Posts Tagged ‘Tbilisi’
Posted on August 7, 2009 - by Venik
Happy Anniversary, Misha
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Tweeter celebrated the one-year anniversary of the Georgian-Russian war by setting it’s Web servers on fire. (For those of you with long-term memory problem, here is a brief recap of the events.) The Unix gurus at Tweeter’s datacenter blamed the downtime on unspecified hackers unleashing a DDoS attack. According to some networking experts interviewed by [...]
Posted on November 7, 2008 - by Venik
Saakashvili’s Endgame
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As waning wartime patriotism in Georgia gives way to realistic assessments of the facts, Saakashvili can now see the end of his political career rapidly approaching. As predicted, the situation in Tbilisi is developing rapidly and Saakashvili may be expected to make his endgame early next year, probably soon after Obama’s inaugural speech in Washington. [...]
Posted on September 4, 2008 - by Venik
Photos: Georgian Army Before the War
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As the Georgian Defense Ministry sacked its Army chief and the Deputy Chief of General Staff, lets take a look at what the Georgian army once was, with the help of some American tax dollars. Watching these ridiculous displays of crispy US-made uniforms and Israeli multiple-launch rocket systems atop shiny Mercedes-Benz trucks, Saakashvili couldn’t wait [...]
Posted on September 1, 2008 - by Venik
The EU Gets the Pipe
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As expected, the EU resolution on Russia was all gasconade and bravado. Russia’s unspoken threat to restrict energy supplies to the European Union did the trick. Gordon Brown found out that a “root-and-branch” review of relations with Russia may be difficult when you are covered head to toe in Russian oil. Today Russia is supplying [...]
Posted on August 28, 2008 - by Venik
The War in Georgia
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For the past two weeks I’ve been trying to collect as much information as possible about the situation in Georgia. I talked to more than a dozen Russian and US military experts, got in touch with my contacts in Tbilisi and North Ossetia, and exchanged information with dozens of journalists in Moscow and here in [...]
Posted on August 25, 2008 - by Venik
Saakashvili Finally Loses It
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Ever since Georgia launched its military operation against South Ossetia, killing Russian peacekeepers and hundreds of its own civilians, many have been asking the same question: has Saakashvili gone stark raving mad? It’s now official: yes. In his latest interview to Financial Times, Saakashvili revealed dark depths of madness that made even Putin shudder: “The [...]
Posted on August 22, 2008 - by Venik
US Confirms It Knew of Georgia’s Plan to Attack South Ossetia
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In its August 22 issue, the Russian business daily Kommersant published the interview with the new US Ambassador to Russia John Beyrly. As should have been expected of an experienced diplomat, Ambassador Beyrly said a lot about nothing. Although he did bring up a couple of points worth mentioning. John Beyrly is a fluent Russian [...]
Posted on August 19, 2008 - by Venik
Latest Developments in Georgia
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The Independent just published the most ridiculous timeline of Russia’s operation in Georgia. It is not surprising since the article relies on analysis by Pavel Felgenhauer – Russia’s leading quack in the field of military pseudo-analysis distilled for amateur foreign journalists who can’t read. The problem with “A new world order: The week Russia flexed [...]
Posted on August 17, 2008 - by Venik
Russia’s War Booty
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Strength and composition of the Georgian army are a big mystery. I checked over a dozen of authoritative sources and no two report the same numbers. Jane’s published a detailed list of major weapons acquisitions by Georgia since 2000. However, in the past few days the Russian military captured weapons not previously known to be [...]
Posted on August 17, 2008 - by Venik
Holbrooke Paid by Saakashvili?
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Richard Holbrooke, the former US Ambassador to the UN and currently the vice chairman of Perseus LLC, is now in Tbilisi accusing the cowardly Russian soldiers of stealing pants off the dead bodies of Georgia’s courageous warriors. Holbrooke is claiming that Russia is about to invade Ukraine and is getting ready to take over the [...]
Posted on August 15, 2008 - by Venik
Georgia’s Attack on South Ossetia: Washington’s Role
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Elusive NATO Membership At the NATO Summit in Bucharest in April 2008 Georgia was denied Membership Action Plan. Aside from Russia’s vehement opposition, the key issues outlined in the NATO Individual Partnership Action Plan, accepted by Georgia in October 2004, remain unresolved. These issues are: Georgia’s antiquated military equipment, insufficient training and deployability of its [...]
Posted on August 14, 2008 - by Venik
The Cease-Fire Deal and Life in Tbilisi
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Mark Deen and Reed Landberg of Bloomberg have beat me to the punch with their Russia’s War With Georgia May Reopen U.S. Rift With Europe. Next time I will have to type faster. If you follow the news from Russia and Georgia, you are probably aware of the extraordinary effort by Nicolas Sarkozy to broker [...]
Posted on August 14, 2008 - by Venik
Russians in Georgia: Goals and Consequences
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The Christian Science Monitor – of all newspapers – published perhaps the most relevant and concise description of what Moscow has achieved so far with its blitzkrieg response to Georgia’s sneak-attack on South Ossetia. “If the Russians stop hostilities now, they will have redrawn the whole strategic situation in the Caucasus, to the detriment of [...]
Posted on August 12, 2008 - by Venik
Georgia’s Blunder
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Saakashvili’s hysterical propaganda aside, it is now evident that Russia’s operation in Georgia was strictly limited to defending the breakaway provinces of South Ossetia and Abkhazia against Georgian aggression. Consider the facts: Russia deployed just 6,000 troops in South Ossetia and 9,000 troops in Abkhazia (and even these modest numbers are probably overstated by the [...]