieve military and economic supremacy for the United States." The plans laid during the war were implemented in various ways in the years that followed.
The goals are deeply rooted in stable institutional structures. Hence they persist through changes in occupancy of the White House, and are untroubled by the opportunity for "peace dividends," the disappearance of the major rival from the world scene, or other marginal irrelevancies. Devising new challenges is never beyond the reach of doctrinal managers, as when Ronald Reagan pulled on his cowboy boots and declared a national emergency because the Nicaraguan army was only two days from Harlingen Texas, and might lead the hordes who are about to "sweep over the United States and take what we have," as Lyndon Johnson lamented when he called for holding the line in Vietnam. Most ominously, those holding the reins may actually believe their own words.
Returning to the efforts to elevate Russia to the civilized world, the seven charter members of the Group of Eight industrialized countries issued a statement "condemning the action of our fellow G8 member," Russia, which has yet to comprehend the Anglo-American commitment to non-intervention. The European Union held a rare emergency meeting to condemn Russia's crime, its first meeting since the invasion of Iraq, which elicited no condemnation.
Russia called for an emergency session of the Security Council, but no consensus was reached because, according to Council diplomats, the US, Britain, and some others rejected a phrase that called on both sides "to renounce the use of force."
The typical reactions recall Orwell's observations on the "indifference to reality" of the "nationalist," who "not only does not disapprove of atrocities committed by his own side, but ... has a remarkable capacity for not even hearing about them."
The basic facts are not seriously in dispute. South Ossetia, along with the much more significant region of Abkhazia, were assigned by Stalin to his native Georgia. Western leaders sternly admonish that Stalin's directives must be respected, despite the strong opposition of Ossetians and Abkhazians. The provinces enjoyed relative autonomy until the collapse of the USSR. In 1990, Georgia's ultranationalist president Zviad Gamsakhurdia abolished autonomous regions and invaded South Ossetia. The bitter war that followed left 1000 dead and tens of thousands of refugees, with the capital city of Tskhinvali "battered and depopulated" (New York Times).
A small Russian force then supervised an uneasy truce, broken decisively on August 7, 2008, when Georgian president Saakashvili's ordered his forces to invade. According to "an extensive set of witnesses," the Times reports, Georgia's military at once "began pounding civilian sections of the city of Tskhinvali, as well as a Russian peacekeeping base there, with heavy barrages of rocket and artillery fire." The predictable Russian response drove Georgian forces out of South Ossetia, and Russia went on to conquer parts of Georgia, then partially withdrawing to the vicinity of South Ossetia. There were many casualties and atrocities. As is normal, the innocent suffered severely.
Russia reported at first that ten Russian peacekeepers were killed by Georgian shelling. The West took little notice. That too is normal. There was, for example, no reaction when Aviation Week reported that 200 Russians were killed in an Israeli air raid in Lebanon in 1982 during a US-backed invasion that left some 15-20,000 dead, with no credible pretext beyond strengthening Israeli control over the occupied West Bank.
Among Ossetians who fled north, the "prevailing view," according to the London Financial Times, "is that Georgia's pro-western leader, Mikheil Saakashvili, tried to wipe out their breakaway enclave." Ossetian militias, under Russian eyes, then brutally drove out Georgians, in areas beyond Ossetia as well. "Georgia said its attack had been necessary to stop a Russian attack that already had been under way," the New York Times reports, but weeks later "there has been no independent evidence, beyond Georgia's insistence that its version is true, that Russian forces were attacking before the Georgian barrages."
In Russia, the Wall Street Journal reports, "legislators, officials and local analysts have embraced the theory that the Bush administration encouraged Georgia, its ally, to start the war in order to precipitate an international crisis that would play up the national-security experience of Sen. John McCain, the Republican presidential candidate." In contrast, French author Bernard-Henri Levy, writing in the New Republic, proclaims that "no one can ignore the fact that President Saakashvili only decided to act when he no longer had a choice, and war had already come. In spite of this accumulation of facts that should have been blindingly obvious to all scrupulous, good-faith observers, many in the media rushed as one man toward the thesis of the Georgians as instigators, as irresponsible provocateurs of the war."
The Russian propaganda system made the mistake of presenting evidence, which was easily refuted. Its Western counterparts, more wisely, keep to authoritative pronouncements, like Levy's denunciation of the major Western media for ignoring what is "blindingly obvious to all scrupulous, good-faith observers" for whom loyalty to the state suffices to establish The Truth - which, perhaps, is even true, serious analysts might conclude.
The Russians are losing the "propaganda war," BBC reported, as Washington and its allies have succeeded in "presenting the Russian actions as aggression and playing down the Georgian attack into South Ossetia on August 7, which triggered the Russian operation," though "the evidence from South Ossetia about that attack indicates that it was extensive and damaging." Russia has "not yet learned how to play the media game," the BBC observes. That is natural. Propaganda has typically become more sophisticated as countries become more free and the state loses the ability to control the population by force.
