The American response to the Russian invasion of South Ossetia and Abkhazia was all rhetoric in large measure because the U.S. was already over-extended in Iraq and Afghanistan and had neither the power, the strategic necessity nor the political capital to take on the Russians over Georgia – and the Russians knew it.

There are two critical lessons to be learned from the recent Russian-Georgian war. First, Western security commitments should not to be made unless they can be enforced; and second, autonomous ethnic regions within tiny nations that border powerful states carry the potential for future conflicts.

The Russian-Georgian war was the by-product of a poorly thought out American foreign policy in the Caucasus because the US attempted to gain influence against Russia without providing sufficient American power to sustain that policy when challenged by Russia. This does not excuse the brutal application of Russian power against a tiny neighboring state, but it goes a long way in explaining why America responded as it did, and why American foreign policy in the Caucasus has proven to be without substance.

During the war, President Bush proclaimed America's "unwavering support" for the former Soviet republic of Georgia. For the U.S., however, it was just another hollow gesture that reinforced an unfortunate pattern of American hubris. Bush lauded the Rose Revolution that swept Mikheil Saakashvili to power, backed Georgia's bid to enter NATO, and traveled to Tbilisi in 2005 to give his "pledge to the Georgian people that you've got a solid friend in America." In response, the Georgians aligned themselves with the U.S., sent 2,000 troops to fight in Iraq and Afghanistan beside American forces, and even named a main road in Tbilisi after Bush. At the White House last March, Saakashvili expressed his gratitude to the President for having "really put Georgia firmly on the world's freedom map."

Nevertheless, when push came to shove, the American response to the Russian invasion of South Ossetia and Abkhazia was all rhetoric in large measure because the U.S. was already over-extended in Iraq and Afghanistan and had neither the power, the strategic necessity nor the political capital to take on the Russians over Georgia – and the Russians knew it. The weak U.S. response to the Russian invasion has not only diminished U.S. standing in the region, but arguably as a world power as well. As a friend and ally, Georgia was abandoned to the mercies of the Russian war machine and the other former Soviet republics have no doubt taken note of this.

In many ways, the war was inevitable. Post-World War II Western strategy toward the Soviet Union and its satellites was shaped by George Kennan's 1947 Cold War doctrine of "containment." For decades, the U.S. alliances that encircled the Soviet bloc sent a clear message to Stalin and his successors: "Not one more inch!" With the fall of the Soviet Union, that policy was extended under the Clinton and Bush administrations to the former Soviet republics but was propelled by the idea of promoting democratic change and stability in the newly-freed countries that border Russia. While the Russians continually questioned Western motives for this expansion, there was little they could do about it. Over the last few years, however, a newly empowered and resurgent oligarchy under Russian nationalist Prime Minister Vladimir Putin began to see these American overtures as an existential threat and now, forty-six years after JFK threatened war with the former Soviet Union over Soviet missiles in Cuba – the roles have suddenly reversed.

George Friedman writing in Stratfor suggests that America overplayed its hand by actively courting former Soviet republics and seeking to place U.S. missile defense systems in some of them, thereby convincing the Russians that their interests and national security were being threatened:

As Russia regained its balance from the chaos of the 1990s, it began to see the American and European presence in a less benign light. It was not clear to the Russians that the United States was trying to stabilize the region. Rather, it appeared to the Russians that the United States was trying to take advantage of Russian weakness to impose a new politico-military reality in which Russia was to be surrounded with nations controlled by the United States and its military system, NATO. In spite of the promise made by Bill Clinton that NATO would not expand into the former Soviet Union, the three Baltic states were admitted. The promise was not addressed. NATO was expanded because it could and Russia could do nothing about it . . . From the Russian point of view, the strategic break point was Ukraine. When the Orange Revolution came to Ukraine, the American and European impression was that this was a spontaneous democratic uprising. The Russian perception was that it was a well-financed CIA operation to foment an anti-Russian and pro-American uprising in Ukraine. When the United States quickly began discussing the inclusion of Ukraine in NATO, the Russians came to the conclusion that the United States intended to surround and crush the Russian Federation. In their view, if NATO expanded into Ukraine, the Western military alliance would place Russia in a strategically untenable position. Russia would be indefensible. The American response was that it had no intention of threatening Russia. The Russians (retorted): Then why are you trying to take control of Ukraine? What other purpose would you have? The United States dismissed these Russian concerns as absurd. The Russians, not regarding them as absurd at all, began (their) planning (based) on the assumption of a hostile United States.

Georgia presented Russia with the perfect opportunity to re-assert its political influence. When the 58th Russian Army of the North Caucasus Military District rolled into South Ossetia and Abkhazia and effectively annexed 18% of Georgia, Russia saw it as payback for years of geo-political irrelevance, for its loss of global influence and empire, and as a response to Western condemnations of Russian transgressions at home and abroad. The invasion restored a sense of Russian pride and power, although it was cloaked as a sort of humanitarian intervention on behalf of the beleaguered Ossetians. In fact, Putin had already decided to make an example of Georgia which had been a constant irritant to Russia over Chechnya and was perceived as a pro-American, Western-oriented government on its border and a barrier to Russian interests in the Caucasus. The war has now placed Georgia firmly within Russia's sphere of influence and there is little that the U.S. can do to alter the facts on the ground.

