In The Power of Impossible Ideas, her book about helping to end the Cold War and to build a better Russia, Sharon Tennison tells one of the great hidden stories of our age.
How rewarding to people like Oleg Deripaska that after the indignities Russia suffered at the hands of the West in the 90s, they today see the flow of power and money in the opposite direction.
No matter how subtly the conquest happens, Russian control of Georgia would amount to an historic shift in the balance of power -- especially as long as the world economy is fueled by oil.