The Russian failure to provide credible evidence was partially overcome by the Financial Times, which discovered that the Pentagon had provided combat training to Georgian special forces commandos shortly before the Georgian attack on August 7, revelations that "could add fuel to accusations by Vladimir Putin, Russian prime minister, last month that the US had 'orchestrated' the war in the Georgian enclave." The training was in part carried out by former US special forces recruited by private military contractors, including MPRI, which, as the journal notes, "was hired by the Pentagon in 1995 to train the Croatian military prior to their invasion of the ethnically-Serbian Krajina region, which led to the displacement of 200,000 refugees and was one of the worst incidents of ethnic cleansing in the Balkan wars." The US-backed Krajina expulsion (generally estimated at 250,000, with many killed) was possibly the worst case of ethnic cleansing in Europe since World War II. Its fate in approved history is rather like that of photographs of Trotsky in Stalinist Russia, for simple and sufficient reasons: it does not accord with the required image of US nobility confronting Serbian evil.
The toll of the August 2008 Caucasus war is subject to varying estimates. A month afterwards, the Financial Times cited Russian reports that "at least 133 civilians died in the attack, as well as 59 of its own peacekeepers," while in the ensuing Russian mass invasion and aerial bombardment of Georgia, according to the FT, 215 Georgians died, including 146 soldiers and 69 civilians. Further revelations are likely to follow.
In the background lie two crucial issues. One is control over pipelines to Azerbaijan and Central Asia. Georgia was chosen as a corridor by Clinton to bypass Russia and Iran, and was also heavily militarized for the purpose. Hence Georgia is "a very major and strategic asset to us," Zbigniew Brzezinski observes.
It is noteworthy that analysts are becoming less reticent in explaining real US motives in the region as pretexts of dire threats and liberation fade and it becomes more difficult to deflect Iraqi demands for withdrawal of the occupying army. Thus the editors of the Washington Post admonished Barack Obama for regarding Afghanistan as "the central front" for the United States, reminding him that Iraq "lies at the geopolitical center of the Middle East and contains some of the world's largest oil reserves," and Afghanistan's "strategic importance pales beside that of Iraq." A welcome, if belated, recognition of reality about the US invasion.
The second issue is expansion of NATO to the East, described by George Kennan in 1997 as "the most fateful error of American policy in the entire post-cold-war era, [which] may be expected to inflame the nationalistic, anti-Western and militaristic tendencies in Russian opinion; to have an adverse effect on the development of Russian democracy; to restore the atmosphere of the cold war to East-West relations."
As the USSR collapsed, Mikhail Gorbachev made a concession that was astonishing in the light of recent history and strategic realities: he agreed to allow a united Germany to join a hostile military alliance. This "stunning concession" was hailed by Western media, NATO, and President Bush I, who called it a demonstration of "statesmanship ... in the best interests of all countries of Europe, including the Soviet Union."
Gorbachev agreed to the stunning concession on the basis of "assurances that NATO would not extend its jurisdiction to the east, 'not one inch' in [Secretary of State] Jim Baker's exact words." This reminder by Jack Matlock, the leading Soviet expert of the Foreign Service and US ambassador to Russia in the crucial years 1987 to 1991, is confirmed by Strobe Talbott, the highest official in charge of Eastern Europe in the Clinton administration. On the basis of a full review of the diplomatic record, Talbott reports that "Secretary of State Baker did say to then Soviet foreign minister Eduard Shevardnadze, in the context of the Soviet Union's reluctant willingness to let a unified Germany remain part of NATO, that NATO would not move to the east."
Clinton quickly reneged on that commitment, also dismissing Gorbachev's effort to end the Cold War with cooperation among partners. NATO also rejected a Russian proposal for a nuclear-weapons-free-zone from the Arctic to the Black Sea, which would have "interfered with plans to extend NATO," strategic analyst and former NATO planner Michael MccGwire observes.
Rejecting these possibilities, the US took a triumphalist stand that threatened Russian security and also played a major role in driving Russia to severe economic and social collapse, with millions of deaths. The process was sharply escalated by Bush's further expansion of NATO, dismantling of crucial disarmament agreements, and aggressive militarism. Matlock writes that Russia might have tolerated incorporation of former Russian satellites into NATO if it "had not bombed Serbia and continued expanding. But, in the final analysis, ABM missiles in Poland, and the drive for Georgia and Ukraine in NATO crossed absolute red lines. The insistence on recognizing Kosovo independence was sort of the very last straw. Putin had learned that concessions to the U.S. were not reciprocated, but used to promote U.S. dominance in the world.Once he had the strength to resist, he did so," in Georgia.