Nor will Europe intervene. Western European states have come to enjoy the richest, longest stretch of peace in their history and are loathe for that to end. While Europe may bluster over Russian aggression, it neither can nor will do anything of substance that would jeopardize 30% of its oil and more than 40% of its natural gas imports from its Russian supplier.

While U.S. entanglements in Iraq and Afghanistan have hindered U.S. power in the Caucasus, the Kremlin's military success in Chechnya combined with soaring oil prices have provided Russia with a tremendous economic and political advantage. With a GDP of $1.2 trillion and money from oil and gas revenues pouring into its treasury and trade with China reaching $48 billion in 2007 and expected to reach $80 billion by 2010, the Russian military is now prepared to flex its muscle by punishing the Georgians for attacking separatist South Ossetia, for seeking membership in NATO, and for forgetting in whose "backyard" Georgia sits.

Although Putin has no ideological interest in rekindling a new Cold War through occupation (which would be much too costly and exceptionally difficult), he certainly intends to re-establish Russia's sphere of influence in the former Soviet republics to counteract what he sees as deliberate American provocations in his "neighborhood." At the very least, the Georgian invasion was meant to serve as a warning to Poland and the Czech Republic who are toying with the idea of deploying U.S. ground-based interceptor (GBI) anti-ballistic and Patriot PAC-3 missiles in their countries.

By humiliating Georgian President Saakashvili and forcing him to accept ceasefire terms that leave open the possibility of Russian control over portions of his country, Russia has sent a message that it will no longer tolerate hostile regimes in bordering states nor permit its economic or military hegemony in the region to be challenged. It has also demonstrated its indifference to Western opinion by showing its willingness to use force to prevent any more former Soviet republics from joining NATO. Putin realizes that Russia's influence over Tehran, its veto in the U.N. Security Council, its nuclear weapons, the U.S. need for Russian "cooperation" in Afghanistan and Iran, Europe's need for a secure energy provider, Russian control over vast oil and natural gas reserves and its willingness to use its military power in support of its strategic objectives, have given it enormous power and influence not experienced since the collapse of the Soviet Union.

Moreover, the Kremlin's recognition of Abkhazia and South Ossetia as independent states, and its threat to do the same in the autonomous regions of Transdniestria (Moldova), Crimea and the Donetsk Basin (Ukraine) and the Central Asian republics of Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan suggest its intention to lay claim to the title of "protector" of Russian minority enclaves in these countries unless they begin towing the Russian line. With twenty-five million ethnic Russians in the fourteen former Soviet republics, Russian intimidation is a real and ever-present threat to the sovereignty of these states. 

Nor will the aftershocks of the invasion be limited to Eastern Europe. They will reverberate throughout the Middle East as Russia will now actively seek to undermine American interests in that region by arming Syria and Iran. On August 30, Russia announced that it would assist Iran in completing its Bushehr plutonium reactor by the end of 2008 after holding back for five years at Washington's request. It also stated its intention to supply Iran with its most sophisticated S-300 air defense system. The current American effort for a U.S.-Russian summit to discuss future relations between the two powers will no doubt secretly re-establish an "understanding" of mutual spheres of influence if only to keep Russian missiles and nuclear technology out of the Middle East (not to mention Venezuela). That is because the West has neither the ability nor the willingness to use force to defend these new democracies and has more immediate and pressing concerns that can only be resolved with Russian assistance.

For the former Russian republics, it means that their independence will now be over-shadowed by Russian overseers and they had best recognize the new reality and adjust their foreign policies accordingly or suffer the same fate as Georgia. Putin has already turned the clock back on democracy at home and dislikes it in neighboring countries. It might be infectious. During the Cold War, the West was unwilling to defend Finland, so Finland had to make its foreign policy subservient to Soviet interests. Georgia, Ukraine, Poland, the Czech Republic, the Central Asian Republics and the other former Soviet republics now find themselves facing a similar dilemma.

As if Western pre-occupation with the threat of non-state Islamic extremism was not enough, the Russian-Georgian war suggests that the days of detente and a bi-polar world have returned – a world that recognized the reality of brute force and trade-offs over noble ideals. Niccolo Machiavelli's advice in The Prince that "it is much safer to be feared than loved" has become the dictum of the new Russia. While the West may move to dissolve the G-8, block Russian entry to the World Trade Organization, possibly suspend its participation in the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympics and issue statements of support for the Saakashvili government, it cannot change this new reality.

The U.S. must now re-evaluate its options and deal with the world not as it wishes it to be, but as it is. Like it or not, the era of moral clarity ushered in by the Reagan administration and carried forward by the current Bush administration has come to an end.