August 11, 2008

Georgian President : We Are Engaged in a War for the Future of Europe

Published in the Wall Street Journal:

Ostensibly, this war is about an unresolved separatist conflict. Yet in reality, it is a war about the independence and the future of Georgia. And above all, it is a war over the kind of Europe our children will live in. Let us be frank: This conflict is about the future of freedom in Europe.

No country of the former Soviet Union has made more progress toward consolidating democracy, eradicating corruption and building an independent foreign policy than Georgia. This is precisely what Russia seeks to crush.

This conflict is therefore about our common trans-Atlantic values of liberty and democracy. It is about the right of small nations to live freely and determine their own future. It is about the great power struggles for influence of the 20th century, versus the path of integration and unity defined by the European Union of the 21st. Georgia has made its choice.

I'm not sufficiently familiar with the geopolitics of Georgia and its surrounding nations to even venture a suggestion as to how we might effectively help our ally right now. It certainly seems that it is in our best interest to do whatever we reasonably can, for the same reasons that it has been in our best interest to stick it out in Iraq. Would-be liberal democratic reformers around the world need to know that they have at least one strong ally in their conflicts with regional hegemons, and they are learning, sadly, that the powers of Western Europe can't be counted on to stand with them. As President Saakashvili notes:
If Georgia falls, this will also mean the fall of the West in the entire former Soviet Union and beyond. Leaders in neighboring states — whether in Ukraine, in other Caucasian states or in Central Asia — will have to consider whether the price of freedom and independence is indeed too high.


By Ragnar Danneskjold, Typical Bitter Gun-Clinger at August 11, 2008 10:29 AM | | l digg this