Clinton officials argue that expansion of NATO posed no military threat, and was no more than a benign move to allow former Russian satellites to join the EU (Talbott). That is hardly persuasive. Austria, Sweden and Finland are in the EU but not NATO. If the Warsaw Pact had survived and was incorporating Latin American countries - let alone Canada and Mexico - the US would not easily be persuaded that the Pact is just a Quaker meeting. There should be no need to review the record of US violence to block mostly fanciful ties to Moscow in "our little region over here," the Western hemisphere, to quote Secretary of War Henry Stimson when he explained that all regional systems must be dismantled after World II, apart from our own, which are to be extended.
To underscore the conclusion, in the midst of the current crisis in the Caucasus, Washington professes concern that Russia might resume military and intelligence cooperation with Cuba at a level not remotely approaching US-Georgia relations, and not a further step towards a significant security threat.
Missile defense too is presented here as benign, though leading US strategic analysts have explained why Russian planners must regard the systems and their chosen location as the basis for a potential threat to the Russian deterrent, hence in effect a first-strike weapon. The Russian invasion of Georgia was used as a pretext to conclude the agreement to place these systems in Poland, thus "bolstering an argument made repeatedly by Moscow and rejected by Washington: that the true target of the system is Russia," AP commentator Desmond Butler observed.
Matlock is not alone in regarding Kosovo as an important factor. "Recognition of South Ossetia's and Abkhazia's independence was justified on the principle of a mistreated minority's right to secession - the principle Bush had established for Kosovo," the Boston Globe editors comment.
But there are crucial differences. Strobe Talbott recognizes that "there's a degree of payback for what the U.S. and NATO did in Kosovo nine years ago," but insists that the "analogy is utterly and profoundly false." No one is a better position to know why it is profoundly false, and he has lucidly explained the reasons, in his preface to a book on NATO's bombing of Serbia by his associate John Norris. Talbott writes that those who want to know "how events looked and felt at the time to those of us who were involved" in the war should turn to Norris's well-informed account. Norris concludes that "it was Yugoslavia's resistance to the broader trends of political and economic reform - not the plight of Kosovar Albanians - that best explains NATO's war."
That the motive for the NATO bombing could not have been "the plight of Kosovar Albanians" was already clear from the rich Western documentary record revealing that the atrocities were, overwhelmingly, the anticipated consequence of the bombing, not its cause. But even before the record was released, it should have been evident to all but the most fervent loyalists that humanitarian concern could hardly have motivated the US and Britain, which at the same time were lending decisive support to atrocities well beyond what was reported from Kosovo, with a background far more horrendous than anything that had happened in the Balkans. But these are mere facts, hence of no moment to Orwell's "nationalists" - in this case, most of the Western intellectual community, who had made an enormous investment in self-aggrandizement and prevarication about the "noble phase" of US foreign policy and its "saintly glow" as the millennium approached its end, with the bombing of Serbia as the jewel in the crown.
Nevertheless, it is interesting to hear from the highest level that the real reason for the bombing was that Serbia was a lone holdout in Europe to the political and economic programs of the Clinton administration and its allies, though it will be a long time before such annoyances are allowed to enter the canon.
There are of course other differences between Kosovo and the regions of Georgia that call for independence or union with Russia. Thus Russia is not known to have a huge military base there named after a hero of the invasion of Afghanistan, comparable to Camp Bondsteel in Kosovo, named after a Vietnam war hero and presumably part of the vast US basing system aimed at the Middle East energy-producing regions. And there are many other differences.
There is much talk about a "new cold war" instigated by brutal Russian behavior in Georgia. One cannot fail to be alarmed by signs of confrontation, among them new US naval contingents in the Black Sea - the counterpart would hardly be tolerated in the Caribbean. Efforts to expand NATO to Ukraine, now contemplated, could become extremely hazardous.
Nonetheless, a new cold war seems unlikely. To evaluate the prospect, we should begin with clarity about the old cold war. Fevered rhetoric aside, in practice the cold war was a tacit compact in which each of the contestants was largely free to resort to violence and subversion to control its own domains: for Russia, its Eastern neighbors; for the global superpower, most of the world. Human society need not endure - and might not survive - a resurrection of anything like that.
A sensible alternative is the Gorbachev vision rejected by Clinton and undermined by Bush. Sane advice along these lines has recently been given by former Israeli Foreign Minister and historian Shlomo ben-Ami, writing in the Beirut Daily Star: "Russia must seek genuine strategic partnership with the US, and the latter must understand that, when excluded and despised, Russia can be a major global spoiler. Ignored and humiliated by the US since the Cold War ended, Russia needs integration into a new global order that respects its interests as a resurgent power, not an anti-Western strategy of confrontation."
* Noam Chomsky's most recent book is Failed States: the Abuse of Power and the Assault on Democracy.
Source: counterpunch, September 11, 2008
www.counterpunch.org/
Towards a Second Cold War?
