We strongly disagree on many things but I'd like to stress the importance of people waking up regarding NATO membership, you couldn't be more right on this vital object lesson! Do we really want to have Georgia claiming Russia attacked and require us to go to war with Russia? Do we really want Azerbaijan pretending they were attacked and drawing us into either their declared intent to eliminate Armenia and commit genocide against Armenians or "liberate" "South Azerbaijan"? Armenia wouldn't be any safer, but they aren't seeking NATO membership.

We should have learned from the 30 year debacle known as Cyprus, NATO isn't a structure suited for countries that are inclined to either draw us into conflict or use the alliance to avoid reprisal for adventurism. (we should have made different alliances with both Greece and Turkey with neither in NATO, the alliance was crippled by the inaction)

Oh Really!

Why should we believe your sources and interpretations are more reliable than the journalists we've linked to on this thread?

[quote name='Marine' date='Aug 11 2008, 11:30 AM' post='874676'


It would be nice if journalist would report facts instead of make believe stuff, I know a bunch of folks who work for DynCorp and the uniform they wear is a camo desert tan tiger stripe. But let's all pretend they wear black SS uniforms, eh?
[/quote]

It's entirely possible that Nimmo's sources originated from Russian propaganda and misinformation-----

But I wonder what Georgian leaders were thinking when they decided to mount a military offensive against South Ossetia with more than a thousand of their troops were off defending Iraq from Iraqis. It doesn't seem that they are getting good advice from military advisors------or a gaggle of corporate contractors looking for a windfall profit.

We need to get to the truth. Private contractors have not been held accountable for their performance or ethics.

I agree that forging NATO alliances with former Soviet republics is foolish foreign policy. For the same reasons, it seems foolish for McCain to make veiled threats of US reprisals and label Russia as the aggressor. Rhetoric, like alliances, can trap leaders into policies that are not workable in the current circumstances.

I completely agree.

I think McCain is just playing to the folks who believe we got to win everywhere at any cost.

South Ossetia and Georgia is almost exactly the same scenario as was Kosovo and Serbia just the roles are reversed; Serbia had close ties to Russia where as Georgia has close ties to the West. Both had a breakaway province and both had an outside power supporting that break away province. I'd bet in a week or less the Russians will announce they recognize the independence of the new nation of Ossetia.

The SS were not mercenaries like your Dyncorp buddies, Marine ....

They were a military branch of the Nazi Party ....

Their loyalty was to the party and Adolph Hitler and it was said to be an intense, fanatical loyalty ...

Your mercenary buddies likely have their loyalty to whomever has the money to buy their swords at that moment in time and that is a transient, ever-shifting loyalty ....

And so ....

Or are you saying that your DynCorp buddies are really the core of a new SS here in America?

And why would that not surprise me?

And so ...

You almost sound like believing that is not necessarily a good thing.

Good for you and common sense!

Do you know any of the torturers, Marine?

The interrogators?

The ones who like to hook electrodes up to men's genitals?

WHY ARE MERCENARIES TRAINING OUR MILITARY FORCES HERE IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA ALONG WITH THOSE OF GEORGIA?

"Gates questions combat training by contractors - Defense secretary asks why private contractors are training his military troops for combat"

By ERICA WERNER, Associated Press

Last updated: 6:22 p.m., Monday, July 21, 2008

WASHINGTON -- Defense Secretary Robert Gates wants to know why his military uses private contractors for combat and security training, and how widespread the practice is.

He's asking for answers from the Pentagon's top military officer, Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Adm. Mike Mullen.

"In my mind, the fundamental question that remains unanswered is this: Why have we come to rely on private contractors to provide combat or combat-related security training for our forces?" Gates wrote in a memo to Mullen that was released Monday to The Associated Press by the office of Sen. Jim Webb, D-Va.

"Further, are we comfortable with this practice, and do we fully understand the implications in terms of quality, responsiveness and sustainability?"

Gates' memo came after Webb raised concerns about the role of private contractors and specifically Blackwater Worldwide, which opened a new counterterrorism training center in San Diego last month over the opposition of city officials.

Webb had been blocking Senate consideration of four civilian Defense Department nominees while waiting for answers.

On Monday, Webb told Gates he was lifting his opposition to the nominees.

In a letter to Gates, Webb wrote that he found the "affirmative steps" outlined in Gates' memo reassuring.

Webb was secretary of the Navy under President Reagan and now serves on the Armed Services Committee.

Webb told Gates that after getting briefed by the Navy last week he still believes there's a "need for more rigorous, senior-level oversight of the outsourcing contracts themselves."

Such contracts must exceed $78.5 million before getting reviewed by service secretaries, Webb said he was told.

So the Navy's fixed-price contract for Blackwater's Lodge and Training Center in North Carolina, which had a ceiling price of $63.8 million -- of which $53.2 million has been obligated -- would have escaped such scrutiny, Webb wrote.

He said he was told the contract was initially valued at $35.9 million.

"Clearly, the size of these contracts and the relatively low level at which such contracts can now be approved should give all of us pause," Webb wrote.

In his memo to Mullen, Gates also sought details on what percentage of military training is conducted by private contractors, how much it has cost over the past decade, and whether "appropriate red lines" have been established to determine what types of security training can be contracted out and what can't.

Gates told Webb he expected a response next week.

Also Monday, Blackwater Worldwide executives told The AP that the company plans to shift away from providing security and focus on training, aviation and logistics.

The company has been under scrutiny since some of its contractors opened fire in a crowded Baghdad intersection last year, and 17 Iraqis were killed.

I don't know Junior, I guess one fellow could a been doing that. He was sent over there to get the Iraqi public school system back up and running. If you'd ever dealt with any Junior High School kids he might a resorted to attaching electrodes to their genitals.

I see hope for you Junior, you actually recognize a difference. I wish some of the other folks here were so perceptive.

That kept me on the straight and narrow when I was going to Junior High, the thought of having that done to me ....

So I know what you are saying here .....

And so ....

Does he wear tiger-striped desert gray cammo when he is teaching school over there, Marine?

Or head-to-toe black?

I don't think he teaches Junior. He worked as an administrator for the private Catholic schools here in this country after he retired from the Air Force; I'd imagine he's there in Iraq to impart his wisdom on managing a school system to the Iraqis. Maybe he'll teach a few of them how to say a few Hail Mary's in the process. Last time I saw him he had on tiger strips.

Well, you keep good company, Marine ...

That's a testament to your character ....

