> This isn't hard. Russia wasn't acting in its own self-defense
Most Ossetians have Russian passports, and the Russian state is obligated to protect its citizens.
> If they wanted to stop it,
> convent an emergency meeting of the UN Security Council and dispatch
> neutral troops as peacekeepers.
That's exactly what the Russians did. They called an emergency Sec Counc meeting, but the US and UK refused to sign off on a ceasefire and non-use of force. So Medvedev said, fine, we'll do the peacekeeping ourselves. It was the right thing to do - lives were saved, and hopefully all the parties involved will put down the guns and negotiate a long-term settlement.
As usual, the Anglo-US mainstream media fell over itself spewing the most despicable lies and Soviet-era stereotypes about Russia at the bidding of their corporate masters. That said, it's remarkable how the digital commons and the media networks of the semi-peripheries have equalized the playing field. Saakashvili tried to sell the world on Cold War II, but instead, to paraphrase the title of Hideo Kojima's magnificent videogame, the blockbuster of the summer was Metal Bear Solid: Guns of the Neocons.
-- DRR