By Noam Chomsky *
Aghast at the atrocities committed by US forces invading the Philippines, and the rhetorical flights about liberation and noble intent that routinely accompany crimes of state, Mark Twain threw up his hands at his inability to wield his formidable weapon of satire. The immediate object of his frustration was the renowned General Funston. "No satire of Funston could reach perfection," Twain lamented, "because Funston occupies that summit himself... [he is] satire incarnated."
It is a thought that often comes to mind, again in August 2008 during the Georgia-Ossetia-Russia war. George Bush, Condoleezza Rica and other dignitaries solemnly invoked the sanctity of the United Nations, warning that Russia could be excluded from international institutions "by taking actions in Georgia that are inconsistent with" their principles. The sovereignty and territorial integrity of all nations must be rigorously honored, they intoned - "all nations," that is, apart from those that the US chooses to attack: Iraq, Serbia, perhaps Iran, and a list of others too long and familiar to mention.
The junior partner joined in as well. British foreign secretary David Miliband accused Russia of engaging in "19th century forms of diplomacy" by invading a sovereign state, something Britain would never contemplate today. That "is simply not the way that international relations can be run in the 21st century," he added, echoing the decider-in-chief, who said that invasion of "a sovereign neighboring state...is unacceptable in the 21st century." Mexico and Canada therefore need not fear further invasions and annexation of much of their territory, because the US now only invades states that are not on its borders, though no such constraint holds for its clients, as Lebanon learned once again in 2006.
"The moral of this story is even more enlightening," Serge Halimi writes in Le Monde Diplomatique and CounterPunch newsletter, "when, to defend his country's borders, the charming pro-American Saakashvili repatriates some of the 2,000 soldiers he had sent to invade Iraq," one of the largest contingents apart from the two warrior states.
Prominent analysts joined the chorus. Fareed Zakaria applauded Bush's observation that Russia's behavior is unacceptable today, unlike the 19th century, "when the Russian intervention would have been standard operating procedure for a great power." We therefore must devise a strategy for bringing Russia "in line with the civilized world," where intervention is unthinkable.
There were, to be sure, some who shared Mark Twain's despair. One distinguished example is Chris Patten, former EU commissioner for external relations, chairman of the British Conservative Party, chancellor of Oxford University and a member of the House of Lords. He wrote that the Western reaction "is enough to make even the cynical shake their heads in disbelief" - referring to Europe's failure to respond vigorously to the effrontery of Russian leaders, who, "like 19th-century tsars, want a sphere of influence around their borders."
Patten rightly distinguishes Russia from the global superpower, which long ago passed the point where it demanded a sphere of influence around its borders, and demands a sphere of influence over the entire world. It also acts vigorously to enforce that demand, in accord with the Clinton doctrine that Washington has the right to use military force to defend vital interests such as "ensuring uninhibited access to key markets, energy supplies and strategic resources" - and in the real world, far more.
Clinton was breaking no new ground, of course. His doctrine derives from standard principles formulated by high-level planners during World War II, which offered the prospect of global dominance. In the postwar world, they determined, the US should aim "to hold unquestioned power" while ensuring the "limitation of any exercise of sovereignty" by states that might interfere with its global designs. To secure these ends, "the foremost requirement [is] the rapid fulfillment of a program of complete rearmament," a core element of "an integrated policy to achieve military and economic supremacy for the United States." The plans laid during the war were implemented in various ways in the years that followed.
The goals are deeply rooted in stable institutional structures. Hence they persist through changes in occupancy of the White House, and are untroubled by the opportunity for "peace dividends," the disappearance of the major rival from the world scene, or other marginal irrelevancies. Devising new challenges is never beyond the reach of doctrinal managers, as when Ronald Reagan pulled on his cowboy boots and declared a national emergency because the Nicaraguan army was only two days from Harlingen Texas, and might lead the hordes who are about to "sweep over the United States and take what we have," as Lyndon Johnson lamented when he called for holding the line in Vietnam. Most ominously, those holding the reins may actually believe their own words.
Returning to the efforts to elevate Russia to the civilized world, the seven charter members of the Group of Eight industrialized countries issued a statement "condemning the action of our fellow G8 member," Russia, which has yet to comprehend the Anglo-American commitment to non-intervention. The European Union held a rare emergency meeting to condemn Russia's crime, its first meeting since the invasion of Iraq, which elicited no condemnation.
Russia called for an emergency session of the Security Council, but no consensus was reached because, according to Council diplomats, the US, Britain, and some others rejected a phrase that called on both sides "to renounce the use of force."
The typical reactions recall Orwell's observations on the "indifference to reality" of the "nationalist," who "not only does not disapprove of atrocities committed by his own side, but ... has a remarkable capacity for not even hearing about them."
