Wednesday, August 27, 2008

Cheney's top top National Security aide was in Geogia just before Saakishvili attacked South Ossetia

Does anyone seriously believe that Joseph R. Wood, Cheney's deputy assistant for national security affairs was in Georgia just before Saakishvili attacked into South Ossetia and didn't discuss (and encourage?) the attack?

Read the LA Times short article Why was Cheney's guy in Georgia before the war?, then go read Pat Buchanan's description of what happened in South Ossetia at Pat Buchanan on what happened in South Ossetia.

Dick Cheney is, of course, the leader of the Neocon ProWar efforts trying to demonize Iran, North Korea, Syria, the Palestinians, and others. Every international problem calls for another war or application of military force. Wood's presence in Georgia just before the hotheaded Saakishvili invaded South Ossetia is unlikely to be a mere coincidence. That so many Georgians reported believing that the U.S. would come to their support if the Russians counterattacked suggests that Wood had reinforced the apparent American support for Georgia in its conflict with Russia over the breakaway provinces.

Did Wood encourage Saakishvili to "Bait the Bear" as Dick Cheney's representative? Was Cheney beating they could bluff Putin? Some reporters think so. Now that the effort has failed, we'll probably never get any answer from the Office of the Vice President. Maybe, once the Bush administration is gone, the Georgians will tell what happened. Of course, since the direct responsibility for the disaster falls on Saakishvili, it'll have to come from someone other than him.

It's another disaster mystery out of the Bush administration that the historians are going to need to dig into.

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