Why Russia Invaded Georgia

T

he war between Russia and Georgia has some nationalist elements and evidence of old grudges, but it is mostly about Russia’s newly found power as an energy imperialist. Georgia has refused to play along like other former Soviet states. If anything, its independent attitude has been a giant irritant to Russia ever since Vladimir Putin used oil and gas to project hegemony over the region and, by extension, into all Europe. At the same time, the tiny country of just 4 million people has been trying to ward off the giant to its north by seeking membership in NATO or the E.U. In the post-Cold War era, the U.S. and Russia-dependent Europe have been reduced to pleading for calm. A look at the map makes the conflict’s issues quite transparent. Oil and gas can come from Russia into Europe by tanker through the Black Sea from its massive terminal in Novorossiysk, or by pipelines through Belarus and Ukraine. (There are also plans for a subsea pipeline in the Baltic.) These routes give Russia huge leverage – almost an energy monopoly – over both the transit and the destination countries. Over 25 European countries now depend on Russia for as much as 75 percent of their oil and gas. Georgia was eager to act as a spoiler, and European countries were even more eager to comply while trying to avoid incurring the wrath of the hand that feeds them. First, it was the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan oil pipeline that started construction in 2002 when Russia was much weaker. The 1,776

photo by Dmitry Lovetsky: AP

kilometer line connects the oil-rich Caspian with southern Europe in what was to be an energy corridor for European oil and gas supplies. The pipeline is designed to carry 1 million barrels per day from Azerbaijan’s Caspian oil fields to the export terminal Ceyhan via Tbilisi, with Georgia acting as a very important transit country. This did not sit well with Russia, cutting it out from oil exports to Europe. The pipeline, funded by Western oil companies and banks to the tune of $3.2 billion, was commissioned in 2006. What gave Russia fits, and still does, is other possibilities that could affect its control – for example, underwater pipelines that could be built across the Caspian linking Kazakhstan or Turkmenistan. But Russia was really irked over talk of a gas pipeline, similar to the oil pipeline, again linking Azerbaijan and Turkey and points beyond (Baku-Tbilisi-Erzerum) through Georgia. This would give Georgia energy independence and create an alternative route to – the holy grail of Russian geopolitics – Gazprom’s transit monopoly.

A Russian armored vehicle enters a tunnel, moving toward the border with Russia's North Ossetia, 70 km (43 miles) north of Tskhinvali, the Georgian breakaway province of South Ossetia's capital.

October 2008