The basic facts are not seriously in dispute. South Ossetia, along with the much more significant region of Abkhazia, were assigned by Stalin to his native Georgia. Western leaders sternly admonish that Stalin's directives must be respected, despite the strong opposition of Ossetians and Abkhazians. The provinces enjoyed relative autonomy until the collapse of the USSR. In 1990, Georgia's ultranationalist president Zviad Gamsakhurdia abolished autonomous regions and invaded South Ossetia. The bitter war that followed left 1000 dead and tens of thousands of refugees, with the capital city of Tskhinvali "battered and depopulated" (New York Times).
A small Russian force then supervised an uneasy truce, broken decisively on August 7, 2008, when Georgian president Saakashvili's ordered his forces to invade. According to "an extensive set of witnesses," the Times reports, Georgia's military at once "began pounding civilian sections of the city of Tskhinvali, as well as a Russian peacekeeping base there, with heavy barrages of rocket and artillery fire." The predictable Russian response drove Georgian forces out of South Ossetia, and Russia went on to conquer parts of Georgia, then partially withdrawing to the vicinity of South Ossetia. There were many casualties and atrocities. As is normal, the innocent suffered severely.
Russia reported at first that ten Russian peacekeepers were killed by Georgian shelling. The West took little notice. That too is normal. There was, for example, no reaction when Aviation Week reported that 200 Russians were killed in an Israeli air raid in Lebanon in 1982 during a US-backed invasion that left some 15-20,000 dead, with no credible pretext beyond strengthening Israeli control over the occupied West Bank.
Among Ossetians who fled north, the "prevailing view," according to the London Financial Times, "is that Georgia's pro-western leader, Mikheil Saakashvili, tried to wipe out their breakaway enclave." Ossetian militias, under Russian eyes, then brutally drove out Georgians, in areas beyond Ossetia as well. "Georgia said its attack had been necessary to stop a Russian attack that already had been under way," the New York Times reports, but weeks later "there has been no independent evidence, beyond Georgia's insistence that its version is true, that Russian forces were attacking before the Georgian barrages."
In Russia, the Wall Street Journal reports, "legislators, officials and local analysts have embraced the theory that the Bush administration encouraged Georgia, its ally, to start the war in order to precipitate an international crisis that would play up the national-security experience of Sen. John McCain, the Republican presidential candidate." In contrast, French author Bernard-Henri Levy, writing in the New Republic, proclaims that "no one can ignore the fact that President Saakashvili only decided to act when he no longer had a choice, and war had already come. In spite of this accumulation of facts that should have been blindingly obvious to all scrupulous, good-faith observers, many in the media rushed as one man toward the thesis of the Georgians as instigators, as irresponsible provocateurs of the war."
The Russian propaganda system made the mistake of presenting evidence, which was easily refuted. Its Western counterparts, more wisely, keep to authoritative pronouncements, like Levy's denunciation of the major Western media for ignoring what is "blindingly obvious to all scrupulous, good-faith observers" for whom loyalty to the state suffices to establish The Truth - which, perhaps, is even true, serious analysts might conclude.
The Russians are losing the "propaganda war," BBC reported, as Washington and its allies have succeeded in "presenting the Russian actions as aggression and playing down the Georgian attack into South Ossetia on August 7, which triggered the Russian operation," though "the evidence from South Ossetia about that attack indicates that it was extensive and damaging." Russia has "not yet learned how to play the media game," the BBC observes. That is natural. Propaganda has typically become more sophisticated as countries become more free and the state loses the ability to control the population by force.
The Russian failure to provide credible evidence was partially overcome by the Financial Times, which discovered that the Pentagon had provided combat training to Georgian special forces commandos shortly before the Georgian attack on August 7, revelations that "could add fuel to accusations by Vladimir Putin, Russian prime minister, last month that the US had 'orchestrated' the war in the Georgian enclave." The training was in part carried out by former US special forces recruited by private military contractors, including MPRI, which, as the journal notes, "was hired by the Pentagon in 1995 to train the Croatian military prior to their invasion of the ethnically-Serbian Krajina region, which led to the displacement of 200,000 refugees and was one of the worst incidents of ethnic cleansing in the Balkan wars." The US-backed Krajina expulsion (generally estimated at 250,000, with many killed) was possibly the worst case of ethnic cleansing in Europe since World War II. Its fate in approved history is rather like that of photographs of Trotsky in Stalinist Russia, for simple and sufficient reasons: it does not accord with the required image of US nobility confronting Serbian evil.
The toll of the August 2008 Caucasus war is subject to varying estimates. A month afterwards, the Financial Times cited Russian reports that "at least 133 civilians died in the attack, as well as 59 of its own peacekeepers," while in the ensuing Russian mass invasion and aerial bombardment of Georgia, according to the FT, 215 Georgians died, including 146 soldiers and 69 civilians. Further revelations are likely to follow.
