All bow their necks to iron feet
As the war spreads from South Ossetia to Abkhazia, here are a few more links on the conflict between Russia and Georgia.
Spiegel Online has an analysis of the roots of the conflict.
Ukrainian journalist Natalia Antonova, laments
What horrifies is me is not just the violence, as if it isn’t bad enough, but the fact that being ethnically half-Russian and half-Ukrainian, I grew knowing that the Georgians are our friends. I grew up in a household in love with Georgian culture. To my Russian mother, Georgia was “the most beautiful place in the world,” and she wasn’t alone in this by far.
The people baying for blood on both sides, have they honestly forgotten our common ties? If the forgetting is this easy, perhaps we really ought to be worried about the future of Russia and Ukraine. The unthinkable is already happening before us, and history has entered a gloomy and bewildering chapter. This is the sort of thing that happens when empires fail; it’s bloody and vile. It reeks of gunpowder and rot and the dried-up glue that used to hold together our old, red memorial wreaths….
Political elites benefit from grand-standing, regular people just lose their limbs in the process.
Rod Dreher links Stratfor’s analysis from Friday afternoon. An excerpt from that analysis.
The most important reaction will not be in the United States or Western Europe. It is the reaction in the former Soviet states that matters most right now. That is the real audience for this. Watch the reaction of Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Nagorno-Karabakh and the Balts. How will Russia’s moves affect them psychologically?
Here’s the International Crisis Group page on the conflicts in South Ossetia and Abkhazia.
Security Council set to meet again on crisis in South Ossetia, Georgia.
Human Rights Watch news release: Georgia/Russia: Do Not Attack Civilians in South Ossetia.
LA Times: Russia brings war deep into Georgia.
Natalia Antonova’s words reminded me of this old Tom Paxton song, from which I take my post title.