Foreign-policy analysts increasingly are questioning whether the Bush administration shares a measure of responsibility for the crisis in Georgia by pushing democracy policies among former Soviet-bloc countries, and missing Russia's angry signals in response.
Administration officials say they haven't overreached and that Moscow is the one that misread and overreacted, out of an unreasonable fear of having Western-oriented democracies on its borders. In the long run, these officials say, Russia will begin to back down, unwilling to tolerate Western censure or the economic punishment that the international marketplace already is beginning to impose.
Still, administration officials, particularly Vice President Dick Cheney who has been traveling in the region, are being noticeably cautious in their actions and rhetoric. Their latest activities suggest they're seeking to ease fears among Western allies that the administration's inclination is to go too far again in response to last month's Russian incursion into Georgia.
Notably, the Bush administration hasn't made any suggestion of short-term assistance to help Georgia rebuild its shattered military, even though it announced last week a $1 billion to help rebuild Georgia's civilian infrastructure.
The U.S. also has avoided any broad security promises for the region. U.S. President George W. Bush's decision soon after the Russian invasion to begin a U.S. military airlift of humanitarian supplies to Tbilisi, and send Navy warships on similar missions were widely perceived as a show of force, but now appear to be about U.S. face-saving as well.
The normally hawkish Mr. Cheney, seeking to reassure Georgia and its pro-Western neighbors of continued U.S. support, also has used more moderate rhetoric than some observers had expected, further signaling the administration's desire not to rattle allies in Western Europe or the Caucasus -- or rile Russian leaders. In his public comments, Mr. Cheney has focused on the importance of holding the North Atlantic Treaty Organization together.
For their part, officials in Moscow have been mostly silent about Mr. Cheney's visit -- even the tough but largely familiar criticisms he leveled at Russia in a major speech on Saturday. Mr. Cheney's more moderate comments in Tbilisi on Thursday -- focused on economic measures to help Georgia weather its crisis -- seem to have convinced Russia that he's being careful to avoid unnecessary short-term confrontations. His brief statement with Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko in Kiev on Friday went through more than a dozen drafts, reflecting the White House caution.
It's likely that European Union countries 'pleaded with Washington 'not to let Cheney be Cheney,'' says Rose Gottemoeller, director of the Carnegie Moscow Center.
EU and U.S. officials alike are hoping their caution can help facilitate a cooling-off period that will prevent another outbreak of violence in the region, ease Russian troops out of undisputed Georgian territory, and give Mr. Saakashvili a badly needed chance to get Georgia along with his own government back on their feet.
A growing number of U.S. analysts see the Bush administration as at least partly to blame for the mess in Georgia. They cite the U.S. pressure to make Georgia and Ukraine members of NATO and construct a missile shield system in Eastern Europe over intense objections from former president and current Prime Minister Vladimir Putin.
As a result of the mistakes, Bush administration policies in the region 'are in shambles,' said Stephen Flanagan, a former national-security official focused on central and eastern Europe. 'I think the Bush-Cheney team overreached in thinking Russia had no real red lines, but [Prime Minister Vladimir] Putin called their bluff in Georgia.'
U.S. officials also failed to restrain the voluble Mr. Saakashvili from launching a counter-offensive against separatists in South Ossetia that touched off the Russian incursion, says Andrew Kuchins, director of the Russia and Eurasia program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.
A senior administration official, speaking with reporters on Monday, disputed the criticisms, saying leaders in the region believe Russia acted out of unjustified desire to block NATO membership for Georgia and Ukraine, both now independent states. The official said Russia's vehement opposition to the missile shield program also was well understood by the U.S. -- and equally unreasonable.
'These are missiles that don't even have explosive warheads on them,' the official said. 'They're strictly aimed at ballistic missiles launched out of the Middle East. And the result of a lot of effort on our part to make sure the Russians understood what was happening here ... were statements by senior Russian military officials threatening Poland with attack. That was inconsistent, I think, with the kind of behavior that we would expect out of a Russia that is truly interested in being fully integrated with the West and being a normal nation, part of all of those international institutions that everybody else belongs to.'
Whether the U.S. pushed too hard against Russia or missed warning signs during the Bush administration likely will be a key issue in deciding the administration's eventual legacy in the former Soviet bloc and beyond. It's a place that provided the blueprint for Mr. Bush's signature 'freedom agenda,' which in turn became an important foundation for his overall foreign policy.
John D. McKinnon |
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