"Georgian conflict shows Russia calling the shots"

By LYNN BERRY, Associated Press Writer

12 AUGUST 2008

MOSCOW - Russia has made clear it calls the shots in this part of the world, a message other former Soviet bloc countries cannot ignore.

Georgia's President Mikhail Saakashvili has been a loyal U.S. ally and has portrayed his nation as a beacon of democracy.

But when he tried to stand up to his country's former masters in Moscow, he faced the full wrath of the Russian army.

Washington could do little but spout angry words as Russian tanks rolled across Georgia's borders last week and its aircraft began dropping bombs on villages and towns.

Russia was punishing Georgia for moving into the separatist region of South Ossetia to claim back territory that has been effectively under Russian control since 1992 — but also for turning its back on Moscow and throwing in with the West, seeking to join NATO and cozying up to Washington.

Russian leaders had seethed as Georgia brought in Americans to arm and train its troops.

One of the first spots hit by Russian aircraft was a military base outside the capital where more than 1,000 U.S. Marines and soldiers led exercises last month.

In ordering a halt to military action Tuesday, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said Georgia had been punished enough.

"The aggressor has been punished and suffered very significant losses."

"Its military has been disorganized," Medvedev said.

The overwhelming use of force caused alarm in other eastern European countries that aspire to NATO membership, like Ukraine, or have recently joined the alliance.

Russia has threatened to target ballistic missiles at them if they allow the U.S. to base a missile defense system on their territory.

After the attack on Georgia, the threat is likely to be taken more seriously.

The leaders of Ukraine, Poland, Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia rushed to Saakashvili's defense Tuesday, traveling to Georgia and appearing together at a mass pep rally in the center of Tbilisi, the capital.

"We came to fight since our old neighbor (Russia) thinks that it can fight us," Polish President Lech Kaczynski said.

"This country thinks that old times will come back, but that time is over."

"Everyone knows that the next one could be Ukraine, then Poland."

But Georgia's experience shows the U.S. can do little in Russia's neighborhood when Russia feels its interests are threatened.

Matthew Bryza, a State Department envoy who was in Tbilisi, all but acknowledged as much in responding to the many Georgians who expressed disappointment that the U.S. was not stepping in militarily.

"I'd like to think words really do matter," he told journalists.

He characterized President Bush's comments that Russia was engaged in a "brutal campaign" as the strongest during his presidency.

The U.S. and Russia have waged a war of words during the Georgia conflict, but it is Russian Vladimir Putin who has sounded the toughest.

"The scale of their (Western leaders') cynicism is surprising," Putin, the former president who is now prime minister, said Monday.

For Russians, U.S. declarations in support of freedom and democracy ring hollow after the invasion of Iraq.

Russia also is no longer willing to accept U.S. preaching, so when Bush "demanded" that Russia end its offensive, it is difficult to imagine it had the desired effect.

Russia's power in the world has grown along with the price of oil and natural gas.

Underlying the Kremlin's determination to reassert its hold over former Soviet states is a desire to control the flow of energy exports to Europe.

Georgia sits on the only oil pipeline carrying crude from the former Soviet Union that bypasses Russia.

In provoking the Georgians into military action in South Ossetia, Russia may have been anxious to show the country as unstable and thus unsuitable for pipelines.

There also is the issue of South Ossetia and another separatist region, Abkhazia, which also has been overrun by Russian troops in recent days.

Saakashvili has pledged to bring the two regions back under Georgian control, but Abkhazia, especially, is close to the heart of many Russians.

Its Black Sea coast was a favorite vacation spot of the Soviet elite, and Abkhazia is just down the coast from Sochi, a resort city in Russia that will host the 2014 Olympics.

Russia has offered passports to residents of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, which allowed Putin and Medvedev to insist they were sending in troops to defend Russian citizens.

Sarah Mendelson, a senior fellow at the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies, said the United States' real leverage in the region is that it is working with European countries and "democratic market ways is ultimately a better way than authoritarian."

"At the moment the score card is one for the authoritarian and zero for democrats," she said.
___

Lynn Berry, Associated Press news editor in Moscow, has covered the former Soviet Union since 1996.

"Tbilisi alleges 'massacres' near South Ossetia"

12 AUGUST 2008

TBILISI (AFP) - A senior Georgian government official alleged Tuesday that ethnic Ossetians were carrying out "massacres" of ethnic Georgians near the rebel province of South Ossetia.

"South Ossetians supported by Russians are committing horrible massacres in Georgian villages," Georgian National Security Council Secretary Alexander Lomaia told AFP.

His charge could not be verified independently.

His comments came two days after Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and other top Russian officials accused the Georgian government and its troops of committing "genocide" against ethnic Ossetians in the province.

They also coincided with Georgia filing a complaint in The Hague with the International Court of Justice for "ethnic cleansing" in its conflict with Russia.

Earlier Tuesday, the Georgian foreign ministry also released a statement saying Russian soldiers in South Ossetia were standing by as Ossetian separatists committed acts of "ethnic cleansing."

"South Ossetian separatists entered the village of Disevi in Gori district and committed acts of ethnic cleansing, burning houses and attacking the population," the ministry said charged.

From Times Online

August 12, 2008

"Georgia: atrocity claims as bodies burn in street"

Kevin O'Flynn in Moscow

The bodies of dead Georgian fighters were today being burned in the streets of the war-ravaged capital of South Ossetia as claims emerged that civilians were targeted in last week’s assault.

Residents contacted by The Times on the phone from Moscow alleged that Georgian troops had killed women and children, although their claims could not be verified.

Parts of the town of Tskhinvali were still in flames several days after the Georgian attack last Thursday and the fierce fighting that followed the Russian counteroffensive.

Russia said that it was gathering evidence for charges of genocide against Georgia, accusing it of driving 30,000 refugees out of South Ossetia.

Georgia responded by filing a case against Russia at the International Court of Justice in the Hague for ethnic cleansing between 1993 and 2008.

Ada Alburova, 32, said that she had seen bodies of women and children after emerging from two days’ hiding in her grandparents’ basement in Tskhinvali from the initial Georgian attack.

“We will write down it all and the guilty should pay,” said Ms Alburova, a charity worker from Vladikavkaz, the capital of Russian-administered North Ossetia.

People “could not believe that Georgia was capable of that,” she said.

“Russia should pay for the fact that they were late but if they did not come we would not exist as nation,” said Ms Alburova.

She alleged that Georgian troops deliberately killed civilians as they went along the Zarsky road to escape from South Ossetia.