In the background lie two crucial issues. One is control over pipelines to Azerbaijan and Central Asia. Georgia was chosen as a corridor by Clinton to bypass Russia and Iran, and was also heavily militarized for the purpose. Hence Georgia is "a very major and strategic asset to us," Zbigniew Brzezinski observes.
It is noteworthy that analysts are becoming less reticent in explaining real US motives in the region as pretexts of dire threats and liberation fade and it becomes more difficult to deflect Iraqi demands for withdrawal of the occupying army. Thus the editors of the Washington Post admonished Barack Obama for regarding Afghanistan as "the central front" for the United States, reminding him that Iraq "lies at the geopolitical center of the Middle East and contains some of the world's largest oil reserves," and Afghanistan's "strategic importance pales beside that of Iraq." A welcome, if belated, recognition of reality about the US invasion.
The second issue is expansion of NATO to the East, described by George Kennan in 1997 as "the most fateful error of American policy in the entire post-cold-war era, [which] may be expected to inflame the nationalistic, anti-Western and militaristic tendencies in Russian opinion; to have an adverse effect on the development of Russian democracy; to restore the atmosphere of the cold war to East-West relations."
As the USSR collapsed, Mikhail Gorbachev made a concession that was astonishing in the light of recent history and strategic realities: he agreed to allow a united Germany to join a hostile military alliance. This "stunning concession" was hailed by Western media, NATO, and President Bush I, who called it a demonstration of "statesmanship ... in the best interests of all countries of Europe, including the Soviet Union."
Gorbachev agreed to the stunning concession on the basis of "assurances that NATO would not extend its jurisdiction to the east, 'not one inch' in [Secretary of State] Jim Baker's exact words." This reminder by Jack Matlock, the leading Soviet expert of the Foreign Service and US ambassador to Russia in the crucial years 1987 to 1991, is confirmed by Strobe Talbott, the highest official in charge of Eastern Europe in the Clinton administration. On the basis of a full review of the diplomatic record, Talbott reports that "Secretary of State Baker did say to then Soviet foreign minister Eduard Shevardnadze, in the context of the Soviet Union's reluctant willingness to let a unified Germany remain part of NATO, that NATO would not move to the east."
Clinton quickly reneged on that commitment, also dismissing Gorbachev's effort to end the Cold War with cooperation among partners. NATO also rejected a Russian proposal for a nuclear-weapons-free-zone from the Arctic to the Black Sea, which would have "interfered with plans to extend NATO," strategic analyst and former NATO planner Michael MccGwire observes.
Rejecting these possibilities, the US took a triumphalist stand that threatened Russian security and also played a major role in driving Russia to severe economic and social collapse, with millions of deaths. The process was sharply escalated by Bush's further expansion of NATO, dismantling of crucial disarmament agreements, and aggressive militarism. Matlock writes that Russia might have tolerated incorporation of former Russian satellites into NATO if it "had not bombed Serbia and continued expanding. But, in the final analysis, ABM missiles in Poland, and the drive for Georgia and Ukraine in NATO crossed absolute red lines. The insistence on recognizing Kosovo independence was sort of the very last straw. Putin had learned that concessions to the U.S. were not reciprocated, but used to promote U.S. dominance in the world.Once he had the strength to resist, he did so," in Georgia.
Clinton officials argue that expansion of NATO posed no military threat, and was no more than a benign move to allow former Russian satellites to join the EU (Talbott). That is hardly persuasive. Austria, Sweden and Finland are in the EU but not NATO. If the Warsaw Pact had survived and was incorporating Latin American countries - let alone Canada and Mexico - the US would not easily be persuaded that the Pact is just a Quaker meeting. There should be no need to review the record of US violence to block mostly fanciful ties to Moscow in "our little region over here," the Western hemisphere, to quote Secretary of War Henry Stimson when he explained that all regional systems must be dismantled after World II, apart from our own, which are to be extended.
To underscore the conclusion, in the midst of the current crisis in the Caucasus, Washington professes concern that Russia might resume military and intelligence cooperation with Cuba at a level not remotely approaching US-Georgia relations, and not a further step towards a significant security threat.
Missile defense too is presented here as benign, though leading US strategic analysts have explained why Russian planners must regard the systems and their chosen location as the basis for a potential threat to the Russian deterrent, hence in effect a first-strike weapon. The Russian invasion of Georgia was used as a pretext to conclude the agreement to place these systems in Poland, thus "bolstering an argument made repeatedly by Moscow and rejected by Washington: that the true target of the system is Russia," AP commentator Desmond Butler observed.
Matlock is not alone in regarding Kosovo as an important factor. "Recognition of South Ossetia's and Abkhazia's independence was justified on the principle of a mistreated minority's right to secession - the principle Bush had established for Kosovo," the Boston Globe editors comment.
But there are crucial differences. Strobe Talbott recognizes that "there's a degree of payback for what the U.S. and NATO did in Kosovo nine years ago," but insists that the "analogy is utterly and profoundly false." No one is a better position to know why it is profoundly false, and he has lucidly explained the reasons, in his preface to a book on NATO's bombing of Serbia by his associate John Norris. Talbott writes that those who want to know "how events looked and felt at the time to those of us who were involved" in the war should turn to Norris's well-informed account. Norris concludes that "it was Yugoslavia's resistance to the broader trends of political and economic reform - not the plight of Kosovar Albanians - that best explains NATO's war."
That the motive for the NATO bombing could not have been "the plight of Kosovar Albanians" was already clear from the rich Western documentary record revealing that the atrocities were, overwhelmingly, the anticipated consequence of the bombing, not its cause. But even before the record was released, it should have been evident to all but the most fervent loyalists that humanitarian concern could hardly have motivated the US and Britain, which at the same time were lending decisive support to atrocities well beyond what was reported from Kosovo, with a background far more horrendous than anything that had happened in the Balkans. But these are mere facts, hence of no moment to Orwell's "nationalists" - in this case, most of the Western intellectual community, who had made an enormous investment in self-aggrandizement and prevarication about the "noble phase" of US foreign policy and its "saintly glow" as the millennium approached its end, with the bombing of Serbia as the jewel in the crown.
Nevertheless, it is interesting to hear from the highest level that the real reason for the bombing was that Serbia was a lone holdout in Europe to the political and economic programs of the Clinton administration and its allies, though it will be a long time before such annoyances are allowed to enter the canon.
There are of course other differences between Kosovo and the regions of Georgia that call for independence or union with Russia. Thus Russia is not known to have a huge military base there named after a hero of the invasion of Afghanistan, comparable to Camp Bondsteel in Kosovo, named after a Vietnam war hero and presumably part of the vast US basing system aimed at the Middle East energy-producing regions. And there are many other differences.
There is much talk about a "new cold war" instigated by brutal Russian behavior in Georgia. One cannot fail to be alarmed by signs of confrontation, among them new US naval contingents in the Black Sea - the counterpart would hardly be tolerated in the Caribbean. Efforts to expand NATO to Ukraine, now contemplated, could become extremely hazardous.
Nonetheless, a new cold war seems unlikely. To evaluate the prospect, we should begin with clarity about the old cold war. Fevered rhetoric aside, in practice the cold war was a tacit compact in which each of the contestants was largely free to resort to violence and subversion to control its own domains: for Russia, its Eastern neighbors; for the global superpower, most of the world. Human society need not endure - and might not survive - a resurrection of anything like that.
A sensible alternative is the Gorbachev vision rejected by Clinton and undermined by Bush. Sane advice along these lines has recently been given by former Israeli Foreign Minister and historian Shlomo ben-Ami, writing in the Beirut Daily Star: "Russia must seek genuine strategic partnership with the US, and the latter must understand that, when excluded and despised, Russia can be a major global spoiler. Ignored and humiliated by the US since the Cold War ended, Russia needs integration into a new global order that respects its interests as a resurgent power, not an anti-Western strategy of confrontation."
* Noam Chomsky's most recent book is Failed States: the Abuse of Power and the Assault on Democracy.
Source: counterpunch, September 11, 2008
www.counterpunch.org/
Die NATO und die Beistandspflicht.......
In den letzten Wochen wurde immer wieder über, dass was geschehen müsste, wäre Georgien Mitglied der NATO debattiert.
Es wurde oft gesagt oder geschrieben, dass wenn Georgien Mitglied der NATO wäre, die Russen nicht in Georgien einmarschiert wären.
Möglich, aber können wir da so sicher sein!
Zu erst muss mal festgestellt werden wer wen angegriffen hat!
Feststeht, dass georgische Truppen in der Nacht zum 8 August Südossetien unter Beschuss genommen haben. Fest steht auch, dass georgische Militär Einheiten russische Friedenstruppen welche schon seit Jahren in Südossetien, mit dem Segen der OSZE, ihren Dienst taten hinterrücks angegriffen haben.
Der russische Gegenschlag folgte ganz klar auf einem Angriff der Georgier
Wäre in einem solchen Fall Russland der Aggressor?
Schwierig zu verkaufen.........aber man kann es ja probieren.
Was hätte die NATO wohl getan?
Hätte sie eingegriffen mit Waffengewalt?
Oder hätte sie eher auf Verhandlungen gesetzt?
Wären die NATO überhaupt verpflichtet gewesen militärische Gewalt einzusetzen?
**********
Ein Teil der Antwort können wir in der NATO Charta vom 4 April 1949 nachlesen:
Der Nordatlantikvertrag – Artikel 5.
