At last! A report that recognises that both Russia and Georgia did some pretty shocking things during the war in August.
The report said that in attacking Tskhinvali, the South Ossetian capital, on Aug. 7 and 8, Georgia fired Grad missiles that seemed to miss their targets and hit civilian areas. It also criticized Russia for bombarding Georgian territory later and for allowing South Ossetian forces to loot ethnic Georgian villages for weeks.
Both sides, the report concludes, used cluster bombs.
Hooray for Amnesty International. Boo for war.
About time.
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{ 16 comments… read them below or add one }
Scrat 11.20.08 at 7:11 am
I don’t fully agree with this report. I do know the S Ossetians went on a rampage in some areas but then Georgian soldiers were confiscating civilian vehicles and fleeing in them too. It was pretty chaotic.
Chris 11.20.08 at 3:09 pm
I haven’t read the report, but “bombing territory” is sort-of what you do in war, and “allowing SO forces” (which raises the question: could these forces realistically be stopped?) is a lot different than firing missiles at a city.
Also, somebody can correct me if I’m wrong as I am not a gunpron guy, but I was under the impression that Grads are not the kind of thing you can really aim beyond “point it north.”.
In general, I think that AI tends to take events in a vacuum, without concerning itself with things like military logic and the avoidability/unavolidability of events in a larger context, as well as automatically assuming that all wars are bad.
That said, I haven’t read the report, so I will now shut my pie-hole.
Scrat 11.22.08 at 11:23 am
Chris. Grads are the descendants of the Katyusha rockets of WWII better known as Stalin Organs. It is an area suppression weapons system and while it is accurate enough to hit a 1 or 2 sq block area in a city it cannot accurately hit a certain building in that area from any distance.
I think the Georgian commanders made a decision to use them fully knowing what the result would be. The commanders were the personal appointees of Saakashvili and not truely combat soldiers/officers. This is not the only mistake they made. They tried to send the tanks directly through the city, a city is a deathtrap for tanks losing most of them in one morning. Either way it appears to me that Saakashvilis pets cared little for civilians and were more focused on pleasing their master with the military prowess and planning abilities.
Chris 11.23.08 at 3:34 am
That;s what I thought. It’s made for taking out large groups of infantry in open ground en masse. You can’t aim it. That would be defeating the purpose. The whole point is to kill large numbers over a large area.
Da Russophile 11.26.08 at 3:29 am
I agree with the above commentators.
Both sides committed brutalities of various sorts, which are inevitable in war, but Georgia’s were of a qualitatively more serious level.
Michael Averko 11.26.08 at 4:49 am
In addition, Russia showed comparitive restraint vis-a-vis some other military actions (Israel and Syria in Lebanon, NATO in Yugoslavia, 2003 attack on Iraq, the two wars of the last decade in Chechnya).
Irishman 11.26.08 at 10:34 pm
”Russia showed comparitive restraint vis-a-vis some other military actions (Israel and Syria in Lebanon, NATO in Yugoslavia, 2003 attack on Iraq, the two wars of the last decade in Chechnya).”
was the last part of that sentence a typo? Russia RESTRAINED in Chechnya?
Not to start trouble here, genuinely, but do you even have a clue about what you’re saying?
This is definitely what Irish bloggers refer to as a ‘wum’ - wind-up merchant:-)
Irishman 11.26.08 at 10:41 pm
http://www.themoscowtimes.com/article/600/42/372675.htm
Good piece here about the Russian government’s spending plans for the next year, and I think credit is due to Putin and Kudrin. Not only are they not cutting spending, they dont need to borrow at all to do this and are introducing a raft of incentives to business. If the Russians come out of this unscathed and back on their feet in a few years, then I think Putin and Kudrin really will have done a good job. Ireland, Britain and the US have to borrow right,left and center and cut back at the same time just to keep afloat.
Michael Averko 11.27.08 at 4:28 am
You lack basic reading comprehension skills.
Andy 11.27.08 at 7:25 am
Chechnya certainly wasn’t “restrained” on Russia’s part.
I think, though, that Mike was trying to say that Russia’s actions in Georgia were restrained compared to Russia’s actions in Chechnya.
I think the whole thing about this “He committed war crimes! No, she committed war crimes!” thing that pisses me off the most is the absurd lack of understanding of the concept of war. There has never been a war fought under Marquis of Queensbury rules, and there never will be, despite what we in the technologically cocooned ‘West’ might like to think.
The trick is not to do what Georgia did - and avoid getting embroiled in stupid wars in the first place.
PS - if you can get hold of a copy, I’d definitely recommend a read of <a href=”http://www.amazon.com/Spectator-Sport-War-Contemporary-Conflict-Security/dp/158826047X” title=”Spectator Sport War by Colin McInnes.”
Andy´s last blog post..Andrew Lloyd Webber and Putin - Eurovision Duet
Irishman 11.27.08 at 10:19 pm
”You lack basic reading comprehension skills.”
” think, though, that Mike was trying to say that Russia’s actions in Georgia were restrained compared to Russia’s actions in Chechnya”
In answer to both, yes. Apologies Mike I misread the post and jumped in with both feet.
In fairness to the Russians, they do seem to have been considerably more measured in the August war. Maybe they’re getting better as an army.
” think the whole thing about this “He committed war crimes! No, she committed war crimes!” thing that pisses me off the most is the absurd lack of understanding of the concept of war. ”
That people say ”he did, she did” is actually neither here nor there. It doesnt excuse the crimes that occurred. There was a time when war was fought in fields miles from population centers and the population were generally left alone (except for the stealing of food and looting in general). But even in modern war there are degrees of brutality and some sides HAVE actually been worse than the other. The Russian invasion and subsequent occupation from 1994 to 1996 was surely one of the worst exhibitions of nonsensical violence and brutality. The US can be accused of many things in Iraq and Afghanistan, but systemic destruction and rape on a massive scale are not among them. Yes, war is brutal, but shooting farm animals, murdering elderly people and setting fire to whole villages full of babas and young women are hardly necessary or productive I would think. And to compound matters, Russia was allegedly there to ‘restore constitutional order’.
Quite!:-)
Michael Averko 11.28.08 at 4:04 am
Okay.
I was following up on what Da Russophile said.
Of course, part of what determines rough play (for lack of a better term) is the given situation.
Russia’s rough action in Chechnya was in part due to a seemingly not so well prepared/disciplined Russian military and some folks on the Chechen separatist side who appeared more brutal than the Georgians.
Irishman 11.28.08 at 6:36 pm
Yes I would agree entirely with that. Putting young, uneducated and unwaged men into a pretty brutal war zone, fighting against an enemy fearsome by any standards and whom the Russians are genetically terrified of, was always going to cause a bad reaction and the atrocious crimes that happened. What baffles me endlessly is why Grachev and Babichev never tried to prevent this.
Michael Averko 12.02.08 at 6:09 am
That saying about hind sight (retrospection) making things look a bit different.
A situation that applies to other conflicts (among them being the US in SE Asia, Soviets in Afghanistan and the 2003 attack on Iraq).
Among the fault lines having to do with the idea (going into the conflict) that it will not be as difficult as what inevitably transpires.
Having said this, some military interventions have a legitimate or more legitimate basis than others.
The legitimacy of a military action can become negatively perceived on account of how the given operation is conducted.
Chris 12.03.08 at 11:01 am
Personally, I think the Russian operation in Georgia was extremely restrained and relatively well carried out. Targeting only military targets and their infrastructure, for instance (which is not something one can say of Georgia). I was pleasantly surprised. Military reform FTW.
Michael Averko 12.04.08 at 5:54 pm
Shortly after the Russian counterattack, I couldn’t help but be reminded of the “humanitarian intervention” term used by some Western neolib foreign policy observers.