It “was full of bodies, whole families died there, children, the elderly,” she claimed.

“Everyone who went out on the Zarsky road saw it.”

Tblisi has denied that its soldiers committed any atrocities.

Natiya Gogichaeva, 33, who ran a children’s centre in the village of Khvtse that became a meeting point for refugees as they escaped from the region, said that she had seen a Georgian plane try to drop a bomb on fleeing refugees.

Initially refugees thought that the jet was Russian.

“They thought that it had come to help,” she said, but when they saw that something was dropping, the refugees scattered and there were only a few light wounds.

Five thousand refugees came through her centre, said Ms Gogichaeva and she said many had tales of indiscriminate attacks against civilians.

“I am ready to cry at the whole of the world."

"I am ready to go to Europe to tell,” said Ms Gogichaeva, slamming Western newspapers for not covering the Georgian assault on South Ossetia.

Elza, a nurse working in Tskhinvali, told The Times that she had treated many civilians with bullet wounds.

“They were shooting at them,” she said before hanging up.

A Reuters journalist who visited the town reported that more than 200 wounded in the fighting were being treated in the hospital.

Another Russian journalist described how militia fighter Beslan Sanakoyev took her to a pile of Georgian bodies on the pavement.

One of them had been set on fire and in the ashes only legs and hands had remained.

"What?"

"Shall we bury them?" said Mr Sanakoyev.

"Nobody will dig a hole for them."

"They did not feel sorry for us, why should we feel sorry for them."

There were also reports of violence directed at ethnic Georgians.

In villages once populated by Georgians on the outskirts of Tskhinvali, South Ossetian fighters reportedly set fire to Georgian houses, and carried out searches in the villages.

The claims and counter-claims come amid a growing humanitarian crisis in the town, where broken glass and fallen masonry litter the streets, and those who have not fled are hiding in basements with no mains electricity or running water and little food.

Doctors at the town’s hospital have been working in the basement since the building was hit by Georgian artillery strikes on the first day of the conflict.

A generator provides some light, but conditions are basic and unsanitary with dust covering the floor.

The first view of the shattered town of Tskhinvali came from Russian journalists on Kommersant, a Moscow business newspaper.

"Doctors have only been treating war injuries, mainly shrapnel and bullet wounds," chief doctor Nodar Kokoyev told the paper, adding that they had very little medication left.

"We have sent 160 wounded to Vladikavkaz in the last three days."

Upstairs, three Russian soldiers, killed in a rocket attack on Sunday, were reported to be lying on the floor of the old operating theatre.

There were reports of two women discovered headless in their flats after an artillery attack.

It took half a day to identify them and then they were buried in the garden, according to the newspaper.

"Why the garden?" asked the Kommersant reporter.

"You cannot go the cemetery."

"You will get shot," answered one woman.

"You cannot keep the body at home, nobody knows what will be in the next hour."

"Maybe we won’t exist so we bury them without a coffin."

The United Nations High Commission for Refugees estimates that, across Georgia, 100,000 people have been forced to flee their homes by the fighting.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/worl...et=0&page=1

So who do we believe? The Russians or Bush? I am leaning toward the Russians. Bush is such a truth teller.

John McCain has already enthusiastically endorsed NATO membership fro Georgia. "Today we All Georgians" he has said. Idiot!

Well I'd imagine both of them are telling the truth as they want to see it.

Bad things happen in a war, even little wars like I was involved in. People who shouldn't a died get killed and it makes you sick at heart when you see it. But I know most of the time it wasn't intentional, they just happened to be in the wrong place at the right time. The other side likes to get emotional and claim atrocities and some times no one knows who really was responsible. But you can bet the emotions will always blame the other side and claim it was an atrocity, no matter who really was at fault.

Thats true Marine. But I used to believe my government. I can no longer do that. My government is now just another source of propaganda. This is just another Bush operation gone wrong in one way or another. The Russians say they were just defending people being murdered. I will see the evidence and make the decision for myself.

I don't believe a word of what George W. Bush says about anything ....

That doesn't mean I believe the Russians .....

It just means that I don't believe anything the liar George W. Bush says ....

And so ....

I heard John McCain saying that on the radio news this morning, and my impression was similar to yours ....

I think John McCain has gone around some twist or turn or bend in his mind, and he is now out of sight of the same reality that the rest of us share ....

Last week, we were all Iraqis ....

Now we are all Georgians ....

I wonder who John will have us being next week ....

I wonder if he knows where the United States of America are any more?

Or if the United States of America is really a lot more than a gaggle of lobbyists waiting to shove some money down John McCain's pants pockets ...

And so ...

"Russia defies truce with Georgia; US sending aid - Russian convoy rolls through Georgia city, defying cease-fire; Bush says massive US aid on way"

By CHRISTOPHER TORCHIA and MATTI FRIEDMAN, Associated Press

Last updated: 5:23 p.m., Wednesday, August 13, 2008

OUTSIDE GORI, Georgia -- Defying a cease-fire agreement, a Russian military convoy rolled through a strategically important Georgia city Wednesday and Georgian officials claimed there was looting and bombing by Russians and their allies.

President Bush said a massive U.S. aid package was on the way for tens of thousands uprooted in the conflict and demanded Russia "keep its word and act to end this crisis" in the former Soviet republic.

"The United States stands with the democratically elected government of Georgia and insists that the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Georgia be respected," Bush said sternly in Washington.

One day after the Kremlin and its smaller neighbor agreed to a French-brokered cease-fire to end the dispute over two pro-Russian breakaway territories, the pact appeared fragile at best.

An Associated Press reporter saw dozens of Russian trucks and armored vehicles leaving the city of Gori, some 20 miles south of the separatist region of South Ossetia and home of a key highway that divides Georgia in two, and moving deeper into Georgia.

Soldiers waved at journalists and one jokingly shouted, "Come with us, beauty, we're going to Tbilisi."

The convoy roared southeast, toward the Georgian capital, but then turned north and set up camp about an hour's drive away from it.

Georgian officials said the Russians had looted and bombed Gori before they left.

Moscow denied the accusation, but it appeared to be on a technicality: A BBC reporter in Gori said Russian tanks were in the streets while their South Ossetian allies seized cars, looted homes and set houses on fire.

As confusion reigned on the first day of the cease-fire agreement, Bush called a Rose Garden speech to express concern about reports the Russians were already breaking it.

He said he was sending Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice first to France and then to Tbilisi to reinforce U.S. efforts to "rally the world in defense of a free Georgia."

