The European Union really is a piece of work sometimes. On the one hand, the EU is very concerned about Russia-Georgia tensions. On the other, they tell Georgia to not have unrealistic expectations. Such expectations include greater EU participation in…

This is not an act of accession.

I’ve seen no analysis of the situation adequately accounting for this behavior by Russia but mine.

Basically, Putin et al are coming to realize that building a strong Russian middle class based on high middle class wages relative to middle class real estate prices is more important than controlling trade routes or importing wage slaves. The result is going to be a turn around in Russian demographic decline coupled with a rise of hard—and by that I mean manufacturing, mining, etc.—technological creation. They may even pick up where Cray Computer Corporation left off with GaAs fabrication due to the West’s increasing hostility toward its own creators favoring masses of “engineers” from Asian academic paper mills.

All Russia has to do beyond building its middle class with policies precisely the opposite of those pursued by the West, is keep Chinese immigration from acquiring its natural resource in Siberia and the Urals. The approach taken by the West of trying to control resources and to commoditize the creation of technology via lowered standard of living for its real creators, will ensure the rise of Russia as a world-class economic power while the West declines into a northern version Brazil.

The Georgians have a long history of successfully existing as small people sandwiched between greater ones so long as a multiplicity of powers resided in the neighborhood. When Persia and the Ottomans went into a steep decline in the late 18th and early 19th century, Georgian independence came to end an end as Russia went from patron to imperial conqueror.

The multipolarity of the region gives Saakashvili some room to manuver against Moscow. The GG option will be used in extremis ( recall that Georgia has its share of OSNAZ and SPETSNAZ veterans, who while getting long in the tooth, would blend fairly easily) which, if not saving Georgia, will a least impose very high costs on Russia

The loss on any GG action is exceedingly asymmetric. If Russia admits a tie between disruption of pipelines and the conflict in Georgia they will be seen as an ureliable supplier. Stock values would plummet. If they attacked militarily and the attacks continued (likely joined by others), then they lose control of the entire bag of marbles.