Date: Sat, 20 Sep 2008
From: GORDON HAHN <gordon-hahn@sbcglobal.net>
Subject: Re: Some truths regarding Georgia
I thank Maj. Schaefer for helping us clarify this issue and I take Maj. Schaefer's word that, as far as he was concerened, the instruction on counter-intelligence (COIN) provided to Georgian forces was not intended for combat operations in Georgia's breakaway republics. I am also not in anyway blaming the American military for the Georgian fiasco. US politicians are to blame for 15 years of an inept Eurasian security policy, and we civilians and the military will pay any price.
That said, one can grant that as the situation as it stands there today does not lend itself to COIN application. However, if instead of five days, the war had gone on for five weeks, months or years and become a modern counter-insurgency campaign, then things would be different. Surely, if Russia had sat out such a war, Abkhaz and/or Ossetian guerillas would have borrowed from the North Caucasus separatists and other jihadists' techniques. Furthermore, I seriously doubt there was no applicability whatsoever of the COIN to other types of warfare. " Indeed, as the major notes: "It is entirely reasonable to think that the basic combat training that we provided to the battalions could be used in other operations. Unfortunately, there is no way to prevent that -- but not because we didn't try." I do not think that that is enough to bury the issue of the Russians' reaction. Indeed, the Maj. himself notes that initally COIN training itself was rejected because it might be 'provocative,' but neverhteless it was given. What exactly was seen as potentially provocative but nevertheless taught is of great interest here.
In addition, military training would surely have gone beyond mere operational tactics etc. and influenced possibly organization, discipline etc. Moreover, the euipment needs to discussed. Perhaps the major could provide a list.
Plus the political efffect of such support is probably the most important result of T&P that helped bring about the conflict. Although, as far as I know, then president Putin agreed with Bush on the suitability of US training for Gerogian counter-insurgency efforts, but again there should have been extraordinary measures to ensire a political solution given the explosiveness of American equipment being seen on Russian television in position for potential or actual use against Russian soldiers.
On snipers, Maj. Schaefer notes that "every military force in the world must have some well-trained snipers as part of a basic defense force." This appears to insiunate that snipers cannot be used in offensive operations. That simply cannot be the case, and there were in fact numerous reports of Georgian snipers firing on South Ossetian positions and villages. Perhaps, engineers are more important in counter-insurgency than snipers, but that is the point. There was not a counterinsurgency campaign; there was an offensive to take South Ossetia.
The major's criticism of analysts: "one could remember the geopolitical situation at the time when Presidents Bush and Putin were on very friendly terms and the GTEP was launched as the first major offensive as part of Operation Enduring Freedom in the Global War on Terrorism. We were all chummy with the Russians at the time, remember? The cold war was over, it was a new era of cooperation, remember? All you analysts were afraid you'd be marginalized and out of a job because Russia was no longer important, remember?" Major, this is shooting at the wrong target. I have always said that Russia was crucial for international security and would yet play its role in writing the 21st century's history. I have been saying for 15 years that NATO expansion will lead to Russian-Western conflict, and the chumminess after 9/11 was an opportunity to stop or revise that policy. Putin hinted at Russia's entry into NATO, and his suggestion was ignored in Western capitols. The major should know there is nothing close to unaninimity among analysts. His comments do show the kind of analysts who get the ears in most places. Hence, August 7-8.
Indeed, many of the military people and those teaching military people have agreed with me on this, and I am glad to hear the major's statement: "I was very disappointed that our efforts to help the Russians did not result in closer cooperation between our governments because that was our intent: any insinuation or claim to the contrary is false." Yes, and here the Russian government is partially to blame as well.
Now back to crossfire - Maj. Schaefer writes: "Dr. Hahn...is dead wrong if he says that information that LTC Hamilton uses from the U.S. Embassy about the events of August 8th would only be coming from the Georgians and should therefore be discounted. No Embassy in the world, U.S. or otherwise, relies solely on the host country for information and to even suggest that the U.S. Country Team in Georgia was not constantly in contact with Washington, and that Washington was not pinging our own intelligence assets for independent information suggests either a momentary oversight or a fundamental lack of knowledge about how the system works."
Now Maj. Schaefer does not know what information was coming from the US embassy. We do know that local American PR people were spinning in Tbilisi and that the Georgians were spinning everyone. We do know that in Amb. Burns testimony before congress he twice cites what the "Georgians were telling us" as the authoritative source on the events of Aug 7. He does not mention intelligence sources or any other sources; just Tbilisi. We also know that on Aug 5 when thousands of georgian troops were illegally already moved into or moving toward the conflict zone, NATO representative Cameron Romero stated NATO had no information regarding any concentration of Georgian forces in or around the conflict zone. Yet after the war we have Western observers telling Wester media that by the morning of August 7 Georgia had amassed 12,000 troops on its border to South Ossetia, and 75 tanks and armored personnel carriers were positioned near Gori. [Manfred Ertel, Uwe Klussmann, Susanne Koelbl, Walter Mayr, Matthias Schepp, Holger Stark and Alexander Szandar, “Road to War in Georgia,” Der Spiegel, 25 August 2008, posted on Johnson’s Russia List, #162, 31 August 2008, www.cdi.org/russia/johnson/ (accessed 31 August 2008).] So I don't know who was talking to who and who was listening to who, but something got lost in the translation. In addition, repeated Georgian violations of the ceasefire from early July and even June suggest that Georgian forces were perhaps not listening to Col. Hamilton's and Maj. Schaefer's lectures on the Western notion that "military action was not the answer and that the only way to achieve lasting security was to integrate economic, diplomatic and informational efforts within a secure environment (which would be provided by the military)."
Perhaps, NATO expansion and the military's growing influence in diplomatic matters - as reflected in the major's comments on the ODC's influence - is a product of NATO expansion, greased by democratization, leading policy, rather than hard-nosed realist considerations about who can help the US more and who can harm US (and Georgian) interests more - Russia or Georgia?
Finally, I don't recall "throwing any invectives" at Col. Hamilton. I respect military people (unlike most in academia) as I do anyone who tells what he believes to be the truth. With all due respect,
Gordon M. Hahn, Ph.D. Senior Researcher, Monterey Terrorism Research and Education Program and Visiting Assistant Professor, Graduate School of International Policy Studies, Monterey Institute of International Studies, Monterey, California; Senior Researcher, Center for Terrorism and Intelligence Studies (CETIS), Akribis Group; and Analyst/Consultant, Russia Other Points of View Russia Media Watch, www.russiaotherpointsofview.com. Dr Hahn is author of two well-received books, Russia’s Islamic Threat (Yale University Press, 2007) and Russia’s Revolution From Above (Transaction, 2002), and numerous articles on Russian politics.