Family Security Matters » Publications » Exclusive: Perception Wars in Iraq and South Ossetia

Not a member? Sign-up

Forgot your password?

SEARCH FSM

A great Christmas or Hanukkah gift!

IN THIS SECTION

September 9, 2008

Exclusive: Perception Wars in Iraq and South Ossetia

Tom Ordeman, Jr.

Few good things have come from Russia's invasion of Georgia. One of these good things is that supporters of the Iraq War can finally understand why the anti-war protestors have been so furious for the last five and a half years. The reason for this is that everything the anti-war folks have accused the United States and its allies of doing, Russia has actually done to Georgia.

Anti-war folks accuse the United States of invading Iraq unilaterally, based primarily on the lack of a final United Nations Security Council resolution prior to the 2003 invasion. In reality, the United States formed a broad-based coalition that consisted of 40 different nations, and invaded only after numerous UNSC resolutions, the last of which threatened hostile action in the case of Iraqi non-compliance. This coalition included the United Kingdom, Spain, Italy, Poland, Georgia, and Japan, to name only a few.

Russia, for its part, actually invaded Georgia unilaterally – with neither UNSC sanction, nor a single allied participant. While the coalition invasion of Iraq was in no way unilateral, Russia's invasion of Georgia was a textbook example of unilateralism.

The anti-war crowd accuses the American military of perpetrating human rights abuses in Iraq, Afghanistan, Guantanamo Bay, and elsewhere. Despite the overwhelming transparency of nearly all American detention operations, the U.S. military is maligned based on isolated incidents like the junior enlisted chicanery at Abu Ghraib. The investigation and prosecution of the perpetrators of these crimes, which are few and far between, are ignored.

Meanwhile, eyewitness reports in South Ossetia, Abkhazia, and Russian-occupied areas of Georgia-proper reveal systematic ethnic violence and human rights abuses perpetrated by both the Russian military and the Ossetian separatist militias. In addition, whereas much of the coalition's efforts have been aimed at preventing sectarian and ethnic violence, Russia's incursions into South Ossetia and Abkhazia have left a security vacuum that has resulted in ethnic violence against the ethnic Georgian residents of these two regions. America is accused of perpetrating a culture of human rights abuse, but Russia actually appears to be doing this on purpose.

The Americans are accused of invading Iraq in a bid to steal its vast oil resources. However, recent news coverage of Iraq's multi-billion dollar oil surplus reveals that if President Bush was out to steal Iraq's oil, he did an extremely poor job of it. The coalition made the justification for invading Iraq quite clear: Saddam Hussein's sponsorship of terrorism, his development of illicit weapons, his flagrant human rights abuses, and his refusal to cooperate with UNSC resolutions required intervention after fourteen years of Iraqi defiance. None of these were disputed, and the only item that is (incorrectly) disputed now is the issue of Saddam's weapons programs.

In the Caucaus, Russia made accusations against Georgia that were easily proven to be illegitimate. While it would be difficult to prove that Russia's motivation for invading was partly economic, it's widely known that the current strength of the Russian economy is based almost entirely on petroleum and natural gas exports. During the course of the South Ossetian War, Russia made several failed attempts to bomb Georgian oil pipelines. Was this done in an effort to boost the falling price of oil? This is unclear, but possible.

The coalition has been maligned for attacking a country that was defenseless by comparison. The Iraqi Army was a spectre of its 1991 strength, and it was so poorly equipped and organized that the only successful tactic that the Iraqis employed in 2003 was surrendering in order to close on coalition forces, then violating the Geneva Conventions by attacking under the cover of surrender. However, the failure of the Iraqi Army to prepare for the invasion was a crisis of mismanagement, and the coalition expected much more fight out of the Iraqis than they were willing or able to give.

On the Caucasian Front, the Russian "defensive action in South Ossetia" violated Georgian air space outside South Ossetia and Abkhazia for the purpose of crippling Georgian military bases. The Russian military sent forces into Abkhazia, then used it as justification to attack Georgia's naval base on the Black Sea. While the United States facilitated a coalition attack on a military force known for its human rights abuses under a brutal tyrant, the Russians used an unsubstantiated claim of abuses and political illegitimacy in order to justify a power play and show of force against a former subject nation.

One of the more absurd claims throughout the course of the Bush presidency is that President Bush is an incompetent simpleton who merely dances to to the manipulations of his Machiavellian puppet-master, Dick Cheney. Cheney is portrayed by the anti-war crowd as an evil genius, hell-bent on lining the coffers of his business associates at Halliburton. This ignores President Bush's success as a governor and business executive prior to his association with Cheney.

Meanwhile, in Russia, President Dmitry Medvedev is the former head of Gazprom, the massive energy company (Russia's largest corporation) that was effectively seized by the Russian government in 2005. However, the real mastermind behind Russia's invasion is widely seen to be Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, Russia's former president. While Vice President Cheney obviously plays a more important role in the Bush administration than many past vice presidents, Vladimir Putin likely wields far more power behind the scenes in the Kremlin than Cheney wields in the White House. The American caricature is borne out in reality in Moscow.

These are merely a few of the similarities between the accusations about the Iraq War, and the realities of the South Ossetian War. Why there have been no protests against Russian aggression in Georgia is subject to interpretation and debate, although it's worth noting that protestors in America have far less to worry about when they criticize the government than their Russian counterparts do. Aside from the obvious studies that can be made of both the state of international relations, and the state of the Russian military, supporters of the Iraq War can finally understand the anger that the American anti-war groups have been experiencing for years. However, as cliché as it sounds, the anger directed at Russia is far more legitimate than the anger directed at the United States, because everything America has been falsely accused of, Russia has actually done.

FamilySecurityMatters.org Contributing Editor Tom Ordeman, Jr. is a technical writer for a major defense contractor in Hampton Roads, Virginia. Feedback: editorialdirector@familysecuritymatters.org.

Print This E-mail This

Share It: