Too Little, too Late, Saakashvili. Not Yet, Maybe, You’re not The Boss of Me Now, says Ukraine.

Posted by Strangely Freedom Add comments

Sep 162008

The “news”, Phone taps ‘prove Georgia’s case’ that Georgia’s President Saakashvili has discovered phone tap evidence that “proves” he was trapped or lured into his Invasion of South Ossetia by the Russians would be more credible if it had come out at the beginning of August. But really, I mean; even I, with no Eastern European languages at my disposal, could have cobbled together a plausible crackly tape or two in a month…

It proves nothing except his desparate position, clutching at straws to keep in the news limelight. Once the oxygen of publicity has gone, he’s a dead man, and he knows it.

Even though he’s undoubtedly right in that the Russians were behind it, the plan was hatched over a decade and a half ago by Putin, who is nothing if not patient in these matters. A phone call is just icing on a rather large cake of plotting. Monday’s news that NATO “backs” him, is just a stalling procedure, that’s all. What can they do? Nothing.

Such is also the state of affairs in Ukraine which has seen it’s application to join the EU crushed for now, mainly because of the flaky government, but also, I think, to give the area “a breather” in Western minds; time to consolidate; to determine opinion; to watch and wait for other moves from the great gas tank that is Russia. The diplomatic and news activity from that quarter is even more bewildering than the spaghetti of pipes transporting energy to the West.

The double trouble for Ukraine is the sliver of land mysteriously filled (again!) with Russian speaking and passport holding people, called Trans-Dniester. This small independent republic (from Moldova, not the Ukraine!), has the whole country of Ukraine between it and Russia (>400 miles) but still “wants” to be joined to Russia.

It’s a bit like Burgundy or Bordeaux wanting to be part of England – what a thing! That would never happen (er…actually they were one country once, remember, Agincourt and all that).

The Ukraine is a bit like Malcolm in the Middle, hence my signature music refrain in this post’s title.

After that, the Crimea (why was GB there 150 years ago? :-? ), which is physically attached to the Ukraine and virtually attached at the east to Russia with only a small channel separating. The Crimea similarly has a large number of Russian passport wielding patriots.