For her part, Rice said:

"This is not 1968 and the invasion of Czechoslovakia where Russia can threaten a neighbor, occupy a capital, overthrow a government and get away with it."

"Things have changed."

The president said a huge U.S. aid effort was under way, including American naval forces and C-17 military cargo planes, to get clothes, blankets, medicine and other supplies to refugees.

The European Union agreed to consider deploying European peacekeeping monitors to the area.

Besides the hundreds killed since hostilities broke out last week, a United Nations agency estimates 100,000 Georgians may have been uprooted.

A spokesman said the U.N. refugee agency was helping evacuate about 1,500 people fleeing the Kodori Gorge in the breakaway province of Abkhazia alone on Wednesday.

Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili conducted a blitz of interviews with news outlets at home and abroad and made a series of claims, some of which were disputed as inaccurate or exaggerated.

He said on national television that the U.S. arrival of a military cargo plane with humanitarian aid "means that Georgia's ports and airports will be taken under the control of the U.S. Defense Department."

Pentagon spokesman Geoff Morrell stressed the United States had no plans to take over Georgian airports or seaports to deliver the aid.

"It is simply not required for us to fulfill our humanitarian mission," he said.

"We have no designs on taking control of any Georgian facility."

In a sharp response to Bush's speech, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov called Georgia's leadership "a special project of the United States."

"And we understand that the United States is worried about its project."

Russian news agencies quoted him saying the United States would have to choose "support for a virtual project" and or "real partnership" on issues such as U.S.-Russian cooperation on Iran and other world tension spots.

Georgia's President Mikhail Saakashvili criticized Western nations for failing to help Georgia, a U.S. ally that has been seeking NATO membership.

"In a way," he said, "Russians are fighting a proxy war with the West through us."

The conflict centers on South Ossetia and another region claimed by Georgia that leans Russian, Abkhazia.

When Georgia cracked down on South Ossetia on Aug. 7, Russia sent its tanks and troops into the two regions and deeper into Georgia proper.

Georgia, bordering the Black Sea between Turkey and Russia, was ruled by Moscow for most of the two centuries preceding the 1991 breakup of the Soviet Union.

Abkhazia lies close to the heart of many Russians.

Its coast was a favorite vacation spot in Soviet times and the province is just down the coast from Sochi, the Russian resort that will host the 2014 Olympics.

Russia has distributed passports to most in South Ossetia and Abkhazia and stationed peacekeepers there since the early 1990s.

Georgia wants the peacekeepers out, but Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has insisted they stay.

Jeffrey Mankoff, an adjunct fellow for Russian studies at The Council on Foreign Relations, said it was too soon to tell the real intentions behind Russia's push into Georgia.

"On the one hand this could be a way to set up a buffer zone between the separatist regions, and on the other it also seems there is an aspect of disbanding the Georgian military aspects," Mankoff said.

In defiance, a few dozen Abkhazian fighters, some with assault rifles and one with a dagger, planted their red, white and green flag in Georgian territory across the Inguri River.

"This is Abkhazian land," one of them said.

Another laughed that Georgians retreating from Abkhazia had received "American training in running away."

The peace plan apparently would allow Georgian forces to return to the positions they held in South Ossetia and Abkhazia before Aug. 7 and clearly requires Russia to leave all parts of Georgia except South Ossetia and Abkhazia.

Nevertheless, Georgian Security Council chief Alexander Lomaia said 50 Russian tanks entered Gori on Wednesday morning.

Some of the Russian units that later left to camp outside the city were camouflaged with foliage.

The convoy was mainly support vehicles, including ambulances, although there were a few heavy cannons.

There were about 100 combat troops and another 100 medics, drivers and other support personnel.

About six miles away from the camp, about 80 well-equipped Georgian soldiers were forming what appeared to be a new front line, armed with pistols, shoulder-launched anti-tank rockets and Kalashnikovs.

Sporadic clashes continued in South Ossetia where Russians responded to Georgian snipers.

In the Black Sea port of Poti, Georgian television showed boats ablaze in the harbor.

Georgia's security chief also said Russian forces targeted three Georgian boats, while Lavrov said Russian troops were nowhere near the city.

For several days, Russian troops held the western town of Zugdidi near Abkhazia, controlling the region's main highway.

An AP reporter saw a convoy of 13 Russian tanks and armored personnel carriers in Zugdidi's outskirts Wednesday.

Later in the day, Georgian officials said the Russians pulled out of Zugdidi.

Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko issued a decree Wednesday saying that Russian navy ships deployed to the Georgian coast will need authorization to return to the navy base Russia leases from Ukraine.

The rights group Human Rights Watch said it has witnessed South Ossetian fighters looting ethnic Georgians' houses and has recorded multiple accounts of Georgian militias intimidating ethnic Ossetians.

The report was important independent confirmation of the claims by each side in the Russia-Georgia conflict.

Meanwhile, at the Olympics in Beijing, Georgia and Russia clashed in competition for the first time.

Georgia rallied to beat Russia in beach volleyball, two sets to one.

"Russia and Georgia are actually friends."

"People are friends," said the Georgian beach volleyball team leader, Levan Akhtulediani.

"I say once again, its better to compete on the field rather than outside the field."

------

Associated Press writers Christopher Torchia reported from Zugdidi, Georgia, and near the Kodori Gorge; Matti Friedman and Sergei Grits from outside Gori, Georgia; Misha Dzhindzhikhashvili and David Nowak from Tbilisi, Georgia; Vladimir Isachenkov, Jim Heintz, Lynn Berry and Angela Charlton in Moscow; Matthew Lee, Pauline Jelinek and Lolita C. Baldor in Washington; John Heilprin at the United Nations; and Carley Petesch in New York contributed to this report.

"Russian feint toward Tbilisi shows truce fragile - Russian convoy roars toward capital in a feint that highlights truce's fragility"

By MATTI FRIEDMAN, Associated Press

Last updated: 4:33 p.m., Wednesday, August 13, 2008

ROAD TO TBILISI, Georgia -- Fifty battered Russian army trucks and armored personnel carriers roared without warning down the highway toward the country's capital, making it clear that a day-old cease-fire would not keep Russia from moving freely through Georgia.

"Come with us, beauty, we're going to Tbilisi!" one of the soldiers bellowed at a photographer in a sleeveless shirt along the road.

Other troops grinned and brandished their weapons, and one hung his bare feet out the back of a truck.

