Our political leaders and mainstream media have been apopleptic over Russia's supposed invasion of neighboring Georgia. They seem to think that Russia should be cast out from humanity into the outerdarkness. And, of course, to defend this kind of hystrionics, they indulge in all kinds of lies and distortions.

We are told over and over again that Russia invaded Georgia. But it didn't. It was already in Georgia (in South Ossetia, precisely), as part of a peacekeeping force, by treaty, so it can't have invaded. What we aren't told, or are told in very soft language, is that Georgia broke the terms of it's agreements over South Ossetia and violently attacked the semi-autonomous region, attacking and killing Russian peacekeepers in the process.

Over and over again we are told that Russia should have gone no further than to drive Georgian troops out of South Ossetia. What we are not told is that this was Georgia's second attack on South Ossetia in four years; thus, Russia could not simply drive the Georgians out, without practically begging them to regroup and attack again.

We are told that Russia has indiscriminately violated Georgian soverignty. In fact, when stories claiming such violations are perused it emerges again and again that Russian attacks have focused on Gori and Tsibli. Both house military bases, Gori's base being a mere 15 miles from the South Ossetian capital; both are undoubtedly sources from which the Georgian assault on South Ossetia came, and certainly they are sources from which a future attack could come.

We are told that the Russians are indiscriminately killing and looting. If they are, then they and their commanders should face serious consequences, and if orders for such behavior came from above, it is a crime against humanity under Geneva. It appears from what I have read that atrocities have in fact been committed by Ossetians and Chechens following Russian columns -
Russia does bear responsiblity for this. Yet such fulminating in the media and from the administration - that continue to ignore the collective punishment on a vast scale being inflicted by Israel on Gaza, and that generally ignore or downplay the fact that Georgia's attack on South Ossetia apparently focused PRECISELY on killing civilians and destroying the capital city of South Ossetia generally - is so hypocritical that really one needs a new word for it. Hyperhypocritial, maybe.

We are told that Russia has repeatedly broken the cease fire, but THERE HAS BEEN NO CEASE FIRE. There has only been talk of a cease fire, there has been much mention of a ceasefire in the media, but so far as I can tell, most of that has come from the EU, which is allied to Georgia, and from Georgia; but so far very reasonable Russian conditions for a truce have not been met.

After all, why should the leader of Georgia make terms with Russia, when serial war crimes perpetrators like George Bush and Condaleeza Rice back him to the hilt?

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For those interested in an actual solution, I would submit that there is an obvious one: Russia should be brought into Nato, along with Georgia and Ukraine. Within the context of Nato, and without Nato's ongoing anti-Russian bias, the kind of ethnic rivalries that fuel crises like the Georgia/Ossetia war would be easier to manage fairly and peacefully.