There is a very good reason why, over the centuries, Russia has been symbolized by the bear. A bear can appear to be a big, clumsy furry thing, almost cute, until it gets angry. Then it takes your head off with one swipe of its razor-sharp claws and tears you apart and eats you.
     The Russian bear apparently is also a cunning creature.
     Vladimir Putin, the Prime Minister of Russia, does not like the independent nations on the border of Russia, especially when they resist the regional influence of Russia and especially if they align themselves with NATO and the West. The republic of Georgia is a prime example.
     Lately Georgia’s behavior has been intolerable to Putin and to the Kremlin clique that wants to firmly re-establish a Russian zone of influence around the borders of the country. Georgia’s application to join NATO –thus far refused—was the final straw.

     The Russians set an elaborate trap for the Georgians, using Georgia’s breakaway region of South Ossetia as bait. Most of the people in South Ossetia are ethnic Russians and have Russian passports. More to the point, they had Russian Army peacekeepers in South Ossetia keeping the Ossetians separte from the Georgians. South Ossetians have been trying to break away from Georgia since 1990. The region has its own government and constitution, but it has asked in the past to be incorporated into the Russian Federation.  
     It’s unclear who fired the first shots back on August 1, but soon the sides were exchanging shellfire and a terrible idea occurred to President Mikheil Saakashvili of Georgia: Why not put this South Ossetia problem behind us once and for all and invade the province while the rest of the world is focused on the Olympics?
     Saakashvili gambled that the Russians were bluffing in the past when they said they would react with force against any Georgian move into South Ossetia. Saakashvili may have counted on U.S. intervention if the Russian’s weren’t bluffing.
     Early Friday morning, Georgia attacked South Ossetia, quickly seizing Tskhinvali, the capital city of the 70,000-person region. There was a great deal of bombing and shellfire and Ossetian civilians and military were killed and injured…and perhaps, also some Russians.

     Putin had the provocation he was hoping for. On that very same Friday (August 8) the Russian 58^th Army began to pour tanks across the border into South Ossetia and Russian jets began to hit Georgian forces in Tskhinvali. The attacks soon widened to include the two military airbases outside the Georgia capital city of Tiblisi. The Georgian cities of Gori and Kareli and the port cities of Poti and Batumi were also struck.
     Today, Russian armor is said to have severed the country’s only east-west highway by taking the city of Gori. Meanwhile, other Russian forces have driven deep into the west of the country, apparently in support of the breakaway region of Abkhazia.
     The Georgians have reportedly lost 30 tanks in the fighting and 150 combat dead. There are no reliable statistics for Russia’s losses although Georgia claims at least 10 jets were shot down. Russia admits two have been lost.
     The Russians are making an example of Georgia.

     The whole idea of this trap, into which the Georgians fell, was to punish Georgia and to demonstrate to other neighboring countries how ruthlessly Russia is prepared to act when provoked. Putin will carve up Georgia like a Christmas goose and there will be very little the Georgians can do about it. The United States will not intervene.

      The war will end in the next few days with Georgia agreeing to a signed cease-fire and withdrawal from South Ossetia without preconditions. If the Russians want to carve an independent Republic of Abkhazia off the western end of Georgia, they’ll do it.
     What’s left of Georgia will still be independent, --President Saakashvili might even keep his job-- but “guided” by the brotherly Russians, who will then be in effective control of the only Caspian Sea-Black Sea oil pipeline to Europe not running through Russian territory. This will give Putin enhanced energy blackmail power over Western Europe.
    Of course, “guided” by the fraternal advice of Moscow, Georgia will drop its bid to join NATO. The American advisors will probably be sent home –to be replaced by Russians.