Another, a machine gunner riding atop an armored vehicle, wore a bandanna and a black T-shirt with the word "Russia" emblazoned in the red, blue and white colors of the national flag.

Asked from the side of the road, the soldiers shouted that their destination was Tbilisi -- "With no detours," one said.

But then they veered abruptly into a field about an hour's drive from the capital and camped conspicuously within sight of the road before the sun went down.

The message was hard to miss: The Russian military is still the landlord in swaths of Georgia, and its forces remain in easy striking distance of the country's capital.

Meanwhile, about six miles down the road and well inside Georgia, a small contingent of subdued and edgy Georgian troops gathered and began preparing a defense line -- an acknowledgment that swaths of their country are still under Russian control.

Two vintage cannons were wheeled into position facing in the direction of the Russians.

Nearby, crack troops equipped with pistols, Kalashnikovs and anti-tank rockets waited by their olive-drab pickup trucks.

One of them played with a puppy.

Other Georgian units were visible along the road closer to the capital.

But nearly the only people traveling toward Tbilisi were refugees, a steady, dejected trickle of Georgians fleeing the front-line area in overloaded cars,
trucks and tractor-pulled wagons.

In one Soviet-era car were eight people, including a dejected mother holding a baby in the front seat.

The back door of a small blue van swung open to reveal at least a dozen people crowded inside.

One army surplus truck ran out of gas behind the Georgian lines, and its dejected passengers waited alongside the road.

One woman who identified herself only as Nina, 57, said she fled her village, Karaleti, when it was assaulted and torched by the Russians earlier in the day.

Her account could not be independently confirmed.

She had spent the days of fighting hiding in a basement, she said, and did not know where her two daughters were, though she believed they had escaped.

"I'm proud that I am Georgian, and they hate us because we are Georgian," she said.

Before the surprise arrival of the Russian convoy, Georgians were debating whether Russian tanks were indeed in the center of the town of Gori, as some reports suggested -- a violation of the cease-fire brokered Tuesday that demands a full withdrawal to pre-fighting lines.

Gori, which has largely been abandoned, is a Georgian town that borders the breakaway territory of South Ossetia.

The tanks were indeed in the town, but the debate was rendered irrelevant when the first armored vehicle rolled down from the direction of Gori, pushing beyond the town and farther into Georgia.

The vehicle was followed by trucks carrying equipment, military ambulances, troop transports and two truck-mounted cannon.

The soldiers clearly feared no resistance, and many grinned and waved as they drove by.

Some of the troops had made a halfhearted attempt at camouflage, decking their vehicles with foliage.

But the convoy was hardly an invasion force, made up mainly of support vehicles and carrying perhaps 100 combat troops and an equal number of medics, drivers and other rear-echelon personnel.

At the end of the convoy drove a beat-up van flying a Russian flag and carrying five militiamen in ragtag uniforms and armed with Kalashnikovs -- South Ossetian irregulars who had attached themselves to the Russian troops.

One of them wore a black mask.

Earlier in the day, a BBC reporter in Gori reported that the South Ossetian militiamen were looting houses in the town.

When the Russians turned left onto a dirt trail and headed for their encampment, the South Ossetians spent a few minutes posing with their rifles before boarding their van and heading jubilantly back in the direction of Gori.

"West warns Russia over military push into Georgia - West invokes Cold War-era rhetoric over Russia's push into Georgian territory"

By PAISLEY DODDS, Associated Press

Last updated: 5:23 p.m., Wednesday, August 13, 2008

LONDON -- The West is threatening to revoke Russia's membership in an elite Group of Eight nations club as punishment for the military incursion into the former Soviet republic of Georgia.

Three countries have already pulled out of a joint military exercise with Russian forces that began in an era of cooperation after the Cold War.

But how far will the West go, and how much do both sides stand to lose?

And who is the West in the post Soviet-era?

Britain and the United States hinted Wednesday that Russia could be expelled from the G-8 club of industrialized nations and other international institutions for its actions in Georgia, subtle threats that have been backed by Latvia and Poland.

But Italy, Germany and France -- which holds the rotating EU presidency -- have been reluctant to take sides, underscoring past divisions of the Cold War era and highlighting a deepening rift in the 27-nation European Union.

The threats have done little to fluster Russia, which continued to push through the Georgian territory of Ossetia on Wednesday despite assurances that it had halted its military operations in a cease-fire agreement.

U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Russia had gone too far.

Britain, France and the U.S. pulled out of a major naval exercise in the North Pacific with Russia scheduled to begin Friday.

Expelling Russia from the G-8 would have little practical effect given the G-8's lack of power to enforce policies, but freezing Russian out of other international organizations such as the World Trade Organization or blocking its membership to the Paris-based Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development could prove humiliating at a time when the country is trying to re-gain international stature and gain access into lucrative markets for its oil and gas reserves.

"So far we all have lost," Nobel Peace laureate and former Polish President Lech Walesa told The Associated Press.

"Russia lost because it infuriated the whole world and seems to be going back to its old methods."

"Europe ... has shown some hectic action and an inability to be organized, and the United States was proven helpless and inefficient."

Britain has been one of the most vocal critics of Russia's actions.

Diplomatic relations between the two countries have sunk to a new low since the Cold War.

Tensions flared last month when Russia -- along with China -- vetoed proposed new sanctions on Zimbabwe at the U.N. Security Council -- only days after Russian President Dmitry Medvedev promised Britain's Prime Minister Gordon Brown he would support tougher measures.

Russia is one of the council's five permanent members with veto power.

The others are Britain, China, France and the United States.

The Kremlin's refusal to extradite the key suspect in the 2006 poisoning death of ex-Russian security agent Alexander Litvinenko also prompted both sides to expel diplomats and withhold diplomatic visas.

Britain has also refused to hand over Russian exiles, including Boris Berezovsky -- once an influential Kremlin insider who fell out with Vladimir Putin and fled to Britain in 2000 to avoid a money-laundering investigation -- and Chechen opposition leader Akhmed Zakayev.

British government officials who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the situation said exclusion from international organizations could help rein in Russia.

Withholding visas for government officials and their spouses had also proved effective in the past, they told AP.

Energy has been a key consideration in negotiations.

Russia -- which supplies the EU with roughly a third of its oil and about 40 percent of its natural gas from Russia -- has blocked visas for senior employees of the British energy giant BP PLC.

One-fifth of the world's gas reserves are in Russia and are controlled by Gazprom, the giant Russian utility that is targeting 20 percent of Britain's domestic gas market by 2015.

