[lbo-talk] "There are gray areas in war"

[Marvin Gandall]

Doug writes:
>
> On Aug 15, 2008, at 5:22 PM, John Thornton wrote:
>
>> You forgot to mention the oil pipeline Putin wants to grab.  According to
>> BS that is what this is all about.
>
> That's included in "Russians bad." And this may be true. But so what?  Why
> should I care? Regardless of which parasite owns the pipeline, the  oil
> will flow and someone will make money.
==================================
The oil and gas pipelines to Turkey will stay under Georgian control. I
don't see where this has ever been at issue.

If the Russians, however, wanted to provide a graphic illustration to Europe
of how dangerous it would be to extend NATO protection to Georgia - the
Europeans had already been resisting American pressure to enroll both
Ukraine and Georgia in the alliance - the mercurial Saakashvili handed them
a golden opportunity to do so.

Maybe that was the object lesson of the Russian counter-assault.