The pictures of war sometimes are not quite what they seem. The horrific picture at the left is a different kind of horror than in South Ossetia or Georgia going on now as the faces on the left are actually Russian conscripts who are doing the fighting or now the punishment work for Russia.Pictures are indeed worth a thousand words in exposing just what Russian youth looks like in the new thousand year calendar. There is nothing inspirational in the least nor a heart of inspiration at all in the common mass of Russians these years and considering the absolute urban tattooed and pierced child showing up in the American service now, America is still getting the better deal.
In all of that, it is important to never stereotype all of these groups as one mass. Ask an American general or American corporation where thee best individuals come from who can think on their own, are capable following orders and do not need anyone supervising them and they will take a map out drawing a line down the Rockies in the west to up the Mississippi in the east, excluding the large urban areas and that is the location of the foundation of American might.
If one wants to find American weakness, just surf to a site like MySpace and one will find in numbers a people who stopped being Americans before they were born.
Russian conscripts look like Judeans herded into work camps in 1940, but in their opposite there are the minority Speznatz forces, paratroopers and the example of Vladamir Putin. They are two different peoples than the above and one can never make the mistake that all Russians are conscripts or all American are Britney Spears.
It is though difficult not to make the mistakes in lumping people like Europeans into one group. In reading the British press, one finds Seamus Milne of the Guardian, whining in leftist fashion about American "expansionism" in Georgia, but never minding "expansionism" when Americans were keeping the English from speaking German in 2 wars and Americans spending billions and dripping blood keeping the English from speaking Russian.
Likewise, Daniel Hannan of the Telegraph was complaining about NATO had no purpose if it was not fighting in Georgia much like Wesley Clark wanting to bomb Russian troops in Kosovo in not figuring out Russians will lob nuclear warheads back.
In looking at those ignorant views, one sees what is the majority of western and central Europeans, but not all Europeans.
This brings the examination to the Georgians and what actually happened in South Ossetia, not in who did what starting what, but the how each side performed in Ossetian militia, Russian occupational peacekeeper with Russian invasion forces and Georgian military.
For the Russian perspective, they had better hope these were not just Georgians, but American trained Georgians and hired American mercenaries as if one examines the Russian statements on the war backed by the BBC embedded views to weed out when the Russians were lying, the Russian conscript did not perform very well.
All of this order of battle started on July 31st when someone blew up a police car near the South Ossetian capital of Tskhinvali.
This could have been Ossetians, Russians or even Chechens, as North Ossetia is the site of the infamous Beslan slaughter of school children. "Russia" is a mean place where rumors abound the KGB/FSB blow up movie theaters and blame Chechens and perhaps South Ossetians blow up Georgian police knowing Russia is on maneuvers in North Ossetia, because by August 4th, 3 Russian battalions were rolling to the tunnel connecting North and South Ossetia.
In the events of August 1st, Georgian troops and South Ossetian militia were in intense firefights.
By August 3rd Russia was clearing the civilian Ossetians from the area by allowing refugees out which brings to August 4th, the Barack Obama birthday positioning of 3 Russian battalions.
During the next 3 days, border clashes erupted in sniper fire from the South Ossetians being returned by artillery from Georgia and South Ossetia ambushing a Georgian APC.
President Saakashvili of Georgia called a Georgian ceasefire on August 7th probably due to the Russian advance to the South Ossetian border. It is now he said she said, as Georgia says South Ossetian milita shelled Georgian villages in the night which they deny.
Around midnight August 8th, Georgia was shelling South Ossetia in response and a major attack was under way.
By morning, the Georgians had effectively smashed the South Ossetian militia, had most of South Ossetia under their control and by photographs of Tskhinvali being hit, they were very adept at walking their artillery through that city destroying it.
At 10 am on August 8th, Russia bombed the Georgian cities of Gori and Kareli with Su-24 bombers. By this time a column from the 58th Army had invaded South Ossetia.
It was during this time that the small Georgian force and the larger Russian force traded severe blows. The Russians would bomb inside Georgia, but also have their aircraft shot down by the Strela 10 anti aircraft systems and 3 of their pilots captured.
This effectively ended Russian bombing of targets they were missing a portion of the time in Georgia as the planes were forced to fly above the SAM system ranges.
The Russians apparently never did dislodge the Georgians, but the Georgians up until the 11th of August were still in South Ossetia. In fact the Georgians bagged Lieutenant General Anatoly Khrulyov, wounding him out side Tskhinvali in the early morning.
The Georgians on the 11th started an organized retreat which was so adept that the Russian military was reporting it was a regrouping action.
The Russians actually reporting that reveals distinctly they feared this force they had been engaging and were wary it was about to attack and overrun their superior forces.
