TBILISI - While the United States is otherwise preoccupied, this small former Soviet republic has become the stage for a blatant effort at regime change, Russian-style.
Vladimir Putin is going all out to undermine and get rid of Georgia's young, pro-American, pro-democracy president, Mikheil Saakashvili. Putin is assuming that the United States, overwhelmed by Iraq and needing Moscow's support on North Korea and Iran, will not make Georgia a "red-line" issue and that the European Union, fearful of endangering energy supplies from Russia, will similarly play it down.
Much is at stake: Putin's long-term strategic goal is to create a sphere of Russian dominance and hegemony in the vast area the Soviet Union and the czars once ruled. If he succeeds in bringing down the most independent and pro-Western leader in the former Soviet space outside the Baltics, he will have gone a long way toward his goal. Also at stake: President Bush's "freedom agenda," stability in the Caucasus and the European Union's attitude toward a small European country on the edge of the world's most volatile region
Interesting turn, which has been said for a while but most have ignored the warnings.
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I'm a bit surprised by that. I think of a lot of these small Caucasian states as small Christian kingdoms. I would have thought that they would be united against their Muslim rivals (i.e. Azerbaijan). I guess not.
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