Britain's Foreign Secretary David Miliband said Wednesday recent discussions among G-8 members that excluded Russia sent a clear message.

"For seven countries to come together without an eighth country ... that has happened over the last few days," Miliband told British Broadcasting Corp. radio.

"I think that makes very clear to Russia that there are political consequences."

Britain's Europe minister Jim Murphy also posted a blistering blog against Russia on Wednesday.

"The events in Georgia over the last 5 days have shocked me, people throughout the U.K. and the international community," he wrote.

"Russia's use of force in a sovereign and democratic country is unacceptable and unjustifiable."

But nations have yet to test strategies for dealing with Russia in a post Cold War climate.

"I think that the Russia government is taking advantage of the fact that the U.S. soft power is in decline and that the EU has a very elastic conception of sovereignty," said Sarah Mendelson, a senior fellow in the Russia-Eurasia Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington D.C.

"I'm worried we might be in a rock, paper, scissors situation and that they (the Russians) are definitely on the rock side."

"I think they are betting that rock trumps paper."

A split among NATO allies over measures against Russia may also prove dangerous.

"The strategic assets of countries with oil are becoming more and more important," said Alexander Rahr, director of the German Council on Foreign Relations and Putin biographer.

"Now Putin wants to show the West that he also can show the West its limits."

------

Associated Press Writers David Stringer and Raphael G. Satter in London, Matt Moore and Patrick McGroarty in Berlin and Monica Scislowska in Warsaw, Poland contributed to this report.

Doesn't sound like the Russian military has changed all that much from the days of the Soviet Union. We always wondered if they roasted goats over open fires at their encampments and had a troop of Gypsy dancing girls along for entertainment.

isn't it convieniant how Bush was in Beijing (along with the other members of his family) for an alibi the exact days this happened.

This was a friendly flag op, the entire thing,

we wuz played again, like an ole'45 this time, it was that obvious.

Sounds like they live a lot better out in the field than we did in Viet Nam ...

They probably do Junior. When the Soviets invaded Afghanistan they lost a whole hell of a lot more people to poor hygeine practices than they did to the Muhajadeen.

It is now more than evident, the proof is there that Karl Rove and John McCain have conspired with these events to try and throw an election

emails and proof have come out, and the White House has been caught

Do you mean by stirring up the trouble in Georgia - people might elect McCain thus throwing the election?

"Russia: Georgia can 'forget' regaining provinces - Russia says Georgia can `forget about' getting its provinces back; ex-Soviet republic on edge"

By DAVID NOWAK and CHRISTOPHER TORCHIA, Associated Press

Last updated: 7:42 p.m., Thursday, August 14, 2008

TBILISI, Georgia -- The foreign minister of Russia said Thursday that Georgia could "forget about" getting back its two breakaway provinces, and the former Soviet republic remained on edge as Russia sent tank columns to search out and destroy Georgian military equipment.

Uncertainty about Russia's intentions and back-and-forth charges clouded the conflict two days after Russia and Georgia signaled acceptance of a French-brokered cease-fire, and a week after Georgia's crackdown on the two provinces drew a Russian military response.

Diplomats focused on finalizing a fragile cease-fire between the two nations and clear the way for Russian withdrawal.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice was heading Friday for Georgia to press the president to sign the deal.

Georgian officials accused Russia of sending a column of tanks and other armored vehicles toward Kutaisi, the second-largest city in Georgia, then said the convey stopped about 35 miles out.

"We have no idea what they're doing there, why the movement, where they're going," Georgian Prime Minister Lado Gurgenidze said in a telephone briefing.

"One explanation could be they are trying to rattle the civilian population."

The U.S. said a move toward Kutaisi would be a matter of great concern, but two defense officials told The Associated Press the Pentagon did not detect any major movement by Russia troops or tanks.

There was no immediate response from Russia itself.

"I think the world should think very carefully about what is going on here," Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili said.

"We need to stop everything that can be stopped now."

The Russian president met in the Kremlin with the leaders of the provinces, South Ossetia and Abkhazia, a clear sign Moscow could absorb the regions even though the territory is internationally recognized as being within Georgia's borders.

And Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov issued a blunt message to Georgia and the world that appeared to challenge President Bush's demand a day earlier that Russia must respect the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Georgia.

"One can forget about any talk about Georgia's territorial integrity because, I believe, it is impossible to persuade South Ossetia and Abkhazia to agree with the logic that they can be forced back into the Georgian state."

The White House said Thursday that the U.S. position was unchanged and dismissed Lavrov's remark as bluster.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates warned Russia was in danger of hurting relations with the U.S. "for years to come" but said he did not see "any prospect" for the use of American military force in Georgia.

As the military and diplomatic battles played out, relief planes swooped into Tbilisi with tons of supplies for the estimated 100,000 people uprooted by the fighting.

U.S. officials said their two planes carried cots, blankets, medicine and surgical supplies -- but the Russians insinuated that the United States, a Georgia ally, might have sent in military aid as well.

U.S. officials rejected the claim.

Even as the relief rolled in, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon warned the fighting and lawlessness was keeping it from reaching large parts of Georgia.

In some places, relief officials were overwhelmed by the sheer numbers of refugees.

"This is too much."

"It is all too much," said Manana Karelidze, a 50-year-old retired accountant, who said she had waited for days at the Department of Refugees in the Georgian capital for registration and dry pasta.

There were hundreds like her.

Russian troops spent the day searching selected cities, forests and fields for military equipment left behind by Georgian forces.

The Georgian ambassador to the United States, H.E. Vasil Sikharulidze, said Russia was employing "scorched-earth" tactics -- destroying Georgian commercial and military infrastructure and burning down religious sites beyond the conflict area of South Ossetia.

"What defenses does Georgia have?"

"Because of the cease-fire agreement, which Russia has not honored, Georgian troops are being moved to organize a defensive line 10 kilometers (six miles) away from Tbilisi," he said.

Sikharulidze said an attack on Kutaisi would be a "catastrophe,"

On the edge of the strategically important city of Gori, Georgian soldiers pointed their weapons at Russian forces, and explosions and small arms fire broke out in the distance.

Georgia claimed Russians had left the oil port city of Poti, but hours later some forces were still there.

Georgia also accused Russia of using short-range missiles in Poti and Gori, showing reporters purported images of shrapnel.

There was no immediate response from Russia.

Russian and Georgian troops briefly patrolled Gori, but relations between the two sides broke down and the Georgians left.

At least 20 explosions were heard later near Gori, along with small-arms fire.

It was not clear whether it was renewed fighting or the disposal of ordnance from a nearby Georgian military base.

Russia said its troops were there to establish contact with the civilian administration and take over abandoned military depots.

Gori, battered by Russian bombing over the week, lies on Georgia's main east-west road only 60 miles west of Tbilisi.

AP Television News footage showed Russian troops in and near Gori, and Georgia said it was checking the area for mines.

An AP Television News crew heard explosions at a military base in the western city of Senaki and were told by officials from both Russia and Georgia that the Russians were destroying ordnance.

Dozens of Russian armored vehicles and troops later set up for the night under camouflage on the main road from Senaki north to Zugdidi.

The same APTN crew followed Russian troops on the outskirts of Poti as they searched a field and a forest at an old Soviet military base for possible Georgian military equipment.

Georgia's coast guard said Russian troops burned four Georgian patrol boats in Poti on Wednesday, then returned Thursday to loot and destroy the coast guard's radar and other equipment.

Another APTN camera crew saw Russian soldiers and military vehicles parked inside the Georgian government's elegant gated residence in the western town of Zugdidi.

Some of the Russian soldiers wore blue peacekeeping helmets, others wore green camouflage helmets, all were heavily armed.

Other Russian troops patrolled the city.

"We don't want them here."

"What we need is friendship and good relations with the Russian people," Ygor Gegenava, an elderly Zugdidi resident, told the APTN crew.

In London, BP PLC said it resumed pumping natural gas Thursday through one Georgia pipeline, but two oil pipelines in Georgia remain closed.

The Russian General Prosecutor's office said it had formally opened a genocide probe into Georgian treatment of South Ossetians.

Georgia sued Russia in international court, alleging murder, rape and mass expulsions of Georgians in both provinces.

------

Correspondents David Nowak, Misha Dzhindzhikhashvili and Matti Friedman in Tbilisi, Georgia; Mansur Mirovalev in Tskhinvali, Georgia; Jim Heintz and Vladimir Isachenkov in Moscow; Alexander Higgins in Geneva; Carley Petesch in New York; Matthew Lee traveling with Rice; and Lolita C. Baldor in Washington contributed to this report.

No kidding, they attack and murder over a thousand civilians then can't understand why they shouldn't rule over their intended victims. I don't like Russia getting those territories, but it's clearly better than Georgia being allowed to finish the genocide.

Which way works out better for Armenia, Tom?

Personally, I think Putin and Cheney were cut from the same cloth - and perhaps Putin is worse to a degree.

The US policy over the last 7 years didn't allow for a good outcome for any part of the Caucuses (or the US). In a very real sense both are horrible for Armenia and my immutable stance against supporting genocide forces me to prefer the one I think is likely to commit genocide to the one who has already attempted it.

If I have to choose one as probably less bad for Armenia I think it's still siding with Russia despite the Georgian and Armenian peoples having more of a record of friendship, delayed high risk of destruction is preferable to immediate destruction and territory allows genocide is a shared argument between Georgia on S. Ossetia and Azerbaijan on the NKR (along with them both having had the legal right to secede which was denied by force). A reasonable approach with increasing reaction if various lines are crossed (with positive reactions if moderation is shown quickly) gets the best results from a country like Russia. If the US REALLY wanted to give the countries a chance we would have financed the infrastructures instead of letting Gazprom force the sales for a few cents on the dollar (at least in Armenia and to some degree Georgia and Azerbaijan). $400million and no lives would've done the trick, if we would've put the same amount into helping safeguard WMDs in Russia we would've been on good enough terms to do it with no backlash.

Compliance on the ceasefire took 12-24 hours longer than it should have because Misha is a mouthy punk and when Russia agreed he rescinded his agreement and claimed the territories were non-negotiable and Georgia had the right to take them by force. We can't afford an "ally" like that. By the way, he also lied and claimed that the Russian bombers were flying out of Armenia when he knew as an absolute fact that was false, so no matter my feelings for the Georgian people he's a worse enemy than Putin.

Thanks, Tom! I'm really not too knowledgeable about Georgia or that specific region so it's a great help with you filling in the blanks!

August 15, 2008
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/worl...icle4535173.ece
Kremlin dusts off Cold War lexicon to make US villain in GeorgiaCharles Bremner in Moscow
Russians were told over breakfast yesterday what really happened in Georgia: the conflict in South Ossetia was part of a plot by Dick Cheney, the Vice-President, to stop Barak Obama being elected president of the United States.

The line came on the main news of Vesti FM, a state radio station that — like the Government and much of Russia's media — has reverted to the old habits of Soviet years, in which a sinister American hand was held to lie behind every conflict, especially those embarrassing to Moscow. Modern Russia may be plugged into the internet and the global marketplace but in the battle for world opinion the Kremlin is replaying the old black-and-white movie.

The Obama angle is getting wide play. It was aired on Wednesday by Sergei Markov, a senior political scientist who is close to Vladimir Putin, the Prime Minister and power behind President Medvedev.

“George Bush's Administration is promoting interests of candidate John McCain,” said Dr Markov. “Defeated by Barak Obama on all fronts, McCain has one last card to play yet - the creation of a virtual Cold War with Russia . . . Bush himself did not want a war in South Ossetia but his Republican Party did not leave him any choice.” The Americans were now engineering an armed conflict between Ukraine and Russia, Dr Markov added.


Vladimir Putin's mastery checkmates the West
Michael Binyon says Russia has been biding its time - but its victory in Georgia has been brutal and brilliant

Multimedia
Video: stories from the front line
Pictures: Georgia conflict

Background
The Russia-Georgia grudge match
Comment: Nato should still embrace Georgia
Reaction: world leaders condemn Moscow
This conflict matters to the West
Related Links
US accuses Russia of scorched earth tactics
Russian troops refuse to withdraw from Gori
Missile shield deal adds to East-West tension
Multimedia
Pictures: Russia-Georgia war
The Establishment and its media supporters are dusting off favourites from the Cold War shelf. Sergei Lavrov, the Foreign Minister, accused Washington of playing dangerous games. The West was guilty of “adventurism”, supporting aggression against peace-loving Russian forces who are engaged on a humanitarian mission to protect human life. Yesterday's headline in Commersant, a generally admired newspaper, announced with old-style sarcasm the imminent American “Military Humanitarian Landing” in Georgia.

A classic of Soviet-speak also came from Vasili Lickhachev, a former Russian Ambassador to the EU. “The West has spent a lot of time, energy and money to teach Georgia the tricks of the trade . . . to make the country look like a democracy,” he said.