By 3:30, the Georgian combat forces ordered a ceasefire and this is when from this point on in the timeline that the Russians start pouring into Georgia and in mopping up operations were demolishing the entire Georgian infrastructure.
This is where the reports were filed of Georgian military fleeing in retreat as they did indeed flee Gori in a scramble as the city was being charged by a Russian column, the Russians were in control of the air making them sitting ducks and they were under orders not to fight as the Georgian government under American pressure had been told that would be the Russian excuse to invade the Georgian capital.
Those are the events of this order of battle which are the underlying factor of mice and men in greater objectives. Russia had a distinct reason to strike out to gain control over the oil issue for it's national survival.
What occurred after though and is occurring in Georgia is Vladamir Putin attempting to build a false morale in his conscripts by having them spread mayhem in Georgia after that military which savaged them stood down.
Mr. Putin has now a Russian military which has not won a victory since the allies pinned Germany down in World War II for them. They have beat up people in Czechoslovakia when unarmed. They have mauled people in Afghanistan and been mauled in retreat. They have brutalized the people of Chechnya in 2 wars which Russia lost and been demoralized over, and now, Vladamir Putin witnessed his North Caucasus 58th Army was only able to trade punches with a pipsqueak Georgian force, which his commanders were not attacking as they attempted to retreat in a regrouping operation, but were instead watching it regroup and then allowed it to retreat.
If the Russians had any muster in their ranks to simply punish Georgian forces then, Georgia would have been so demoralized it never would have attacked South Ossetia again and might have marched to the capital and installed a junta.
That is not a story Vladamir Putin wants the world looking at, so he is deliberately allowing in the BBC, ravaging and robbing Reuters and Turkish journalists to show how brutal Russia is, because he has seen his troops after a summer of combat training were incapable of handling a Georgian force.
The picture here is of that Georgian force in prisoners of war. If Russia can not handle American trained men who look as uninspired as this with effect, then the Russian conscripts pictured above are the refuse of Russia they appear to be.Vladamir Putin has an incredible problem on his hands in not having a Russian people who can conscript a fighting force no matter if he gives them state of the art equipment to back them up.
If one visits history, there is time period which mirrors Russia's dilemma.
In the 1780 to 1820 period, the British Empire was built. It was done by naval battles and if one visits those battles telling situations appear.
The Spanish who had an immense fleet like Russia's military is now, had great ships and powerful cannon, but their seamen were not trained so the English simply in their ships outmaneuvered them and sank their armada.
Later, these same English would take on the Dutch at Copenhagen. The Dutch had the finest of trained sailors, but their ships and guns were worthless. The end result was the Dutch fleet was destroyed.
The English would do the same thing to Russians.
It was during this period that a small merchant marine formed skirting the empire fleets, trusting to their own men in musket and cannon, that America was born.
These "American Jacks" were the people who would man frigates like the USS Constitution and in every straight up fight with thee great 1000 ship British Navy, savage it and make fools of this greatest of superpowers.
The reason being was England after winning it's battles in armada warfare neglected training as they were only fighting skirmishes.
The Americans were firing guns from the time they could pull a trigger, their sailors would trust to themselves anywhere in the world and create a race of people who would confound armies around the world as these Americans could and would fight.
Mr. Putin's military in Georgia is trying to hide he does not have a military capable of fighting on large scale from his conscripts. They have no heart for battle.
The damage of Afghanistan was nothing compared to what occurred to the east of Georgia in Chechnya. For the facts of those 2 wars, the Russians ran into Chechens who have been a self reliant people since the Soviet's annexed them. The Chenchens to survive became the biggest gangster people in Russia.
These Chechens savaged the Russians to stalemate in the first war there. Few have examined how complete the lack of control ended with the Russian army now in this Georgian campaign from Moscow.
Russian soldiers sat in bunkers and Chechen militia savaged them The Russians could not effectively combat them so they took it out on the civilians in murdering them.The atrocities which the Russian conscripts and special forces carried out and no one paid attention to were truly horrific.
The photo on the left is a man dragged to death behind a truck.
A Russian conscript noted that when they captured a Chechen female sniper that they, "Tied metal cables to her feet and then hooked her between two trucks and pulled her apart".
Not exactly the information a nation wants leaking out.
The heated bayonet was a favored death sentence for Chechens caught by Russians. The slower the death and the more pain inflicted was what Russian troops were carrying out.
Added to this the special forces were as horrid in the photo on the left is the head of Chechen cut off. The special forces had a distinct way in cutting off ears to send messages that their comrades had been avenged as they presented body parts by laying them on their tombstone in Moscow.Perhaps now it make a great deal more sense why Vladamir Putin and the generals of the 58th Army in Georgia have been so barbarous. They actually have been in their minds "under control" compared to what they have been doing and they are attempting to instill in the Russian conscript a feeling of "winning" that they can take pride in.
