Dick Cheney Travels to Georgia

The White House has announced that vice-president Dick Cheney will meet with Georgian President Mikhail Shaakashvili next week. The trip is sure to further stoke tensions with Russia and is a further sign of the influence that Cheney wields--the neoconservatives clustered around Cheney continue to have the upper hand in the Bush administration. If John McCain, whose chief foreign policy advisor Randy Schenuemann is a veteran neocon and has also been a lobbyist for Georgia, is elected president, he will continue further down the path that set by Cheney in the next few weeks. Though Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice briefly tried to reassert herself in foreign affairs in pushing for an Israeli-Palestinian settlement and an agreement with Iran, the conflict between Russia and Georgia means that the neocons are resurgent

The fact is that Cheney and the neocons have long had Georgia on their minds, and the war itself has been a very convenient one for them. It would likely not have occurred absent their stalwart backing of the Shaakashvili. Indeed, the administration's unremitting efforts to portray Georgia, which, by the way, has a rather shaky human rights record, as a flourishing democracy have boomeranged. The result has been a war that will probably cost Georgia for decades, if not longer, as Russian troops linger on its territory, intent on demonstrating the price of trying to defy the oil-rich and thuggish Kremlin. The costs of the administration's so-called freedom agenda keep mounting.

But lousy relations with Russia suit Cheney & Co. well. For one thing, it means that any Russian cooperation in containing Iran's nuclear ambitions is probably null and void. Another war with Iran would serve as the capstone to the Bush presidency, allowing Cheney to engage in the kind of regime change he was intent upon from the outset. It will be interesting to see how far Cheney is willing to go in antagonizing Russia during his upcoming visit. It will give a very good indication of where the administration -- and John McCain -- is headed as well in coming months.

Comments

[TRIATHLON]

RUSSIAN COOPERATION NULL AND VOID

Russian cooperation in containing Iran's nuclear ambitions is probably null and void.

Russian Deputy Chief of Staff Col. Gen. Anatoly Nogovitsyn, will retaliation against Israel and the (US/MIC) United States Military Industrial Complex for encouraging the rapid expansion of the former Soviet Republic of Georgian armed forces, approving hundreds of millions of dollars of military assistance to Georgia, to which Israeli arms dealers, and businessmen acted as the arms and weaponry supplier, selling and exporting ($200M) two hundred million dollars or more in military equipment to the former Georgia Government, in offensive weapons, which included the sale by Israel of at least eight different models of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV's) and Israel also sought to export main battle tanks to Georgia. As Israeli Mossad Intelligence Agents and CIA worked together with the Pentagon in the operation of an important intelligence station in Tbilisi. While a Battalion of Blackwater & Israeli mercenaries, advisors and trainers, worked with Georgian military units.

The retribution will be in the form of advance weaponry to Iran selling their best anti-aircraft systems in Iran, for example, could make that troublesome nation virtually invulnerable to attack from Israel or the US. And, let us not forget much closer problems to Israel then Iran, like Hamas and Hezbollah And, the placement of task force to a naval base in Syria with an aircraft carrier and subs to the Mediterranean, all the better to bollix up US strategy in the Middle East.

[Pippilin]

We're referring to the Russians as thugs???? Those who live in glass houses shouldn't throw stones.

[repearwo]

Can we get them to keep him?

[Archie1955]

Really the very presence of that reprobate in Georgia is a poke in the eye to Russia. Why can't the U.S. just leave well enough alone? Is it so filled with hubris and arrogance that it is willing to start WW111? It's time the U.N. stepped in and offered peace keepers to prevent any more clashes and pointedly to request the U.S. keep its butt out of the area.

[Crowhaul]

Nice post. There's one thing we all can agree on: Cheney & Co. have no material interest in that ugly thing called peace (there's just no money in it). And Mother Nature provides disasters all too infrequently. Thus, the Cheney & Co. imperative of creating one's own disasters (i.e. Shock & Awe, Georgian intrusions, etc.). Heady times indeed for Dick....

[amoment]

Hmmmmm, McCain had better be on his "P's" and "Q's" with Cindy and Cheney in Georgia.

[BadChristian]

In Jane Mayers book, "THE DARK SIDE," she asserts that the precise locations of Black sites remains a closely guarded secret. Also that the "War Council" had considered many locations outside the US, particularly favoring places it could call "Failed states."

On page 148:
"Several other allied countries, including a number of former Soviet satellite states who were hoping to win U.S. favor for their ambitions to join NATO, also agreed to host ghost prisons."

Of course, Cheney is as tight as a tick with this program, and Georgia sounds like an ideal location... I wonder... Since we started working so closely with the Russians at the beginning of the war on Terror... I wonder if this story has a lot more to it.

[jsinclair]

The anti-Russian feelings Bush exploited after Russia intervened in South Ossetia, gave him an extra argument to NATO for the US installing the so-called Missile "Defense" Shield in Poland.

I don't think it was any coincidence that Cheney and Rove were in Georgia, meeting with Saakashvili, two weeks prior to Georgia's attack on South Ossetia.

"Bait and switch". It's at the heart of GWB's foreign policy style.

[WmC]

Cheney to Georgia? Who cares? It's merely symbolism, because that's all the Bushies have left. It's all ". . .sound and fury, signifying nothing."

[ICanHasDemocracy]

Imagine if the French tried to force Democracy down our throats in the 1780's.

[degenerate1991]

Actually, we got into a couple of mini-wars with France during that time, and LouisXVI forcing democracy, thats a funny thought.

[bayside]

Why do I feel like he is up to no good...

[blueskybigstar]

It sounds like some Lucille Ball kind of scheme is in the making at the upper most reaches of power in the White House. I don't put it past them to declare a state of emergency and not giving up power for this reason. They wanted Obama and Democrats to not vote for FISA, so they could let something happen and then blame it on Obama and the Dems.

[Manx]

The good news is that Cheney is going to Georgia.

The bad news is that he's coming back.

[SimonNZ]

Why do I feel very uneasy? Is it because of the signs that Cheney and the Neomorons will push with everything they've got for another disastrous "regime change" adventure before they leave office?

These dangerous idiots should hold zero influence over US foreign policy in the last days of a deeply unpopular "lame duck" presidency. Instead it seems the opposite is true and there's a good a chance they'll be able to manufacture some more long term nightmares before they go.