Has US Crippled NATO?

For years, the U.S. could afford to dismiss Russian declarations that such encirclement was a threat to its national interests and would be resisted. Russia was weak. But the U.S. occupation of Iraq, instead of unleashing its huge oil supplies, and being a bonanza for American oil companies, has severely weakened the U.S. and contributed to the huge increase in oil prices — giving back to the Russian state the financial power it had lost. The Bush administration, still addled by ideology, apparently didn’t notice and continued to dismiss Russia as if it were still a bankrupt state.

The Georgian attack was either a wag-the-dog strategy to help the Republicans win the White House, or one of the most spectacularly incompetent applications of foreign policy in U.S. history. In either case, the U.S. miscalculated not only Russia’s response, but more importantly, the entire geo-political balance of power in the region. Someone, such as the usually astute Israelis, should have told the U.S. that in this confrontation, Russia holds virtually all the cards.

TheTyee