As a side note explanation, the Russian rampage in Chechnya was the reason Russian Islamocommunist forces were spreading rumors about American atrocities in Afghanistan and Iraq against Muslims. The Russian Bolsheviks were attempting by blaming Americans for actions US soldiers never carried out as a way to diffuse what Russia did in Chechnya.
Remarkably just like Vietnam, the Russians found the same willing dupes to disseminate that message in the leftist State Department, Dan Rather and the old cast of Teddy Kennedy and John Kerry.
One can find worse than Abu Gharib in any war, but Russia made certain Muslims would be talking about America instead of what it was doing in Chechnya to Muslims.
It is vital to understand that this conscript military is not Vladamir Putin no more than his generals who he has promoted and were allowing their conscripts to practice genocide are him.
It is though his Afghanistan culture when he was exposed to it in the KGB and it is how the Russians have notoriously acted out when Stalin let them loose on Germans.
When Russian leaders loose wars they deliberately loose control of their troops, so the troops vent on the battlefield and do not return home and revolt.
That is why Russia in dealing with it's oil cycle being pumped dry in falling prices is acting out now notoriously as they are quite scared.
This is an even more greater danger not in Russia invading Europe as it acts out, but the fact that Russia is not facing the Reich, the Napoleonic guards, the Austro Hungarian military or even those black souls of the English who could march for weeks in the cold rain, be sick with dysentery and still mount a battle to destroy France at Agincourt.
Without America, there is no force to stop Russia now.
Those European traits of grandeur are still there but so socialized they have suppressed their entire nature and it will take years of training to instill in them the warrior code which Russia would never dare to attack.
Weakness is the greatest causes of wars and why nations turn to that option preying on weaker nations. The Russians have revealed their weakness and it will bring out an attack on weaker Europeans.
In assessment, Mr. Putin had better hope that the communist Chinese who can indeed still field a military which will charge to suicide was distracted by their Olympic Peking girl show or the Chicoms will simply move 300 million Chinese in the Russian east and central regions taking over that Federation where not even Russian nuclear power can stop them.
This is why Vladamir Putin blinked in allowing America to fly in Georgian forces and now "supplies". He knows Russia is no match for the American soldier.
In revamped analysis of this situation, President Bush should forget his missile shield and David Rockefeller should re tutor Zbigniew Brzezinski on his Russian civil war doctrine and instead push for a Georgian, Ukrainian, Latvian, Lithiuanian, Estonian and Polish confederated trading partner with the United States building their economic power to rival Russia and central Europe, and, in trade train and build up their military with their own nuclear option on Moscow's border.
These peoples have shown a will to fight while old Europe has shown a cowardice to chop up nations again to feed to aggression. If and it is the "if", this confederation could cement a military force in 2 years, Russia would never dare launch it's war option, and, be forced to deal with it's real problem in central European bankers and Chinese immigration.
Russia could deal with Europe by investing money in infrastructure which is crumbing there creating an expanding economy and deal with China by providing cheap resources draining their funds, instead of arming them with next generation weapons for use against the United States.
A much better policy as there is no NATO for the United States to rely on as the "Europeans" are asleep except for a few British and French forces. Mr. Brzezinski can then stop radicalizing Muslims which Russia armed Iran with nuclear weapons, so America under Bill Clinton allowed the arming of Pakistan and Saudi Arabia with nuclear weapons.
The escalation must stop in fomenting and arming peoples who have not allegiance to American values.
Provide instead these Baltic and Crimean peoples the ability to police themselves, create a trading partner for America to return American strength and Mr. Putin will not act out now and then in the future will not be able to act out.
This will save numerous billions of lives and save the world from a WMD war.
Of course, it will not happen as the prevailing natures are geared for war, but there is a sound way out of this situation and in simple doctrines built upon, perhaps they will enter the discussion to influence more reasoned if not informed political figures.
American policy should be to keep out of wars by being economically and militarily too strong to engage. It should be engaged with peoples who will fight their own battles with our assistance so America will not have to fight for them.
Russia has now a policy of getting into wars, because it is economically drunk on oil revenue and while a nuclear superpower it has a conscripted force so inept that it is going to have to keep picking fights as a bully to keep nations from noticing how afraid she is.
View that photo again of Russian conscripts. That is not a people capable of doing anything but lashing out. Mr. Putin is attempting to keep the world from noticing his nuclear lights are on, but there is no population left to man it for the present.
There must be a new assessed doctrine for western Europe, central Europe and eastern Europe with a new Russian Doctrine, before the Bolshevik Doctrine lashes out again or the Brzezinski Doctrine forces the Russians to strike out.
This entire scenario can end so much better than what is being initiated now.
agtG