“We and many other nations see through this deceit. We understand that the seditious tactics of the so-called colour revolutions are a real threat to international law and the source of global legal nihilism.”

These grooves from the Cold War grave are shrugged off by many Russians but they strike a chord in a nation ready once again to see itself as the victim of outside conspiracy. Blogs everywhere attract conspiracy lovers but Russian blogs have been exceptionally rich this week in theories of Western skulduggery over Georgia.

The old thinking finds more fertile ground now because, in the view of disillusioned Russians, President Bush relaunched the ideological war through a compliant American media, especially at the time of the invasion of Iraq.

“In the old days under Soviet rule we didn't believe a word of our own propaganda but we thought that information was free in the West and we longed for it,” said Katya, a middle-aged Muscovite. “But we have learnt since that the West has its own propaganda and in some ways it is more powerful because people believe it.”

Moscow is using novel methods to spread a very unsubtle, Cold War version of the Caucasian conflict to the world. Chief among them is Russia Today, a state 24-hour news channel that is fronted much of the time by cheery British and other English-speaking television professionals.

The smiles and studio banter could come from BBC World or CNN but the story is unrelentingly the Kremlin version. Banners flash along at the bottom of the screen saying such things as “genocide” and “aggression” or “city turns into human hell, many people still trapped under rubble”. Recapping the conflict yesterday RT's presenter said that Georgia's “brutal assault” had killed 1,600 civilians in its breakaway province in a campaign that destroyed 70 per cent of the buildings in Tskhinvali, its capital. Russian forces had moved in only to bring peace as Georgian forces killed women and children who were trying to flee, it said. Throughout its rolling cover of alleged Georgian atrocities, there was no mention of the heavy Russian military offensive.

The coverage goes down well in developing countries that want an alternative to CNN and BBC World Service, a Russian official said. “We have learnt from Western TV how to simplify the narrative.”

The Soviet crackdown

— In January 1968 Alexander Dubcek became First Secretary of the Czechoslovak Communist Party, instituting the “Prague Spring” liberalising reforms

— In August the Soviet-led Warsaw Pact invaded, below, claiming that its assistance had been requested by Communist Party leaders. Dubcek was arrested

— Lyndon Johnson, the US President, declared the invasion in violation of the United Nations Charter, but America was in the middle of a presidential election campaign and a war in Vietnam. The West took no action

— In 1988 mass demonstrations marked the anniversary

— The Communists were finally ousted in 1989 and Václav Havel was elected President in what became known as the Velvet Revolution. Soviet forces withdrew in 1991

"CON-JOB CONNIE" RICE IS SO FULL OF BEANS ...

HER NEGOTIATING POSITION ON GEORGIA'S "SOVEREIGNTY" HAS HER STANDING WITH HER BACK FIRMLY PRESSED INTO A CORNER BY ALL OF HER PREVIOUS LIES THAT HAVE WEAKENED OUR AMERICA BY GETTING US MIRED IN THE QUAGMIRE OF IRAQINAM ...

WHERE "CON-JOB CONNIE" AND HER DIM-WIITED BOSS WENT TO DO EXACTLY WHAT THE RUSSIANS ARE DOING NOW IN GEORGIA ....

SAUCE FOR THE GOOSE, "CON-JOB" ...

And so ...

"Rice says draft truce protects Georgia"

By MATTHEW LEE, Associated Press Writer

15 AUGUST 2008

TBILISI, Georgia - Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Friday that a proposed cease-fire she wants Georgia to sign with Russia protects Georgia's interests despite concessions to Moscow.

On her way to Tbilisi with the document, Rice said the immediate goal is to get Russian combat forces out of Georgia and more difficult questions about the status of the country's separatist regions and Russia's presence there can be addressed later.

"The United States would never ask Georgia to sign onto something where its interests were not protected," she told reporters aboard her plane as she flew to the Georgian capital from France where she met French President Nicolas Sarkozy who brokered the cease-fire.

"This is not an agreement about the future of Abkhazia and the future of South Ossetia," Rice said, referring to the two flashpoint areas.

"This is about getting Russian troops out."

Rice will be consulting with pro-Western Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili about details of the cease-fire, which will require Russia to withdraw its combat forces from Georgia but allows Russian peacekeepers to remain in South Ossetia and conduct limited patrols outside the region.

The draft document also does not commit Russia to respecting Georgia's "territorial integrity," but rather refers to Georgian "independence" and "sovereignty," meaning Moscow does not necessarily accept that South Ossetia and Abkhazia, are Georgian.

Officials say the eventual status of the two areas will be worked out under existing U.N. Security Council resolutions which recognize Georgia's international borders and Abkhazia and South Ossetia as Georgian.

The U.S. and its allies had been pushing for Russia to agree to restore the situation in Georgia to the "status quo ante," or how it stood before Georgian troops moved into South Ossetia last week prompting Russia's severe response and seven days of bloodshed.

Now they have been forced to back down on the key issues of the mandate of Russian peacekeepers in South Ossetia, which did not previously include outside patrols, and the territorial integrity question, which Russia ostensibly accepted before but no longer does.

U.S. officials concede the agreement is not perfect but maintain it will get Russian combat troops out of Georgia, hopefully in a matter of days.

"It will be a major accomplishment for Georgia to get the Russians out of their country and back effectively to the status quo ante," Rice said.

"I think that will be a major accomplishment."

In addition to the cease-fire document, Rice is carrying with her a letter signed by Sarkozy that clarifies the special security measures that Russian peacekeepers will be allowed to take on Georgian soil, officials said.

"These clarifications are meant to protect Georgian interests," she said.

If agreed, the cease-fire would allow Russian peacekeepers who were in South Ossetia before the fighting broke out to stay and to patrol temporarily in a strip of up to 6.2 miles, or 10 kilometers, outside, officials said.

"Any measures that they are allowed to take have got to be of a very limited nature for a very limited period of time," Rice said.

Officials say the expanded mandate would end as soon as a team of international monitors could be sent to observe, something they believe can be done in weeks.

Amid rising tensions with Russia over the situation in Georgia, Rice also said Thursday she would travel to Poland soon, possibly next week, to sign a missile defense agreement that Moscow vehemently opposes.

U.S. and Polish negotiators reached a deal on Thursday to deploy American interceptors in Poland as part of a European missile shield the United States plans.

Under another agreement, a radar tracking station will be located in the Czech Republic.