Die Parteien vereinbaren, daß ein bewaffneter Angriff gegen eine oder mehrere von ihnen in Europa oder Nordamerika als ein Angriff gegen sie alle angesehen wird; sie vereinbaren daher, daß im Falle eines solchen bewaffneten Angriffs jede von ihnen in Ausübung des in Artikel 51 der Satzung der Vereinten Nationen anerkannten Rechts der individuellen oder kollektiven Selbstverteidigung der Partei oder den Parteien, die angegriffen werden, Beistand leistet, indem jede von ihnen unverzüglich für sich und im Zusammenwirken mit den anderen Parteien die Maßnahmen, einschließlich der Anwendung von Waffengewalt, trifft, die sie für erforderlich erachtet, um die Sicherheit des nordatlantischen Gebiets wiederherzustellen und zu erhalten.
Von jedem bewaffneten Angriff und allen daraufhin getroffenen Gegenmaßnahmen ist unverzüglich dem Sicherheitsrat Mitteilung zu machen. Die Maßnahmen sind einzustellen, sobald der Sicherheitsrat diejenigen Schritte unternommen hat, die notwendig sind, um den internationalen Frieden und die internationale Sicherheit wiederherzustellen und zu erhalten.
Da juristisch gesehen nur die englischen und französischen Versionen gültig sind .......
Article 5. –
The Parties agree that an armed attack against one or more of them in Europe or North America shall be considered an attack against them all and consequently they agree that, if such an armed attack occurs, each of them, in exercise of the right of individual or collective self-defence recognised by Article 51 of the Charter of the United Nations, will assist the Party or Parties so attacked by taking forthwith, individually and in concert with the other Parties, such action as it deems necessary, including the use of armed force, to restore and maintain the security of the North Atlantic area.
Any such armed attack and all measures taken as a result thereof shall immediately be reported to the Security Council. Such measures shall be terminated when the Security Council has taken the measures necessary to restore and maintain international peace and security .
Article 5. –
Les parties conviennent qu'une attaque armée contre l'une ou plusieurs d'entre elles survenant en Europe ou en Amérique du Nord sera considérée comme une attaque dirigée contre toutes les parties, et en conséquence elles conviennent que, si une telle attaque se produit, chacune d'elles, dans l'exercice du droit de légitime défense, individuelle ou collective, reconnu par l'article 51 de la Charte des Nations Unies, assistera la partie ou les parties ainsi attaquées en prenant aussitôt, individuellement et d'accord avec les autres parties, telle action qu'elle jugera nécessaire, y compris l'emploi de la force armée, pour rétablir et assurer la sécurité dans la région de l'Atlantique Nord.
Toute attaque armée de cette nature et toute mesure prise en conséquence seront immédiatement portées à la connaissance du Conseil de Sécurité. Ces mesures prendront fin quand le Conseil de Sécurité aura pris les mesures nécessaires pour rétablir et maintenir la paix et la sécurité internationales.
**********
Dieser Artikel 5. der NATO Charta ist in diesem Fall der wichtigste, er regelt zwar die Beistandspflicht, aber die Feinheit des Textes liegt in dem kleinen Satz „die sie für erforderlich erachtet“.
Wir müssen feststellen, dass gemäss diesem Artikel 5. die NATO einem ihren Mitglieder Beistand leisten kann aber nicht muss!
Um einen kleinen Vergleich zu machen, es gibt in Europa noch ein anderes Vertragswerk, nämlich das der Westeuropäische Union basierend auf den Brüsseler Pakt, der als Verteidigungsbündnis 1948 gegründet wurde.
Dieser Brüsseler Pakt regelt die Beistandspflicht auf einer viel rigideren Art.
Gemäss Artikel 5 in dem Pakt besteht eine Beistandspflicht die auch militärische Gewalt beinhaltet.
Article V – Brüsseler Pakt – (Rechtlich gültig sind auch hier die englische und französische Versionen)
If any of the High Contracting Parties should be the object of an armed attack in Europe, the other High Contracting Parties will, in accordance with the provisions of Article 51 of the Charter of the United Nations, afford the Party so attacked all the military and other aid and assistance in their power.
***
Au cas où l’une des Hautes Parties Contractantes serait l’objet d’une agression armée en Europe, les autres lui porteront, conformément aux dispositions de l’article 51 de la Charte des Nations Unies, aide et assistance par tous les moyens en leur pouvoir, militaires et autres.
***
Wie man sieht sind die Texte im Brüsseler Pakt kürzer aber auch verbindlich.
Um es klar auszudrücken, die NATO wäre nicht verpflichtet einem seiner Mitglieder zu verteidigen, erst recht nicht wenn dieses Mitglied der Angreifer wäre.
Warum der der Nordatlantikvertrag so mehrdeutig ist hat viel mit der Entstehung der NATO zu tun.
Als 1949 der Vertrag ausgehandelt wurde wäre es für die US Regierung unmöglich gewesen ein Vertragswerk durch den Kongress Ratifizieren zulassen, dass absolut verbindlich gewesen wäre.
Ende Teil 1
EGR
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