In November 2010, Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili announced that Georgia renounced using force to recover its occupied territories in Abkhazia and South Ossetia.  He further advocated resumption of dialogue with Russia and stated that Georgia would accept Russian membership in the World Trade Organization if Georgian border guards were posted in these territories, thereby recognizing Georgia’s sovereignty there. Saakashvili also urged the West to help foster a normalization of relations with Russia. Saakashvili here clearly took heed of long-standing Western and U.S. diplomatic representations to Georgia and in fact accepted one of Moscow’s prime demands, namely the renunciation of force. Yet Moscow responded predictably, saying it had nothing to say to Georgia.

BACKGROUND: Since the Russo-Georgian war in 2008, Moscow has converted Abkhazia and South Ossetia into an armed camp bristling with Russian bases and forces and striven to garner widespread recognition for their independence. Moscow has also refused to enter into serious negotiations with Georgia about the fate of these territories, demanding in advance a renunciation of force. At the same time, Russia has continued its campaign to destabilize Georgia and unhinge its domestic political status quo. Yet except for militarizing the conquered Georgian territories where it had already wielded influence bordering on control before the war, it has achieved nothing. Saakashvili’s government has overcome all manner of domestic challenges, reform continues even if Georgia’s democratic credentials are far from immaculate, Russian plots have been uncovered and nobody except a few Russian clients have been willing to recognize Abkhazia and South Ossetia as independent. None of this has deterred Moscow from adamantly refusing to discuss the future of the region or from militarizing those territories and turning them into Russian economic, political, and military protectorates.

Worse yet from Moscow’s standpoint, Georgia has continued to gain Western support for its position, even if it clearly will not enter NATO anytime soon. NATO recently reiterated it support for Georgia’s integrity, namely that Georgia includes Abkhazia and South Ossetia, and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has publicly labeled Russian policy as an “occupation” of Georgian territory. Indeed, Georgia has continued to engage in diplomatic moves that provoke Moscow’s ire. In particular, earlier in 2010 Georgia announced that residents of the Russian North Caucasus would not need visas to enter Georgia, thus playing Moscow’s attempts to detach its territories back on Russia. The North Caucasus is presently a cauldron of anti-Russian insurgencies where Islamic and ethno-national movements are demanding independence much like what happened in Georgia’s territories. Since Russia has no answer to these movements and has proven utterly unable to respond to demands for improved governance other than by terror, repression, corruption, and continued misrule, the insurgencies continue.  This misrule is, of course, the proximate cause of these insurgencies.

But by conquering and occupying Georgian territory, and then unilaterally declaring these areas to be independent, Moscow has made itself vulnerable to the precedent it set. It is hardly surprising that Russia’s reacted furiously to Georgia’s announcement that residents of the North Caucasus did not need visas. But Georgia’s action was just another example of how Georgia has consistently replicated Russia’s style of diplomacy as practiced for years against Georgia.

IMPLICATIONS: Georgia’s latest initiatives therefore represent a departure from its previous tactics, e.g. unwillingness to make a public renunciation of force. To Russia and skeptical Western regimes, its previous policies looked like provocations of further Russian pressure on Georgia. They reflect a new realism in the conduct of Georgian foreign policy. Other evidence of the turn in Georgian policy is the attempt to reduce discord with West European governments, improve relations with Iran and strengthen its role as a conduit of Caspian energy to Europe, e.g. through the AGRI (Azerbaijan-Georgia, Romania-Hungary Interconnector). Yet at the same time, these steps not only adroitly reverse untenable past positions, they have also exposed that Russia’s claims in the South Caucasus rest on nothing more than force majeure and an atavistic neo-imperial belief that it is ordained to have a sphere of influence against the will of local governments. It is fast becoming apparent that while Russia won a decisive military victory over Georgia in 2008, its political actions there have given it nothing more than a lasting albatross that continues to poison its relations with the West. In fact President Medvedev admitted during the NATO Summit in Lisbon that Georgia remains the most outstanding difference between Russia and the U.S. And now that NATO has reiterated the position that these territories remain part of Georgia, that dispute is now firmly lodged in the Russo-NATO agenda despite the present bilateral reconciliation.

Diplomatically, Russia no longer has any excuse for avoiding direct and serious negotiations with Georgia. And to its own chagrin the warnings of its own Foreign Ministry against unilaterally abridging the sovereignty and integrity of Georgia and the Helsinki Final Act are now beginning to bear fruit. Indeed, recent Russian press reports warn that the regime cannot hold on to the North Caucasus much longer, yet it is unthinkable to Moscow that it simply let these regions go. If that would happen, Russia’s ability to exercise the type of influence it claims for itself in the South Caucasus would be severely reduced. With the passage of time, Moscow’s victory in 2008 thus seems increasingly hollow and in fact a stumbling block to the improvement of Russian relations with the West and to its own domestic security.

Russia’s obduracy in refusing to talk with Georgia also adds to the overall tension throughout the Transcaucasus. The tensions over Nagorno-Karabakh show no sign of abating despite Moscow’s attempts at mediation. And Russia’s ongoing refusal to discuss anything seriously with Georgia leaves Abkhazia and South Ossetia as unresolved issues for all the Russian buildup there. In addition, that buildup seems directed more than anything at continuing to threaten Georgia, a needless policy that no longer has any grounds for existence given Georgia’s renunciation of force with regard to recovering its lost territories. In other words, Russia is fast heading into an impasse of its own making.

CONCLUSIONS: Georgia’s latest moves, probably made in response to Western urgings over the last two years, represent a clever tactical and possibly even strategic adjustment of its course. However, they do not suffice to initiate a genuine and serious negotiation process regarding the disposition of Abkhazia and South Ossetia as well as the other issues arising out of the Russo-Georgian war. It will take more than this to establish a legitimate, stable, and yet dynamic order in the South Caucasus that gives security and real guarantees to both its states and its non-state national movements. But Russia’s position clearly rests on nothing more than chauvinistic great power claims to hegemony and the illegal exercise of force in defiance of international treaties. The West needs more than declarations and resets to bring about a real negotiation.              

Indeed, Moscow continues to turn the area into an armed camp and still tries to undermine the government of Georgia. Much of this undoubtedly has to do with the visceral personal animosity felt by President Dmitry Medvedev and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin for President Mikheil Saakashvili which, in turn, owes much to his defiance of their neo-imperial policies in the former Soviet Union.  But it is also clear that Moscow is essentially sitting upon its bayonets and has no idea what to do in either the North or South Caucasus other than to continue this posture. It has long been known that this posture is strategically untenable. However, neither the West nor Russia, which should both have vital interests in stabilizing the region, seems ready to realize that the longer this untenable situation goes on, the only way it will be resolved is at least temporarily by force. The smaller local states cannot prevent that trend since it is Russia who has placed force at the center of the regional agenda. And in any case, they neither have the strength to restrain Russia nor possess (thanks to Nagorno-Karabakh) the unity of purpose needed to do so. But only an equal and countervailing political force of unified Western support for Georgia beyond empty rhetoric will force Moscow to realize that it can only serve its security by negotiation, just as Saakashvili has realized.

AUTHOR’S BIO: Stephen Blank is Professor at the Strategic Studies Institute, U.S. Army War College. The views expressed here do not represent those of the U.S. Army, Defense Department, or the U.S. Government.